Herv Lv 8^VIII (Heiðr 25)

This group of stanzas constitutes a dialogue between Hervǫr and the ghost of her dead father, Angantýr. At the mound on Samsø where Angantýr and his brothers have been buried following their defeat in a duel, Hervǫr summons them to waken and give her the sword Tyrfingr (Herv Lv 8-11 (Heiðr 25-8)). Initially, Angantýr is reluctant and attempts to dissuade her, first by telling her he does not have the sword (Angantýr Lv 1-2 (Heiðr 29-30)), then by warning her against the dangers of being on the island (Angantýr Lv 3 (Heiðr 32)), and, when Hervǫr still persists (Herv Lv 12-13 (Heiðr 31, 33)), finally by foreboding that Tyrfingr mun spilla allri ætt þinni ‘will destroy all your family’ (Angantýr Lv 4 (Heiðr 34)). Hervǫr stands firm, however, and Angantýr agrees to yield up the sword to her (Angantýr Lv 7-8 (Heiðr 39, 41)), with a grudging admiration for her courage (Mey veit ek enga | moldar hvergi | at þann hjör þori | í hendr nema ‘I know no woman anywhere on the earth who would dare to take that sword in her hands’, Angantýr Lv 7/5-8 (Heiðr 39)), but not without some final words of warning: Takattu á eggjum, | eitr er í báðum ‘Do not touch the edges, poison is in both’ (Angantýr Lv 10/5-6 (Heiðr 45)). Hervǫr herself comes across as fearless and resolute throughout, allowing signs of trepidation to be revealed only in the final stanza (Herv Lv 19/2, 4 (Heiðr 47)): brótt fýsir mik … heðan vil ek skjótla ‘I long to be away … I wish to go from here quickly’. On other episodes in Old Norse literature involving revenants, burial mounds and treasure, see Chadwick (1946).

These dialogue stanzas have often been treated as part of an eddic-style long poem, sometimes together with the preceding seven stanzas describing the encounter between Hervǫr and the shepherd, which set the scene. This poem has been called Hervararkviða (apparently first recorded in the foreword and contents page of Dietrich 1864, vi-vii, although the stanzas appear in that work within their prose context) but is now well known to the English-speaking world as ‘The Waking of Angantýr’, a title which seems to have been used first by Ker (1896), following the edition and translation in CPB under the Anglicised title ‘The Waking of Angantheow’. Following Verelius’ 1672 edition of the saga, extracts of these stanzas (in Latin) were published in Bartholin (1689), and it first appeared as a poem in English translation (untitled) in 1705, based on Verelius’ edition, in George Hickes’s Linguarum Vett. Septentrionalium Thesaurus Grammatico-Criticus et Archaeologicus (Hickes 1703-5, II, I, 193-5). It became a popular subject for reworking, and appeared regularly from the eighteenth century onward under various titles and in various incarnations with varying fidelity to the original (see Burrows 2017), most extreme being M. G. Lewis’s ‘The Sword of Angantýr’ (Lewis 1801, 32-41), a melodramatic interpretation in rhyming tetrametric quatrains in which Hervǫr is devoured by flames at the end.

The presentation of these stanzas in Hb lends extra support to the possibility that they were intended as a long poem. Herv Lv 8 (Heiðr 25) begins on a new line, with the rubric vísur ‘verses’ written in red at the end of the preceding line. The first word of the stanza, Vaki ‘Waken’, is also given a large red initial <V>. The end of the poetry is not marked, however: a short passage of prose describing Hervǫr’s desertion by her terrified shipmates and later passage away follows on from the end of the final stanza.

Dating remains unresolved, although there has been some, if not complete, scholarly consensus on a date in the first half of the twelfth century (Edd. Min. xxi; Mundt 1990, 410). As the discussion above implies, most scholars have believed the stanzas to be ‘unquestionably older than the saga’ (Heiðr 1960, xi) and later set into the present narrative frame. Alaric Hall (2005, 7) has argued to the contrary, however (though not without reservation), that the poem ‘was specifically composed for a narrative very like the Heiðreks saga we know … and put into writing soon enough afterward that it was not substantially corrupted by oral transmission’.

The stanzas are extant in full or in part in all of the mss of Heiðr listed in the Introduction to the saga above, and separately in JS 112 8°ˣ. As well as their inclusion in the editions of the saga listed above, they have been edited by Finnur Jónsson (Skj) and Kock (Skald), by Heusler and Ranisch (Edd. Min., 13-20) and by Guðbrandur Vigfússon and York Powell (CPB I, 163-8), and appear in Ettmüller (1861, 32-3). All of these editions use Hb as the base text: it contains more stanzas of the dialogue than the other redactions and its readings are often preferable; consequently it has also been chosen as the main ms. here. The speaker of the verse is indicated in all mss every time there is a change of speaker, except once in Hb, which does not note that Herv Lv 12 (Heiðr 31) is Hervǫr’s (it does, however, note that the following stanza is spoken by Angantýr). The metre is fornyrðislag.

