Note to ShÞ Frag 1^III

[All]: The couplet is too fragmentary to allow for an interpretation. The first line, which contains the kenning for ‘wounds’ (fet jarna lit. ‘steps of irons’), is fairly certain, but l. 2 cannot be construed to make sense as it stands. Finnur Jónsson (Skj B) gives friðar skepjandi … miðjum, which is translated as fredstifteren … ‘the peacemaker …’. Kock (NN §1124A) takes miðjum as dat. pl. of mið ‘fishing ground’ (rather than as dat. pl. of the adj. miðr ‘middle’) and translates friðar skepjandi miðjum as a form of address: o, du fiskevattnens skydd! ‘oh, protector of fishing grounds!’. In view of the incompleteness of the fragment, that interpretation is not persuasive. Further, mið ‘fishing ground’ does not appear to be a n. ja-stem (cf. Fritzner: mið 3, which lists the dat. pl. forms miðum and miðunum). Based on the syntax of the two lines, they seem to form ll. 3-4 of a couplet (with l. 3 as an intercalary independent clause), and the missing two lines must have provided the syntactically necessary elements to make sense of the words in l. 4.

References

1. Bibliography
2. Skj B = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1912-15b. Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning. B: Rettet tekst. 2 vols. Copenhagen: Villadsen & Christensen. Rpt. 1973. Copenhagen: Rosenkilde & Bagger.
3. NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
4. Fritzner = Fritzner, Johan. 1883-96. Ordbog over det gamle norske sprog. 3 vols. Kristiania (Oslo): Den norske forlagsforening. 4th edn. Rpt. 1973. Oslo etc.: Universitetsforlaget.