Cite as: Kari Ellen Gade (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Lausavísur, Stanzas from Snorra Edda 18’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 530.

This stanza (Anon (SnE) 18) is transmitted only in ms. U of Skm (SnE). It is written on fol. 44r at the very end of Skm, following Þul Woman 1-2 without intervening prose.

Stendr, þats stórum grandar, sterkviðri mér Herkju í hneggverǫld; hyggju hefk stríð borit víða. Þar kømr enn, ef unna ítr vildi Bil skaldi, at blíðr of grœr Gríðar glaumvindr í sal þindar. Stendr, þats stórum grandar, sterkviðri mér Herkju í hneggverǫld; hyggju hefk stríð borit víða. Þar kømr enn, ef unna ítr vildi Bil skaldi, at blíðr of grœr Gríðar glaumvindr í sal þindar. Sterkviðri Herkju, þats grandar stórum, stendr í hneggverǫld mér; hefk borit stríð hyggju víða. Þar kømr enn, ef ítr Bil vildi unna skaldi, at blíðr glaumvindr Gríðar of grœr í sal þindar.

text prose order   {A strong storm of Herkja}, [THOUGHT] which hurts greatly, resides in {my heart-world}; [BREAST] I have carried my grief of mind far and wide. Yet it will happen, if the precious Bil would love the skald, that {a sweet pleasure-wind of Gríðr} [THOUGHT] will grow in {my hall of the diaphragm}. [BREAST]

notes: [5-8]: There are several problems in this helmingr, and different emendations have been suggested. — [7]: As it stands in the ms., this line contains five rather than six metrical positions, and a syllable is missing after the adj. blíðr ‘sweet’. The missing syllable must have been unstressed and must have belonged syntactically either to that adj. or to the following verb grœr ‘will grow’ (see Gade 1995a, 47-9). There are three possible emendations that would obviate the metrical deficiency. First of all, the adj. blíðr (m. nom. sg.), which qualifies glaumvindr ‘pleasure-wind’ (l. 8), could have been desyllabified (blíður), but that would presuppose that the stanza is late (C14th), and there are no other metrical or linguistic irregularities that would suggest such a late date. Second, emendation of blíðr to blíðum (m. dat. sg.) qualifying sal (m. dat. sg.) ‘hall’ would also furnish the missing syllable. Third (and adopted here), the expletive particle of could have dropped out in the ms. transmission. That emendation was first proposed by Konráð Gíslason (Nj 1875-89, II, 75-6) and adopted in Skj B. Kock (Skald; NN §2127) provides the pron. mér ‘for me’, but that emendation is unmetrical.

texts: ‹SnEU 4, ‹SnE 700›

editions: Skj Anonyme digte og vers [XII]: C. Vers om ubestemmelige personer og begivenheder 36 (AI, 601; BI, 601); Skald I, 293, NN §§1209, 1910, 2127, 2991B; SnE 1848-87, II, 363, III, 164-5.

sources

DG 11 (U)

44r, 24 - 44r, 26

(SnE)