Svart Skauf 31^VIII

‘Hef eg með ströndu         strokið jafnliga
og heima jafnan         um hauga snuðrað.
Bitið hef eg álar,         belt klyppingum,
rifið af þönum         riett húð hverja.

‘Eg hef jafnliga strokið með ströndu og jafnan snuðrað um hauga heima. Eg hef bitið álar, belt klyppingum, rifið hverja húð riett af þönum.

‘I’ve regularly rushed along the beach and always sniffed around the hillocks of the homesteads. I’ve bitten leather thongs, destroyed shorn sheepskins, ripped every hide right off the racks.

Mss: 603(82), Rask87ˣ(114v)

Readings: [1] Hef: Hefi Rask87ˣ    [2] strokið: so Rask87ˣ, ‘strakit’ 603;    jafnliga: tíðum Rask87ˣ    [3] jafnan: um hauga 603, Rask87ˣ    [4] um hauga: jafnan 603, Rask87ˣ    [5] Bitið hef eg álar: etið ólar Rask87ˣ    [6] belt: ‘enn billt’ Rask87ˣ;    klyppingum: klippingum Rask87ˣ

Editions: Kölbing 1876, 245, Jón Þorkelsson 1888, 233, CPB II, 384, Jón Þorkelsson 1922-7, 158, Páll Eggert Ólason 1947, 66-7.

Notes: [2] strokið ‘rushed’: So Rask87ˣ. The 603 reading ‘strakit’ must be a scribal error, and the emendation is in keeping with earlier eds. — [2] jafnliga ‘regularly’: The Rask87ˣ variant, tíðum ‘often’, results in a hypometrical line. — [3-4]: Both mss render these lines as og heima um hauga | jafnan snuðrað, leaving l. 4 without alliteration. The present edn follows Jón Þorkelsson (1888; 1922-7) and Páll Eggert Ólason (1947). — [5] eg hef bitið ‘I’ve bitten’: The Rask87ˣ variant etið ‘eaten’ must have been introduced to provide double alliteration. It makes the line hypometrical, however, and fails to provide the required alliteration with belt ‘destroyed’ in l. 6. — [6] klyppingum ‘shorn sheepskins’: So Jón Þorkelsson (1888). Kölbing (1876) and CPB have klýpingum but, according to Guðbrandur Vigfússon (CPB II, 610), klippingum would be better, i.e. shorn sheepskins for trade, an article of export from Iceland in the Middle Ages (cf. Jón Jóhannesson 1974, 313). Both klyppingum and klippingum (Rask87ˣ followed by Jón Þorkelsson 1922-7 and Páll Eggert Ólason 1947) are possible forms of this word.

References

1. Bibliography
2. CPB = Gudbrand Vigfusson [Guðbrandur Vigfússon] and F. York Powell, eds. 1883. Corpus poeticum boreale: The Poetry of the Old Northern Tongue from the Earliest Times to the Thirteenth Century. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon. Rpt. 1965, New York: Russell & Russell.
3. Jón Þorkelsson [J. Thorkelsson]. 1888. Om digtningen på Island i det 15. og 16. århundrede. Copenhagen: Høst & søns forlag.
4. Kölbing, Eugen. 1876. Beiträge zur vergleichenden Geschichte der romantischen Poesie und Prosa des Mittelalters unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der englishen und nordischen litteratur. Breslau: Koebner.
5. Páll Eggert Ólason, ed. 1947. Kvæðasafn 1300-1600. Vol. 2 of Einar Ólafur Sveinsson et al., eds. Íslands þúsund ár. 4 vols. Reykjavík: Helgafell.
6. Jón Jóhannesson. 1974. A History of the Old Icelandic Commonwealth: Íslendinga saga. Trans. Haraldur Bessason. [n. p.]: University of Manitoba Press.
7. Internal references
8. Not published: do not cite (Run^VI)