Anon Krm 11VIII/4 — Englanes ‘Englanes’
Hjuggu vér með hjörvi.
Hundruðum frá ek liggja
á Eynæfis öndrum,
þar er Englanes heitir.
Siglðu vér til snerru
sex dægr, áðr lið felli;
áttum odda messu
við uppruna sólar.
Varð fyr várum sverðum
Valþjófr í styr hníga.
Hjuggu vér með hjörvi. Ek frá liggja hundruðum á öndrum Eynæfis, þar er heitir Englanes. Siglðu vér til snerru sex dægr, áðr lið felli; áttum messu odda við uppruna sólar. Valþjófr varð hníga í styr fyr sverðum várum.
We hewed with the sword. I heard that they lay in hundreds on the skis of Eynæfir <sea-king> [SHIPS] at the place named Englanes. We were sailing into battle for three days before the troop fell; we conducted a chant of sword-points [BATTLE] at the rising of the sun. Valþjófr had to fall in battle before our swords.
readings
[4] Englanes: ‘[…]’ 147
notes
[4] Englanes: The tentative suggestion of Langenfelt (1920, 84 n. 1), that this refers to Caithness in north-eastern Scotland cannot be corroborated, nor is the name included in Townend’s (1998, 19 n. 30) list of names in Scotland mentioned in skaldic verse. The first element Engla- gen. pl. could mean either ‘of the Angles’ (i.e. the English) or ‘of angels’, though the latter is unlikely. The second element is nes ‘ness, headland’. Preference is given here to the old suggestion, adopted by Rafn (1826, 116) from Suhm et al. 1782-1828, I, 556; (cf. Johnstone 1782, 98; Depping 1839, 359), that it is Kent, or a part of it, that is referred to here. While the majority of the earliest Germanic settlers of Kent seem to have been Jutes rather than Angles (Collingwood and Myres 1937, 363), there is a strong case for saying that their first leaders, Hengest and Horsa, whose landing in Kent at Ypwines fleot (in all probability Ebbsfleet) is recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle s. a. 449 (ASC I, 12-13), were of Anglian descent (see Bliss 1998, 168-80). If so, and if it is borne in mind that in medieval times Ebbsfleet was at the neck of a peninsula on the south coast of what was then the Isle of Thanet, now the easternmost tip of Kent (see Lewis 1736, I, 9-10 and map facing p. viii; cf. Moody 2008, 36-42), it is quite possible that it was remembered by some as Englanes ‘the headland of the Angles’.