Note to Anon (Ragn) 8VIII (Ragn 38)
[7-8] þessa þorps ‘of this habitation’: Evans (1986, 95-7) surveys the various senses that have been proposed for the word þorp as it occurs in Hávm 50/1-2 (NK 24; cf. Evans 1986, 49): Hrørnar þǫll, | sú er stendr þorpi á ‘a pine-tree standing in an area of human habitation withers’. Among the senses proposed is ‘mound’ (cf. LP: þorp 2), which might seem to be suggested by the prose context of the present stanza as it occurs in Hálf, where a burial-mound is mentioned; there is nothing in the stanza itself, however, to justify this interpretation, nor does the word þorp occur in the accompanying prose, either in Hálf or in Ragn. Evans plumps for the meaning ‘habitation’ as being the usual sense of the word in Old Norse (and, in the Hávm context, the one that makes most sense). This interpretation has been adopted here.
References
- Bibliography
- 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.
- Evans, David A. H., ed. 1986. Hávamál. Viking Society Text Series 7. University College London: Viking Society for Northern Research.
- NK = Neckel, Gustav and Hans Kuhn (1899), eds. 1983. Edda: Die Lieder des Codex Regius nebst verwandten Denkmälern. 2 vols. I: Text. 5th edn. Heidelberg: Winter.
- Internal references
- 2017, ‘ Anonymous, Hálfs saga ok Hálfsrekka’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 303. <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=75> (accessed 18 April 2024)
- 2017, ‘ Anonymous, Ragnars saga loðbrókar’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 616. <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=81> (accessed 18 April 2024)
- Not published: do not cite ()