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Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages

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Anon Krm 29VIII

Rory McTurk (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Poems, Krákumál 29’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 775.

Anonymous PoemsKrákumál
2829

text and translation

Fýsumz hins at hætta.
Heim bjóða mér dísir,
þær er frá Herjans höllu
hefr Óðinn mér sendar.
Glaðr skal ek öl með ásum
í öndvegi drekka;
lífs eru liðnar vánir;
læjandi skal ek deyja.

Fýsumz hins at hætta. Dísir bjóða mér heim, þær er Óðinn hefr sendar mér frá {höllu Herjans}. Glaðr skal ek drekka öl með ásum í öndvegi; vánir lífs eru liðnar; læjandi skal ek deyja.
 
‘I wish to make an end. Dísir <minor female deities> are welcoming me home, the ones Óðinn has sent me from the hall of Herjan <= Óðinn [= Valhǫll]. I shall gladly drink ale with the gods in the high seat; hopes of life are past; I’ll die laughing.

notes and context

This stanza resembles st. 23 in consisting of only eight lines, but differs from it, as well as from all other stanzas in Krm, in not beginning with a refrain in the first line. While in the case of st. 23 it is conceivable that two lines were lost in the course of the poem’s transmission, this is less likely to be the case here. There is a certain dramatic appropriateness in the absence of the refrain from this, the final stanza of the poem. Up to this point the speaker has been mainly concerned with events of the past, something reinforced by the pret. tense of the refrain Hjuggu vér með hjörvi ‘We hewed with the sword’, and also by the fact that in the penultimate stanza, st. 28, he looks back for the last time on his career in claiming to have taken part in fifty-one battles. Now, however, in the final stanza, his mind is on the future: on the drinking of ale after death in Valhǫll, to which the dísir are inviting him. — [5-6]: The speaker is here anticipating drinking ale (ǫl) with the gods (æsir) in Valhǫll, cf. first Note to st. 25/5 above. As mentioned there, Grí 36, quoted in Gylf (SnE 2005, 30), gives the information that valkyries bring ale (ǫl) to the einherjar in Valhǫll. — [8]: This line shows consonantless skothending, with each of the participating diphthongs <æ> and <ey> being followed by the glide <j> rather than by a consonant (cf. Kahle 1892, 23; Kuhn 1983, 77-8, and cf. the first Note to st. 2/10, above). — [8]: Other examples in Scandinavian tradition of heroes dying laughing are Saxo 2015, I, ii. 7. 19, pp. 134-7 and the Icelandic Bjarkarímur (Finnur Jónsson 1904b, 161), where the death of one Agnerus/Agnarr is described, as discussed in the Introduction, and, most famously, Akv 24 and Am 65, where Hǫgni Gjúkason laughs as he dies at the hands of King Atli. Mention may also be made of the manner of Hálfr Hjǫrleifsson’s death as envisaged in Innsteinn Innkv 17/5-8 (Hálf 37), and of the case in Arngrímur Jónsson’s Rerum Danicarum fragmenta ‘Fragments of Danish history’ (1596) (Jakob Benediktsson 1950-7, I, 341, cf. IV, 233), of Áli inn frœkni ‘the Bold’ who ‘breathed his last while laughing’ (ridens animam efflavit). While the laughter is unmistakably heroic in all these cases, in Akv (though not in Am) it is no doubt also motivated by Hǫgni’s knowledge that after his death and that of his brother Gunnarr the secret of the Niflung hoard’s whereabouts will never be told.

readings

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.

editions and texts

Skj: Anonyme digte og vers [XII], H. Krákumál 29: AI, 649, BI, 656, Skald I, 321; Rafn 1826, 24-25, 151-2, Pfeiffer 1860, 127, CPB II, 345, Wisén 1886-9, I, 66, Krm 1891, 228, Finnur Jónsson 1893b, 91, Finnur Jónsson 1905, 157; Ragn 1906-8, 189.

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