Skúli Svǫlðr 5^III

Margr of hlaut of morgin
morðelds, þars vér felldumsk,
Freyju tôr at fleiri
fárbjóðr, at þar vôrum.

{Margr {{morðelds} fár}bjóðr} of hlaut {at fleiri tôr Freyju} of morgin, þars vér felldumsk, at vôrum þar.

{Many an offerer {of the harm {of murder-fire}}} [(lit. ‘harm-offerer of murder-fire’) SWORD > BATTLE > WARRIOR] got {all the more tears of Freyja <goddess>} [GOLD] in the morning, where we felled one another, because we were there.

Mss: R(28r), Tˣ(29r), W(73), U(30v) (SnE)

Readings: [1] Margr of: margr W, U    [2] vér: hlyn U;    felldumsk: felldum U    [4] þar: því U

Editions: Skj AI, 306, Skj BI, 284, Skald I, 145, NN §770; SnE 1848-87, I, 346-7, II, 320, III, 56, SnE 1931, 125, SnE 1998, I, 43.

Context: This helmingr is the first in a series of three verse quotations in Skm (SnE) exemplifying gold-kennings of the type tôr Freyju ‘tears of Freyja’.

Notes: [2] þars vér felldumsk ‘where we felled one another’: Skj B (followed by Skald) instead adopts the U variant felldum ‘[we] felled’ and emends vér ‘we’ to val, acc. of valr m. ‘the slain’: þars feldum val ‘there where [we] felled the slain’, but pressing reasons to do so are lacking. Ms. U’s text could be construed as þars felldum hlyn morðelds ‘where [we] felled the maple of murder-fire [SWORD > WARRIOR]’, but the other ms. witnesses show that these grammatically straightforward readings are secondary. — [3] tôr Freyju ‘tears of Freyja <goddess> [GOLD]’: A common kenning-type (Meissner 227), based on the myth that the goddess Freyja wept tears of gull rautt ‘red gold’ for her husband Óðr while he was absent on a journey (see Note to Anon Bjark 5/6). — [4] at vôrum þar ‘because we were there’: At is taken here, following Kock (NN §770), as a correlative motivated by the comp. at fleiri in l. 3. As Kock observes, at cannot be the adv. ‘present, there’, as suggested by other eds (Skj B; SnE 1998), because it cannot carry stress in this position in the line. For the conjunction at in the sense ‘because’, see NS §265 Anm. 1a.

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. SnE 1848-87 = Snorri Sturluson. 1848-87. Edda Snorra Sturlusonar: Edda Snorronis Sturlaei. Ed. Jón Sigurðsson et al. 3 vols. Copenhagen: Legatum Arnamagnaeanum. Rpt. Osnabrück: Zeller, 1966.
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. Meissner = Meissner, Rudolf. 1921. Die Kenningar der Skalden: Ein Beitrag zur skaldischen Poetik. Rheinische Beiträge und Hülfsbücher zur germanischen Philologie und Volkskunde 1. Bonn and Leipzig: Schroeder. Rpt. 1984. Hildesheim etc.: Olms.
7. NS = Nygaard, Marius. 1906. Norrøn syntax. Kristiania (Oslo): Aschehoug. Rpt. 1966.
8. SnE 1931 = Snorri Sturluson. 1931. Edda Snorra Sturlusonar. Ed. Finnur Jónsson. Copenhagen: Gyldendal.
9. SnE 1998 = Snorri Sturluson. 1998. Edda: Skáldskaparmál. Ed. Anthony Faulkes. 2 vols. University College London: Viking Society for Northern Research.
10. Internal references
11. Edith Marold 2017, ‘Snorra Edda (Prologue, Gylfaginning, Skáldskaparmál)’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols [check printed volume for citation].
12. Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Poems, Bjarkamál in fornu 5’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 502.
13. (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 28 April 2024)