[6] jarnmunnum ‘with iron mouths’: Cf. Hókr Eirfl 7/4, and Note to st. 1/2 above for further resemblances between the two poems. Krijn (1931, 54) observed that the expression is more opaque here, where it stands alone, than in Hókr Eirfl 7/4, where jarnmunnr is part of a bird metaphor. Munnr ‘mouth’ is, however, a well-established term for the cutting edge of a weapon (Fritzner: muðr 2; LP: munnr, muðr; NN §2450), and would have been intelligible as such.
References
- Bibliography
- NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
- 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.
- Fritzner = Fritzner, Johan. 1883-96. Ordbog over det gamle norske sprog. 3 vols. Kristiania (Oslo): Den norske forlagsforening. 4th edn. Rpt. 1973. Oslo etc.: Universitetsforlaget.
- Krijn, S. A. 1931. ‘Halfred Vandraedaskald’. Neophilologus 16, 46-55, 121-31.
- Internal references
- Kari Ellen Gade (ed.) 2012, ‘Halldórr ókristni, Eiríksflokkr 7’ 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. 482.