Vitr þóttisk valkyrja; verar né óru þekkir
feimu inni framsóttu, es fugls rǫdd kunni.
Kvaddi in kverkhvíta ok in glæ*hvarma
Hymis hausreyti, es sat á horni of bjarga.
Valkyrja þóttisk vitr; verar né óru þekkir inni framsóttu feimu, es kunni rǫdd fugls. In kverkhvíta ok in glæ*hvarma kvaddi hausreyti Hymis, es sat á horni of bjarga.
The valkyrie thought herself wise; men were not pleasing to the aggressive maid, who understood the voice of the bird. The white-throated and the bright-eyelashed one greeted the skull-picker of Hymir <giant> [RAVEN], which sat on the edge of a cliff.
[7] hausreyti Hymis ‘the skull-picker of Hymir <giant> [RAVEN]’: Hymir is an adversary of Þórr and subject of the late eddic poem Hymiskviða (and SnE 2005, 44-5), but on what occasion a raven picked flesh from the skull of Hymir is unknown. There may be confusion with the primeval giant Ymir, from whose skull the sky was made (Vafþr 21, 28, Vsp 3, Arn Magndr 19/4II; SnE 2005, 10, 11, 12, 15, and 170 on confusion between Hymir and Ymir in mss). Kock (NN §1024) accordingly emends to Ymis here, also reversing the order of the words for the sake of the alliteration. Skj B reads -rofa ‘reaver, robber’ for ‑reyti, and Möbius (1860) reads -reyta (so 301ˣ), as if -reyti were the nom. of a weak noun.