[4] fjǫrnharðan ‘amazingly hard’: A hap. leg. The element fjǫrn- is related to f. pl. firnar (ModIcel. n. pl. firn) ‘something remote, exceptional’, often used as intensifying gen. pl., e.g. HSt Rst 9/2 firna mǫrg ‘very many’; see LP: firnar, fjǫrnharðr. (a) The interpretation of Kock (NN §1062), taking it in parallel with heinþynntan ‘whetstone-sharpened’ (lit. ‘-thinned’), is adopted here, as syntactically more conventional than the following solution. (b) Finnur Jónsson (Skj B; LP: fjǫrnharðr) takes fjǫrnharðan as a m. acc. sg. adj. used as an adv., ‘amazingly strongly’, in the rel. clause. (c) Faulkes (SnE 1998, II, 274) notes the further possibility that it could function adjectivally with sik ‘himself’.
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.
- 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.
- SnE 1998 = Snorri Sturluson. 1998. Edda: Skáldskaparmál. Ed. Anthony Faulkes. 2 vols. University College London: Viking Society for Northern Research.
- Internal references
- Rolf Stavnem (ed.) 2012, ‘Hallar-Steinn, Rekstefja 9’ in Diana Whaley (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 1: From Mythical Times to c. 1035. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 1. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 906.