Note to Þul Waves 1III
[5-6]: (a) The present interpretation follows Skj B. Gaddr ‘anchor-fluke’ (l. 6) occurs in the same meaning in ÞjóðA Har 6/7II af gaddi digrum ‘at the stout anchor-fluke’. (b) In LP, gaddr is interpreted as ‘ice’ and taken as the object of the verb svelja (svelr) ‘become cold’ so that the clause has a different subject: Blodughadda bevirker ved sin kulde is (på søen) ‘Blóðughadda is causing with its coolness ice [to form] on the surface (of the sea)’. The latter explanation not only causes difficulties for the interpretation of the preceding line, but it is also not in keeping with the syntactic structure of the couplets in this stanza, in which no single line constitutes a complete clause. (c) Kock (NN §2159) suggests another interpretation of l. 6. Because the verb svelja ‘become cold’ in Blóðughadda svelr is intransitive, he maintains that the better reading is Blóðughadda svellr ‘Blóðughadda swells’ (cf. hafit svellr, sær svellr ‘the sea swells’, see LP: svella). However, the verb svelja is also used intransitively in SnSt Ht 35/7III húfar svǫlðu ‘the hulls became cool’, and that construction has been adopted in the present edn.
References
- Bibliography
- Skj B = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1912-15b. Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning. B: Rettet tekst. 2 vols. Copenhagen: Villadsen & Christensen. Rpt. 1973. Copenhagen: Rosenkilde & Bagger.
- NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
- LP = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1931. Lexicon poeticum antiquæ linguæ septentrionalis: Ordbog over det norsk-islandske skjaldesprog oprindelig forfattet af Sveinbjörn Egilsson. 2nd edn. Copenhagen: Møller.
- Internal references
- Kari Ellen Gade (ed.) 2017, ‘Snorri Sturluson, Háttatal 35’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 1142.
- Diana Whaley (ed.) 2009, ‘Þjóðólfr Arnórsson, Stanzas about Haraldr Sigurðarson’s leiðangr 6’ in Kari Ellen Gade (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 2: From c. 1035 to c. 1300. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 2. Turnhout: Brepols, pp. 156-7.