Svá hlóð siklingr hôvan
snarr af ulfa barri
(hrósak hugfulls vísa)
hrækǫst (fira* ævi),
at áleggjar Yggjar
allnôttfǫrull máttit,
— ǫld lá vítt — þótt vildi,
vífs marr yfir klífa.
Snarr siklingr hlóð svá hôvan hrækǫst af barri ulfa—hrósak ævi hugfulls vísa fira*—, at allnôttfǫrull marr vífs Yggjar áleggjar máttit klífa yfir, þótt vildi; ǫld lá vítt.
The keen sovereign heaped up so high a corpse-mound of wolves’ barley [CORPSES]—I praise the life of the mettlesome leader of men—that, ever prowling by night, the steed of the wife of the Yggr <= Óðinn> of the river-limb [ROCK > GIANT > GIANTESS > WOLF] could not scale it, though he longed to; men were strewn widely.
[4] fira* ævi: firar æfi H, Hr, ‘fíra ræfe’ Flat
[4] fira* ‘of men’: (a) The simple emendation of firar (m. nom. pl.) ‘men’ to gen. pl. fira yields vísa fira ‘leader of men’, a phrase with abundant parallels, and this solution is preferred here. Alternatively, fira could be taken with siklingr in l. 1 (so Skj B) or with hrækǫst (Kock, NN §821), although the latter would yield the extremely tautologous hrækǫst fira af barri ulfa, lit. ‘corpse-heap of men of wolves’ barley [CORPSES]’. (b) Firar ‘men’ in the mss could be an apostrophe to the skald’s audience (so Sveinbjörn Egilsson in SHI 6, 63), but such a bare apostrophe would be unusual at best.