Note to FriðÞ Lv 1VIII (Frið 1)
[7-8] blæjur eru nú komnar á blik ‘bed-sheets have now been placed on the bleaching ground’: Before the discovery of chlorine in the late C18th, sunlight was the principal bleaching agent for whitening flax-woven linen, for light energy causes a reaction in wet flax, producing a hydrogen peroxide solution that bleaches the fabric. Until well into the C20th in Scandinavia, after washing the household linen, women would set it out to whiten and dry off on a bleaching ground (ON blik; cf. ModDan. bleg, ModNorw. bleik, ModSwed. blek), usually a patch of grass beside the house (cf. Falk 1919, 40; Schlabow 1978, 76). Although conceived in the B text of Frið as a prearranged signal, the gesture of washing and whitening linen bed-sheets (blæjur) may well symbolise the termination of the intimacies understood to have been enjoyed between the women at Baldrshagi and the men of Framnes. Cf. Oddrgr 6/4, 25/8 and Rþ 23/9, where references to blæjur indicate sexual intimacy.
References
- Bibliography
- RGA = Beck, Heinrich and Holger Arbmann, eds. 1973-2008. Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde. 37 vols. Berlin: de Gruyter. 2nd rev. edn of Hoops 1911-19.
- Falk, Hjalmar. 1919. Altwestnordische Kleiderkunde, mit besonderer Berücksichtigung der Terminologie. Videnskapsselskapets Skrifter, II. Hist.-filos. kl. 1918, 3. Kristiania (Oslo): Dybwad.
- Schlabow, K. 1978. ‘Bleichen’. In RGA, 3, 76.
- Internal references
- 2017, ‘ Anonymous, Friðþjófs saga ins frœkna’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 190. <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=8> (accessed 25 April 2024)
- Not published: do not cite ()
- Not published: do not cite ()