ÞKolb Eirdr 13I/2 — renndi ‘ran’
Enn at eyrar grunni
endr Skjǫldungr of renndi,
sás kjǫlslóðir kníði,
Knútr langskipum útan.
Varð, þars vildu fyrðar
varrláð koma báðir,
hjalmaðs jarls ok hilmis
hœgr fundr á því dœgri.
Enn Skjǫldungr, Knútr, sás kníði kjǫlslóðir, of renndi endr langskipum útan at grunni eyrar. Fundr hjalmaðs jarls ok hilmis varð hœgr á því dœgri, þars báðir fyrðar vildu koma varrláð.
And the Skjǫldungr, Knútr, who pounded the keel-paths [SEA], again ran his longships ashore onto the shallows of the land-spit. The meeting of the helmeted jarl and the prince proved propitious on that day, when both men wished to cross the oarstroke-land [SEA].
notes
[2] Skjǫldungr of renndi ‘Skjǫldungr ... ran’: Line 2 is problematic, and no ideal solution presents itself. (a) Skjǫldungr of is emended from ms. skjǫldungum (as also in Skj B; Skald; ÍF 35) in order to provide the antecedant that rel. sás ‘who’ requires. It is likely that in the process of transmission, an expletive particle um (earlier of) has been reanalysed as the dat. pl. ending of the preceding word, and final -r has been lost, giving Skjǫldungum. Skjǫldungr is a general ruler-heiti, but here and in Ótt Knútdr 10/1 may allude to Knútr’s royal Danish ancestry, and to a tradition of Danish rule in England (Frank 1994b, 110-13). Skjǫldungr is taken in apposition to Knútr (l. 4). As well as being an emendation, skjǫldungr has the drawback that it produces a metrically irregular line, whereas skjǫldungum produces a standard Type D2-line with a single word (simplex or cpd) occupying positions 1-4 (cf. Gade 1995a, 113-14). (b) To retain ms. skjǫldungum would therefore be preferable, yet it has no clear function in the helmingr. Renndi skjǫldungum ‘made princes flee’ would be possible in itself (cf. a similar statement in HSt Rst 20/5-6), but it would conflict with the stanza’s focus on a meeting of two allies; the identity of the skjǫldungar would be unclear; and renndi ‘ran, impelled’ already has a dat. object in langskipum ‘longships’. (c) Skj B’s sá skjǫldungr, es kníði ... ‘that prince who pounded ...’ entails syntactic problems (on which see NN §583; cf. §1853A) as well as the problems noted for interpretation (a).