GunnLeif Merl II 56VIII
Russell Poole (ed.) 2017, ‘Breta saga 56 (Gunnlaugr Leifsson, Merlínusspá II 56)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 181.
text and translation
‘Mun it hvíta silfr hǫlðum granda,
ok gull gera gumna blinda.
Himni hafna en á hauðr séa;
svíkr ofdrykkja ýta mengi.
‘It hvíta silfr mun granda hǫlðum, ok gull gera gumna blinda. Hafna himni en séa á hauðr; ofdrykkja svíkr mengi ýta.
‘‘The white silver will harm men, and gold make men blind. They will forsake heaven and look on the earth; excessive drinking will undo a multitude of men. ’
notes and context
Cf. DGB 116 (Reeve and Wright 2007, 159.285-; cf. Wright 1988, 114, prophecy 71): Fulgor auri oculos intuentium excaecabit. Candebit argentum in circuitu et diuersa torcularia uexabit. Imposito uino, inebriabuntur mortales postpositoque caelo in terram respicient ‘The glint of gold will blind the eyes of those who behold it. Silver will gleam as it passes round and trouble various wine-presses. When the wine has been served, mortals befuddled with drink will neglect the heavens and gaze at the ground’ (cf. Reeve and Wright 2007, 158). From this point Geoffrey draws upon the dire cosmological prodigies and the astrologer’s prophecies in Lucan’s Pharsalia I 522-695 (Tatlock 1950, 405-6, citing Rydberg 1881). Whereas Geoffrey constructs a progression from the circulation of the silver cup to the drunkenness of the company and their neglect of the heavens in favour of earthly things, Gunnlaugr appears to treat drunkenness as a separate issue, obscuring its relation to the silver of the cup: for a later instance of invective against silver cf. Nik (Unger 1877 II, 101): silfrpenningar blinduðu þin augu steypandi þik fram i þvilika glæpsku ‘silver pennies blinded your eyes, plunging you into such sin [i.e. avarice]’.
sources
Text is based on reconstruction from the base text and variant apparatus and may contain alternative spellings and other normalisations not visible in the manuscript text. Transcriptions may not have been checked and should not be cited.
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AM 544 4° (Hb) — 50v/9 - 50v/11
imagesMvn eð hvita sil | fr havlldvm granda ok gvll gera gvmna blinda himni hafna en a havðr sia svikr | ofdryckia yta mengi
(VEÞ)
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