KrákÁsl Lv 2^VIII (Ragn 3 [b])

Vammlausa skaltu, vísi,
ef viltu griðum þyrma,
— heim höfum hilmi sóttan —
heðan mik fara láta.

Vísi, skaltu láta mik fara heðan vammlausa, ef viltu þyrma griðum; höfum sóttan hilmi heim.

Leader, you must let me go away unblemished, if you wish to keep to the terms of the safe-conduct; I have visited the ruler.

Mss: 1824b(58r), 147(106v) (Ragn); 762ˣ(2r)

Readings: [1] Vammlausa skaltu vísi: ‘Vamlau(sa skal)[…](si)’(?) 147    [2] ef viltu griðum þyrma: ‘[…] vil(l)tu (gridum þryma)’(?) 147    [3] heim höfum hilmi sóttan: ‘[…] (haufum hi)lmi s[…]ttan’(?) 147    [4] heðan mik fara: ‘h(ie)d(an) […] (fara)’(?) 147;    láta: so 762ˣ, látið 1824b, 147

Editions: Skj AII, 232, Skj BII, 252, Skald II, 131, NN §2338Fa; FSN 1, 247 (Ragn ch. 5), Ragn 1891, 185 (ch. 5), Ragn 1906-8, 126, 197 (ch. 5), Ragn 1944, 36-7 (ch. 5), FSGJ 1, 235 (Ragn ch. 5), Ragn 1985, 112-13 (ch. 5), Ragn 2003, 21 (ch. 5), CPB II, 347.

Context: Kráka-Áslaug resists Ragnarr’s advances, pointing out that he should keep to the terms of the safe-conduct she had been granted in visiting him.

Notes: [All]: See Notes to Ragn 3a, above, on the prose introduction to that half-stanza in 1824b and on what appears in 147 to be the prose introduction to the present half-stanza. — [2] griðum ‘the terms of the safe-conduct’: Lit. ‘the safe-conduct’. In the saga prose (Ragn 1906-8, 125), Kráka-Áslaug insisted on a safe-conduct for herself and her companion when visiting Ragnarr. When she meets him on board his ship, however, the dog accompanying her bites Ragnarr’s outstretched hand, and is promptly killed by his men, who strangle it with a bowstring, thus showing scant respect for the safe-conduct, as the saga indicates. — [4] láta ‘let’: All eds apart from Rafn (who nevertheless notes it as a variant in FSN) and Vigfusson and Powell (CPB) adopt the reading láta (so 762ˣ) as opposed to 1824b’s látið. The 2nd pers. pl. (imp.?) form látið finds no place in the syntax of the half-stanza, whereas the inf. láta follows on from the modal auxiliary skaltu ‘you must’ in l. 1 hardly less naturally than the inf. þyrma ‘keep to, observe’, follows on from the modal auxiliary viltu ‘you wish’ in l. 2.

References

1. Bibliography
2. FSN = Rafn, Carl Christian, ed. 1829-30. Fornaldar sögur nordrlanda. 3 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. CPB = Gudbrand Vigfusson [Guðbrandur Vigfússon] and F. York Powell, eds. 1883. Corpus poeticum boreale: The Poetry of the Old Northern Tongue from the Earliest Times to the Thirteenth Century. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon. Rpt. 1965, New York: Russell & Russell.
6. FSGJ = Guðni Jónsson, ed. 1954. Fornaldar sögur norðurlanda. 4 vols. [Reykjavík]: Íslendingasagnaútgáfan.
7. Ragn 1906-8 = Olsen 1906-8, 111-222.
8. Ragn 1944 = Eskeland, Severin, ed. and trans. 1944. Soga om Ragnar Lodbrok med Kråka-kvædet. Norrøne bokverk 16. 2nd ed. Oslo: Det Norske Samlaget. [1st ed. 1914].
9. Ragn 1985 = Örnólfur Thorsson 1985, 101-53.
10. Ragn 1891 = 2nd edn (pp. 175-224) of Ragn as ed. in Valdimar Ásmundarson 1885-9, I.
11. Ragn 2003 = Ebel, Uwe, ed. 2003. Ragnars saga loðbrókar. Texte des skandinavischen Mittelalters 4. Vol. II of Ebel 1997-2003.
12. Internal references
13. 2017, ‘ Anonymous, Ragnars saga loðbrókar’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 616. <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=81> (accessed 2 May 2024)
14. Rory McTurk (ed.) 2017, ‘Ragnars saga loðbrókar 3 (Ragnarr loðbrók, Lausavísur 2)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 630.