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Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages

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Anon Lil 66VII

Martin Chase (ed.) 2007, ‘Anonymous Poems, Lilja 66’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry on Christian Subjects. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 7. Turnhout: Brepols, pp. 637-8.

Anonymous PoemsLilja
656667

Þú fyrirdæmdir auma Évam,
Éva mann fyrir epli bannað,
maðr bannsettr um allar ættir,
ættin Krist, er spjóti nisti.
Kristr þig þó, er fant í fystu
fystan prett og manndráp settir;
svá ódygðar brandrinn bjúgi
beygiz aftr í þína kjafta.

Þú fyrirdæmdir auma Évam, Éva mann fyrir bannað epli, maðr bannsettr um allar ættir, ættin Krist, er nisti spjóti. Kristr þig þó, er í fystu fant fystan prett og settir manndráp; svá beygiz bjúgi brandrinn ódygðar aftr í kjafta þína.

You doomed to death wretched Eve, Eve [doomed] the man with the forbidden apple, man was cursed through all his descendants, his descendants [doomed] Christ, whom they pierced with a spear. Christ nevertheless [doomed] you, who, in the beginning, conceived the first fraud and established murder; thus the recoiling sword of faithlessness is turned back into your mouth.

Mss: Bb(115va), 99a(13v), 622(35), 713(12), Vb(253), 41 8°ˣ(126-127), 705ˣ(16v), 4892(35v)

Readings: [1] auma: ‘aua’ 622;    Évam: Éva 622, Vb, 41 8°ˣ, 4892    [2] Éva: og Éva 622, 713, Vb, 41 8°ˣ, 705ˣ, 4892;    mann: maðr 713;    epli: eplið 99a, 622, Vb, 41 8°ˣ    [4] ættin: ættina Vb;    Krist: Krists 99a, 622, Vb, 41 8°ˣ, 4892;    er: so 713, 4892, á Bb, 99a, 622, Vb, 41 8°ˣ, 705ˣ;    spjóti: spjótið 4892;    nisti: nistir 99a, nistu 622    [5] Kristr: Kristr að 99a, 705ˣ, Kristr af 713, 4892, Kristr liet Vb, 41 8°ˣ;    þig þó er: þig er Bb, þig þó 99a, 705ˣ, þau er 622, þier að 713, 4892, því að Vb, 41 8°ˣ;    fant: fann 99a, 713, 705ˣ, 4892, fanstu Vb, 41 8°ˣ;    fystu: so 713, fyrsta Bb, fyrstu 99a, 622, Vb, 41 8°ˣ, 705ˣ    [6] fystan: á fystan 99a, 705ˣ, fyrstann 622, Vb, 4892;    og: til Vb, 41 8°ˣ;    manndráp: manndráps 622, Vb, 41 8°ˣ, 4892;    settir: lystann 99a, lysti 622, lystir 713, 4892, lystar Vb, 41 8°ˣ, þystan 705ˣ    [7] svá: sá 99a, 622, 713, þann Vb, 41 8°ˣ;    brandrinn: brandinn Vb, ‘brodrinn’ 4892;    bjúgi: beygði 705ˣ    [8] beygiz: beygðiz 99a, 713, 4892, beygjaz Vb, 41 8°ˣ

Editions: Skj AII, 384, Skj BII, 407, Skald II, 223, NN §§1528, 1529, 2594.

