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skaldic

Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages

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Þjóð Haustl 13III/1 — skjótt ‘quickly’

Hófu skjótt, en skófu,
skǫpt, ginnregin, brinna
en sunr biðils sviðnar
— sveipr varð í fǫr — Greipar.
Þats of fátt á fjalla
Finns iljabrú minni.
Baugs þák bifum fáða
bifkleif at Þórleifi.

Skǫpt hófu skjótt brinna, en ginnregin skófu, en sunr biðils Greipar sviðnar; sveipr varð í fǫr. Þats of fátt á minni iljabrú Finns fjalla. Þák bifkleif baugs, fáða bifum, at Þórleifi.

Shafts quickly began to burn, which the mighty powers had shaved, and the son of the wooer of Greip <giantess> [GIANT > = Þjazi] is scorched; there was a swerve in his course. That’s depicted on my footsole-bridge of the Finnr <Saami> of the mountains [GIANT = Hrungnir > SHIELD]. I received the quivering cliff of the shield-boss [SHIELD], decorated with moving stories, from Þorleifr.

notes

[1-2] skǫpt hófu skjótt brinna, en ginnregin skófu ‘shafts quickly began to burn, which the mighty powers had shaved’: This seems the most likely interpretation of these lines, in accordance with Skm (SnE 1998, I, 2): Þá gengu þeir út undir Ásgarð ok báru þannig byrðar af lokarspánum ‘Then they [the gods] went out below Ásgarðr and carried there loads of wood-shavings’. Kock (Skald and NN §1811) emends skjótt ‘quickly’ (l. 1) to skǫf ‘shavings’ and en (l. 1) to enn and construes skǫf hófu brinnaenn ginnregin skófu skǫpt ‘shavings began to burn – in addition the mighty powers had shaved the shafts’. He had previously (NN §225) proposed that skǫpt ‘shafts’ be taken as the subject of hófu brinna and the object of en ginnregin skófu

grammar

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