The Poetic Edda
Henry Adams Bellows (translator)
3,671 passages indexed from The Poetic Edda (Henry Adams Bellows (translator)) — Page 35 of 74
License: Public Domain
The Poetic Edda, passage 576
48. Sithhott, Sithskegg, | Sigfather, Hnikuth,
Allfather, Valfather, | Atrith, Farmatyr:
A single name | have I never had
Since first among men I fared.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2168
The nature and condition of the material have made editorial
conjectures and emendations very numerous, and as most of the guesses
are neither conclusive nor particularly important, only a few of them
are mentioned in the notes.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1099
18. “‘Clouds’ men name them, | ‘Rain-Hope’ gods call them,
The Wanes call them ‘Kites of the Wind’;
‘Water-Hope’ giants, | ‘Weather-Might’ elves,
‘The Helmet of Secrets’ in hell.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 370
39. In the manuscript this stanza follows stanza 40.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2250
Sigurth urged Grani | then with his sword,
The fire slackened | before the hero,
The flames sank low | for the greedy of fame,
The armor flashed | that Regin had fashioned.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2814
26. “Too late is thy speaking, | for so is it settled;
From the faring I turn not, | the going is fixed,
Though likely it is | that our lives shall be short.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 2150
32. That the birds’ stanzas come from more than one source is fairly
apparent, but whether from two or from three or more is uncertain. It
is also far from clear how many birds are speaking. The manuscript
numbers II, III, and IV in the margin with numerals; the Volsungasaga
makes a different bird speak each time. There are almost as many
guesses as there are editions. I suspect that in the original poem
there was one bird, speaking stanzas 34 and 37. Stanza 38 is little
more than a repetition of stanza 34, and may well have been a later
addition. As for the stanzas in Fornyrthislag (32–33 and 35–36), they
apparently come from another poem, in which several birds speak (cf.
“we sisters” in stanza 35). This may be the same poem from which
stanzas 40–44 were taken, as well as some of the Fornyrthislag stanzas
in the Sigrdrifumol.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2137
13. Snorri quotes this stanza. There were minor Norns, or fates, in
addition to the three great Norns, regarding whom cf. Voluspo, 20.
Dvalin: chief of the dwarfs; cf. Voluspo, 14.
The Poetic Edda, passage 867
7. Egil: possibly, though by no means certainly, the father of Thor’s
servant, Thjalfi, for, according to Snorri, Thor’s first stop on this
journey was at the house of a peasant whose children, Thjalfi and
Roskva, he took into his service; cf. stanza 38, note. The Arnamagnæan
Codex has “Ægir” instead of “Egil,” but, aside from the fact that Thor
had just left Ægir’s house, the sea-god can hardly have been spoken of
as a goat-herd.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3117
Alf′-heim, home of the elves, 3, 88, 186.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2600
1. “What thy sorrow, Atli, | Buthli’s son?
Is thy heart heavy-laden? | Why laughest thou never?
It would better befit | the warrior far
To speak with men, | and me to look on.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 291
97. Billing’s daughter | I found on her bed,
In slumber bright as the sun;
Empty appeared | an earl’s estate
Without that form so fair.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2123
40. “Bind, Sigurth, the golden | rings together,
Not kingly is it | aught to fear;
I know a maid, | there is none so fair,
Rich in gold, | if thou mightest get her.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3208
Ēl″-i-vāg′-ar, the Milky Way (?), 76, 140.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1753
30. Helgi demonstrates his courage, whatever one may think of his
seamanship. Ægir’s daughters: the waves; cf. stanza 29 and note.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1475
2. . . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . .
Hlathguth and Hervor, | Hlothver’s children,
And Olrun the Wise | Kjar’s daughter was.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3659
Vols′-ungs, descendants of Volsung, 269–272, 290–292, 306–311, 318,
319, 332, 333, 339, 421, 422, 425, 428.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2068
24. Goddesses: Norse mythology included an almost limitless number of
minor deities, the female ones, both kind and unkind, being generally
classed among the lesser Norns.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2147
28–29. Almost certainly interpolated from some such poem as the
Hovamol. Even the faithful Volsungasaga fails to paraphrase stanza 29.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2762
25. Helm-hammerer (literally “helmet-smith”): warrior, i.e., Hogni. No
gap indicated in the manuscript.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2521
5. Weeping I sought | with Grani to speak,
With tear-wet cheeks | for the tale I asked;
The head of Grani | was bowed to the grass,
The steed knew well | his master was slain.
The Poetic Edda, passage 888
35. The father of Mothi and Sif’s husband: Thor.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1817
19. “At Hlebjorg fell | the sons of Hrollaug,
Starkath the king | at Styrkleifar;
Fighters more noble | saw I never,
The body fought when | the head had fallen.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1479
6. Völund home | from his hunting came,
From a weary way, | the weather-wise bowman,
Slagfith and Egil | the hall found empty,
Out and in went they, | everywhere seeking.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1703
35. “Say tonight | when you feed the swine,
And send your bitches | to seek their swill,
That out of the East | have the Ylfings come,
Greedy for battle, | to Gnipalund.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1417
47. “Now answer me, Fjolsvith, | the question I ask,
For now the truth would I know:
What call they the hall, | encompassed here
With flickering magic flames?”
