The Poetic Edda
Henry Adams Bellows (translator)
3,671 passages indexed from The Poetic Edda (Henry Adams Bellows (translator)) — Page 14 of 74
License: Public Domain
The Poetic Edda, passage 3339
Her′-vor, a swan-maiden, 254–256, 259.
The Poetic Edda, passage 36
PRESERVATION OF THE EDDIC POEMS
The Poetic Edda, passage 2570
15. The manuscript marks line 3 as the beginning of a stanza. Some
editors combine lines 5–6 with lines 1–2 of stanza 16, while others
mark them as interpolated.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1668
Except for its intricacies of diction, and the possible loss of a
stanza here and there, the poem is comparatively simple. The story
belongs in all its essentials to the Helgi tradition, with the Volsung
cycle brought in only to the extent of making Helgi the son of Sigmund,
and in the introduction of Sinfjotli, son of Sigmund and his sister
Signy, in a passage which has little or nothing to do with the course
of the narrative, and which looks like an expansion of a passage from
some older poem, perhaps from the “old Volsung lay” to which the
annotator of the second Helgi Hundingsbane lay refers (prose after
stanza 12). There are many proper names, some of which betray the
confusion caused by the blending of the two sets of traditions; for
example, Helgi appears indiscriminately as an Ylfing (which presumably
he was before the Volsung story became involved) and as a Volsung.
Granmar and his sons are called Hniflungs (Nibelungen) in stanza 50,
though they seem to have had no connection with this race. The place
names have aroused much debate as to the localization of the action,
but while some of them probably reflect actual places, there is so much
geographical confusion, and such a profusion of names which are almost
certainly mythical, that it is hard to believe that the poet had any
definite locations in mind.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1799
7. “Where hast thou, warrior, | battle wakened,
Or gorged the birds | of the sisters of Guth?
Why is thy byrnie | spattered with blood,
Why helmed dost feast | on food uncooked?”
The Poetic Edda, passage 2348
1. Of old did Sigurth | Gjuki seek,
The Volsung young, | in battles victor;
Well he trusted | the brothers twain,
With mighty oaths | among them sworn.
The Poetic Edda, passage 522
Like the preceding poem, the Grimnismol is largely encyclopædic in
nature, and consists chiefly of proper names, the last forty-seven
stanzas containing no less than two hundred and twenty-five of these.
It is not, however, in dialogue form. As Müllenhoff pointed out, there
is underneath the catalogue of mythological names a consecutive and
thoroughly dramatic story. Othin, concealed under the name of Grimnir,
is through an error tortured by King Geirröth. Bound between two
blazing fires, he begins to display his wisdom for the benefit of the
king’s little son, Agnar, who has been kind to him. Gradually he works
up to the great final moment, when he declares his true name, or rather
names, to the terrified Geirröth, and the latter falls on his sword and
is killed.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2167
The Sigrdrifumol represents almost exclusively the contributions of the
North to the Sigurth tradition (cf. introductory note to the
Gripisspo). Brynhild, here disguised by the annotator as “Sigrdrifa,”
appears simply as a battle-maid and supernatural dispenser of wisdom;
there is no trace of the daughter of Buthli and the rival of Guthrun.
There is, however, so little of the “poem” which can definitely be
assigned to the Sigurth cycle that it is impossible to trace back any
of the underlying narrative substance.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1532
11. No gap indicated in the manuscript; some editors combine these
lines with lines 3–4 of stanza 10, while others combine them with the
first two lines of stanza 12. The one ring which Nithuth’s men steal is
given to Bothvild, and proves the cause of her undoing.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1233
9. The manuscript marks line 2 as the beginning of a stanza.
The Poetic Edda, passage 32
Of all the migrations, however, the most important were those to
Iceland. Here grew up an active civilization, fostered by absolute
independence and by remoteness from the wars which wracked Norway, yet
kept from degenerating into provincialism by the roving life of the
people, which brought them constantly in contact with the culture of
the South. Christianity, introduced throughout the Norse world about
the year 1000, brought with it the stability of learning, and the
Icelanders became not only the makers but also the students and
recorders of history.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1606
25. “’Tis Lothin shall have thee,— | thou’rt loathsome to men,—
His home in Tholley he has;
Of the wild-dwellers worst | is the giant wise,
He is meet as a mate for thee.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 496
20. The fragmentary version of this poem in the Arnamagnæan Codex
begins in the middle of the first line of this stanza.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2315
19. “In his seat, in his bed, | I see no more
My heart’s true friend; | the fault is theirs,
The sons of Gjuki, | for all my grief,
That so their sister | sorely weeps.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3160
Bleik, Mengloth’s handmaid, 249.
The Poetic Edda, passage 34
After 1250 came a rapid and tragic decline. Iceland lost its
independence, becoming a Norwegian province. Later Norway too fell
under alien rule, a Swede ascending the Norwegian throne in 1320.
