Cookies on our website

We use cookies on this website, mainly to provide a secure browsing experience but also to collect statistics on how the website is used. You can find out more about the cookies we set, the information we store and how we use it on the cookies page.

Continue

skaldic

Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages

Menu Search

Anon Gát 3III

Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Poems, Gátur 3’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 635.

Anonymous PoemsGátur
234x

Þá ‘Then’

(not checked:)
2. þá (adv.): then

Close

‘saw’

(not checked:)
2. sjá (verb): see

Close

fljúga ‘fly’

(not checked:)
fljúga (verb): fly

Close

þriðja ‘a third’

(not checked:)
þriði (num. ordinal): third

Close

silki ‘silk’

(not checked:)
silki (noun n.): silk

notes

[3] saumat silki ‘sewn silk’: The clue resolves to tjald (n.) ‘tapestry’ or ‘bedhangings’, a homonym of tjaldr (m.) ‘oystercatcher’, Hæmatopus ostralegus (Þul Fugla 4/5). Árni Magnússon has added this solution above the line in 743ˣ.

Close

saumat ‘sewn’

(not checked:)
sauma (verb): sew

notes

[3] saumat silki ‘sewn silk’: The clue resolves to tjald (n.) ‘tapestry’ or ‘bedhangings’, a homonym of tjaldr (m.) ‘oystercatcher’, Hæmatopus ostralegus (Þul Fugla 4/5). Árni Magnússon has added this solution above the line in 743ˣ.

Close

ok ‘and’

(not checked:)
3. ok (conj.): and, but; also

Close

sænska ‘Swedish’

(not checked:)
sœnskr (adj.): Swedish

notes

[4] sænska menn ‘Swedish men’: In LP: sœnskr and Skj B, Finnur Jónsson suggests Helsingjar, inhabitants of Hälsingland (ON Helsingjaland), a district in Sweden, and helsingjar ‘barnacle geese’, which seems to be the likely solution. See Notes to Gát 2/5, above, and Þul Sverða 8/7. Ms. 743ˣ is not annotated here, but 1562ˣ glosses svanir ‘swans’, printed in SnE 1848, though how this fits the clue is not clear.

Close

menn ‘men’

(not checked:)
maðr (noun m.): man, person

notes

[4] sænska menn ‘Swedish men’: In LP: sœnskr and Skj B, Finnur Jónsson suggests Helsingjar, inhabitants of Hälsingland (ON Helsingjaland), a district in Sweden, and helsingjar ‘barnacle geese’, which seems to be the likely solution. See Notes to Gát 2/5, above, and Þul Sverða 8/7. Ms. 743ˣ is not annotated here, but 1562ˣ glosses svanir ‘swans’, printed in SnE 1848, though how this fits the clue is not clear.

Close

Gunnlaugs ‘Gunnlaugr’s’

(not checked:)
Gunnlaugr (noun m.): Gunnlaugr

notes

[5] bana Gunnlaugs ‘Gunnlaugr’s slayer’: In Gunnlaugs saga, the eponymous hero Gunnlaugr ormstunga ‘Serpent-tongue’ is killed in a duel by his opponent, Hrafn (hrafn ‘raven’). The solution is added above the line in 1562ˣ.

Close

bana ‘slayer’

(not checked:)
bani (noun m.; °-a; -ar): death, killer

notes

[5] bana Gunnlaugs ‘Gunnlaugr’s slayer’: In Gunnlaugs saga, the eponymous hero Gunnlaugr ormstunga ‘Serpent-tongue’ is killed in a duel by his opponent, Hrafn (hrafn ‘raven’). The solution is added above the line in 1562ˣ.

