Tarrin Wills and Stefanie Gropper (eds) 2007, ‘Anonymous Poems, Hugsvinnsmál 57’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry on Christian Subjects. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 7. Turnhout: Brepols, pp. 395-6.
Gæzku safna skal gumna hverr,
sá er vill hyggindi hafa;
æðri speki fær maðr aldrigi,
en hann við syndum sjái.
Hverr gumna, sá er vill hafa hyggindi, skal safna gæzku; maðr fær aldrigi æðri speki, en hann sjái við syndum.
Every man who wants to have wisdom must accumulate virtues; a man never gets more wisdom than [if] he guards himself against sins.
Mss: 1199ˣ(73r), 624(143)
Readings: [1] safna: gerva 624 [2] skal: skyli 624 [3] vill hyggindi: hyggindi vill 624 [4] æðri: æðra 624; speki: spekt 624 [5] fær: getr 624 [6] hann við syndum sjái: lastvarr lifa 624
Editions: Skj AII, 180-1, Skj BII, 195, Skald II, 102; Gering 1907, 16, Tuvestrand 1977, 103, Hermann Pálsson 1985, 67.
Notes: [All]: Lat. parallel: (Praefatio Libri II, 6-9) Si quid amare libet vel discere amare legendo, / Nasonem petito; sin autem cura tibi haec est, / Ut sapiens vivas, audi quae discere possis, / Per quae semotum vitiis deducitur aevum ‘If your fancy is to love something, or you want to learn of love by reading, seek out Ovid [Publius Ovidius Naso]; but if this is your concern, to live as a wise man, hear those things you may learn, from which a lifetime removed from vice is drawn’. The Icel. text of the preface to Book II avoids specific mention of the two Lat. authors Virgil and Ovid, in the latter case possibly because his Ars Amatoria ‘Art of Love’ appears to have been somewhat controversial in Icel. classrooms, to judge by the well-known incident reported in Jóns saga helga (JBp 2003, 19, 84, 125), in which Bishop Jón forbade the future bishop Klængr Þorsteinsson to study this and similar books.
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