Sigv Lv 9^I

Sendi mér inn mæri
— man þengill sá drengi —
(síð munk heldr at hróðri)
hnytr þjóðkonungr (snytrask).
Opt, en okkr bað skipta
Óttar í tvau dróttinn,
endask môl, sem myndim,
manndjarfr, fǫðurarfi.

Inn mæri þjóðkonungr sendi mér hnytr; sá þengill man drengi; munk snytrask at hróðri heldr síð. Môl endask opt, en manndjarfr dróttinn bað okkr Óttar skipta í tvau, sem myndim fǫðurarfi.

The famous great king sent nuts to me; that prince remembers his fellows; I shall probably grow wise at encomium rather late. Meals often come to an end, and the man-bold lord told Óttarr and me to divide [the nuts] in two as we would a father’s inheritance.

Mss: DG8(91v) (ÓHLeg); Flat(187rb), Tóm(122v), 73aˣ(95v), 71ˣ(78r), 76aˣ(100v-101r) (ÓH)

Readings: [1] mæri: mæti Tóm    [2] man: mann Flat    [3] síð: síðan Tóm    [4] hnytr: so 73aˣ, 71ˣ, 76aˣ, nætr DG8, hnetr Flat, Tóm;    snytrask: so Flat, 71ˣ, 76aˣ, vitrask DG8, letjask Tóm, ‘snytras’ 73aˣ    [6] tvau: tvá Flat, Tóm, ‘tvan’ 71ˣ    [7] endask: enda Tóm;    myndim: so Flat, ‘minndi’ DG8, mundum Tóm, 73aˣ, 71ˣ, 76aˣ    [8] ‑arfi: arfinn 71ˣ

Editions: Skj AI, 268, Skj BI, 248, Skald I, 128, NN §§2010, 2338C; ÓHLeg 1849, 47, 110, ÓHLeg 1922, 58, ÓHLeg 1982, 136-7; Fms 5, 176, Fms 12, 109, ÓH 1849, 47, 110, Flat 1860-8, III, 242-3, ÓH 1941, II, 689, 703, 705; Konráð Gíslason 1892, 39, 182, 231, Jón Skaptason 1983, 192, 318-19.

Context: After Sigvatr and his nephew, the skald Óttarr svarti, have served King Óláfr for a long time, they are not as valued as they had once been. One day the king sends them nuts from his table, and Sigvatr composes this stanza. Except in Tóm, the prose adds, either before or after the stanza, that the king tells them to divide the nuts between them as evenly as if they were dividing their paternal inheritance. After Sigvatr delivers the stanza, Óttarr speaks another (Ótt Lv 1). In all the texts but ÓHLeg, it is said that the king smiles at hearing the two stanzas.

Notes: [4] hnytr ‘nuts’: The usual form is hnetr, but Kock (NN §2010B) is right that hnytr, the form required by the aðalhending, is what should be expected on an etymological basis. It is not surprising that a word as uncommon in literature as this should not happen to be attested elsewhere in its older form. — [4] snytrask ‘grow wise’: The verb is found nowhere else, but Kock (NN §2010A) rightly points out that it is presupposed by the agent noun snytrir ‘one who makes wise’ (LP: snytrir). The reading letjask ‘to become unwilling or slow’ chosen by Konráð Gíslason (1892, 39) and by Finnur Jónsson (Skj B, and so also hnetr for hnytr, for the sake of the hending) may in fact be cleverer, but it is found only in Tóm, whose readings for this stanza are generally unreliable. It is easy to explain why snytrask should have been altered to letjask (to rhyme with hnetr once it replaced the older hnytr), but it would not be easy to explain the reverse alteration. What Sigvatr seems to mean, with high irony, is that some day he will learn to compose verses commensurate with the king’s gifts to him. Jón Skaptason (1983, 192) takes the meaning to be ‘I shall not soon become wise (or: lazy) from praising [you]’. Poole (2005a, 273), largely in agreement with Kock, translates, ‘it will be a long time before I devote more art to praise poetry’, and it is quite possible that this is what is meant. — [5, 6] okkr ... Óttar ‘Óttarr and me’: So Kock (NN §2010E, followed by ÓHLeg 1982 and by Jón Skaptason 1983), criticizing Finnur Jónsson’s reading of Óttarr as a vocative in Skj B. For Óttarr svarti ‘the Black’ (Ótt), see the skald Biography. — [5, 7] môl endask opt ‘meals often come to an end’: Môl is probably to be taken as a pun, since it may mean ‘meals’ (in reference to the nuts), ‘tales’ (the one Sigvatr is telling), and ‘matters, affairs’, especially legal affairs (in reference to the dividing of the supposed inheritance). Finnur Jónsson (Skj B) hesitatingly takes the meaning to be ‘words are often fulfilled, come true’, and if this is the sense, Sigvatr may be chiding Óláfr for the miserliness of the ‘inheritance’ (or gifts) he provides his poets. That is, ‘as we should divide an inheritance’ may turn out to be an actual case of poor reward, not merely a comparison. But endask, though it may mean ‘to turn out’, is not otherwise attested in the sense ‘come true’. Kock (NN §2010) construes opt with bað ‘asked, told’ (l. 5) in the main clause, where it makes no obvious sense (whereas in the intercalary clause it may have a universalizing, satirically gnomic function), and this in turn obliges him to ignore en ‘and, but’ in l. 5, which he takes as enn in NN §2010D, dismissing it as not needing translation. The purpose of these rearrangements is to allow him to interpret endask môl to mean ‘the poem comes to an end’, parallel to endisk leyfð ‘the praise ends’ and lýkk vísu nú ‘I close my verse now’ in Lv 6/7-8. Jón Skaptason (1983, 192) translates, ‘Disputes often drag on (?)’.