Close

ok ‘and’

(not checked:)
3. ok (conj.): and, but; also

[6] ok: í 167b 3ˣ

Close

goða ‘of gods’

(not checked:)
goð (noun n.): (pagan) god

notes

[6] brenni goða ‘burner of gods’: In 743ˣ Árni Magnússon has added the note Már brenndi goðin ‘Már burnt the gods’, and 1562ˣ also has the gloss Már. Már is ‘seagull’ (Þul Fugla 1/8 and 7/4) and also a pers. n. but any other details about the incident referred to are now lost. Lbs 1199 4°ˣ and Lbs 756 4°ˣ claim Már brenndi goðin, les Kjalnesinga sǫgu ‘Már burnt the gods, read Kjalnesinga saga’, but in the extant version it is Búi Andríðsson, one of the major characters, who burns the temple. There is no extant text of the saga that mentions anyone called Már, and Búi is mockingly nicknamed hundr ‘dog’, but not anything to do with birds. There are also temple- and idol-burnings in Friðþjófs saga, Njáls saga,  Ǫrvar-Odds saga, Harðar saga, Hrafnkels saga and Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar, but none of the perpetrators (Friðþjófr, Hrappr, Oddr, Þorgeirr, Grímkell, and Óláfr respectively) share their names with birds (although Lbs 1116 4°ˣ does suggest ‘Hrapp’). In Hallfreðar saga (ch. 4, ÍF 8, 146) Már Jǫrundsson, who also appears in Ldn, Vatn and HrHalt, is nicknamed Blót-Már ‘Sacrifice-Már’ and described as allheiðinn ‘completely heathen’ in Hfr Lv 1/4V (Hallfr 2), but this seems to be rather the opposite of what is required, since he would presumably then worship idols of the gods, not burn them.

Close

brenni ‘burner’

(not checked:)
brennir (noun m.; °dat. & acc. -): [burner]

notes

[6] brenni goða ‘burner of gods’: In 743ˣ Árni Magnússon has added the note Már brenndi goðin ‘Már burnt the gods’, and 1562ˣ also has the gloss Már. Már is ‘seagull’ (Þul Fugla 1/8 and 7/4) and also a pers. n. but any other details about the incident referred to are now lost. Lbs 1199 4°ˣ and Lbs 756 4°ˣ claim Már brenndi goðin, les Kjalnesinga sǫgu ‘Már burnt the gods, read Kjalnesinga saga’, but in the extant version it is Búi Andríðsson, one of the major characters, who burns the temple. There is no extant text of the saga that mentions anyone called Már, and Búi is mockingly nicknamed hundr ‘dog’, but not anything to do with birds. There are also temple- and idol-burnings in Friðþjófs saga, Njáls saga,  Ǫrvar-Odds saga, Harðar saga, Hrafnkels saga and Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar, but none of the perpetrators (Friðþjófr, Hrappr, Oddr, Þorgeirr, Grímkell, and Óláfr respectively) share their names with birds (although Lbs 1116 4°ˣ does suggest ‘Hrapp’). In Hallfreðar saga (ch. 4, ÍF 8, 146) Már Jǫrundsson, who also appears in Ldn, Vatn and HrHalt, is nicknamed Blót-Már ‘Sacrifice-Már’ and described as allheiðinn ‘completely heathen’ in Hfr Lv 1/4V (Hallfr 2), but this seems to be rather the opposite of what is required, since he would presumably then worship idols of the gods, not burn them.

Close

‘cow’

(not checked:)
kýr (noun f.; °kýr, dat. kú; kýr): cow

notes

[7] kollótta kú ‘cow without horns’: Árni Magnússon annotates ‘riupa’ (rjúpa; Þul Fugla 5/6) ‘ptarmigan’, apparently a name often given to cows: LP: kýr notes køer benævnes ofte således ‘cows are often named thus’.

Close

kollótta ‘without horns’

(not checked:)
kollóttr (adj.): bald, ?without horns

notes

[7] kollótta kú ‘cow without horns’: Árni Magnússon annotates ‘riupa’ (rjúpa; Þul Fugla 5/6) ‘ptarmigan’, apparently a name often given to cows: LP: kýr notes køer benævnes ofte således ‘cows are often named thus’.

