Sigv Lv 26^I

Alfífu mun ævi
ungr drengr muna lengi,
es oxamat ôtum
inni, skaf sem hafrar.
Annat vas, þás Ôleifr
ógnbandaðr réð landi;
hverr átti þá hrósa
hjalmþornuðu korni.

Ungr drengr mun lengi muna ævi Alfífu, es ôtum oxamat inni, sem hafrar skaf. Vas annat, þás Ôleifr, {ógnbandaðr}, réð landi; hverr átti þá hrósa hjalmþornuðu korni.

A young fellow will long remember the days of Álfífa (Ælfgifu), when we ate cattle fodder indoors, as goats [eat] peeled bark. It was otherwise when Óláfr, {the battle-gesturer} [WARRIOR], ruled the country; everyone then had to praise the rick-dried grain.

Mss: DG8(103r) (ÓHLeg); Bb(202rb), Flat(129va), Tóm(163r) (ÓH); Ágr(13vb) (Ágr)

Readings: [1] Alfífu: so all others, ‘[…]lfiuu’ DG8;    mun: man DG8;    ævi: arfi Tóm    [3] es (‘er’): so Bb, Flat, Ágr, þar er DG8, þá er Tóm;    ôtum: ôtu Ágr    [4] inni skaf: inni skap Tóm, ‘iniskaf’ Ágr;    sem hafrar: ‘sem hafarar’ Flat, hafta Tóm    [6] ógn‑: ǫgn‑ Bb, Ágr;    ‑bandaðr: so Bb, Ágr, ‑bannaðr DG8, ‑bráðr er Flat, ‑bráðr um Tóm;    réð: ræð Ágr;    landi: so Bb, Ágr, lǫndum DG8, láði Flat, Tóm    [7] hverr: hvert Tóm;    hrósa: ‘hrꜹsa’ Ágr    [8] hjalmþornuðu: hjalmr þornuðu Bb, hjalmþornaðu fræ DG8, hjalmþorns freku Flat, hjalm þorn fræri Tóm, hjalmar hlǫðnu Ágr;    korni: borin or borni Tóm

Editions: Skj AI, 274, Skj BI, 253, Skald I, 130, NN §1877, 3069B; ÓHLeg 1849, 75, 121, ÓHLeg 1922, 91, ÓHLeg 1982, 208-9, Fms 5, 209-10, 219-20, Fms 12, 111, Flat 1860-8, II, 393, ÓH 1941, II, 837, 838, 839, n.; Fms 10, 400, Fms 12, 229, Ágr 1880, 51, ÍF 29, 31, Ágr 2008, 44-5; Jón Skaptason 1983, 210, 327.

Context: It is said that Norway fares pitiably under the reign of Sveinn Álfífuson/Knútsson and his mother Álfífa, and the people live more on fodder than on food for human beings because there is no plenty in the land during their day, as may be heard in this stanza that Sigvatr composed.

Notes: [All]: Olsen (1945b, 188) perceives a connection between this stanza and Eyv Lv 12, concerning the lean years under Queen Gunnhildr, and indeed the two stanzas share references to goats eating bark (and to being indoors). — [1] Alfífu ‘of Álfífa (Ælfgifu)’: Ælfgifu or Ælfgyfu of Northampton, the English concubine of Knútr inn ríki Sveinsson and mother of Sveinn Álfífuson, who ruled in Norway 1029/30-1035 (see M. Campbell 1971). — [3] es ôtum oxamat ‘when we ate cattle fodder’: Kock (NN §3069B) would rearrange the words to read oxa mat es ôtum, on the ground that the frumhending (the first part of an internal rhyme) is not otherwise found in the fourth position except in lines of Type E. — [4] sem hafrar skaf ‘as goats [eat] peeled bark’: Bark was used as fodder for goats and cattle. Kock (NN §1877) objects to this interpretation, saying that the meaning is instead that ‘we had to content ourselves with fodder’. He also objects that inni ‘indoors’ is meaningless in the present arrangement, and he would instead form a cpd inniskaf (see Readings; so already Fms), referring to bark dried and brought in (i.e. brought home). But inni sufficiently conveys the meaning not that the people ate like cattle (outdoors) but that they had only fodder to put on their tables indoors. Such is the interpretation of Olsen (1945b, 189), who rejects the supposition that farmers ate bark. — [5] Ôleifr ‘Óláfr’: Gering (1912, 139) points out that Sigvatr otherwise never uses the name Áleifr/Ôleifr in the cadence of a line, because the second syllable is not unstressed. For this name he would instead read sonr Ôstu ‘son of Ásta’, i.e. Óláfr. On the faulty hending, see Note to Lv 1/7 egna. — [7] hverr átti þá hrósa ‘everyone then had to praise’: Due to the faulty hending, Gering (loc. cit.) would emend this line to halir ôttu þá hœla, with the same meaning. — [8] hjalmþornuðu korni ‘the rick-dried grain’: That is, the grain (korni) was plentiful, raked into ricks or heaps (hjalm-) and dried (-þornuðu).

