[3-4] sás bindr beinan hún ‘who secures the straight mast’: According to Falk (1912, 59) and Jesch (2001a, 160-1), húnn is the upper, cube-shaped tip of a mast, with a hole through which the rope securing the sail was drawn, which is taken here as a pars pro toto for ‘mast’. This would mean that the ruler is being characterised as a brave seafarer, cf. Finnur Jónsson (1931, 111; Skj B). He interprets the rel. clause sás bindr hún as ‘who ties (the sail) to the mast-head’. Kock’s (NN §§261, 2511) alternative suggestion that hún is a bear that is tied up by the ruler is unconvincing.
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.
- Jesch, Judith. 2001a. Ships and Men in the Late Viking Age: The Vocabulary of Runic Inscriptions and Skaldic Verse. Woodbridge: Boydell.
- Falk, Hjalmar. 1912. Altnordisches Seewesen. Wörter und Sachen 4. Heidelberg: Winter.
- Finnur Jónsson. 1931. ‘Kormákr Ögmundarson’. ÅNOH, 107-206.