The Poetic Edda, passage 2495
14. “Ever with grief | and all too long
Are men and women | born in the world;
But yet we shall live | our lives together,
Sigurth and I. | Sink down, Giantess!”
The Poetic Edda, passage 1013
60. Loki’s taunt that Thor hid in the thumb of Skrymir’s glove is
similar to that of Othin, Harbarthsljoth, 26, in the note to which the
story is outlined. Line 4 is identical with line 3 of Harbarthsljoth,
26.
The Poetic Edda, passage 884
28. Sea-horse: boat. Surf-swine: the whales.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1644
15. The manuscript does not indicate the speaker. The pun on “Atli” and
“atall” (meaning “ill”) is untranslatable.
The Poetic Edda, passage 538
10. Easy is it to know | for him who to Othin
Comes and beholds the hall;
There hangs a wolf | by the western door,
And o’er it an eagle hovers.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1314
45. Then comes another, | a greater than all,
Though never I dare | his name to speak;
Few are they now | that farther can see
Than the moment when Othin | shall meet the wolf.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3361
Hlīf′-thras-a, Mengloth’s handmaid, 248.
The Poetic Edda, passage 525
The applications of this fact, which has been too often overlooked, are
almost limitless, for it suggests a still unwritten chapter in the
history of ballad poetry and the so-called “popular” epic. It implies
that narrative among early peoples may frequently have had a period of
prose existence before it was made into verse, and thus puts, for
example, a long series of transitional stages before such a poem as the
Iliad. In any case, the prose notes accompanying the Eddic poems prove
that in addition to the poems themselves there existed in the twelfth
century a considerable amount of narrative tradition, presumably in
prose form, on which these notes were based by the compiler.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1003
45. Nothing further is known of either Byggvir’s swiftness or his
cowardice. Hropt: Othin.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2104
24. “Unknown it is, | when all are together,
(The sons of the glorious gods,)
Who bravest born shall seem;
Some are valiant | who redden no sword
In the blood of a foeman’s breast.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 2175
4. “Long did I sleep, | my slumber was long,
And long are the griefs of life;
Othin decreed | that I could not break
The heavy spells of sleep.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 272
78. Cattle die, | and kinsmen die,
And so one dies one’s self;
One thing I know | that never dies,
The fame of a dead man’s deeds.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1093
12. “‘Heaven’ men call it, | ‘The Height’ the gods,
The Wanes ‘The Weaver of Winds’;
Giants ‘The Up-World,’ | elves ‘The Fair-Roof,’
The dwarfs ‘The Dripping Hall.’”
The Poetic Edda, passage 3119
Alm′-veig, wife of Halfdan, 222.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2636
14. “These were the words | the weary king,
Ere he died, | spake last of all:
He bade me with red gold | dowered to be,
And to Grimhild’s son | in the South be wedded.
The Poetic Edda, passage 106
50. From the east comes Hrym | with shield held high;
In giant-wrath | does the serpent writhe;
O’er the waves he twists, | and the tawny eagle
Gnaws corpses screaming; | Naglfar is loose.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3231
Fjorg′-yn, Jorth, 23, 24, 136.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1691
23. “Bid them straightway | seek the ships,
And off Brandey | ready to be!”
There the chief waited | till thither were come
Men by hundreds | from Hethinsey.
The Poetic Edda, passage 221
27. A witless man, | when he meets with men,
Had best in silence abide;
For no one shall find | that nothing he knows,
If his mouth is not open too much.
(But a man knows not, | if nothing he knows,
When his mouth has been open too much.)
The Poetic Edda, passage 2843
55. “Seize ye now Hogni, | and with knives shall ye hew him,
His heart shall ye cut out, | this haste ye to do;
And grim-hearted Gunnar | shall ye bind on the gallows,
Swift shall ye do it, | to serpents now cast him.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 413
144. Dain and Dvalin: dwarfs; cf. Voluspo, 14, and note. Dain, however,
may here be one of the elves rather than the dwarf of that name. The
two names also appear together in Grimnismol, 33, where they are
applied to two of the four harts that nibble at the topmost twigs of
Yggdrasil. Alsvith (“the All-Wise”) appears nowhere else as a giant’s
name. Myself: Othin. We have no further information concerning the list
of those who wrote the runes for the various races, and these four
lines seem like a confusion of names in the rather hazy mind of some
reciter.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1249
26. Many editors make a stanza out of line 4 and lines 1–2 of the
following stanza. Strewn: with fresh straw in preparation for a feast;
cf. Thrymskvitha, 22.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3604
Thjōth′-var-a, Mengloth’s handmaid, 248.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1543
22. The manuscript indicates line 3 as the beginning of a stanza, and
several editors have adopted this grouping. In the Thithrekssaga Völund
sends the boys away with instructions not to come back until just after
a fall of snow, and then to approach his dwelling walking backward. The
boys do this, and when, after he has killed them, Völund is questioned
regarding them, he points to the tracks in the snow as evidence that
they had left his house.