Pestilence and famine laid waste the whole North; volcanic disturbances
worked havoc in Iceland. Literature did not quite die, but it fell upon
evil days; for the vigorous native narratives and heroic poems of the
older period were substituted translations of French romances. The
poets wrote mostly doggerel; the prose writers were devoid of national
or racial inspiration.
The Poetic Edda, passage 826
“Aye, friend, we can, | if cunning we are.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 2152
35. Wolf, etc.: the phrase is nearly equivalent to “there must be fire
where there is smoke.” The proverb appears elsewhere in Old Norse.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2934
47. Line 3 is very likely an interpolation. The manuscript marks line 4
as the beginning of a new stanza, and some editions make a separate
stanza of lines 4–5. Atli’s brother: doubtless a reminiscence of the
early tradition represented in the Nibelungenlied by the slaying of
Etzel’s brother, Blœdelin (the historical Bleda), by Dancwart.
The Poetic Edda, passage 694
16. Brother’s slayer: perhaps the brother is Beli, slain by Freyr; the
only other references are in Voluspo, 53, and in Snorri’s paraphrase of
the Skirnismol, which merely says that Freyr’s gift of his sword to
Skirnir “was the reason why he was weaponless when he met Beli, and he
killed him bare-handed.” Skirnir himself seems never to have killed
anybody.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2724
32. “It shall go with thee, Atli, | as with Gunnar thou heldest
The oaths ofttimes sworn, | and of old made firm,
By the sun in the south, | by Sigtyr’s mountain,
By the horse of the rest-bed, | and the ring of Ull.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 364
13. The heron: the bird of forgetfulness, referred to in line 1.
Gunnloth: the daughter of the giant Suttung, from whom Othin won the
mead of poetry. For this episode see stanzas 104–110.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2975
90. Some editions mark line 3 as spurious or defective. The manuscript
marks line 4 as the beginning of a new stanza. The land, etc.: there is
much obscurity as to the significance of this line. Some editors omit
or question “me,” in which case Atli is apparently reproaching Guthrun
for having incited him to fight with his brothers to win for himself
the whole of Buthli’s land. In stanza 91 Guthrun denies that she was to
blame for Atli’s quarrels with his brothers. The Volsungasaga reading
supports this interpretation. The historical Attila did actually have
his brother, Bleda, killed in order to have the sole rule. The
treasure: Sigurth’s hoard, which Atli claimed as the brother of
Brynhild and husband of Guthrun, Sigurth’s widow, but which Gunnar and
Hogni kept for themselves, with, as Atli here charges, Guthrun’s
connivance. My mother: the only other reference to Atli’s mother is in
Oddrunargratr, 30, wherein she appears as the adder who stings Gunnar
to death, and in the prose passages based on that stanza.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2349
2. A maid they gave him, | and jewels many,
Guthrun the young, | the daughter of Gjuki;
They drank and spake | full many a day,
Sigurth the young | and Gjuki’s sons.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1872
12. Some editors reject line 3, others line 5. The manuscript omits
Helgi’s name in line 5, thereby destroying both the sense and the
meter. Vigfusson, following his Karuljoth theory (cf. note on prose
following stanza 4), changes Hogni to Halfdan, father of Kara.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2922
34. Keel, etc.: in the Nibelungenlied, and presumably in the older
German tradition, Hagene breaks his oar steering the Burgundians across
the Danube (stanza 1564), and, after all have landed, splinters the
boat (stanza 1581) in order that there may be no retreating. The poet
here seems to have confused the story, connecting the breaking of the
ship’s keel with the violence of the rowing, but echoing the older
legend in the last line, wherein the ship is allowed to drift away
after the travellers have landed. Oar-loops: the thongs by which the
oars in a Norse boat were made fast to the thole-pins, the combination
taking the place of the modern oarlock.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2269
13. His feet were tossing, | he talked to himself,
And the slayer of hosts | began to heed
What the twain from the tree | had told him then,
The raven and eagle, | as home they rode.
The Poetic Edda, passage 127
5. Various editors have regarded this stanza as interpolated; Hoffory
thinks it describes the northern summer night in which the sun does not
set. Lines 3–5 are quoted by Snorri. In the manuscripts line 4 follows
line 5. Regarding the sun and moon as daughter and son of Mundilferi,
cf. Vafthruthnismol, 23 and note, and Grimnismol, 37 and note.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2069
25. This stanza almost certainly had nothing originally to do with the
others in this passage; it may have been taken from a longer version of
the Hovamol itself.
