Bjbp Jóms 30^I

Hvervetna frák hǫlða
— herr œxti gný darra —
fyr hreggviðum hjǫrva
hrøkkva gunnar rǫkkum,
áðr í ǫrva drífu
ýtum grimmr at blóta
— framm kom heipt in harða —
Hákun þegar tœki.

Frák hǫlða hrøkkva hvervetna fyr {{hjǫrva hregg}viðum} rǫkkum gunnar — herr œxti {gný darra} —, áðr Hákun, grimmr ýtum í {drífu ǫrva}, tœki þegar at blóta; in harða heipt kom framm.

I have heard that everywhere men recoiled before {trees {of the storm of swords}} [(lit. ‘storm-trees of swords’) BATTLE > WARRIORS] bold in battle — the army caused {the din of spears} [BATTLE] to increase —, before Hákon, cruel to men in {the snow-storm of arrows} [BATTLE], proceeded at once to make a sacrifice; the harsh violence proceeded.

Mss: R(54r); 61(19vb-20ra), 54(16rb), Bb(26va) (ÓT)

Readings: [1] Hver‑: huar‑ 61, ‘Hvo᷎r‑’ Bb;    ‑vetna: so 54, Bb, ‑vitna R, 61;    hǫlða: haulda 54, ‘huo᷎lda’ Bb    [2] œxti: ‘ægsti’ 61, æsti 54, Bb    [4] gunnar: ‘guínari’ 54;    rǫkkum: rekkum 61, Bb, rokkum 54    [8] Hákun: ‘hallkæm’ 54, ‘halkæm’ Bb;    þegar: syni all others

Editions: Skj AII, 7, Skj BII, 7, Skald II, 4, NN §3257; Fms 11, 171, Fms 12, 245, Jvs 1879, 114-15; Fms 1, 174, Fms 12, 43, ÓT 1958-2000, I, 191 (ch. 90), Ólafur Halldórsson 2000, 27, 80.

Context: Hákon jarl sees that the battle is not going his way; he goes ashore and sacrifices his seven-year-old son Erlingr in order to attain victory.

Notes: [3, 4] hjǫrva hreggviðum rǫkkum gunnar ‘trees of the storm of swords [(lit. ‘storm-trees of swords’) BATTLE > WARRIORS] bold in battle’: The cpd hreggviðir ‘storm-trees’ also forms part of an inverted warrior-kenning in st. 20/5. Rekkum (m. dat. pl.) ‘warriors’, the variant to rǫkkum in 61 and Bb, does not fit the context since another noun is superfluous. — [5] í drífu ǫrva ‘in the snow-storm of arrows [BATTLE]’: This phrase is taken here with grimmr ýtum ‘cruel to men’. It could alternatively modify blóta ‘make a sacrifice’ if it refers to the overall course of the battle, rather than the thick of the fighting. According to the ÓT account (see Context above) Hákon went ashore to sacrifice. — [7] heipt ‘violence’: It is unclear what sense of heipt is intended here, and hence whether the line refers to Hákon jarl’s sacrifice of his young son for victory (see Context) or the progress of the battle. Its normal senses of ‘hate, enmity’ and actions arising from those (LP: heipt 1) or ‘battle-fury, aggression’ (LP: heipt 2), seem inadequate to the situation. Skj B offers for l. 7, det hårde sind viste sig i gærningen ‘the ruthless mind showed itself in the action’. — [8] Hákun: The variant ‘hal(l)kæm’ in 54 and Bb could be an assimilated form of the adj. haldkvæm(r) ‘fit, meet, convenient’, but this could only qualify f. nom. sg. heipt ‘violence’, which is already qualified by the weak adj. harða ‘harsh’, and the clause would lack a nominal subject. — [8] þegar ‘at once’: This, the R reading, makes sense in context. The ÓT variant syni ‘son’ also gives good sense and makes explicit reference to Hákon’s alleged human sacrifice (otherwise lacking in the stanza) by providing a grammatical (dat.) object for at blóta ‘to sacrifice’. It is adopted in Jvs 1879, Skj B and Skald.

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. Fms = Sveinbjörn Egilsson et al., eds. 1825-37. Fornmanna sögur eptir gömlum handritum útgefnar að tilhlutun hins norræna fornfræða fèlags. 12 vols. Copenhagen: Popp.
4. Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
5. NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
6. 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.
7. ÓT 1958-2000 = Ólafur Halldórsson, ed. 1958-2000. Saga Óláfs Tryggvasonar en mesta. 3 vols. EA A 1-3. Copenhagen: Munksgaard (Reitzel).
8. Jvs 1879 = Petersens, Carl af, ed. 1879. Jómsvíkinga saga (efter Cod. AM. 510, 4:to) samt Jómsvíkinga drápa. Lund: Gleerup.
9. Ólafur Halldórsson. 2000a. Danish Kings and the Jomsvikings in the Greatest Saga of Óláfr Tryggvason. London: Viking Society for Northern Research.
10. Internal references
11. (forthcoming), ‘ Unattributed, Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar en mesta’ 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. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=60> (accessed 25 April 2024)