Note to GunnLeif Merl I 75VIII
[2] †tiossa† ‘…’: This ms. reading (not refreshed) has not so far been explained or convincingly emended; DGB supplies no guidance at this point. Skj B emends to brúsa ‘of the he-goat’. Bret 1848-9 already interprets it in that sense (af Bukkenæsen) but without emendation; CVC has the entry tjossi ‘he goat (?)’, citing the present passage as the unique attestation, but it does not feature in Fritzner or ONP and is no doubt a mere ghost-word. Kock (NN §105; Skald), followed by Merl 2012, emends to acc. *tjǫssu, taken as in apposition to þoku ‘fog’ and glossed as ‘wave’. He bases his case on inference from West Germanic words denoting ‘heavy wave, sea-swell’, but no such word is attested in Old Norse and Kock does not clarify how such a sense would relate to the context.
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.
- Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
- NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
- CVC = Cleasby, Richard, Gudbrand Vigfusson [Guðbrandur Vigfússon] and W. A. Craigie. 1957. An Icelandic-English Dictionary. 2nd edn. Oxford: Clarendon.
- 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.
- ONP = Degnbol, Helle et al., eds. 1989-. A Dictionary of Old Norse Prose / Ordbog over det norrøne prosasprog. 1-. Copenhagen: The Arnamagnæan Commission.
- Bret 1848-9 = Jón Sigurðsson. 1848-9. ‘Trójumanna saga ok Breta sögur, efter Hauksbók, med dansk Oversættelse’. ÅNOH 1848, 3-215; 1849, 3-145.
- Merl 2012 = Horst, Simone, ed. 2012. Merlínússpá. Merlins Prophezeiung. Munich: Herbert Utz Verlag.