Gamlkan Has 3VII/5 — þollar ‘Trees’
Send þú yðvarn anda,
einskepjandi, hreinan
mér, þanns mitt of fœri
munar grand heðan, landa.
Alls megu ekki þollar
án fremja þess hônum
súða viggs, es seggjum
siðabót af því hljótisk.
Send þú mér hreinan anda yðvarn, einskepjandi landa, þanns of fœri heðan munar grand mitt. Alls ekki megu þollar viggs súða fremja þess án hônum, es siðabót hljótisk seggjum af því.
Send your pure spirit to me, sole creator of lands [= God], the one which may carry hence my sorrow of mind. Trees of the steed of planking [SHIP > SEAFARERS] can by no means achieve this without it [lit. him, viz. the Holy Spirit], because moral amendment may proceed for men from it.
notes
[7] þollar viggs súða ‘trees of the steed of planking [SHIP > SEAFARERS]’: Súð f. (here in gen. pl. súða) is a term for the overlapping planks that form the hull of a clinker-built ship (Jesch 2001a, 139-40). Although the word occurs several times as a heiti for ‘ship’ (see LP: súð), this is its only occurrence as part of a ship-kenning. Jón Helgason (1935-6, 253), presumably influenced by the uniqueness of the kenning and its apparent tautology, objected to Finnur Jónsson’s transcription of B in Skj A: ‘The first word is written suda in the manuscript, and there is a hole over the u. The possibility that what was there was sūda = sunda must thus be considered’. Kock (NN §2926) and Black (1971, 340 and 141) adopt this suggestion and emend to sunda gen. sg. of sund ‘a body of water’, taking the kenning to be þollar viggs sunda ‘trees of the steed of the water’. Although there is indeed a hole in B, it is considerably above and to the left of súða, and does not interfere with the text at this point. It is not conceivable that a nasal stroke, which would be expected to sit very close to the letter and extend over its full width, has been lost here. B’s súða is therefore retained in this edn.
kennings
- þollar viggs súða — Trees of the steed of planking [SEAFARERS]
grammar
case: nom.
number: pl.