Note to Bjbp Jóms 27I
[6] í bug snœrum ‘on the curve of the spear-thongs’: Bugr is ‘bend, bight, (inner) curve, concave side’, e.g. í bug hringinum ‘the inside curve of the ring’ (CVC: bugr). Snœri is related to snœra ‘to tie, twist’ (AEW: snœra), and denotes a cable, cord or thong of various sorts. In battle contexts, it normally denotes the thongs by which spears are held (ÞjóðA Magnfl 17/6II, and cf. the compounds snœrispjót, snœridarr ‘thonged spear’, LP: snœri), so that this seems the most likely sense here, and it is assumed in Fms 12 and Skj B. Contextually, though, a bow-string would also be an attractive possibility.
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.
- Fms = Sveinbjörn Egilsson et al., eds. 1825-37. Fornmanna sögur eptir gömlum handritum útgefnar að tilhlutun hins norræna fornfræða fèlags. 12 vols. Copenhagen: Popp.
- AEW = Vries, Jan de. 1962. Altnordisches etymologisches Wörterbuch. 2nd rev. edn. Rpt. 1977. Leiden: Brill.
- 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.
- CVC = Cleasby, Richard, Gudbrand Vigfusson [Guðbrandur Vigfússon] and W. A. Craigie. 1957. An Icelandic-English Dictionary. 2nd edn. Oxford: Clarendon.
- Internal references
- Diana Whaley (ed.) 2009, ‘Þjóðólfr Arnórsson, Magnússflokkr 17’ 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. 84-5.