The Poetic Edda, passage 933
33. “Small ill does it work | though a woman may have
A lord or a lover or both;
But a wonder it is | that this womanish god
Comes hither, though babes he has borne.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 2549
33. Weeping Grimhild | heard the words
That fate full sore | for her sons foretold,
(And mighty woe | for them should work;)
“Lands I give thee, | with all that live there,
(Vinbjorg is thine, | and Valbjorg too,)
Have them forever, | but hear me, daughter.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 3529
Sev′-a-fjoll, Sigrun’s home, 319, 323, 325, 327–329.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3546
Sig″-urth-a-kvith′-a en Skam′-ma, the Short Lay of Sigurth, 93, 241,
308, 407, 410, 416–441, 443, 448–450, 453, 459, 470, 475, 488, 493,
534, 538, 539, 543, 547.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2263
7. Only this | did Hogni answer:
“Sigurth we | with our swords have slain;
The gray horse mourns | by his master dead.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 575
47. Sath and Svipal | and Sanngetal,
Herteit and Hnikar,
Bileyg, Baleyg, | Bolverk, Fjolnir,
Grim and Grimnir, | Glapsvith, Fjolsvith.
The Poetic Edda, passage 657
18. “I am not of the elves, | nor the offspring of gods,
Nor of the wise Wanes;
Though I came alone | through the leaping flame
Thus to behold thy home.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2860
72. Thus bitterly planned she, | and Buthli’s race threatened,
And terrible vengeance | on her husband would take;
The little ones called she, | on a block she laid them;
Afraid were the proud ones, | but their tears did not fall;
To their mother’s arms went they, | and asked what she would.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1991
39. The last half of line 4 is obscure, and the reading is conjectural.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2826
38. Then Vingi did they smite, | and they sent him to hell,
With their axes they clove him | while the death-rattle came.
The Poetic Edda, passage 921
21. “Mad art thou, Loki, | and little of wit,
The wrath of Gefjun to rouse;
For the fate that is set | for all she sees,
Even as I, methinks.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 3298
Guth″-rūn-ar-kvith′-a III (Thrith′-ja), the Third Lay of Guthrun, 450,
451, 465–469, 517.
The Poetic Edda, passage 31
Within the proper limits of an introduction it would be impossible to
give any adequate summary of the history and literature with which the
Eddic poems are indissolubly connected, but a mere mention of a few of
the salient facts may be of some service to those who are unfamiliar
with the subject. Old Norse literature covers approximately the period
between 850 and 1300. During the first part of that period occurred the
great wanderings of the Scandinavian peoples, and particularly the
Norwegians. A convenient date to remember is that of the sea-fight of
Hafrsfjord, 872, when Harald the Fair-Haired broke the power of the
independent Norwegian nobles, and made himself overlord of nearly all
the country. Many of the defeated nobles fled overseas, where inviting
refuges had been found for them by earlier wanderers and
plunder-seeking raiders. This was the time of the inroads of the
dreaded Northmen in France, and in 885 Hrolf Gangr (Rollo) laid siege
to Paris itself. Many Norwegians went to Ireland, where their
compatriots had already built Dublin, and where they remained in
control of most of the island till Brian Boru shattered their power at
the battle of Clontarf in 1014.
The Poetic Edda, passage 131
9. Here apparently begins the interpolated catalogue of the dwarfs,
running through stanza 16; possibly, however, the interpolated section
does not begin before stanza 11. Snorri quotes practically the entire
section, the names appearing in a somewhat changed order. Brimir and
Blain: nothing is known of these two giants, and it has been suggested
that both are names for Ymir (cf. stanza 3). Brimir, however, appears
in stanza 37 in connection with the home of the dwarfs. Some editors
treat the words as common rather than proper nouns, Brimir meaning “the
bloody moisture” and Blain being of uncertain significance.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2903
13. The manuscript, followed by some editions, has “Hogni spake” in the
middle of line 1. Ill: the manuscript and many editions have “this.”
The king: Atli.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1811
“Who is the king | who captains the fleet,
And to the land | the warriors leads?”
The Poetic Edda, passage 2599
Herkja was the name of a serving-woman of Atli’s; she had been his
concubine. She told Atli that she had seen Thjothrek and Guthrun both
together. Atli was greatly angered thereby. Then Guthrun said:
The Poetic Edda, passage 553
25. Heithrun is the goat | who stands by Heerfather’s hall,
And the branches of Lærath she bites;
The pitcher she fills | with the fair, clear mead,
Ne’er fails the foaming drink.
The Poetic Edda, passage 245
51. Hotter than fire | between false friends
Does friendship five days burn;
When the sixth day comes | the fire cools,
And ended is all the love.
The Poetic Edda, passage 976
13. Sijmons makes one line of lines 4–5 by cutting out a part of each;
Finnur Jonsson rejects 5 as spurious.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2859
71. The beer then she brought | for her brothers’ death-feast,
And a feast Atli made | for his followers dead;
No more did they speak, | the mead was made ready,
Soon the men were gathered | with mighty uproar.