Note to ÞjóðA Frag 3II
[3-4] slíðrdúkaðar siglur samnagla ríða ‘sheath-covered masts of the rivet [SWORDS] ride high’: Samnagli only otherwise occurs among sword-heiti in Þul Sverða 12/2III; many of these refer literally to parts of swords, and since samnagli here seems to be a determinant to siglur it probably has the specific sense ‘rivet’, lit. ‘together-nail’ (on a sword), which forms a kenning for ‘sword’ with siglur ‘masts’. The adj. slíðrdúkaðar ‘sheath-covered’, as well as being decorative, further disambiguates the kenning, reinforcing its reference to ‘sword’, though since dúkr refers to cloth, there is also a hint at a sail on a mast, hence slíðrdúkaðar siglur may amount to ‘masts of the rivet [SWORDS], whose sail is a sheath’. The verb ríða ‘ride, swing high’ is appropriate both to the metaphorical masts and sails and to the literal swords; the verb is elsewhere predicated of both swords (as in Rv Lv 17) and banners.
References
- Internal references
- Elena Gurevich (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Þulur, Sverða heiti 12’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 812.
- Judith Jesch (ed.) 2009, ‘Rǫgnvaldr jarl Kali Kolsson, Lausavísur 17’ in Kari Ellen Gade (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 2: From c. 1035 to c. 1300. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 2. Turnhout: Brepols, pp. 595-6.