GunnLeif Merl I 58VIII
Russell Poole (ed.) 2017, ‘Breta saga 126 (Gunnlaugr Leifsson, Merlínusspá I 58)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 95.
‘Es í reiðingu ráð þjóðkonungs
inn fyrra hlut fylkis ævi.
En inn øfri aldr auðvarpaðar
líkar helgum himinstilli vel.
‘Ráð þjóðkonungs es í reiðingu inn fyrra hlut ævi fylkis. En inn øfri aldr {auðvarpaðar} líkar {helgum himinstilli} vel.
‘The behaviour of the mighty king will waver for the first part of the leader’s life. But the later life {of the wealth-flinger} [GENEROUS MAN] will please {the holy ruler of heaven} [= God] well.
Mss: Hb(52r) (Bret)
Editions: Skj AII, 30, Skj BII, 35-6, Skald II, 22; Bret 1848-9, II, 59 (Bret st. 126); Hb 1892-6, 280; Merl 2012, 172.
Notes: [All]: Cf. DGB 114 (Reeve and Wright 2007, 149.101-2; cf. Wright 1988, 105, prophecy 17): Principium eius uago affectui succumbet, sed finis ipsius ad superos conuolabit ‘His beginning will be weakened by uncertain desires, but his end will ascend to the heavens’ (cf. Reeve and Wright 2007, 148).
References
- Bibliography
- Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
- 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.
- Bret 1848-9 = Jón Sigurðsson. 1848-9. ‘Trójumanna saga ok Breta sögur, efter Hauksbók, med dansk Oversættelse’. ÅNOH 1848, 3-215; 1849, 3-145.
- 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.
- Wright, Neil, ed. 1988. The Historia Regum Britannie of Geoffrey of Monmouth. II. The First Variant Version: A Critical Edition. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer.
- Merl 2012 = Horst, Simone, ed. 2012. Merlínússpá. Merlins Prophezeiung. Munich: Herbert Utz Verlag.
- Internal references
- 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)
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