Anon Sól 77^VII

Óðins kván        rær á jarðar skipi
        móðug á munað;
seglum hennar        verðr síð hlaðit,
        þeim er á þráreipum þruma.

Óðins kván, móðug á munað, rær á skipi jarðar; seglum hennar verðr síð hlaðit, þeim er þruma á þráreipum.

Óðinn’s wife, mighty in desire, rows on the ship of the earth; her sails will be late furled, those which hang on the ropes of longing.

Mss: 166bˣ(48v), papp15ˣ(7v), 738ˣ(83v), 167b 6ˣ(4r), 214ˣ(152r), 1441ˣ(587), 10575ˣ(10v-11r), 2797ˣ(237)

Readings: [1] kván: kon 1441ˣ    [2] jarðar: jarður 214ˣ    [3] móðug á munað: so papp15ˣ, 214ˣ, 10575ˣ, í móðugum munað 166bˣ, 214ˣ, í móðug á munað 738ˣ, 167b 6ˣ, 1441ˣ    [6] þruma: so 2797ˣ, ‘þumu’ 166bˣ, ‘þumar’ papp15ˣ, 214ˣ, 1441ˣ, ‘þrymur’ 738ˣ, ‘þrimur’ 167b 6ˣ, þrumir 10575ˣ

Editions: Skj AI, 639, Skj BI, 648, Skald I, 315; Bugge 1867, 369, Falk 1914, 48, Björn M. Ólsen 1915, 22, Fidjestøl 1979, 70, Njörður Njarðvík 1991, 101-2, Njörður Njarðvík 1993, 83, 147.

Notes: [1] Óðins kván ‘Óðinn’s wife’: Frigg, or conceivably Freyja, as Björn M. Ólsen (1915, 59) and Paasche (1914a, 158) suggest. Both goddesses are associated with Venus in homiletic writing, both in ON and OE, symbolising sexual desire. Ælfric of Eynsham names Frigg as þære sceamleasan gydenan ‘the shameless goddess’ (Pope 1967-8, 686); Freyja is noted as Freyja portkona ‘Freyja the whore’ in Heilagra manna søgur (Unger 1877, I, 417; II, 233). — [2] skipi jarðar ‘on the ship of the earth’: That the world can be symbolised by a ship is a homiletic commonplace; cf. Lange (1958a, 257-8) who adduces a homily about the ship of the earth in AM 673 a 4^o. Here, however, the Christian symbol is given a traditional ON context, and associated with the persistent force of sexual desire, linked with the dominance of female powers. The metaphor of the world as a ship is elaborated in the second half of the st.; see Fidjestøl 1979, 56-7. — [3] móðug á munað ‘mighty in desire’: 166bˣ’s reading, as well as those of many of the other mss, seems to be the result of confusion about word division. — [6] þruma ‘hang’: 2797ˣ’s reading looks like an intelligent guess for a word which most mss had difficulty with; the form is found in 5 other mss and as a correction in a further 3. The readings of 738ˣ, 10575ˣ and a further 15 mss may also derive from þruma, which gives good sense, even if the word is not widely attested with this meaning, as Njörður Njarðvík (1991, 101) points out. Its normal sense is ‘to stand, sit fast, loiter, mope’.

References

1. Bibliography
2. Unger, C. R., ed. 1877. Heilagra manna søgur. Fortællinger og legender om hellige mænd og kvinder. 2 vols. Christiania (Oslo): Bentzen.
3. Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
4. Fidjestøl, Bjarne, ed. 1979a. Sólarljóð: Tydning og Tolkningsgrunnlag. Nordisk Instituts skrifteserie 4. Bergen, Oslo and Tromsø: Universitetsforlaget.
5. Björn Magnússon Ólsen, ed. 1915a. Sólarljóð: gefin út með skíringum og athugasemdum. Safn til sögu Íslands og íslenzkra bókmenta 5.1. Reykjavík: Prentsmiðja Gutenberg.
6. Bugge, Sophus, ed. 1867. Norrœn fornkvæði. Islandsk samling af folkelige oldtidsdigte om nordens guder og heroer. Almindelig kaldet Sæmundar Edda hins frøda. Christiania (Oslo): Malling. Rpt. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget 1965.
7. Falk, Hjalmar, ed. 1914a. Sólarljóð. Videnskapsselskapets skrifter II. Hist.-filos. kl. 7. 2 vols. Kristiania (Oslo): Dybwad.
8. Njörður P. Njarðvik, ed. 1991. Sólarljóð. Útgáfa og umfjöllun. Íslensk Rit 10. Reykjavík: Bókmenntafræðistofnun Háskóla Íslands og Menningarsjóður.
9. Njörður P. Njarðvik. 1993. Solsången. Akademisk avhandling för filosofiedoktorsexamen i nordiska språk. Göteborgs universitet: Institutionen för svensk språket.
10. Lange, Wolfgang. 1958a. Studien zur christlichen Dichtung der Nordgermanen 1000-1200. Palaestra 222. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.
11. Paasche, Fredrik. 1914. Kristendom og kvad: En studie i norrøn middelalder. Christiania (Oslo): Aschehoug. Rpt. in Paasche 1948, 29-212.