Note to ÞjóðA Sex 23II
[1, 4] fœrði starf til króks ‘brought the task to completion’: Starf could mean either ‘work, task’ in general, or more specifically ‘fighting’, as attested in Sigv Víkv 7/8I, Þorm Þorgdr 1/1V and elsewhere. Fœra til króks contextually seems to mean ‘complete, finish’, and there is a general consensus about this, but the exact sense is obscure. Krókr ‘hook, bend’ has multiple applications, including everyday objects and landscape features, but the present usage does not match any recorded idiom, and Þjóðolfr’s semi-figurative usage in his Run 1, ók í ǫngvan krók ‘drove into a tight spot’, does not seem to help. Sveinbjörn Egilsson suggested a reference to anchoring a ship, i.e. completing a journey; Finnur Jónsson (Hkr 1893-1901, IV, 235) cited this but himself suggested reference to hanging something that is completed on a hook. ÍF 28, ÍF 29, Hkr 1991 and Andersson and Gade take the emphasis to be especially on ceasing warfare (the starf), and Finlay (2004, 217) translates ‘hung up hostility’.
References
- Bibliography
- ÍF 26-8 = Heimskringla. Ed. Bjarni Aðalbjarnarson. 1941-51.
- Hkr 1893-1901 = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1893-1901. Heimskringla: Nóregs konunga sǫgur af Snorri Sturluson. 4 vols. SUGNL 23. Copenhagen: Møller.
- Hkr 1991 = Bergljót S. Kristjánsdóttir et al., eds. 1991. Heimskringla. 3 vols. Reykjavík: Mál og menning.
- Finlay, Alison, trans. 2004. Fagrskinna: A Catalogue of the Kings of Norway. Leiden: Brill.
- ÍF 29 = Ágrip af Nóregskonunga sǫgum; Fagrskinna—Nóregs konungatal. Ed. Bjarni Einarsson. 1985.
- Internal references
- Judith Jesch (ed.) 2012, ‘Sigvatr Þórðarson, Víkingarvísur 7’ in Diana Whaley (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 1: From Mythical Times to c. 1035. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 1. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 544.
- R. D. Fulk (ed.) 2022, ‘Fóstbrœðra saga 2 (Þormóðr Kolbrúnarskáld, Þorgeirsdrápa 1)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross, Kari Ellen Gade and Tarrin Wills (eds), Poetry in Sagas of Icelanders. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 5. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 484.