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skaldic

Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages

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Þjóð Haustl 2III

Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.) 2017, ‘Þjóðólfr ór Hvini, Haustlǫng 2’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 434.

Þjóðólfr ór HviniHaustlǫng
123

text and translation

Segjǫndum fló sagna
snótar ulfr at móti
í gemlis ham gǫmlum
glamma ófyrskǫmmu.
Settisk ǫrn, þars æsir
ár-Gefnar mar bôru
— vasa byrgitýr bjarga
bleyði vændr — á seyði.

{Ulfr snótar} fló glamma ófyrskǫmmu at móti {segjǫndum sagna} í gǫmlum ham gemlis. Ǫrn settisk, þars æsir bôru {mar {ár-Gefnar}} á seyði; {{bjarga byrgi}týr} vasa vændr bleyði.
 
‘The wolf of the woman [= Þjazi] flew noisily no short time ago for a meeting with the commanders of the troops [= Æsir] in the old shape of an eagle. The eagle alighted where the Æsir were putting the horse of fruitfulness-Gefn <= Freyja> [= Gefjun <goddess> > OX] in an earth-oven; the god of the refuge of crags [(lit. ‘refuge-god of crags’) CAVE > GIANT = Þjazi] was not to be accused of cowardice.

notes and context

As for st. 1. In addition, ll. 1-4 are cited in mss R, , U, A, B and C in a section of Skm that lists poetic terms for eagles.

[5-8]: According to Snorri’s prose narrative, three of the Æsir, Óðinn, Hœnir and Loki, were travelling away from Ásgarðr and ran short of food. They managed to kill an ox and prepared it for cooking in an earth-oven, but the oven would not cook the meat. Eventually, they became aware of an eagle (Þjazi) sitting in an oak-tree above them, and he admitted preventing the food from cooking (presumably by means of sorcery), demanding his fill of the ox in return for letting the meat cook. In support of the notion that Þjazi used sorcery to stop the ox cooking is an invocation on a rune stick from Bergen (Run N B252VI) in which a supernatural being named Ími is exhorted to prevent food from cooking (in the þulur Ímr is a heiti for ‘giant’ and ‘wolf’; see Þul Jǫtna II 1/4 and Þul Vargs 1/9).

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: Þjóðólfr ór Hvini, enn hvinverski, 2. Haustlǫng 2: AI, 16, BI, 14, Skald I, 9-10, NN §§1810, 2004, 2504; SnE 1848-87, I, 306-7, 492-3, II, 354, 457, 544, 598, III, 40-1, SnE 1931, 111, 173, SnE 1998, I, 30-1, 92.

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