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Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages

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Bragi Rdr 5III

Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.) 2017, ‘Bragi inn gamli Boddason, Ragnarsdrápa 5’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 35.

Bragi inn gamli BoddasonRagnarsdrápa
456

Þar, svát gerðu gyrðan
golfhǫlkvis sá fylkis,
segls naglfara siglur
saums andvanar standa.
Urðu snemst ok Sǫrli
samráða þeir Hamðir
hǫrðum herðimýlum
Hergauts vinu barðir.

Þar, svát gerðu gyrðan {sá {golfhǫlkvis}} fylkis, standa {siglur {segls naglfara}}, andvanar saums. Þeir Sǫrli ok Hamðir urðu snemst barðir samráða {hǫrðum herðimýlum {vinu Hergauts}}.

There, so that they encircled {the vat {of the floor-steed}} [HOUSE > BED] of the ruler, {the masts {of the sail of the nail-studded one <ship’s planking>}} [SHIELD > WARRIORS], lacking nails, stand. Sǫrli and Hamðir were very soon pelted by common resolve {with hard shoulder-lumps {of the mistress of Hergautr <= Óðinn>}} [= Jǫrð (jǫrð ‘earth’) > STONES].

Mss: R(30v), Tˣ(32r), C(2r) (SnE)

Readings: [2] fylkis: so C, fylkir R, Tˣ    [4] andvanar: so Tˣ, C, ‘anvanar’ R    [7] hǫrðum: ‘halum’ C    [8] vinu: vinum C

Editions: Skj AI, 2, Skj BI, 2, Skald I, 1, NN §§1161, 1916B, 2720; SnE 1848-87, I, 372-3, II, 576, III, 60, SnE 1931, 134, SnE 1998, I, 51.

Context: See Context to st. 3. This stanza follows immediately upon Rdr 4 in three mss of SnE, R, and C.

Notes: [2] sá golfhǫlkvis ‘the vat of the floor-steed [HOUSE > BED]’: Some commentators (e.g. Dronke 1969, 211-12) have understood as the 3rd pers. pret. sg. of the verb sjá ‘see’, but this requires emendation of ‑hǫlkvis to ‑hǫlkvi and adoption of R’s and ’s fylkir ‘ruler’ as subject of the clause. A majority of scholars, including the present ed., understand as acc. sg. of sár m. ‘vessel, tub, vat’, forming the base-word of a tvíkent bed-kenning. Golfhǫlkvir ‘floor-steed’ is then a house-kenning (cf. Meissner 430-1), referring to Jǫrmunrekkr’s hall. Hǫlkvir occurs as a horse-heiti in several contexts (e.g. Akv 30/7, SnE 1998, I, 89, Anon Kálfv 4/5, where it refers to the hero Hǫgni’s horse). Kock (NN §1916) regards hǫlkvir as a ship-heiti, and it is possible that the word could have had both senses (AEW: hǫlkvir). Bed-kennings are uncommon in skaldic verse, and sár, with its probably mundane associations, is never used elsewhere in the corpus (see LP: sár). Bragi is likely to have chosen it at least partly a) for metrical reasons (Gade 1995a, 29-30); b) because it extends the metaphor of the verb gyrða ‘encircle’ (with a band or hoop); and c) because it connotes a vessel containing liquid, the implicit parallel being with Jǫrmunrekkr’s maimed and bleeding body, shorn of arms and legs. Marold (1994c, 569-71), however, sees the referent of sár as Jǫrmunrekkr’s sleeping chamber, formed from planks of wood. — [3-4] siglur segls naglfara, andvanar saums ‘the masts of the sail of the nail-studded one <ship’s planking> [SHIELD > WARRIORS], lacking nails’: The interpretation of this elaborate kenning has occasioned much debate (see Marold 1994c, 571-2 for a summary). Here it is understood that siglur ‘masts’ stands for a group of the Gothic warriors, who defend their injured leader by surrounding his bed. The phrase andvanar saums ‘lacking nails’ (saumr is a collective noun for ‘ship’s nails’) further defines what kind of ‘masts’ these are by indicating what they are not, i.e. they lack the kinds of nails that ships contain; they are mast-like, and so men. Bragi then extends the parallel between men and masts in a clever nýgerving when he calls the warriors ‘masts of the sail of the nail-studded one’, repeating his nautical and his nail analogy, with reference to naglfara < naglfari ‘something studded or decorated with nails’ (so Lie 1954). This cpd occurs in several other contexts: in þulur as a sword-heiti (Þul Sverða 8/4, SnE 1998, I, 120) or as a ship-heiti (Þul Skipa 1/7, SnE 1998, I, 127); in the shield-kenning borð naglfara ‘board of the nail-studded one’ (Ggnæv Frag 1/2-3), where naglfari may refer either to a sword (so SnE 1998, II, 361) or a ship (so Marold 1994c, 574-5); as the name of the husband of Night in Gylf (SnE 2005, 13) and (probably connected by Snorri with nagl ‘nail’ of the body by popular etymology) as the name of the ship Naglfar or Naglfari in which a company of fire-giants and monsters travel to oppose the gods at Ragnarǫk (SnE 2005, 50). Opinion is divided on whether Bragi is using naglfari in this kenning as a sword- or a ship-heiti, but Marold’s (1994c, 572-7) advocacy of a reference to ship’s planking fits better with the nautical imagery of the kenning, and has been adopted here. Kock (NN §2720) proposed a different syntactical arrangement, siglur naglfara, andvanar saums segls ‘masts of the nail-studded one <sword>, lacking a sewn sail’, taking saumr as ‘sewing’ rather than ‘nail(s)’, a sense which it appears to have only in the pl. (cf. Fritzner: saumr 2). — [6] samráða ‘by common resolve’: The adv. (Finnur Jónsson 1930-1, 262) refers to the Gothic warriors, who stone Hamðir and Sǫrli, apparently (cf. st. 6 and Hamð 25) on Jǫrmunrekkr’s orders. Later sources (e.g. Saxo, Vǫls) represent Óðinn as initiating the stoning, but there is no evidence that Bragi alluded to this idea (contra Brady 1940 and Dronke 1969, 207-8) and it does not appear in SnE either.

