Þul Elds 4^III

Brísingr, brenna,         blossi, gneisti,
gnipall, glœðr, dúni,         geiri, tandri,
dunsuðr, dini,         dusill ok snæra;
nú eru sex tigir         seyðisheita.

Brísingr, brenna, blossi, gneisti, gnipall, glœðr, dúni, geiri, tandri, dunsuðr, dini, dusill ok snæra; nú eru sex tigir seyðisheita.

Blaze, burning, flame, spark, high one, glowing one, storming one, flare, conflagration, thundering one, flickering one, glimmering one and crackling one; now sixty fire-names are [enumerated].

Mss: A(20v), B(9v), 744ˣ(85r) (SnE)

Readings: [5] dini: om. B    [7] eru: so B, er A    [8] seyðis‑: ‘s[…]diss’ B, ‘seidiss’ 744ˣ;    ‑heita: ‘hei[…]’ B, ‘heíte’ 744ˣ

Editions: Skj AI, 684, Skj BI, 675, Skald I, 339; SnE 1848-87, II, 486, 570.

Notes: [All]: Most of fire-heiti listed here are not attested elsewhere (see Notes below). — [1] brísingr (m.) ‘blaze’: Cf. ModIcel. brísi ‘fire’ (known from C15th) and New Norw. brising, briseld ‘blaze’, brisa ‘lighten, burn with a flame’. For the proper names Brísingr/Brísingar, see Note to Þjóð Haustl 9/6. The word brísingr does not occur elsewhere in skaldic poetry as a term for ‘fire’, but it is found in the rímur (Finnur Jónsson 1926-8: brísingr). — [3] gnipall (m.) ‘high one’: An obscure word, possibly related to ON gnípa f. ‘peak’ and Gneip, the name of a giantess (see Note to Þul Trollkvenna 2/3; cf. ÍO: gnipall). De Vries (AEW: gnipall) argues that the heiti may refer to a tongue of flame. Other than in the present list the word occurs only in RE 1665 (‘Gnipal’). — [3] glœðr (m.) ‘glowing one’: The word is related to the weak verb glœða ‘blaze, sparkle, kindle’. This fire-heiti is not found in skaldic verse, but it is included in the list in RE 1665 (‘Glædur’). — [3] dúni (m.) ‘storming one’: A hap. leg. (perhaps related to dúnn m. ‘crowd, mass’), which seems to be connected with the fire-heiti dunsuðr ‘thunderer’ (see l. 5 below) and the weak verb duna ‘make noise’ (ÍO: dúni).  — [4] geiri (m.) ‘flare’: This is an obscure word. Several explanations of this name have been suggested. According to AEW: geiri 2, the word may mean ‘greedy’ (cf. ModIcel. gírugr and the fire heiti freki ‘greedy one’, st. 3/1 above). Alternatively, it may be connected with the weak verb geisa (< *gaizan-) ‘rage, storm’ (cf. Faroese geisa ‘beam’). However, it cannot be excluded that the fire-heiti geiri is the same word as geiri ‘triangular piece of land, triangular piece of clothing’ (ÍO: geiri 2). If so, the heiti may refer to a tongue of flame. — [4] tandri (m.) ‘conflagration’: Most likely a variant of tandr m. ‘fire’ (the latter word occurs in poetry, but it is not included in the present þula); cf. the weak verb tendra ‘make a fire, light’ and New Norw. tandre ‘spark’. The noun tandri is not found elsewhere. — [5] dunsuðr (m.) ‘thundering one’: A hap. leg. Cf. New Norw. duns ‘rumbling sound’, dunsa ‘crash, make a noise’, the Old Norse weak verb duna ‘thunder’, duna f. ‘rushing, thundering noise’ and dynr m. ‘noise, din, crash’. — [5] dini (m.) ‘flickering one’: A hap. leg. and an obscure word. Torp (1963, 61) argues for a connection with New Norw. dena ‘run about’ (of animals). If so, the word possibly refers to flickering fire (see ÍO: dini). Alternatively, dini may be a loanword from OIr. tene ‘fire’. The heiti is omitted in B, and possibly in RE 1665, unless the form ‘Dyn’ given there is a corruption of dini. — [6] dusill (m.) ‘glimmering one’: A hap. leg., perhaps derived from the weak verb dúsa ‘doze’ and hence most likely denoting a hidden, glimmering or small fire. Cf. CVC: drysil-, dusil- a term of contempt, ‘paltry’, dusil-menni n. ‘a petty man’ and the weak verb dusla ‘bustle’ (see also AEW: dusill; ÍO: dusi, dusill and Note to Þjóð Yt 2/7^I). — [6] snæra (f.) ‘crackling one’: Cf. New Norw. snæra ‘crackle’ and other terms for ‘fire’ in the present þula with a similar meaning: túsi, harkr ‘crackling one’ (sts 2/3, 3/4) and skerkir ‘tumultuous one’ (st. 1/6). The heiti occurs rather frequently in the rímur (Finnur Jónsson 1926-8: snæra), but it is not used in skaldic poetry. — [7-8] nú eru sex tigir seyðisheita ‘now sixty fire-names are [enumerated]’: This ending of the þula is likely to have been added by a later compiler or scribe, who revised the original text in an attempt to produce regular eight-line stanzas and provided what was perceived to be lines that were missing (see Notes to st. 1/1-4; cf. also Note to Þul Øxna 1/1-2 and Gurevich 2008, 359). The lines must have been included in the ms. of SnE available to Resen’s compiler, however, because RE 1665 lists the fire-heiti ‘Seidir’, which must be a corrupt form of the word seyðis- ‘fire-’ (nom. seyðir) in the present þula.

References

1. Bibliography
2. 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.
3. Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
4. AEW = Vries, Jan de. 1962. Altnordisches etymologisches Wörterbuch. 2nd rev. edn. Rpt. 1977. Leiden: Brill.
5. CVC = Cleasby, Richard, Gudbrand Vigfusson [Guðbrandur Vigfússon] and W. A. Craigie. 1957. An Icelandic-English Dictionary. 2nd edn. Oxford: Clarendon.
6. Finnur Jónsson. 1926-8. Ordbog til de af samfund til udg. af gml. nord. litteratur udgivne Rímur samt til de af Dr. O. Jiriczek udgivne Bósarímur. SUGNL 51. Copenhagen: Jørgensen.
7. ÍO = Ásgeir Blöndal Magnússon. 1989. Íslensk orðsifjabók. Reykjavík: Orðabók Háskólans.
8. Torp, Alf. 1963. Nynorsk etymologisk ordbok. Oslo: Aschehoug.
9. Gurevich, Elena A. 2008. ‘K voprosu o sootnoshenii dvukh redakci tul poeticheskikh sinonimov v Mladshey Edde’ [‘Towards the Problem of Relationship between the Two Versions of þulur-lists in Snorra Edda’]’. In Mikhailova et al. 2008, 351-69.
10. Internal references
11. Edith Marold 2017, ‘Snorra Edda (Prologue, Gylfaginning, Skáldskaparmál)’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols [check printed volume for citation].
12. Elena Gurevich (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Þulur, Trollkvenna heiti 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. 725.
13. Elena Gurevich (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Þulur, Øxna heiti 1’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 885.
14. Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.) 2017, ‘Þjóðólfr ór Hvini, Haustlǫng 9’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 444.
15. Edith Marold (ed.) 2012, ‘Þjóðólfr ór Hvini, Ynglingatal 2’ 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. 10.