Cookies on our website

We use cookies on this website, mainly to provide a secure browsing experience but also to collect statistics on how the website is used. You can find out more about the cookies we set, the information we store and how we use it on the cookies page.

Continue

skaldic

Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages

Menu Search

Note to Eskál Hardr 2III

[2, 4] in mildri ógnherði ‘more generous than the terror-enhancer [WARRIOR]’: The word ógn ‘terror’ is frequently used as a heiti for ‘battle’; the cpd thus characterises the king as successful in war. In the construction in mildri ógnherði, the word in is a colourless adjunct of the comparative (probably originally ‘yet’ in meaning) common in verse (LP: enn 4), and the use of the dat. for ógnherði ‘terror-enhancer’ is the older method of expressing the comparand in comparative constructions. The reading inn mildi ógnherðir ‘the generous terror-enhancer’ of R, W is a plausible noun phrase (and adopted in SnE 1848-87), but it would have to be the subject of the verb of the main clause, with the resulting meaning that the generous warrior is not (or will not be) a pillar of the family. This is not the sort of sentiment normally expressed in panegyric.

References

  1. Bibliography
  2. SnE 1848-87 = Snorri Sturluson. 1848-87. Edda Snorra Sturlusonar: Edda Snorronis Sturlaei. Ed. Jón Sigurðsson et al. 3 vols. Copenhagen: Legatum Arnamagnaeanum. Rpt. Osnabrück: Zeller, 1966.
  3. 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.

Close

Log in

This service is only available to members of the relevant projects, and to purchasers of the skaldic volumes published by Brepols.
This service uses cookies. By logging in you agree to the use of cookies on your browser.

Close