Anon Bjark 1III/6 — vina ‘friends’
Dagrs upp kominn; dynja hana fjaðrar;
máls vílmǫgum at vinna erfiði.
Vaki æ ok vaki, vina hǫfuð,
allir inir œztu Aðils of sinnar.
Dagrs upp kominn; fjaðrar hana dynja; máls vílmǫgum at vinna erfiði. Vaki æ ok vaki, hǫfuð vina, allir inir œztu of sinnar Aðils.
Day has broken; the rooster’s feathers rustle; it is time for the sons of toil [SERVANTS] to get to work. Wake now and wake, friends, all the noblest companions of Aðils.
notes
[6] hǫfuð vina ‘friends’: Lit. ‘heads of friends’. Hǫfuð ‘head’ is used here in a circumlocutionary sense, based on the sense ‘person’ (cf. LP: hǫfuð 2). Saxo (Saxo 2005, I, 2, 7, 4, p. 170) has quisquis se regis amicum … fatetur ‘whoever would prove … that he is a friend to the king’. The Germanic leader was traditionally primus inter pares with his personal followers; cf. Green (1965, 106-7). It has been argued by Hofmann (1955, 94-5), and before him Kock (1921, 117), that the Old Norse use of vinr in the sense of a leader as friend to his followers and vice versa shows the influence of West Germanic usage; cf. the Old English Beowulf where wine ‘friend’ can refer either to the leader or his retainers.