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. Fms = Sveinbjörn Egilsson et al., eds. 1825-37. Fornmanna sögur eptir gömlum handritum útgefnar að tilhlutun hins norræna fornfræða fèlags. 12 vols. Copenhagen: Popp.
4. Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
5. NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
6. 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.
7. Flat 1860-8 = Gudbrand Vigfusson [Guðbrandur Vigfússon] and C. R. Unger, eds. 1860-8. Flateyjarbók. En samling af norske konge-sagaer med indskudte mindre fortællinger om begivenheder i og udenfor Norge samt annaler. 3 vols. Christiania (Oslo): Malling.
8. ÓH 1941 = Johnsen, Oscar Albert and Jón Helgason, eds. 1941. Saga Óláfs konungs hins helga: Den store saga om Olav den hellige efter pergamenthåndskrift i Kungliga biblioteket i Stockholm nr. 2 4^to med varianter fra andre håndskrifter. 2 vols. Det norske historiske kildeskriftfond skrifter 53. Oslo: Dybwad.
9. ÓHLeg 1982 = Heinrichs, Anne et al., eds and trans. 1982. Olafs saga hins helga: Die ‘Legendarische Saga’ über Olaf den Heiligen (Hs. Delagard. saml. nr. 8^II). Heidelberg: Winter.
10. Jón Skaptason. 1983. ‘Material for an Edition and Translation of the Poems of Sigvat Þórðarson, skáld’. Ph.D. thesis. State University of New York at Stony Brook. DAI 44: 3681A.
11. ÓHLeg 1922 = Johnsen, Oscar Albert, ed. 1922. Olafs saga hins helga efter pergamenthåndskrift i Uppsala Universitetsbibliotek, Delagardieske samling nr. 8^II. Det norske historiske kildeskriftfond skrifter 47. Kristiania (Oslo): Dybwad.
12. Konráð Gíslason, ed. 1892a. Udvalg af oldnordiske skjaldekvad, med anmærkninger. Copenhagen: Gyldendal.
13. ÓHLeg 1849 = Keyser, R. and C. R. Unger. eds. 1849. Olafs saga hins helga: En kort saga om kong Olaf den Hellige fra anden halvdeel af det tolfte aarhundrede. Efter et gammelt pergaments-haandskrift i Universitets-bibliotheket i Upsala. Christiania (Oslo): Feilberg & Landmark.
14. Poole, Russell. 2005a. ‘Claiming Kin Skaldic Style’. In Harbus et al. 2005, 269-84.
15. Internal references
16. (forthcoming), ‘ Unattributed, Óláfs saga helga (Legendary)’ 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. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=31> (accessed 3 May 2024)
17. Matthew Townend 2017, ‘(Biography of) Óttarr svarti’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 335.
18. Matthew Townend and R. D. Fulk 2012, ‘ Óttarr svarti, Lausavísur’ 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. 783. <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=1343> (accessed 3 May 2024)
19. Matthew Townend (ed.) 2012, ‘Þórarinn loftunga, Glælognskviða 9’ 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. 875.