GunnLeif Merl I 28^VIII

‘Ok ôttungar         ins ítra grams
laða at lofðungi         landi ok þegnum.
En eptir þat         orms ins hvíta
verðr meira vald         en verit hafði.

‘Ok ôttungar ins ítra grams laða landi ok þegnum at lofðungi. En eptir þat verðr vald ins hvíta orms meira en hafði verit.

‘And the descendants of the illustrious king will attract land and subjects to the ruler. But after that the power of the white snake will become greater than it had been.

Mss: Hb(51r) (Bret)

Editions: Skj AII, 25, Skj BII, 29, Skald II, 18; Bret 1848-9, II, 48 (Bret st. 96); Hb 1892-6, 278-9; Merl 2012, 148.

Notes: [All]: Cf. DGB 112 (Reeve and Wright 2007, 145.43-4; cf. Wright 1988, 102, prophecy 3): Sex posteri eius sequentur sceptrum, sed post ipsos exsurget Germanicus uermis ‘His six successors will wield the sceptre, but after them the German [i.e. Germanic] worm will rise’ (Reeve and Wright 2007, 144). The idea of ‘six’ is absent from Merl. The variant reading sed, for sex, is found in mss O and G (Reeve and Wright 2007, 145; cf. xlv and xlvii for identifications of these mss); Gunnlaugr’s copy-text may have been related to them, but polygenetic error is also thinkable (Reeve and Wright 2007, xviii). Equivalents of the term ‘sceptre’ do not occur in Merl (cf. I 33). In reckoning with an increase in territorial sway on the part of Arthur’s successors, Gunnlaugr may have drawn on the narrative in DGB XI (J. S. Eysteinsson 1953-7, 100; for text see Reeve and Wright 2007, 254-5). — [3-4] laða landi ok þegnum at lofðungi ‘will attract land and subjects to the ruler’: Among possible explanations for sg. ‘ruler’ here are that it alludes to Arthur’s status as perpetual king (cryptically referred to in I 26/7-8) or that it is used pars pro toto for ‘royal line/dynasty’.

References

1. Bibliography
2. Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
3. 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.
4. Eysteinsson, J. S. 1953-7. ‘The Relationship of Merlínússpá and Geoffrey of Monmouth’s Historia’. SBVS 14, 95-112.
5. Bret 1848-9 = Jón Sigurðsson. 1848-9. ‘Trójumanna saga ok Breta sögur, efter Hauksbók, med dansk Oversættelse’. ÅNOH 1848, 3-215; 1849, 3-145.
6. 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.
7. Wright, Neil, ed. 1988. The Historia Regum Britannie of Geoffrey of Monmouth. II. The First Variant Version: A Critical Edition. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer.
8. Merl 2012 = Horst, Simone, ed. 2012. Merlínússpá. Merlins Prophezeiung. Munich: Herbert Utz Verlag.
9. Internal references
10. 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 23 April 2024)