Vaki þú, Angantýr;         vekr þik Hervör,
eingadóttir         ykkr Sváfu.
Selðu mér ór haugi         hvassan mæki,
þann er Svafrlama         slógu dvergar.

Vaki þú, Angantýr; Hervör vekr þik, eingadóttir ykkr Sváfu. Selðu mér ór haugi hvassan mæki, þann er dvergar slógu Svafrlama.

Waken, Angantýr; Hervǫr wakes you, only daughter to you and Sváfa. Give me from the mound the sharp sword which dwarfs forged for Svafrlami.

Mss: Hb(74r), 2845(65r), R715ˣ(13r) (Heiðr)

Readings: [3] ‑dóttir: mögr added above the line in the hand of JR R715ˣ    [4] Sváfu: so 2845, R715ˣ, Tófu Hb    [5] mér: om. 2845    [6] hvassan: harðan R715ˣ    [7] Svafrlama: Sigrlama 2845

Editions: Skj AII, 245, Skj BII, 265, Skald II, 138; Heiðr 1672, 91, FSN 1, 435, 519, Heiðr 1873, 214, 316, Heiðr 1924, 21, 107, FSGJ 2, 15, Heiðr 1960, 14; Edd. Min. 15.

Context: In all redactions of the saga a prose passage narrates Hervǫr’s arrival at the mound of Angantýr and his brothers.

Notes: [1] vaki þú, Angantýr ‘waken, Angantýr’: Similar to HHj 24/1 (NK 145): Vaki þú, Helgi ‘Waken, Helgi’ and Grott 18/4-5 (NK 300): Vaki þú, Fróði ‘Waken, Fróði’. — [3-4]: Cf. Vǫl 36/7-8 eingadóttir | yccor beggia (NK 123) ‘only daughter to you both’.  — [3] -dóttir ‘daughter’: In R715ˣ Jón Rugman has added mögr ‘son’ above, though without crossing out the original, presumably in reference to the fact that Hervǫr is here in disguise as a man. — [4] Sváfu ‘Sváfa’: Hervǫr’s mother is named as Sváfa in 2845 and R715ˣ, both here and elsewhere in the saga (Heiðr 1924, 8, 96, 102). There is thus stronger evidence for this reading than for Hb’s Tófa: in Hb this stanza is the only place the name Tófa appears for Hervǫr’s mother; she is not mentioned by name elsewhere in the H redaction. The eds of Edd. Min. and CPB (CPB I, 164) however, choose to retain Tófu. — [6-8] hvassan mæki, þann er dvergar slógu ‘the sharp sword which dwarfs forged’: I.e. Tyrfingr. In Old Norse literature dwarfs were consistently portrayed as craftsmen. In Old Norse mythology, they were said to have made a variety of magical objects valuable to the gods (Simek 1993, 68); in the later traditions of the fornaldarsögur and riddarasögur they became more narrowly associated with the crafting of weapons (Motz 1977, 49). Cf. Heiðr 26/7-8, 33/7. — [6] hvassan mæki ‘the sharp sword’: This half-line also occurs in Heiðr 40/3 and, in the dat. case, Heiðr 88/6; see Note there. See also Note to Heiðr 38/6. — [8] Svafrlama ‘Svafrlami’: Called Sigrlami in the R redaction; in the H and U redactions Sigrlami is Svafrlami’s father, and son of Óðinn. According to the saga, Svafr-/Sigrlami is king of Garðaríki (Russia; in H the name of his kingdom is not stated) and father of Eyfura, mother of Angantýr. In H and U the viking Arngrímr attacks Sigrlami’s kingdom, abducts Eyfura and steals Tyrfingr, using it to kill Sigrlami; in R the king appoints Arngrímr overseer of his kingdom, grants him Eyfura’s hand in marriage and gives Tyrfingr to him (Heiðr 1924, 3-4, 93).

