Note to Anon (FoGT) 33III
[8] píslarmerki ‘in the sign of his passion’: Here understood as a cpd of píslar ‘of suffering, torment’ + dat. sg. of merki ‘mark, sign, banner’, referring to Christ’s Cross as the symbol of his passion (so FoGT 1884, 285 n. 7 and FoGT 2004, 145), and taken with í skíru vatni ‘in pure water’ (l. 7) as representing the two main guarantees of human salvation, the water of baptism and the symbol of Christ’s crucifixion. Cf. the more common noun píslarmark, which always refers to Christ’s Cross. Kock (NN §3163) understands píslar merki to refer to Christ’s blood. Both FoGT 1884, 284 and Skj B construe ok píslarmerki with sekt verka vára (ll. 7-8) to give the sense ‘[he washed] the guilt of our deeds and signs of torment [in pure water]’. This is possible grammatically but less plausible from a doctrinal point of view.
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.
- FoGT 1884 = Björn Magnússon Ólsen, ed. 1884. Den tredje og fjærde grammatiske afhandling i Snorres Edda tilligemed de grammatiske afhandlingers prolog og to andre tillæg. SUGNL 12. Copenhagen: Knudtzon.
- FoGT 2004 = Longo, Michele, ed. [2004]. ‘Il Quarto Trattato Grammaticale Islandese: Testo, Traduzione e Commento’. Dottorato di Ricerca in ‘Linguistica Sincronica e Diacronica’ (XV Ciclo). Palermo: Università degli Studi di Palermo, Facoltà di Lettere e Filosofia.