8. Sample stanza

Knátti eðr við illan

Jǫrmunrekkr at vakna

með dreyrfáar dróttir

draum í sverða flaumi.

Rósta varð í ranni

Randvés hǫfuðniðja,

þás hrafnbláir hefndu

harma Erps of barmar.

{= Skj Bragi enn gamli, Ragnarsdrápa 3}

Prose order: Jǫrmunrekkr knátti eðr at vakna við illan draum með dreyrfáar dróttir í {sverða flaumi}. Rósta varð í ranni {hǫfuðniðja Randvés}, þás {hrafnbláir barmar Erps} of hefndu harma.

Translation: Jǫrmunrekkr was then awakened by an evil dream among the blood-stained troops in {the eddy of swords} [BATTLE]. There was tumult in the hall {of the chief kinsmen of Randvér} [= the dynasty of the Goths] when {the raven-black brothers of Erpr} [= Hamðir and Sǫrli] avenged [their] injuries.

Mss: R(30v), T«(32r) C(2r) (SnE); W(113) (FoGT).

Editions: Skj AI, 1, Skj BI, 1, Skald I, 1, NN §§1909A, 2507; SnE 1848-87, I, 372, SnE 1931, 134, SnE 1998, I, 50; SnE 1848-87, II, 208, FoGT 1884, 129.

Readings: [1] Knátti: knátt W;   eðr: ‘ørr’ W, áðr C   [2] Jǫrmunrekkr: ‘erminrekkr’ W, ‘ermenrekkr’ C   [3] dróttir: dóttur C   [5] Rósta varð: ‘rostu vann’ C   [6] Randvés: randvers C   [7] hrafnbláir: ‘hrafn blám’ W, -bláir corrected from -blár R   [8] of: ok W, um C;   barmar: barma W.

Context: With st. 3 begins that part of Bragi's poetry that we can confidently assign to Rdr on Snorri Sturluson’s authority. Sts 3-7, comprising four dróttkvætt stanzas and a stef, are quoted as a block in mss R, T and C of SnE (W has st. 3 only in FoGT as an example of the rhetorical figure of ekbasis or digression) and are there preceded by the following prose introduction: Bragi hinn gamli orti um fall Sǫrla ok Hamðis í drápu þeiri er hann orti um Ragnar loðbrók... ‘Bragi the old composed [verses] about the death of Sǫrli and Hamðir in the drápa which he composed about Ragnarr loðbrók…’ (SnE 1998, I, 50). The general context is Snorri’s lengthy account of various legends of the Niflungar, Atli (Attila) and Jǫrmunrekkr (Ermanaric).

Notes: [All]: This is the first of four sts in which Bragi depicts the destructive vengeance carried out by the brothers Hamðir and Sǫrli upon the Gothic king Jǫrmunrekkr, the historical Ermanaric (d. 375 AD), because he had their sister and his wife Svanhildr put to death for supposed adultery with his own son Randvér. Svanhildr was torn apart by wild horses and Randvér was hanged according to Hamð 2-3 and 17. For other OIcel. accounts of the legend, see Snorri’s prose preceding these sts and Vǫls chs 41-4 (Finch 1965, 74-8); for the historical record, Ammianus Marcellinus, Rerum gestarum libri qui supersunt XXXI, ch. 3; Jordanes, Getica §§ 129-30. Dronke 1969, 159-242 discusses the verbal and thematic connections between Bragi's sts, Hamð and some verses attributed to the late C9th Orkney jarl Torf-Einarr (TorfE Lv^I; cf. also Olsen 1936). Unlike the eddic Hamð, with which Bragi's poetry shares some verbal similarities, Bragi begins in medias res with a depiction of the blood and chaos that follows the brothers’ onslaught upon Jǫrmunrekkr, sleeping among his drunken entourage in the Goths’ ancestral hall. The poem's st. is decidedly anti-heroic; following the Norse legend, the brothers maim, but do not kill the king outright. The Goths then turn upon Hamðir and Sǫrli, pelting them to death with stones. — [3] dreyrfáar ‘blood-stained’: In order to produce a 6-syllable l., the uncontracted form -fáar is required, though it is not indicated in any ms. — [4] sverða flaumi ‘eddy of swords’: Battle-kenning in which the base-word flaumr ‘eddy, torrent’ may connote blood as well as a multitude of weapons. — [4] rósta varð í ranni ‘there was tumult in the hall’: Closely paralleled by Hamð 23/1 Styrr varð í ranni ‘there was uproar in the hall’ (the rest of this st. being closer to Rdr 4/5-8); cf. also Hamð 18/1 Glaumr var í hǫllo ‘there was noisy merriment in the hall’ (of the Goths’ drinking party before the brothers arrive). The formula ‘noise word (happy or anguished) + verb + in + hall word’ occurs in a number of other contexts in which hall fights are described; cf. Beowulf 1302a Hream wearð in Heorote ‘There was uproar in Heorot’. — [5-6] ranni hǫfuðniðja Randvérs ‘the hall of the chief kinsmen of Randvér [= the dynasty of the Goths]’: The designation of the hall as that of Randvér’s chief kinsmen, that is, of the royal house of the Goths, is one of several ironic allusions to the disunity of the families in conflict in this myth. To define the Goths here with reference to the son that Jǫrmunrekkr supposed committed adultery with his wife does not connote dynastic solidarity. A similar irony is achieved in l. 8 by means of the designation Erps barmar ‘Erpr’s brothers’, for Hamðir and Sǫrli. Hamð 12-15 gives a graphic account of how Erpr, inn sundrmœðri, a half-brother born of a different mother (hence the word barmi, ‘fed at the same breast’, ‘brother’ is doubly ironic if its etymology was apparent to Bragi’s audience), was killed by his two brothers even as he offered to ride with them and attack Jǫrmunrekkr, an action they later regret (Hamð 26-8). Bragi gives none of this circumstantial detail, but his audience is likely to have known and relished it. — [7] hrafnbláir ‘raven-black’: This epithet is intended to refer to the hair colour of Hamðir and Sǫrli, who, in the tradition known in Iceland, and as recounted by Snorri (SnE 1998, I, 49), were thought unhistorically to belong to the family of the Niflungar, traditionally supposed to have been dark-haired.

References