The Poetic Edda
Henry Adams Bellows (translator)
3,671 passages indexed from The Poetic Edda (Henry Adams Bellows (translator)) — Page 62 of 74
License: Public Domain
The Poetic Edda, passage 1632
4. The bird’s demands would indicate that it is in reality one of the
gods. Gold-horned cattle: cf. Thrymskvitha, 23. There are other
references to gilding the horns of cattle, particularly for sacrificial
purposes.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2536
20. (Valdar, king | of the Danes, was come,
With Jarizleif, Eymoth, | and Jarizskar).
In like princes | came they all,
The long-beard men, | with mantles red,
Short their mail-coats, | mighty their helms,
Swords at their belts, | and brown their hair.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1512
35. “First shalt thou all | the oaths now swear,
By the rail of ship, | and the rim of shield,
By the shoulder of steed, | and the edge of sword,
That to Völund’s wife | thou wilt work no ill,
Nor yet my bride | to her death wilt bring,
Though a wife I should have | that well thou knowest,
And a child I should have | within thy hall.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1759
36. Quern: turning the hand mill was, throughout antiquity, the task of
slaves.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2289
18. Footprints: the actual mingling of blood in one another’s
footprints was a part of the ceremony of swearing blood-brotherhood,
the oath which Gunnar and Sigurth had taken. The fourth line refers to
the fact that Sigurth had won many battles for Gunnar.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1031
10. “Trouble I have, | and tidings as well:
Thrym, king of the giants, | keeps thy hammer,
And back again | shall no man bring it
If Freyja he wins not | to be his wife.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 117
61. In wondrous beauty | once again
Shall the golden tables | stand mid the grass,
Which the gods had owned | in the days of old,
. . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . .
The Poetic Edda, passage 35
The mass of literature thus collected and written down largely between
1150 and 1250 may be roughly divided into four groups. The greatest in
volume is made up of the sagas: narratives mainly in prose, ranging all
the way from authentic history of the Norwegian kings and the early
Icelandic settlements to fairy-tales. Embodied in the sagas is found
the material composing the second group: the skaldic poetry, a vast
collection of songs of praise, triumph, love, lamentation, and so on,
almost uniformly characterized by an appalling complexity of figurative
language. There is no absolute line to be drawn between the poetry of
the skalds and the poems of the Edda, which we may call the third
group; but in addition to the remarkable artificiality of style which
marks the skaldic poetry, and which is seldom found in the poems of the
Edda, the skalds dealt almost exclusively with their own emotions,
whereas the Eddic poems are quite impersonal. Finally, there is the
fourth group, made up of didactic works, religious and legal treatises,
and so on, studies which originated chiefly in the later period of
learned activity.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1125
11. Lines 1, 2, and 4 of Thor’s questions are regularly abbreviated in
the manuscript. Beheld, etc.: the word in the manuscript is almost
certainly an error, and all kinds of guesses have been made to rectify
it. All that can be said is that it means “beheld of” or “known to”
somebody.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1773
50. No gap indicated in the manuscript. Hniflungs: cf. introductory
note.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2509
Gunnar and Hogni then took all the gold that Fafnir had had. There was
strife between the Gjukungs and Atli, for he held the Gjukungs guilty
of Brynhild’s death. It was agreed that they should give him Guthrun as
wife, and they gave her a draught of forgetfulness to drink before she
would consent to be wedded to Atli. The sons of Atli were Erp and
Eitil, and Svanhild was the daughter of Sigurth and Guthrun. King Atli
invited Gunnar and Hogni to come to him, and sent as messenger Vingi or
Knefröth. Guthrun was aware of treachery, and sent with him a message
in runes that they should not come, and as a token she sent to Hogni
the ring Andvaranaut and tied a wolf’s hair in it. Gunnar had sought
Oddrun, Atli’s sister, for his wife, but had her not; then he married
Glaumvor, and Hogni’s wife was Kostbera; their sons were Solar and
Snævar and Gjuki. And when the Gjukungs came to Atli, then Guthrun
besought her sons to plead for the lives of both the Gjukungs, but they
would not do it. Hogni’s heart was cut out, and Gunnar was cast into
the serpent’s den. He smote on the harp and put the serpents to sleep,
but an adder stung him in the liver.
