Anon Sól 16^VII

Rík þau urðu        Ráðný ok Véboði
        ok hugðuz gótt eitt gera;
nú þau sitja        ok sárum snúa
        ýmsum elda til.

Þau Ráðný ok Véboði urðu rík ok hugðuz gótt eitt gera; nú sitja þau ok snúa ýmsum sárum til elda.

Ráðný and Véboði became powerful and thought to do only good; now they sit and turn now one, now another wound towards the fires.

Mss: 166bˣ(46r), papp15ˣ(2v), 738ˣ(80v), 167b 6ˣ(2r), 214ˣ(149v), 1441ˣ(582), 10575ˣ(3r), 2797ˣ(232)

Readings: [1] þau urðu: þau váru papp15ˣ, 167b 6ˣ, 214ˣ, 1441ˣ, 10575ˣ, 2797ˣ, váru þau 738ˣ    [2] ‑ný: ‑ey papp15ˣ, 1441ˣ, ‑ri 214ˣ;    ‑boði: ‑bogi papp15ˣ, 10575ˣ, 2797ˣ, ‑logi 1441ˣ    [3] eitt: om. 214ˣ    [4] nú: enn nú 10575ˣ    [6] elda: eldi all;    til: at 1441ˣ, 2797ˣ

Editions: Skj AI, 630, Skj BI, 638, Skald I, 310, NN §§2147A, 2148; Bugge 1867, 359, Falk 1914, 7, Björn M. Ólsen 1915, 9, Fidjestøl 1979, 62, Njörður Njarðvík 1991, 54-5, Njörður Njarðvík 1993, 22, 101.

Notes: [All]: The st. is rather cryptic, but the sense seems to be that those who trust in their own power (rather than in God’s, cf. st. 17) come to grief, even though they intend to do good. The implication of hugðuz gótt eitt gera (l. 3) could be, as given here, ‘thought to do, i.e. intended to do only good’, or ‘thought they were doing only good’. — [5-6] ok snúa ýmsum sárum ‘and turn now one, now another wound’: The sense of ýmiss (adj.), usually used in the pl., is ‘various, now this, now that, by turns’. — [6] elda (gen. pl.) ‘fires’: The noun must be gen. pl., governed by til; the ungrammatical eldi dat. sg. is found in all but 2 mss (539ˣ and 24ˣ), not used in this edn. Eds uniformly make the emendation, following Bugge’s initial suggestion (1867, 359).

References

1. Bibliography
2. Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
3. NN = Kock, Ernst Albin. 1923-44. Notationes Norrœnæ: Anteckningar till Edda och skaldediktning. Lunds Universitets årsskrift new ser. 1. 28 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
4. Fidjestøl, Bjarne, ed. 1979a. Sólarljóð: Tydning og Tolkningsgrunnlag. Nordisk Instituts skrifteserie 4. Bergen, Oslo and Tromsø: Universitetsforlaget.
5. Björn Magnússon Ólsen, ed. 1915a. Sólarljóð: gefin út með skíringum og athugasemdum. Safn til sögu Íslands og íslenzkra bókmenta 5.1. Reykjavík: Prentsmiðja Gutenberg.
6. Bugge, Sophus, ed. 1867. Norrœn fornkvæði. Islandsk samling af folkelige oldtidsdigte om nordens guder og heroer. Almindelig kaldet Sæmundar Edda hins frøda. Christiania (Oslo): Malling. Rpt. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget 1965.
7. Falk, Hjalmar, ed. 1914a. Sólarljóð. Videnskapsselskapets skrifter II. Hist.-filos. kl. 7. 2 vols. Kristiania (Oslo): Dybwad.
8. Njörður P. Njarðvik, ed. 1991. Sólarljóð. Útgáfa og umfjöllun. Íslensk Rit 10. Reykjavík: Bókmenntafræðistofnun Háskóla Íslands og Menningarsjóður.
9. Njörður P. Njarðvik. 1993. Solsången. Akademisk avhandling för filosofiedoktorsexamen i nordiska språk. Göteborgs universitet: Institutionen för svensk språket.