Note to Þjóð Haustl 14^III

[3, 4] b*ǫr hellis haugs Grjótúna ‘the tree of the cave of the mound of Grjótún [Grjótúnagarðar > GIANT = Hrungir]’: This edn follows Wisén (1886-9, II, 116), Åkerblom (1899a, 269-71) and Marold (1983, 168-9) in adopting W’s haugs (l. 4) over R, Tˣ’s haug and tentatively accepting Kock’s emendation bǫr for the various ms. forms of the second word in l. 3. This gives a formally unusual kenning for Hrungnir, in which bǫr hellis ‘the tree of the cave’ refers to a ‘giant’ in general while haugs Grjótúna ‘of the mound of Grjótún’ identifies Hrungnir by referring to his dwelling at Grjótún ‘Stones’-dwellings’ courts’ in the prose of Skm and said there to be ‘in the border-land’ (at landamæri). Haugs ‘of the mound’ appears to be structurally redundant, but ON haugr often refers to a burial mound, and giants are conventionally supposed to sit or dwell on them; cf. Þry 6/1, Skí 11/2. The identity and sense of the base-word given here as bǫr ‘tree’ is uncertain, and the word is likely to be corrupt in all mss. None of the ms. readings make sense without emendation, and no fully acceptable emendation has yet been proposed. The base-word is likely to be a term for ‘animal’, ‘(demonic) dweller’ or ‘inhabitant’ [of a cave], to judge by skaldic kenning-types for giants; Kock (NN §139) proposed bǫr(r) ‘tree’, which certainly appears as a base-word in man-kennings (cf. LP: bǫrr), but is not found elsewhere as the base-word of a giant-kenning. This emendation is followed by Faulkes (SnE 1998, I, 22, 170, II, 255), who, however, takes bǫrr as the base-word of a man-kenning, bǫrr hyrjar hellis ‘tree of the fire of the cave [GOLD > GENEROUS MAN]’, which he presumes to be a vocative address to the patron, Þorleifr. As he remarks (SnE 1998, I, 170), one of the problems with this proposed kenning is that there is no precedent for the gold-kenning type ‘fire of the cave’. Kock (NN §1018 Anm. 2) later proposed emending the base-word to bǫrg(r) ‘(castrated) boar’, but this is purely conjectural. Finnur Jónsson (Skj B) does not attempt an interpretation of ‘hellis baur hyrjar’ (l. 3) and adopts R, Tˣ’s haug with Grjótúna to specify ‘the mound of Grjótún’ (l. 4) as the place Þórr visited. In this reading there is no kenning for Hrungnir in the stanza.

References

1. Bibliography
2. Skj B = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1912-15b. Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning. B: Rettet tekst. 2 vols. Copenhagen: Villadsen & Christensen. Rpt. 1973. Copenhagen: Rosenkilde & Bagger.
3. NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
4. LP = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1931. Lexicon poeticum antiquæ linguæ septentrionalis: Ordbog over det norsk-islandske skjaldesprog oprindelig forfattet af Sveinbjörn Egilsson. 2nd edn. Copenhagen: Møller.
5. Wisén, Theodor, ed. 1886-9. Carmina Norrœnæ: Ex reliquiis vetustioris norrœnæ poësis selecta, recognita, commentariis et glossario instructa. 2 vols. Lund: Ohlsson.
6. SnE 1998 = Snorri Sturluson. 1998. Edda: Skáldskaparmál. Ed. Anthony Faulkes. 2 vols. University College London: Viking Society for Northern Research.
7. Marold, Edith. 1983. Kenningkunst: Ein Beitrag zu einer Poetik der Skaldendichtung. Quellen und Forschungen zur Sprach- und Kulturgeschichte der germanischen Völker, new ser. 80. Berlin: de Gruyter.
8. Åkerblom, Axel. 1899a. ‘Bidrag til tolkningen af skaldekvad’. ANF 15, 269-73.
9. Internal references
10. (forthcoming), ‘ Snorri Sturluson, Skáldskaparmál’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=112> (accessed 6 May 2024)
11. Not published: do not cite ()
12. Not published: do not cite ()