ÞjóðA Sex 20^II

Létu lystir sleitu
landkarlar gram varla
— gerði ǫld á jǫrðu
ódœmi — lǫg sœma.
En, því ráði þjóðar,
þeim brutu troll, es ollu,
hæls í hleypikjóla
hrís andskotum vísa.

Landkarlar lystir sleitu létu varla gram sœma lǫg; ǫld gerði ódœmi á jǫrðu. En troll brutu hrís í {hleypikjóla hæls} þeim andskotum vísa, es ollu því ráði þjóðar.

The landsmen, eager for strife, hardly allowed the king to honour the law; the people committed outrage in the land. But trolls broke brushwood in {the speeding ships of the heel} [SHOES] of those adversaries of the prince who directed that action of the people.

Mss: FskBˣ(77v), FskAˣ(285-286) (Fsk); Mork(10v) (Mork); Flat(199ra-b) (Flat); H(60v), Hr(44va) (H-Hr)

Readings: [1] Létu: létuð FskAˣ;    sleitu: ‘sleytu’ Flat    [3] ǫld: ǫllum H    [5] En (‘enn’): ok Mork, Flat, H, Hr;    því: þar Hr;    þjóðar: þjóðir FskAˣ, þjóða Mork, Flat, H, Hr    [6] þeim: ‘[...]’ Mork, þeir Flat;    brutu: ‘[...]to’ Mork;    es: ‘vr’ Hr    [7] hæls: ‘hlíess’ Hr    [8] ‑skotum: ‑skota FskAˣ

Editions: Skj AI, 373, Skj BI, 343-4, Skald I, 173, NN §§806, 1902; Fsk 1902-3, 276 (ch. 47), ÍF 29, 271-2 (ch. 57); Mork 1928-32, 188, Andersson and Gade 2000, 216, 477 (MH); Flat 1860-8, III, 351 (MH); Fms 6, 339 (HSig ch. 91), Fms 12, 159.

Context: Haraldr comes into conflict with the Upplendingar, who maintain that they have ancient privileges given them by Óláfr Haraldsson for their support of him at the battle of Nesjar. This was shortly before the battle at the Nissan (Niz) estuary according to Fsk, or the winter when Haraldr fought Hákon jarl Ívarsson according to H-Hr.

Notes: [All]: H-Hr cites this st. explicitly from drápu þeirri, er hann orti um Harald konúng ‘the drápa that he [Þjóðólfr] composed about King Haraldr’. — [2] landkarlar ‘the landsmen’: A hap. leg., whose exact sense is unclear; LP glosses it as bonde ‘farmer’. — [3] á jǫrðu ‘in the land’: (a) The adverbial is here taken with gerði ódœmi ‘committed outrage’ in the intercalated cl., as by Kock (NN §806). This avoids unforced fragmentation of the intercalated cl. (b) It could alternatively be construed with sœma lǫg ‘honour the law’ in the outer cl., as in the other eds and translations listed above. — [6, 7, 8] troll brutu hrís í hleypikjóla hæls ‘trolls broke brushwood in the speeding ships of the heel [SHOES]’: Troll here seems to be a rather general, even tongue-in-cheek, reference to supernatural beings, such as the ones invoked in various oaths and curses, usually consigning enemies to the trolls, e.g. HólmgB Lv 11/5^V, KormǪ Lv 44/8^V, VígVest Lv l. 2^V. The kenning hleypikjóla hæls designates a shoe using a term for ‘ship’ as base-word qualified by a determinant referring to the foot. This is unusual but not unparalleled: see Meissner 434. The idea seems to be that trolls break off twigs of brushwood and stuff it in the shoes of Haraldr’s enemies to prevent their progress, hence cause trouble generally (so Andersson and Gade 2000, 477). There are no close parallels to this idiom (brjóta hrís, attested in Fritzner: hrís 2, is literal, not figurative), though LP: brjóta 5 compares another figurative usage from Þjóðolfr, brjóta sér byrðar, lit. ‘break off a burden for oneself’, hence ‘make difficulties for oneself’, st. 25/5, 8.

