BjRagn Lv 3^VIII (Ragn 28)

Rory McTurk (ed.) 2017, ‘Ragnars saga loðbrókar 28 (Bjǫrn Ragnarsson, Lausavísur 3)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 680.

introduction

This stanza and Ragn 29, both spoken by Björn járnsíða, clearly belong together and occur only in 1824b. They follow on from a passage in the prose (Ragn 1906-8, 159-60) describing Ragnarr’s abortive invasion of England.

text and translation

notes and context

Ragnarr’s sons are on their way back to the Danish realm from southern Europe. While they are still en route, Bjǫrn járnsíða recites this and the next stanza.

[3]: The emendation to pres. læz ‘declares himself (to be about to die)’ from ms. ‘lez’ (pret.) seems necessary here to provide consistency with pres. flýgr ‘flies’ in l.1, and with the pres. inf. munu ‘be about to …’, which in this line is preferable metrically to the past inf. (mundu) as an emended form of ms. ‘-mvn’. The emendations to this line in the present edn follow those adopted by the eds of CPB (who, however, are exceptional in omitting af ‘of (hunger)’ from l. 3), and by all other eds apart from Rafn (FSN), who emends problematically to lèzt heill mun af hùngri. — [5-8]: Line 6 presents a problem in that the ms. lacks a word beginning with <s> that would supply the head-stave determining the s- alliteration in l. 5 (and would bring the number of syllables in the line to six). (a) The CPB eds and Rafn (FSN) supply seggi by emendation in l. 6 and read seggi hvar vér létum, disregarding ms. ok and presumably taking seggi, acc. pl. of seggr m. ‘man, warrior (-companion)’ as the direct object of létum ‘(we) left’, to give the meaning ‘where we left warriors behind’ (CPB translates simply ‘where we fought’). This would imply that ll. 5-6 and ll. 7-8 each consist of a self-contained syntactic unit. (b) Olsen (Ragn 1906-8, 213-14), on the other hand, followed here by Eskeland (Ragn 1944), Guðni Jónsson (FSGJ) and Ebel (Ragn 2003), supplies by emendation sára, gen. pl. of sár n. ‘wound’ at the beginning of l. 6, also disregarding ok in that line, taking sára ‘of wounds’ as the determinant in a kenning with dögg f. ‘dew’ in l. 8 as its base-word, i.e. ‘dew of wounds [BLOOD]’, and leaving l. 7 as syntactically free-standing. This would imply that létum ‘(we) left behind’ in l. 6 could alternatively be translated as ‘(we) let flow’, with sára … dögg ‘the dew of wounds’, i.e. ‘blood’ as its object. (c) Finnur Jónsson (Skj B) and Kock (Skald) retain ms. ok in l. 6 and supply by emendation sé ‘(let him) see’ (as does also Örnólfur Thorsson (Ragn 1985), with Modern Icelandic spelling sjái), 3rd pers. sg. pres. subj. of sjá ‘see’ (so also the present ed.). Finnur and Kock differ, however, in their view of the object of létum. (d) Finnur sees dreyra, acc. sg. of dreyri m. ‘blood’, as its object, to be taken together with ór skýlihöggum ‘from oblique axe-strokes’ in l. 8. He brackets off þar fær hann dauðs manns in l. 7 as well as dögg in l. 8 and assumes an unusual kenning, to give ‘there he (the raven) will find the dew of a dead man [BLOOD]’. (e) Kock (NN §§1276, 1462), on the other hand, finds that the relative simplicity of the Ragn stanzas in general makes Finnur’s reading of ll. 6-8 unlikely. Drawing attention to Krm 12/2-3, which appear to speak of brown dew, i.e. blood, splashing down from swords (Hrunði dögg af sverðum | brún ‘Brown dew splashed down from swords’), he regards dögg ‘dew’ when juxtaposed with ór skýlihöggum ‘from axe-strokes’ (cf. Krm’s af sverðum ‘from swords’) as yielding the meaning ‘blood’ and takes it as the object of létum, leaving l. 7 as syntactically independent. Örnólfur Thorsson (Ragn 1985) clearly follows Kock here translating létum dögg as okkur blæddi ‘we bled’. (f) Finnur’s reading of the lines is on balance the one preferred here, mainly on the grounds that it allows for a more effective poetic expression for blood, dauðs manns … dögg ‘a dead man’s dew [BLOOD]’, than either the dauðs manns dreyra ‘a dead man’s blood’ of l. 7 or the unqualified dögg ‘dew’ of l. 8 that Kock’s reading would require.

readings

• [3] læz heill munu: ‘lez hellmvn’ 1824b
• [4] valr: vals 1824b
• [4] deyja: ‘dey[…]’ 1824b
• [6] sé: om. 1824b
• [7] dreyra: ‘dr[…]ra’ 1824b

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.

• NKS 1824 b 4° (1824b) — 72v/7 - 72v/10

  Hér flýgr hverjan morgin
  hress um borgir þessar
  (†lez hellmvn† af hungri)
  heiðar vals (of †dey[…]†).
  Hann fari suðr um sanda
  ok , hvar vér létum
  (þar fær hann dauðs manns) †dr[…]ra†
  (dögg) ór skýlihöggum.

  her flygr hverian m | orgínn. hreꜱ of borgir þessar. lez hellmvn af hvngri. heidar vals of dey[...] | hann farí ꜱvdr vm sanða. ok hvar ver letum. þar fęʀ hann dauds mannz dr[...] | ra davgg or skylí havggvm.

  (RM)

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