Tarrin Wills (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Lausavísur, Stanzas from the Third Grammatical Treatise 3’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 539.
Lofðungr gekk at Lakkar
— laut herr í gras — snerru.
Lofðungr gekk at {snerru Lakkar}; herr laut í gras.
The prince went to {the onslaught of Hlǫkk <valkyrie>} [BATTLE]; the army fell in the grass.
Mss: A(4r), B(2v), W(102) (TGT)
Readings: [1] Lofðungr: Lofðung W [2] laut: land W; gras snerru: gram snerru B, ‘grasnerro’ W
Editions: Skj AI, 599, Skj BI, 599, Skald I, 292; SnE 1818, 312, SnE 1848, 183, SnE 1848-87, II, 104-5, 407, 510, III, 139, TGT 1884, 15, 68, 177, TGT 1927, 46, 93.
Context: Cited as an example of barbarismus involving the removal of aspiration (aftekning áblásningar), i.e. the aspirated [h] (see Note to l. 1 below).
Notes: [1] Lakkar ‘of Hlǫkk <valkyrie>’: The removal of aspiration occurs in the substitution of Lakkar for Hlakkar (Hlǫkk, a valkyrie-name) to produce correct alliteration (TGT 1927, 46): Hér er lakkar sett fyrir hlakkar at kveðandi haldiz ‘Here Lakkar is used instead of Hlakkar so that the verse-form is preserved’, i.e. to achieve alliteration. Björn Magnússon Ólsen (TGT 1884, 177) suggests a Norwegian pronunciation, which Finnur Jónsson (TGT 1927, 93) uses to date the couplet to C12th. Initial h- was lost in Norwegian in the C12th in certain phonetic environments (cf. Seip 1955, 76), but the couplet may have been composed later than that.
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