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. NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
  5. Meissner = Meissner, Rudolf. 1921. Die Kenningar der Skalden: Ein Beitrag zur skaldischen Poetik. Rheinische Beiträge und Hülfsbücher zur germanischen Philologie und Volkskunde 1. Bonn and Leipzig: Schroeder. Rpt. 1984. Hildesheim etc.: Olms.
  6. AEW = Vries, Jan de. 1962. Altnordisches etymologisches Wörterbuch. 2nd rev. edn. Rpt. 1977. Leiden: Brill.
  7. 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.
  8. Gade, Kari Ellen. 1995a. The Structure of Old Norse dróttkvætt Poetry. Islandica 49. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.
  9. Fritzner = Fritzner, Johan. 1883-96. Ordbog over det gamle norske sprog. 3 vols. Kristiania (Oslo): Den norske forlagsforening. 4th edn. Rpt. 1973. Oslo etc.: Universitetsforlaget.
  10. Dronke, Ursula, ed. and trans. 1969. The Poetic Edda. I: Heroic Poems. Oxford: Clarendon.
  11. SnE 1931 = Snorri Sturluson. 1931. Edda Snorra Sturlusonar. Ed. Finnur Jónsson. Copenhagen: Gyldendal.
  12. SnE 1998 = Snorri Sturluson. 1998. Edda: Skáldskaparmál. Ed. Anthony Faulkes. 2 vols. University College London: Viking Society for Northern Research.
  13. Lie, Hallvard. 1954. ‘Naglfar og Naglfari’. MM, 152-61. Rpt. in Lie 1982, 332-41.
  14. Vǫls = Vǫlsunga saga.
  15. Marold, Edith. 1994c. ‘“Nagellose Masten”. Die Sage von Hamðir und Sörli in der Ragnarsdrápa’. In Gísli Sigurðsson et al. 1994, II, 565-79.
  16. Brady, Caroline. 1940. ‘Óðinn and the Norse Jǫrmunrekkr-legend’. PMLA 55, 910-30.
  17. Finnur Jónsson. 1930-1. ‘Brage skjald’. APS 5, 237-86.
  18. Internal references
  19. 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].
  20. (forthcoming), ‘ Snorri Sturluson, Gylfaginning’ 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=113> (accessed 28 March 2024)
  21. Kari Ellen Gade (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Þulur, Kálfsvísa 4’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 668.
  22. Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.) 2017, ‘Bragi inn gamli Boddason, Ragnarsdrápa 4’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 33.
  23. Not published: do not cite ()
  24. Not published: do not cite ()
  25. Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.) 2017, ‘Gamli gnævaðarskáld, Fragment 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. 190.
  26. Elena Gurevich 2017, ‘ Anonymous, Sverða heiti’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 789. <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=3194> (accessed 28 March 2024)
  27. Elena Gurevich 2017, ‘ Anonymous, Skipa heiti’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 861. <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=3208> (accessed 28 March 2024)
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