References

1. Bibliography
2. Fms = Sveinbjörn Egilsson et al., eds. 1825-37. Fornmanna sögur eptir gömlum handritum útgefnar að tilhlutun hins norræna fornfræða fèlags. 12 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. Meissner = Meissner, Rudolf. 1921. Die Kenningar der Skalden: Ein Beitrag zur skaldischen Poetik. Rheinische Beiträge und Hülfsbücher zur germanischen Philologie und Volkskunde 1. Bonn and Leipzig: Schroeder. Rpt. 1984. Hildesheim etc.: Olms.
6. LP = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1931. Lexicon poeticum antiquæ linguæ septentrionalis: Ordbog over det norsk-islandske skjaldesprog oprindelig forfattet af Sveinbjörn Egilsson. 2nd edn. Copenhagen: Møller.
7. Andersson, Theodore M. and Kari Ellen Gade, trans. 2000. Morkinskinna: The Earliest Icelandic Chronicle of the Norwegian Kings (1030-1157). Islandica 51. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press.
8. Flat 1860-8 = Gudbrand Vigfusson [Guðbrandur Vigfússon] and C. R. Unger, eds. 1860-8. Flateyjarbók. En samling af norske konge-sagaer med indskudte mindre fortællinger om begivenheder i og udenfor Norge samt annaler. 3 vols. Christiania (Oslo): Malling.
9. Fritzner = Fritzner, Johan. 1883-96. Ordbog over det gamle norske sprog. 3 vols. Kristiania (Oslo): Den norske forlagsforening. 4th edn. Rpt. 1973. Oslo etc.: Universitetsforlaget.
10. Mork 1928-32 = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1928-32. Morkinskinna. SUGNL 53. Copenhagen: Jørgensen.
11. Fsk 1902-3 = Finnur Jónsson, ed. 1902-3. Fagrskinna: Nóregs kononga tal. SUGNL 30. Copenhagen: Møller.
12. ÍF 29 = Ágrip af Nóregskonunga sǫgum; Fagrskinna—Nóregs konungatal. Ed. Bjarni Einarsson. 1985.
13. Internal references
14. (forthcoming), ‘ Unattributed, Fagrskinna’ in Kari Ellen Gade (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 2: From c. 1035 to c. 1300. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 2. Turnhout: Brepols, p. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=56> (accessed 27 April 2024)
15. (forthcoming), ‘ Unattributed, Hulda-Hrokkinskinna’ in Kari Ellen Gade (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 2: From c. 1035 to c. 1300. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 2. Turnhout: Brepols, p. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=84> (accessed 27 April 2024)
16. (forthcoming), ‘ Heimskringla, Haralds saga Sigurðssonar’ in Kari Ellen Gade (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 2: From c. 1035 to c. 1300. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 2. Turnhout: Brepols, p. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=142> (accessed 27 April 2024)
17. (forthcoming), ‘ Unattributed, Magnúss saga góða ok Haralds harðráða’ in Kari Ellen Gade (ed.), Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas 2: From c. 1035 to c. 1300. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 2. Turnhout: Brepols, p. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=147> (accessed 27 April 2024)
18. Not published: do not cite (VígVest Lv^V (Gr))
19. Edith Marold (ed.) 2022, ‘Kormáks saga 47 (Hólmgǫngu-Bersi Véleifsson, Lausavísur 11)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross, Kari Ellen Gade and Tarrin Wills (eds), Poetry in Sagas of Icelanders. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 5. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 1108.
20. Edith Marold (ed.) 2022, ‘Kormáks saga 63 (Kormákr Ǫgmundarson, Lausavísur 44)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross, Kari Ellen Gade and Tarrin Wills (eds), Poetry in Sagas of Icelanders. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 5. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 1137.
21. (forthcoming), ‘ Þjalar-Jón Svipdagsson, Lausavísur’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. . <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=11021> (accessed 27 April 2024)