Notes: [All]: Cf. Geoffrey of Vinsauf, Poetria nova: Hostis enim primus damnaverat Evam, / Eva secunda virum, vir tertius omne quod ejus / Stirpis erat, stirps quarta Deum, Deus ultimus hostem, / Cui mors ipse fuit ‘So the condemnation justly came to a close with him from whom it began. For the enemy had first condemned Eve; Eve, secondly, condemned her husband; her husband, thirdly, condemned all his offspring; the offspring, fourthly, condemned God; God, last of all condemned the enemy whose cause of death he was’ (Nims 1967, 57-8; Faral 1924, 232; see Foote 1982, 118-9). JH notes that this st. has become garbled in the ms. tradition: none of the scribes appears to have understood it fully. The basic theme is that of the second helmingr of st. 45: the curse laid on humanity by the devil is now turned back on him. Eiríkur Magnússon (1870, 66-7) offers a step-by-step theory of how the text became corrupt. Hill points out that this st. marks a key juncture in the poem, the completion of the Atonement, while st. 67 marks the beginning of a new age. He notes that ‘Christ’s birth is described in st. 33. Thus the poet describes Christ’s life on earth through the completion of the Atonement in a sequence of thirty-three verses, which obviously corresponds to the traditional asumption that Christ lived thirty-three years on earth’ (Hill 1970, 564). The st. is dunhent ‘resounding rhymed’: it exhibits anadiplosis as well as climax or gradatio and polyptoton: see Note on 49/1-4 and cf. st. 55. — [3] maðr ‘man’: The meaning here is ‘man as a link in a line of descent’ (see Heggstad, Hødnebø and Simensen 1997: maðr 5). — [3, 5] bannsettr, Kristr ‘cursed, Christ’: JH agrees with Kock (NN §§1528, 1529) that Skj B’s insertion of svarabhakti vowels is unacceptable. — [3] um allar ættir ‘through all generations’: Cf. um aldr ok æfi ‘from age to age, through all ages’ 1/7 and Note, and um allar aldir alda ‘through all ages of ages’ 74/7-8. The customary idiom is í öllum ættum. — [5] þó ‘nevertheless’: No single ms. has both the adv. and the necessary rel. particle in this l., though 99a and 705ˣ have þó, but not er. JH agrees with Kock (NN §2594) that the emendation is necessary for the metre. — [7] brandrinn ódygðar ‘the sword of faithlessness’: Cf. 19/2, where ódygð is used in reference to the sin of Adam and Eve, and 42/8 and Note, where flein ódygðar ‘dart of faithlessness’ is analogous to brandrinn ódygðar in this st. Hill sees in this image an allusion to the krókr ‘hook’ of st. 60 (Hill 1969, 563-4). — [7] bjúgi ‘recoiling’: JH (see also Finnur Jónsson 1772-8, II, 430-1 and Nj 1875-8, II, 947-51) was tempted to emend to beygði ‘bent, bowed, turned’ in order to preserve the dunhent pattern of the st. Cf. the analogous use of the word in the phrase hinn bjúgi ormr ‘the twisted serpent’ in 60/7. The meaning of bjúgi underlines the circular nature of the process the st. describes.

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. Nj 1875-89 = Konráð Gíslason and Eiríkur Jónsson. 1875-89. Njála: Udgivet efter gamle håndskrifter. Íslendingasögur udgivne efter gamle haandskrifter af Det Kongelige Nordiske Oldskrift-selskab 4. Copenhagen: Thiele.
  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. Hill, Thomas D. 1969. ‘Eve’s Light Answer: Lilja, Stanzas 16-17’. MS 2, 129-31.
  7. Faral, Edmond. 1924. Les Arts Poétiques du XIIe et du XIIIe Siècle. Bibliothèque de l’Ecole des Hautes Etudes 238. Paris: Champion.
  8. Finnur Jónsson [Finnus Iohannaeus]. 1772-8. Historia Ecclesiastica Islandiae. 4 vols. Copenhagen.
  9. Foote, Peter G. 1982. ‘Latin Rhetoric and Icelandic Poetry: Some Contacts’. Saga och sed, 107-27. Rpt. in Foote 1984a, 249-70.
  10. Nims, Margaret F., trans. 1967. Poetria Nova of Geoffrey of Vinsauf. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies.
  11. Hill, Thomas D. 1970. ‘Number and patterns in Lilja’. JEGP 69, 516-7.
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