References

1. Bibliography
2. FSN = Rafn, Carl Christian, ed. 1829-30. Fornaldar sögur nordrlanda. 3 vols. Copenhagen: Popp.
3. Skald = Kock, Ernst Albin, ed. 1946-50. Den norsk-isländska skaldediktningen. 2 vols. Lund: Gleerup.
4. CPB = Gudbrand Vigfusson [Guðbrandur Vigfússon] and F. York Powell, eds. 1883. Corpus poeticum boreale: The Poetry of the Old Northern Tongue from the Earliest Times to the Thirteenth Century. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon. Rpt. 1965, New York: Russell & Russell.
5. NK = Neckel, Gustav and Hans Kuhn (1899), eds. 1983. Edda: Die Lieder des Codex Regius nebst verwandten Denkmälern. 2 vols. I: Text. 5th edn. Heidelberg: Winter.
6. Heiðr 1672 = Verelius, Olaus, ed. 1672. Hervarar Saga på Gammel Gotska. Uppsala: Curio.
7. FSGJ = Guðni Jónsson, ed. 1954. Fornaldar sögur norðurlanda. 4 vols. [Reykjavík]: Íslendingasagnaútgáfan.
8. Dietrich, Franz E. C., ed. 1864. Altnordisches Lesebuch: Aus der skandinavischen Poesie und Prosa bis zum XIV. Jahrhundert zusammengestellt und mit literarischen Übersicht, Grammatik und Glossar versehen. 2nd edn. Leipzig: F. A. Brockhaus.
9. Ettmüller, Ludwig. 1861. Altnordisches Lesebuch nebst kurzgefasster Formenlehre und Wörterbuch. Zürich: Meyer & Zeller.
10. Edd. Min. = Heusler, Andreas and Wilhelm Ranisch, eds. 1903. Eddica Minora: Dichtungen eddischer Art aus den Fornaldarsögur und anderen Prosawerken. Dortmund: Ruhfus. Rpt. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft.
11. Bartholin, Thomas. 1689. Antiquitatum danicarum de causis contemptæ a Danis adhuc gentilibus mortis libri tres ex vetustis codicibus & monumentis hactenus ineditis congesti. Copenhagen: J. P. Bockenhoffer.
12. Simek, Rudolf. 1993. Dictionary of Northern Mythology. Trans. Angela Hall. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer.
13. Heiðr 1924 = Jón Helgason, ed. 1924. Heiðreks saga. Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks konungs. SUGNL 48. Copenhagen: Jørgensen.
14. Heiðr 1960 = Tolkien, Christopher, ed. and trans. 1960. Saga Heiðreks konungs ins vitra / The Saga of King Heidrek the Wise. Nelson Icelandic Texts. London etc.: Nelson.
15. Heiðr 1873 = Bugge, Sophus, ed. 1873. Hervarar saga ok Heidreks. Det Norske oldskriftselskabs samlinger 17. Christiania (Oslo): Brøgger.
16. Chadwick, Nora (Kershaw). 1946. ‘Norse Ghosts (A Study in the Draugr and the Haugbúi)’. Folklore 57, 50-65; 106-27.
17. Ker, W. P. 1896. Epic and Romance: Essays on Medieval Literature. London: Macmillan.
18. Lewis, M. G., ed. 1801. Tales of Wonder. London: Bulmer.
19. Mundt, Marina. 1990. ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks konungs Revisited’. In Pàroli 1990, 405-25.
20. Hall, Alaric. 2005. ‘Changing Style and Changing Meaning: Icelandic Historiography and the Medieval Redactions of Heiðreks saga’. SS 77, 1-30.
21. Burrows, Hannah. 2017. ‘Reawakening Angantýr: English Translations of an Old Norse Poem from the Eighteenth Century to the Twenty-First’. In Birkett et al. 2017, 148-64.
22. Hickes, George. 1703-5. Linguarum vett. septentrionalium thesaurus grammatico-criticus et archaeologicus. 2 vols. Oxford: [n. p.].
23. Motz, Lotte. 1977. ‘The Craftsman in the Mound’. Folklore, 46-60.
24. Internal references
25. 2017, ‘ Anonymous, Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 367. <https://skaldic.org/m.php?p=text&i=23> (accessed 30 April 2024)
26. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 72 (Gestumblindi, Heiðreks gátur 25)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 438.
27. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 79 (Gestumblindi, Heiðreks gátur 32)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 446.
28. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 73 (Gestumblindi, Heiðreks gátur 26)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 440.
29. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 76 (Gestumblindi, Heiðreks gátur 29)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 443.
30. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 78 (Gestumblindi, Heiðreks gátur 31)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 445.
31. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 81 (Gestumblindi, Heiðreks gátur 34)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 448.
32. Not published: do not cite ()
33. Not published: do not cite ()
34. Not published: do not cite ()
35. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 25 (Hervǫr, Lausavísur 8)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 386.
36. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 29 (Angantýr Arngrímsson, Lausavísur 1)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 390.
37. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 31 (Hervǫr, Lausavísur 12)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 392.
38. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 32 (Angantýr Arngrímsson, Lausavísur 3)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 393.
39. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 34 (Angantýr Arngrímsson, Lausavísur 4)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 395.
40. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 38 (Hervǫr, Lausavísur 15)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 398.
41. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 39 (Angantýr Arngrímsson, Lausavísur 7)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 399.
42. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 40 (Hervǫr, Lausavísur 16)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 400.
43. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 45 (Angantýr Arngrímsson, Lausavísur 10)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 404.
44. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 47 (Hervǫr, Lausavísur 19)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 406.
45. Hannah Burrows (ed.) 2017, ‘Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 88 (Anonymous Lausavísur, Lausavísur from Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks 7)’ in Margaret Clunies Ross (ed.), Poetry in fornaldarsögur. Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages 8. Turnhout: Brepols, p. 457.