Þul Elds 1III/4 — él ‘of storm’
Gims heiti vilk greppum segja:
Ægis bróðir ok élreka,
eldr, eimr, usli, úði, skerkir,
hrǫtuðr ok hrótgandr, hrímnir, eimi.
Vilk segja greppum heiti gims: bróðir Ægis ok élreka, eldr, eimr, usli, úði, skerkir, hrǫtuðr ok hrótgandr, hrímnir, eimi.
I will tell men the names for blaze: brother of Ægir <sea-giant> and of storm-driver, fire, smoke, conflagration, swarming, noise-maker, stumbler and roof-wolf, soot-maker, vapour.
notes
[3-4] bróðir Ægis ok élreka ‘brother of Ægir <sea-giant> and of storm-driver’: Here, as in Skm (SnE 1998, I, 39), fire (eldr), wind (élreki) and sea (Ægir) are represented as three brothers, sons of the giant Fornjótr (see Notes to Þul Jǫtna I 3/5, Þul Veðra 1/8 and Sveinn Norðrdr 2/2). In Skm (loc. cit.), fire is also called bróðir vinds ok Ægis ‘brother of the wind and of Ægir’ (for Ægir see Þul Sjóvar 1/2). Thus the m. nom. élreki ‘storm-driver’ in A is incorrect, since this is a term for ‘wind’ and not for ‘fire’ (cf. Þul Veðra 1/2), and the B variant élreka (gen.) has been adopted here. Neither of these poetic terms, which are rather mythological kennings than heiti, is otherwise used in poetry. The B variant bróður ‘brother’ (here most likely in the gen.) may indicate a connection with heiti gims ‘the names for blaze’ in l. 1 and suggests that, in B, ll. 3-4 were regarded as belonging to the introductory clause of the þula rather than to the list of fire-heiti proper (‘I will tell men the names of blaze, of the brother of Ægir and of storm-driver’). It seems that Þul Elds, like most other þulur, originally started with the most common term for ‘fire’, i.e. eldr (cf. the initial position of this word in l. 5), while the introduction (ll. 1-4) was probably an addition by a later compiler (cf. Gurevich 2008, 356-9).