Cite as: Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.) 2017, ‘Ǫrvar-Odds saga 115 (Ǫrvar-Oddr, Ævidrápa 45)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 923.
Mátta ek banorði fyr brögnum hrósa
snotra seggja, er til sævar kom. |
Höfðum vit Hjálmarr haldit illa,
þá er Glámi stóð í gegnum spjör. |
Ek mátta hrósa banorði snotra seggja fyr brögnum, er kom til sævar. Vit Hjálmarr höfðum haldit illa, þá er spjör stóð í gegnum Glámi.
I was able to boast about the death of wise men in the presence of warriors, when I came to the sea. Hjálmarr and I had taken it badly when a spear pierced Glámr.
Mss: 343a(81r), 471(95r), 173ˣ(63va) (Ǫrv)
Readings: [1] Mátta: Knátta 471; ek: so 471, 173ˣ, ‘[…]’ 343a; banorði: so 173ˣ, ‘[…]an ordi’ 343a, bónorði 471 [4] er: er ek 471; kom: so 471, 173ˣ, kómum 343a [5] Höfðum: höfðu 471 [7] Glámi: Gláma 471, Glám 173ˣ [8] spjör: spörr 343a, 173ˣ, spörum 471
Editions: Skj: Anonyme digte og vers [XIII], E. 10. Vers af Fornaldarsagaer: Af Ǫrvar-Oddssaga IX 45: AII, 314, BII, 333, Skald II, 178-9, NN §3290A; Ǫrv 1888, 204, FSGJ 2, 354.
Notes: [All]: This stanza appears to follow on from the previous stanza’s reference to Oddr’s encounter with Ǫgmundr Eyþjófsbani. According to the prose texts (Ǫrv 1888, 92-3), the antagonists agree to call their conflict quits for the time being, though Ǫgmundr promises Oddr that this will not be the last time they meet. Oddr, Hjálmarr and Þórðr stafngláma (on this name, see Note to l. 7 below) then go off in different directions, Oddr to shoot animals for food, Hjálmarr to build a fire to cook them, while Þórðr remains behind to guard their ship. When Oddr and Hjálmarr return to the ship, Þórðr is nowhere to be seen. They eventually find him dead in a rock cleft on a hillside, with a spear (spjót) right through him (Ǫrv 1888, 94-5). They attribute this to Ǫgmundr’s treachery. — [All]: The stanza presents several problems of interpretation and may be corrupt in all extant versions. If one heeds the narrative of the prose text, the first helmingr seems to require a negated verb, though no ms. has one. Skj B emends 471’s variant knátta ek to knáttigat to give one, translating jeg kunde ikke prale af drabet … ‘I was not able to boast about the slaughter …’. However, the reference to ‘wise men’ and the people (brögnum, l. 2) before whom Oddr boasts, does not seem close to the prose text, so the whole of the first helmingr may belong to an unknown version of the narrative or else misunderstand it. — [5-8]: The second helmingr refers to Oddr’s and Hjálmarr’s reaction to their
finding of Þórðr’s dead body pierced by a spear. — [7] Glámi ‘Glámr’: This appears to be a reference to a short form of the nickname of Þórðr stafngláma ‘Prow-gleam’, but the exact form of the name varies from one ms. to another. Ms. 343a has Glámi, presumably the dat. sg. of Glámr, m. (for the etymology cf. AEW: glámr). Ms. 471 has Gláma, possibly influenced by the name of one of Hjálmarr’s bench companions, listed in Hjálm Lv 15/5 (Ǫrv 25) as Gláma, a nickname possibly meaning ‘bald, barren tract’. Ms. 173ˣ has Glám, acc. sg. of Glámr. — [8] spjör ‘a spear’: Most eds have emended the mss’ readings here. Both 343a and 173ˣ have spörr (343a ‘spaurr’) which can only mean ‘sparrow’ but this sense does not seem appropriate here. Ms. 471 has spörum, dat. pl. CPB II, 551 has spiörr ‘spears’, which would make good sense, but this noun is normally n. pl. and the verb here (stóð) is sg. However, the noun spjǫr is only found in the pl. and, as Kock has suggested (NN §3290A), it may function as a sg. here. Boer (Ǫrv 1888, 204 n.) proposed that an antecedent ms. of the younger mss, which he designated z, must have read spjót ‘spear’, which was later changed to ǫr ‘arrow’ and then by a later copyist to spǫrr. However, this explanation seems over-complex, and the present edn has assumed the original word to be spjör ‘spears’ used in a sg. sense (following Boer’s argument, Skj B and FSGJ emend to spjót). In Skald Kock retains spǫrr, though this spelling in the sense ‘spear’ is unprecedented.
