Note to ESk Lv 12^III

[4] af fjalli svarðar ‘from the mountain of the scalp [HEAD]’: Ms. W ends with the word af ‘from’ and fjalli svarðar ‘the mountain of the scalp’ is conjectural. Fjalli (n. dat. sg.) ‘mountain’ is partly secured by the internal rhyme (-all : ‑all-), but aside from the fact that it must be a determinant in a kenning for ‘head’, the preceding word cannot be established with any certainty. Following Sveinbjörn Egilsson, SnE 1848-87, II, 500 suggests the reading skarar fjalli ‘hair’s mountain’ (see ESk Frag 2/4), which is unmetrical (the metre requires a long first syllable in position 3 and skar- is short). Skj B supplies reikar fjalli ‘the parting of the hair’s mountain’ (so also Skald). Both svǫrðr ‘scalp’ and reik ‘parting of the hair’ occur elsewhere in kennings for ‘head’ (see LP: reik; svǫrðr) but, whereas reik is used more commonly as pars pro toto for ‘head’ (see LP: reik 2), svǫrðr is often a determinant in head-kennings, e.g. land svarðar ‘land of the scalp’, stofn svarðar ‘stump of the scalp’, strǫnd svarðar ‘beach of the scalp’; see LP: svǫrðr 1. Svǫrðr also occurs in the two stanzas directly preceding this stanza in W and LaufE (SnSt Lv 7/3, 4 (twice) and Árni Lv 1/8^IV).

References

1. Bibliography
2. Skj B = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1912-15b. Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning. B: Rettet tekst. 2 vols. Copenhagen: Villadsen & Christensen. Rpt. 1973. Copenhagen: Rosenkilde & Bagger.
3. SnE 1848-87 = Snorri Sturluson. 1848-87. Edda Snorra Sturlusonar: Edda Snorronis Sturlaei. Ed. Jón Sigurðsson et al. 3 vols. Copenhagen: Legatum Arnamagnaeanum. Rpt. Osnabrück: Zeller, 1966.
4. Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
5. 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.
6. Internal references
7. Guðrún Nordal (forthcoming), ‘ Snorri Sturluson, Lausavísur’ in Guðrún Nordal (ed.), Poetry on Icelandic History. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 4. Turnhout: Brepols, p. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=1378> (accessed 26 April 2024)
8. Not published: do not cite (Árni Lv 1^IV)
9. Kari Ellen Gade (ed.) 2017, ‘Einarr Skúlason, Fragments 2’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 153.
10. (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 26 April 2024)