Nú vill kapp*
við konungsfrænda
afreksmaðr
engi deila.
Giptudrjúgr,
sem glíkligt es,
verðr vinsæll
vella deilir.
Nú vill engi afreksmaðr deila kapp* við konungsfrænda. Vinsæll deilir vella verðr giptudrjúgr, sem es glíkligt.
Now no outstanding man wishes to try his courage against the king’s kinsman. The popular distributor of pure gold [GENEROUS MAN] becomes lasting in good luck, as is likely.
[1] kapp*: kappi Flat
[1] kapp* (n. acc. sg.) ‘courage’: The verb deila ‘try, test’ (l. 4) takes the dat. in the construction deila kappi við e-n ‘try one’s courage against sby’ (see Fritzner: kapp). However, it can also take the acc. (see Fritzner: deila 5), and the emendation (following Skj B and Skald) preserves the trisyllabic structure of the kviðuháttr odd l.