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skaldic

Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages

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Gestumbl Heiðr 4VIII (Heiðr 51)/5 — munna ‘mouths’

Hverr er sá inn hvelli,         er gengr harðar götur,
        ok hefir hann þær fyrr um farit?
Mjök fast kyssir,         sá er hefr munna tvá
        ok á gulli einu gengr.
Heiðrekr konungr,         hyggðu at gátu.

Hverr er sá inn hvelli, er gengr harðar götur ok hefir hann þær fyrr um farit? Mjök fast kyssir, sá er hefr tvá munna ok gengr á gulli einu. Heiðrekr konungr, hyggðu at gátu.

Who is that shrill one who walks on hard paths and he has travelled on them before? Very firmly [he] kisses, the one who has two mouths, and walks on gold alone. King Heiðrekr, think about the riddle.

notes

[5] tvá munna ‘two mouths’: Archaeological finds and pictorial depictions across Scandinavia and the North from the C9th to C12th are consistent in revealing that hammers, both practical smiths’ tools and ceremonial instruments, such as the so-called Thor’s hammers, were symmetrical in the shape of a T or (particularly in symbolic depictions) an elongated cross. Each side of its double-head is described as a ‘mouth’ in the present riddle. See, for example, the depiction of Weland (ON Vǫlundr) on the front panel of the Franks Casket (Anglo-Saxon, C8th Northumbrian); that of Reginn the smith, foster-father of Sigurðr, on the church at Hylestad, Norway (c. 1200); the Viking Age tool-chest found at Mästermyr, Gotland, Sweden (e.g. Arwidsson and Berg 1983); for Thor’s hammers see e.g. Staecker (1999), Perkins (2001); on finds of possible smiths’ graves see e.g. Wallander (1989).

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