ǪrvOdd Ævdr 40^VIII (Ǫrv 110)

Réð mik ór vagni         víf at kveðja,
ok þær hoddum mér         hétu góðum.
Bað mik snót koma         sumar it næsta;
léz þá at launum         leita mundu.

Víf réð at kveðja mik ór vagni, ok þær hétu mér góðum hoddum. Snót bað mik koma it næsta sumar; léz þá mundu leita at launum.

A woman greeted me from a waggon, and they promised me fine treasures. The lady bade me come the following summer; she said she would then look for rewards.

Mss: 343a(81r), 471(95r), 173ˣ(63rb) (Ǫrv)

Readings: [2] víf: added above the line 471    [3] hoddum: so 471, 173ˣ, ‘hauddum’ 343a    [4] hétu: hættu 471    [6] sumar it (‘sumar hit’): sumarit 471, 173ˣ    [7] at: om. 471

Editions: Skj AII, 313, Skj BII, 332, Skald II, 178, NN §2607; Ǫrv 1888, 203, FSGJ 2, 352.

Notes: [All]: This stanza diverges considerably from the prose text in all its versions. In them, after killing Ǫlvǫr’s menfolk, Oddr rages through the forest, pulling up bushes by their roots in his fury, until he comes upon an underground chamber beneath one of the bushes. In it he finds some women, one of whom is more beautiful than the others. This turns out to be Ǫlvǫr. Oddr tries to abduct her, but she and her companions resist. She promises to make him a magic shirt if he comes back the following summer. — [1-2]: Skj B emends mik ‘me’ (l. 1) to ek ‘I’, which is suffixed to the verb réð to make it 1st pers. sg. pret. (réðk) rather than 3rd pers. sg. pret., with víf ‘woman’ as subject, as here. Skj B construes: jeg talte til kvinden i vognen ‘I spoke to the woman in the waggon’. However, the mss’ unemended version as presented here (also in Ǫrv 1888, Skald, NN §2607 and FSGJ) makes better sense, partly because it foreshadows the agency of Ǫlvǫr in the second helmingr and partly because it enables a closer translation of ór vagni ‘from a waggon’ (rather than ‘in a waggon’). The change of person from sg. to pl. in ll. 3-4 (þær ‘they’ f. nom. pl.) presumably refers to Ǫlvǫr and her female companions, who are mentioned in the prose texts.

References

1. Bibliography
2. Skj B = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1912-15b. Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning. B: Rettet tekst. 2 vols. Copenhagen: Villadsen & Christensen. Rpt. 1973. Copenhagen: Rosenkilde & Bagger.
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. FSGJ = Guðni Jónsson, ed. 1954. Fornaldar sögur norðurlanda. 4 vols. [Reykjavík]: Íslendingasagnaútgáfan.
6. Ǫrv 1888 = Boer, R. C., ed. 1888. Ǫrvar-Odds saga. Leiden: Brill.