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 Mey 9VII

Kirsten Wolf (ed.) 2007, ‘Anonymous Poems, Heilagra meyja drápa 9’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry on Christian Subjects. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 7. Turnhout: Brepols, pp. 897-8.

Anonymous PoemsHeilagra meyja drápa
8910

text and translation

Máría hlaut hin yngsta æru
angri svift, er tók að giftaz;
Zébédéus mildrar meyjar
móður fekk að vilja góðum.
Þeira sonr má heita herra
harðla kunnr, er guðs son unni,
postuli Jón við mildleik mestan
mektarsannr og Jacóbus annarr.

Hin yngsta Máría, svift angri, hlaut æru, er tók að giftaz; Zébédéus fekk mildrar meyjar að góðum vilja móður. Þeira sonr má heita harðla kunnr herra, er guðs son unni, Jón postuli við mestan mildleik, mektarsannr, og Jacóbus annarr.
 
‘The youngest Mary, deprived of sorrow, gained honour when she got married; Zebedee received in marriage the gentle maiden with the good will of her mother. Their son can be called a very famous lord, whom God’s son loved, the Apostle John with the greatest mercifulness, in possession of true might and the second James.

notes and context

The Apostles James the Great and John are said to be the sons of Zebedee in gospel accounts (Matt. IV.21 and Mark I.19). The notion that John (and therefore James) was the son of the Virgin Mary’s sister is found in many medieval sources and was well known in Iceland; cf. this poem, st. 10/1 and Gamlkan Jóndr 3/1, where John is also called Christ’s systrungr ‘sister’s son, cousin whose mothers are sisters’; see also Jón4 1874, 466 and I, 56.

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: [Anonyme digte og vers XIV], [B. 12]. Af heilogum meyjum 9: AII, 528, BII, 584, Skald II, 322, NN §2971A.

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.