Ormr Woman 4III
Russell Poole (ed.) 2017, ‘Ormr Steinþórsson, Poem about a woman 4’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 328.
Skorða ‘The prop’
(not checked:)
1. skorða (noun f.; °-u; -ur): prop
kennings
Skorða fjarðbeins‘The prop of the fjord-bone ’
= WOMAN
the fjord-bone → STONE
The prop of the STONE → WOMAN
vas ‘was’
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2. vera (verb): be, is, was, were, are, am
í ‘in’
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í (prep.): in, into
notes
[1] fœrð í ‘clothed in’: Lit. ‘conveyed into’.
fǫt ‘garments’
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fat (noun n.; °; *-): garments
fœrð ‘clothed’
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2. fœra (verb): bring
notes
[1] fœrð í ‘clothed in’: Lit. ‘conveyed into’.
fjarð ‘of the fjord’
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fjǫrðr (noun m.): fjord < fjarðbein (noun n.): [fjord-bone]
kennings
Skorða fjarðbeins‘The prop of the fjord-bone ’
= WOMAN
the fjord-bone → STONE
The prop of the STONE → WOMAN
fjarð ‘of the fjord’
(not checked:)
fjǫrðr (noun m.): fjord < fjarðbein (noun n.): [fjord-bone]
kennings
Skorða fjarðbeins‘The prop of the fjord-bone ’
= WOMAN
the fjord-bone → STONE
The prop of the STONE → WOMAN
beins ‘bone’
(not checked:)
bein (noun n.; °-s; -): bone < fjarðbein (noun n.): [fjord-bone]
kennings
Skorða fjarðbeins‘The prop of the fjord-bone ’
= WOMAN
the fjord-bone → STONE
The prop of the STONE → WOMAN
beins ‘bone’
(not checked:)
bein (noun n.; °-s; -): bone < fjarðbein (noun n.): [fjord-bone]
kennings
Skorða fjarðbeins‘The prop of the fjord-bone ’
= WOMAN
the fjord-bone → STONE
The prop of the STONE → WOMAN
afar ‘exceedingly’
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afar (adv.): exceedingly < afarhreinn (adj.)
[2] afar‑: ‘anar’ W(109)
hrein ‘clean’
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2. hreinn (adj.; °compar. hreinari/hreinni, superl. hreinastr/hreinstr): pure < afarhreinn (adj.)
[2] ‑hrein: hreins C, teins W(109)
nýri ‘with new’
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nýr (adj.; °nýjan; compar. nýrri, superl. nýjastr): new
[3] nýri: nýtri A
notes
[3] sǫng ‘sang’: In the present edn this reading (3rd pers. sg. pret. indic. of syngja), found in all mss except A, is retained, in view of its much stronger support in the paradosis and its status as the lectio difficilior as contrasted with slǫng ‘slung, cast’. The subject of the verb is nadd-Freyr ‘the spear-Freyr’ (l. 3), while of Hrist mjaðar ‘about the Hrist of mead’ (l. 4) is understood as the theme of the ‘song’. The song could be a lament (grátr) over the dead woman. The word order is more complex in this interpretation than if A is followed, but it is not greater than the complexity seen in st. 2. All previous eds adopt the reading slǫng ‘slung’ (< slyngva), uniquely attested in A. The word order for the stanza as a whole is then as follows: Skorða fjarðbeins vas fœrð í afarhrein fǫt; nadd-Freyr slǫng nýri nisting of Hrist mjaðar ‘The prop of the fjord-bone [STONE > WOMAN] was clothed in exceedingly clean garments; the spear-Freyr <god> [WARRIOR] cast new stitching about the Hrist <valkyrie> of mead [WOMAN]’. However, a reliance on A seems unwarranted. The reading nýtri ‘useful, good’ (f. dat. sg.), likewise found only in A, for nýri ‘new’ (l. 3) in all other mss, is unlikely to be original because it entails loss of skothending with Freyr. This raises the suspicion that both nýtri and slǫng are innovations, perhaps the product of scribal enhancement.
nadd- ‘the spear-’
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naddr (noun m.; °-s; -ar): spear, point < naddfreyr (noun m.)
kennings
nadd-Freyr‘the spear-Freyr ’
= WARRIOR
the spear-Freyr → WARRIOR
Freyr ‘Freyr’
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Freyr (noun m.): (a god) < naddfreyr (noun m.)
kennings
nadd-Freyr‘the spear-Freyr ’
= WARRIOR
the spear-Freyr → WARRIOR
nisting ‘stitching’
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nisting (noun f.): [stitching]
notes
[4] nisting ‘stitching’: This word occurs five times, only here in poetry, and always in the sense of ‘stitching, sewing’ (LP, Fritzner: nisting; cf. citations in ONP: nisting). The extended sense ‘garment’ posited uniquely for this stanza by Sveinbjörn Egilsson (LP (1860): nisting), followed by Guðbrandur Vigfússon (CPB II, 323) and Finnur Jónsson (Skj B, LP: nisting), is not warranted, since fǫt ‘garments’ can be envisaged as undergoing ‘stitching’ or ‘sewing’ to adapt them to fit the dead woman, perhaps by way of being ‘taken in’ or ‘gathered’. The case of nisting is dat. (instrumental), indicating the manner in which or means by which the corpse is conveyed into the fǫt. In previous eds it is taken as the dat. object of slǫng (ms. A). Such flexionless dat. forms start to supplant older forms in -u in the C11th or 12th (Finnur Jónsson 1901, 40-1; ANG §376).
of ‘about’
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3. of (prep.): around, from; too
mjaðar ‘of mead’
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mjǫðr (noun m.; °dat. miði): mead
kennings
Hrist mjaðar.‘the Hrist of mead. ’
= WOMAN
the Hrist of mead. → WOMAN
Hrist ‘the Hrist’
(not checked:)
Hrist (noun f.): Hrist
kennings
Hrist mjaðar.‘the Hrist of mead. ’
= WOMAN
the Hrist of mead. → WOMAN
Interactive view: tap on words in the text for notes and glosses
In Skm (SnE) and LaufE the stanza is quoted to illustrate the use of the base-word skorð ‘prop’ in kennings for ‘woman’. In TGT it illustrates the use of inanimate metaphors for something animate (here, skorða fjarðbeins ‘prop of the fjord-bone [STONE > WOMAN]’).
This stanza, like st. 5, may contain elements of the Snæfríðr legend (for which see Introduction). In the Flat version of the story, a magical coverlet or shroud (blæja) called Svásanautr ‘Svási’s gift’ is draped over the woman upon her death and it prevents her body from putrefying (Flat 1860-8, I, 582).
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