Note to Anon (Ragn) 3VIII (Ragn 33)
[5] feittira ‘you did not fatten’: The ms. has ‘feittada’, which Olsen and some later eds have emended to a supposed 2nd pers. sg. pret. form feitaðir ‘you fattened’, belonging to the first class weak conjugation. But feita ‘fatten’ is a weak verb of the third conjugation (ANG §§515-17), whose 2nd pers. sg. pret. is feittir. Here, however, the overall syntax of ll. 5-8 suggests that a negated verb is required, and this is provided by the ms. form ending in the negative particle -a, with the proclitic né negating the wolf-kenning sækitík sólar ‘the chasing-bitch of the sun’ in ll. 1-2 in a double negative construction; for similar constructions, cf. Þhorn Gldr 9/1-2I and Eil Þdr 11/7III and Note there, also Kuhn (1936a, 431). Finnur Jónsson (Skj B) emends ms. ‘feittada’ to fæddir ‘you fed’, 2nd pers. sg. pret. of fæða ‘feed’. Kock (Skald) emends to fættuða, 2nd pers. pl. pret. of fæta ‘have to do with’, with the negative particle -a suffixed.
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.
- ANG = Noreen, Adolf. 1923. Altnordische Grammatik I: Altisländische und altnorwegische Grammatik (Laut- und Flexionslehre) unter Berücksichtigung des Urnordischen. 4th edn. Halle: Niemeyer. 1st edn. 1884. 5th unrev. edn. 1970. Tübingen: Niemeyer.
- Kuhn, Hans (1899). 1936a. ‘Die Negation des Verbs im Altnordischen’. BGDSL 60, 431-44. Rpt. in Kuhn (1899) 1969-78, I, 124-34.
- Internal references
- Edith Marold (ed.) 2017, ‘Eilífr Goðrúnarson, Þórsdrápa 11’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 99.
- Edith Marold (ed.) 2012, ‘Þorbjǫrn hornklofi, Glymdrápa 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. 90.