Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.) 2017, ‘Anonymous Poems, Nikulásdrápa 2’ in Kari Ellen Gade and Edith Marold (eds), Poetry from Treatises on Poetics. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 3. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 567.
Öll þing boða eingla
eining í þrenningu
órofnuðu jafnan
alls grams lofi framda.
Öll þing eingla boða eining í þrenningu, jafnan framda órofnuðu lofi {grams alls}.
All the assemblies of angels proclaim unity in the Trinity, always worshipped with unbroken praise {of the ruler of all} [= God].
Mss: W(113) (FoGT)
Readings: [4] lofi: ‘l[…]fi’ W
Editions: Skj AII, 160, Skj BII, 174, Skald II, 91; SnE 1848-87, II, 208-9, III, 157, FoGT 1884, 129, 260, FoGT 2004, 39, 66, 108-9, FoGT 2014, 16-17, 79-80.
Context: The author of FoGT cites this and the following helmingr as examples of the rhetorical figure of ekbasis, or digression. After having first cited Bragi Rdr 3 (see Context of this stanza for the full quotation), the author continues: Stvndum verðr ebasis, þá er skalldit tekr stef af ǫðru efni en kvęðit er, sem i nikolass drapv er stefit er af guðligri þrenningv, sem her ‘Sometimes e(k)basis occurs when the poet takes the refrain from subject matter other than what the poem is about, as in Nikulásdrápa, where the refrain is about the holy Trinity, as here’. Stanza 2 is then quoted.
Notes: [All]: FoGT thus supplies information to confirm that this is the (or a) stef or refrain of Nikdr. In a regular drápa of the C13th-14th, the first stef would appear at the end of the upphaf or introduction to the poem, which was of varying length, and it would then be repeated at regular intervals within the stefjabálkr or middle section of the poem. There is no evidence in the case of Nikdr about where in the sequence this stef appeared. — [4] grams alls ‘of the ruler of all [= God]’: Finnur Jónsson (Skj B), followed by Longo (FoGT 2004, 66, 109), takes this kenning with ll. 1-2, Öll þing eingla boða eining grams alls í þrenningu, which he renders as Alle engleskarer forkynder alkongens enhed i treenigheden ‘All the hosts of angels proclaim the king of all’s unity in Trinity’. However, it seems less disturbing of word order to take the kenning with ll. 3-4. — [4] lofi ‘with praise’: The present condition of W has obscured the second letter of this word, but all earlier eds have read lofi without difficulty. — [4] framda ‘worshipped’: Past participle of fremja ‘further, promote, practise, worship’, inflected as a f. acc. adj. to agree with eining ‘unity’.
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