Cite as: Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 58 (Gestumblindi, Heiðreks gátur 11)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 421.

Hvat er þat undra,         er ek úti sá         fyrir Dellings durum? Svartan gölt ek sá

í sauri vaða,         ok reis honum eigi burst á baki. Heiðrekr konungr,         hyggðu at gátu.

Hvat undra er þat, er ek sá úti fyrir durum Dellings? Ek sá svartan gölt vaða í sauri, ok burst reis eigi á baki honum. Heiðrekr konungr, hyggðu at gátu.

What is the wonder that I saw outside before Dellingr’s doors? I saw a black boar wade in muck, but bristles did not rise on his back. King Heiðrekr, think about the riddle.

Mss: 597bˣ(49v), 281ˣ(99v) (Heiðr)

Readings: [1-3] om. 597bˣ, 281ˣ    [7-8] abbrev. as ‘h^c: K: h:’ 597bˣ, abbrev. as ‘heidr: k^r’ 281ˣ

Editions: Skj: Anonyme digte og vers [XIII], D. 5. Heiðreks gátur 33: AII, 227, BII, 246, Skald II, 128; Heiðr 1873, 243, Heiðr 1924, 65, Heiðr 1960, 80; Edd. Min. 110.

Notes: [All]: Heiðrekr’s response is (Heiðr 1960, 81): þat er tordýfill, ok er nú mart til tínt, er tordýflar eru ríkra manna spurningar ‘that is the dung-beetle, and much has been recounted now, when dung-beetles are [the subject of] the questions of powerful men’. — [1-3]: Omitted in the mss, but the organising principle of the H redaction is to group riddles with a similar beginning together, and this comes in the midst of eight other riddles with this opening. See also Note to Heiðr 55/1-3. Other eds also insert this opening formula. — [1]: See Note to Heiðr 55/1. — [5] sauri ‘muck’: Puns on the two (related) meanings of saurr (Fritzner: saurr 1, 2): ‘mud’, fitting the boar context, and ‘excrement’, fitting the dung-beetle context. — [6] burst ‘bristles’: A hap. leg. in poetry. In the sense ‘the bristles on a boar’s back’, as here, the f. sg. noun is used collectively (ONP: burst 1).