Note to Án Lv 4VIII (Án 4)
[All]: The demeaning characterisation of Ketill as a brauðsveigir ‘bread-bender’ (i.e. ‘kneader of bread’) and an ostasveigir ‘cheese-bender’ has many parallels in Old Norse literature, e.g. in a stanza from LaufE (Anon (LaufE) 5III), in which a man-servant is called an ostmýgir ‘oppressor of cheese’ and a saupstríðir ‘tormentor of buttermilk’, while the maid-servant for whom he pines is called brauðgýgr ‘ogress of bread’ (i.e. ‘woman who consumes bread’) and saurug flot-Gríðr ‘the filthy Gríðr <giantess> of fat’ (i.e. a woman who consumes the fat that swims on the surface of the soup); cf. Edd. Min. lxxxiv and LP: flotgríðr). Heusler and Ranisch also cite a parallel from Saxo (Saxo 2015, I, vi, 9. 14, pp. 436-7). Cf. the hostile exchange between Kormákr and Narfi in Korm ch. 4, in the course of which Kormákr refers to his opponent as Áli orfa ‘Áli <sea-king> of the scythe-handle’ (KormǪ Lv 12/1V (Korm 13), ÍF 8, 216).
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.
- Edd. Min. = Heusler, Andreas and Wilhelm Ranisch, eds. 1903. Eddica Minora: Dichtungen eddischer Art aus den Fornaldarsögur und anderen Prosawerken. Dortmund: Ruhfus. Rpt. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft.
- ÍF 8 = Vatnsdœla saga. Ed. Einar Ólafur Sveinsson. 1939.
- Saxo 2015 = Friis-Jensen, Karsten, ed. 2015. Saxo Grammaticus: Gesta Danorum: The History of the Danes. Trans. Peter Fisher. Oxford Medieval Texts. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon.
- Internal references
- 2022, ‘ Anonymous, Kormáks saga’ in Margaret Clunies Ross, Kari Ellen Gade and Tarrin Wills (eds), Poetry in Sagas of Icelanders. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 5. Turnhout: Brepols, pp. 1031-1181. <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=83> (accessed 16 April 2024)
- Kari Ellen Gade (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Lausavísur, Stanzas from Laufás Edda 5’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 642.
- Edith Marold (ed.) 2022, ‘Kormáks saga 13 (Kormákr Ǫgmundarson, Lausavísur 12)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross, Kari Ellen Gade and Tarrin Wills (eds), Poetry in Sagas of Icelanders. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 5. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 1048.
- (forthcoming), ‘ Unattributed, Laufás Edda’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=10928> (accessed 16 April 2024)