References

1. Bibliography
2. Fms = Sveinbjörn Egilsson et al., eds. 1825-37. Fornmanna sögur eptir gömlum handritum útgefnar að tilhlutun hins norræna fornfræða fèlags. 12 vols. Copenhagen: Popp.
3. Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
4. NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
5. Campbell, Alistair. 1971. Skaldic Verse and Anglo-Saxon History: The Dorothea Coke Memorial Lecture in Northern Studies delivered 17 March 1970 at University College London. London: Lewis.
6. Flat 1860-8 = Gudbrand Vigfusson [Guðbrandur Vigfússon] and C. R. Unger, eds. 1860-8. Flateyjarbók. En samling af norske konge-sagaer med indskudte mindre fortællinger om begivenheder i og udenfor Norge samt annaler. 3 vols. Christiania (Oslo): Malling.
7. ÓH 1941 = Johnsen, Oscar Albert and Jón Helgason, eds. 1941. Saga Óláfs konungs hins helga: Den store saga om Olav den hellige efter pergamenthåndskrift i Kungliga biblioteket i Stockholm nr. 2 4^to med varianter fra andre håndskrifter. 2 vols. Det norske historiske kildeskriftfond skrifter 53. Oslo: Dybwad.
8. ÓHLeg 1982 = Heinrichs, Anne et al., eds and trans. 1982. Olafs saga hins helga: Die ‘Legendarische Saga’ über Olaf den Heiligen (Hs. Delagard. saml. nr. 8^II). Heidelberg: Winter.
9. ÍF 29 = Ágrip af Nóregskonunga sǫgum; Fagrskinna—Nóregs konungatal. Ed. Bjarni Einarsson. 1985.
10. Jón Skaptason. 1983. ‘Material for an Edition and Translation of the Poems of Sigvat Þórðarson, skáld’. Ph.D. thesis. State University of New York at Stony Brook. DAI 44: 3681A.
11. ÓHLeg 1922 = Johnsen, Oscar Albert, ed. 1922. Olafs saga hins helga efter pergamenthåndskrift i Uppsala Universitetsbibliotek, Delagardieske samling nr. 8^II. Det norske historiske kildeskriftfond skrifter 47. Kristiania (Oslo): Dybwad.
12. Ágr 2008 = Driscoll, Matthew J., ed. and trans. 2008. Ágrip af Nóregskonungasǫgum: A Twelfth-Century Synoptic History of the Kings of Norway. 2nd edn. Viking Society for Northern Research Text Series 10. University College London: Viking Society for Northern Research.
13. Ágr 1880 = Dahlerup, Verner, ed. 1880. Ágrip af Noregs konunga sögum: Diplomatarisk udgave. SUGNL 2. Copenhagen: Møller.
14. Gering, Hugo. 1912. ‘Beiträge zu der Metrik und Erklärung skaldischer Dichtungen’. ZDP 44, 133-69.
15. Olsen, Magnus. 1945b. ‘Skaldevers om nods-år nordenfjells’. In Festskrift til Konrad Nielsen på 70-årsdagen, 28. august 1945. Studia Septentrionalia 2. Oslo: Brøgger, 176-92.
16. ÓHLeg 1849 = Keyser, R. and C. R. Unger. eds. 1849. Olafs saga hins helga: En kort saga om kong Olaf den Hellige fra anden halvdeel af det tolfte aarhundrede. Efter et gammelt pergaments-haandskrift i Universitets-bibliotheket i Upsala. Christiania (Oslo): Feilberg & Landmark.
17. Internal references
18. Russell Poole (ed.) 2012, ‘Eyvindr skáldaspillir Finnsson, Lausavísur 12’ in Diana Whaley (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 1: From Mythical Times to c. 1035. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 1. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 231.