GunnLeif Merl I 99VIII
Russell Poole (ed.) 2017, ‘Breta saga 167 (Gunnlaugr Leifsson, Merlínusspá I 99)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 131.
text and translation
Rekr inn dýri Dávíð konungr
margfalda spô, ok mælir svá:
‘Fjǫll munu fagna ok inn fríði skógr,
en skœðar ár skella lófum,
ok dalir ymna dróttni syngja.’
Inn dýri Dávíð konungr rekr margfalda spô, ok mælir svá: ‘Fjǫll ok inn fríði skógr munu fagna, en skœðar ár skella lófum, ok dalir syngja ymna dróttni.’
‘The noble King David utters manifold prophecy and speaks thus: ‘The mountains and the fair forest will rejoice, and dangerous rivers clap their hands and the valleys sing hymns to the Lord.’ ’
notes and context
Cf. Ps. XCVII.8: Flumina plaudent manu simul montes laudabunt ‘The rivers shall clap their hands, the mountains shall rejoice together’. The mentions of the ‘forest’ and the ‘valleys’ seem to represent free variation; for the concept of forest as speaker, cf. II 15/5‑8. The psalms of David were regarded as prophesying the coming of the Messiah, but this would not have been the totality of their perceived relevance to an Icelandic audience; Sv (ÍF 30, 152) represents King Sverrir himself as claiming that the prophecies of the psálmaskáldit ‘the poet of the psalms’, i.e. King David, have come true in Sverrir’s own days.
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) — 52v/35 - 52v/36
imagesRekr en dyri david konungr margfallda spa ok mælir sva fioll mvnv fa | gna ok en friði skogr enn skæðar ár skella lofvm · ok dalir ymna drottni syngia
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