Close

ok ‘and’

(not checked:)
3. ok (conj.): and, but; also

Close

kvíslatré ‘a forked tree’

(not checked:)
kvíslatré (noun n.): [a forked tree]

notes

[8] kvíslatré ‘a forked tree’: I.e. the homonyms súla ‘forked piece of wood used as a neck yoke to prevent pigs from escaping the pen’ (see Fritzner: súla 2) and súla ‘gannet’ (Þul Fugla 3/1). Kvíslatré is a hap. leg. in poetry and there is only one recorded instance in prose (in Reykd ch. 22, ÍF 10, 220; cf. ONP: kvíslartré). This gloss is provided in 1562ˣ. In 743ˣ Árni glosses svala ‘swallow’, but this likely resulted from his misreading of the word súla.

Close

gnúp ‘peak’

(not checked:)
gnúpr (noun m.): [peak, Gnúpr]

notes

[9] gildligan gnúp ‘a massive peak’: Skj B proposes múli ‘mountain peak’, corresponding with tyrðilmúli ‘razorbill’ (Alca torda; Þul Fugla 4/6). Árni glossed ‘ha hella’, printed (háhella) in SnE 1848; this is not a known Old Norse word, but is clearly a cpd from ‘high’ and hella ‘rock, table-land’, which fits the clue. If there was a corresponding bird-name, however, it is no longer known. Possibly cf. hávella ‘long-tailed duck’; see Note to Anon Gát 2/5. Ms. 1562ˣ glosses this line ‘lomur’; lómr is ‘red-throated diver (US ‘loon’)’ (Gavia stellata). The relevance to a ‘massive peak’ perhaps comes from such an Icelandic p. n. as Lómagnúpur, the 688m high promontory on the south coast, which features in Njáls saga (Nj ch. 133, ÍF 12, 346). This is unlikely to be the original solution, however.

Close

gildligan ‘a massive’

(not checked:)
gildligr (adj.): [a massive]

notes

[9] gildligan gnúp ‘a massive peak’: Skj B proposes múli ‘mountain peak’, corresponding with tyrðilmúli ‘razorbill’ (Alca torda; Þul Fugla 4/6). Árni glossed ‘ha hella’, printed (háhella) in SnE 1848; this is not a known Old Norse word, but is clearly a cpd from ‘high’ and hella ‘rock, table-land’, which fits the clue. If there was a corresponding bird-name, however, it is no longer known. Possibly cf. hávella ‘long-tailed duck’; see Note to Anon Gát 2/5. Ms. 1562ˣ glosses this line ‘lomur’; lómr is ‘red-throated diver (US ‘loon’)’ (Gavia stellata). The relevance to a ‘massive peak’ perhaps comes from such an Icelandic p. n. as Lómagnúpur, the 688m high promontory on the south coast, which features in Njáls saga (Nj ch. 133, ÍF 12, 346). This is unlikely to be the original solution, however.

Close

hvat ‘what’

(not checked:)
hvat (pron.): what

Close

heita ‘are called’

(not checked:)
2. heita (verb): be called, promise

Close

Interactive view: tap on words in the text for notes and glosses

Close

Log in

This service is only available to members of the relevant projects, and to purchasers of the skaldic volumes published by Brepols.
This service uses cookies. By logging in you agree to the use of cookies on your browser.

Close

Stanza/chapter/text segment

Use the buttons at the top of the page to navigate between stanzas in a poem.

Information tab

Interactive tab

The text and translation are given here, with buttons to toggle whether the text is shown in the verse order or prose word order. Clicking on indiviudal words gives dictionary links, variant readings, kennings and notes, where relevant.

Full text tab

This is the text of the edition in a similar format to how the edition appears in the printed volumes.

Chapter/text segment

This view is also used for chapters and other text segments. Not all the headings shown are relevant to such sections.