Gamli gnævaðarskáld (Ggnæv)

10th century; volume 3; ed. Margaret Clunies Ross;

1. Poem about Þórr (Þórr) - 1

2. Fragment (Frag) - 1

Only two helmingar composed by Gamli gnævaðarskáld (Ggnæv) are known, both recorded in mss of SnE (SnE 1998, I, 16, 103). Nothing is known of Gamli’s origin or dates, though the pagan subject-matter of Ggnæv Þórr has suggested a date in the tenth century (Skj; SnE 1998, I, 222). Previous editors have assumed he was an Icelander, though there is no proof of this. The nickname gnævaðarskáld is recorded in SnE (SnE 1998, I, 103), though its meaning is uncertain. It may derive from the verb gnæfa ‘to tower high’. Faulkes (SnE 1998, II, 460) speculates that the name may indicate that Gamli composed about someone with the nickname Gnævaðr ‘raised high, towering’; Lind (1920-1, cols. 113-14). It is assumed, though without certainty, that the Gamli credited with the Poem about Þórr (Ggnæv Þórr) is the same as the Gamli gnævaðarskáld credited with the Fragment, though only in the latter case is the nickname mentioned in the mss.