GunnLeif Merl II 30^VIII

‘Ok suðr skulu þeir         sveitar leita;
vekr vargr ok bjǫrn         villigalta.
En galti þeim         gengi sínu
heitr hvatliga,         þvít hann hug trúir.

‘Ok þeir skulu leita sveitar suðr; vargr ok bjǫrn vekr villigalta. En galti heitr þeim gengi sínu hvatliga, þvít hann trúir hug.

‘And they will have to seek for an army in the south; the wolf and the bear will rouse a wild boar. And the boar will promise them his support with alacrity, since he trusts in his [own] courage.

Mss: Hb(50r) (Bret)

Readings: [1] skulu þeir: skal Hb

Editions: Skj AII, 15-26, Skj BII, 16, Skald II, 10, NN §97; Bret 1848-9, II, 26 (Bret st. 30); Hb 1892-6, 274; Merl 2012, 93-4.

Notes: [All]: Cf. DGB 116 (Reeve and Wright 2007, 153.191-2; cf. Wright 1988, 109, prophecy 42): At ipsi excitabunt aprum dentosum in illa et nauigio reuecti cum uulpe congredientur ‘They will stir up a tusked boar against it and sail back with a fleet to fight the fox’ (Reeve and Wright 2007, 152). Gunnlaugr expands on the characterisation of the boar, introducing indirect speech and an element of irony, since the boar, despite his trust in his own courage, will emerge as rather a pathetic figure. — [1]: Emended in NN §97 (cf. Skald) from ms. skal (refreshed) to skulu ‘must’. While syntactically speaking skal might be used impersonally, as in Bret 1848-9 and Skj B (followed by Merl 2012), the line as it stands in the ms. is metrically deficient and skal for skulu could have arisen through abbreviation. In this edn þeir is added by analogy with II 31/3 and similar lines, with its antecedent in barmar ‘brothers’ in II 29/7. In Bret 1848-9 ms. ok (refreshed) is emended to í, which is accepted in Skj B with further emendation of suðr to suðri, which might also be right; Merl 2012 rejects this further emendation. — [8] hann ‘he’: Omitted in 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. 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. Hb 1892-6 = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1892-6. Hauksbók udgiven efter de Arnamagnæanske håndskrifter no. 371, 544 og 675, 4° samt forskellige papirshåndskrifter. Copenhagen: Det kongelige nordiske oldskrift-selskab.
6. Bret 1848-9 = Jón Sigurðsson. 1848-9. ‘Trójumanna saga ok Breta sögur, efter Hauksbók, med dansk Oversættelse’. ÅNOH 1848, 3-215; 1849, 3-145.
7. Reeve, Michael D., and Neil Wright. 2007. Geoffrey of Monmouth. The History of the Kings of Britain. An Edition and Translation of De gestis Britonum [Historia regum Britanniae]. Woodbridge: Boydell.
8. Wright, Neil, ed. 1988. The Historia Regum Britannie of Geoffrey of Monmouth. II. The First Variant Version: A Critical Edition. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer.
9. Merl 2012 = Horst, Simone, ed. 2012. Merlínússpá. Merlins Prophezeiung. Munich: Herbert Utz Verlag.
10. Internal references
11. 2017, ‘ Unattributed, Breta saga’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 38. <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=125> (accessed 25 April 2024)