The Poetic Edda, passage 808
44. Othin refers to the dead, from whom he seeks information through
his magic power.
The Poetic Edda, passage 52
That this translation may be of some value to those who can read the
poems of the Edda in the original language I earnestly hope. Still more
do I wish that it may lead a few who hitherto have given little thought
to the Old Norse language and literature to master the tongue for
themselves. But far above either of these I place the hope that this
English version may give to some, who have known little of the ancient
traditions of what is after all their own race, a clearer insight into
the glories of that extraordinary past, and that I may through this
medium be able to bring to others a small part of the delight which I
myself have found in the poems of the Poetic Edda.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3146
Baldr, a god, 1, 2, 14–16, 22, 25, 82, 83, 90, 91, 114, 161, 172,
195–199, 218, 227, 228, 236, 245, 360.
The Poetic Edda, passage 740
20. “Much love-craft I wrought | with them who ride by night,
When I stole them by stealth from their husbands;
A giant hard | was Hlebarth, methinks:
His wand he gave me as gift,
And I stole his wits away.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 2004
The twenty-six stanzas and accompanying prose notes included under the
heading of Reginsmol belong almost wholly to the northern part of the
Sigurth legend; the mythological features have no counterpart in the
southern stories, and only here and there is there any betrayal of the
tradition’s Frankish home. The story of Andvari, Loki, and Hreithmar is
purely Norse, as is the concluding section containing Othin’s counsels.
If we assume that the passage dealing with the victory over Hunding’s
sons belongs to the Helgi cycle (cf. introductory notes to Helgakvitha
Hjorvarthssonar and Helgakvitha Hundingsbana I), there is very little
left to reflect the Sigurth tradition proper.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2835
47. Then the daughter of Gjuki | two warriors smote down,
Atli’s brother she slew, | and forth then they bore him;
(So fiercely she fought | that his feet she clove off;)
Another she smote | so that never he stood,
To hell did she send him,— | her hands trembled never.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3331
Helg′-i, son of Sigmund, 221, 269, 270, 276, 289–301, 304, 306–336,
339, 340, 357, 358, 364–366, 368, 371, 446.
The Poetic Edda, passage 403
131. Lines 5–6 probably were inserted from a different poem.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2539
23. In the cup were runes | of every kind,
Written and reddened, | I could not read them;
A heather-fish | from the Haddings’ land,
An ear uncut, | and the entrails of beasts.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3030
The Hamthesmol, the concluding poem in the Codex Regius, is on the
whole the worst preserved of all the poems in the collection. The
origin of the story, the relation of the Hamthesmol to the
Guthrunarhvot, and of both poems to the hypothetical “old” Hamthesmol,
are outlined in the introductory note to the Guthrunarhvot. The
Hamthesmol as we have it is certainly not the “old” poem of that name;
indeed it is so pronounced a patchwork that it can hardly be regarded
as a coherent poem at all. Some of the stanzas are in Fornyrthislag,
some are in Malahattr, one (stanza 29) appears to be in Ljothahattr,
and in many cases the words can be adapted to any known metrical form
only by liberal emendation. That any one should have deliberately
composed such a poem seems quite incredible, and it is far more likely
that some eleventh century narrator constructed a poem about the death
of Hamther and Sorli by piecing together various fragments, and
possibly adding a number of Malahattr stanzas of his own.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2469
59. Line 3 may well be spurious, as it is largely repetition. The
manuscript has “sofa” (“sleep”) in place of “sona” (“sons”), but the
Volsungasaga paraphrase says clearly “sons.” The slaying of Atli by
Guthrun in revenge for his killing of her brothers is told in the two
Atli lays. The manuscript marks line 4 as the beginning of a new
stanza, and some editions make a separate stanza out of lines 4–5, or
else combine them with stanza 60.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3574
Sprak′-ki, daughter of Karl, 210.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3143
Auth, mother of Harald Battle-Tooth, 227.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1819
Then Sigrun wept. | Helgi said:
The Poetic Edda, passage 2054
8. The word translated “maid” in line 2 is obscure, and “gold” may be
meant. Apparently, however, the reference is to the fight between
Sigurth and the sons of Gjuki over Brynhild. The manuscript does not
name the speaker, and many editions assign this stanza to Hreithmar.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3174
Breith′-a-blik, Baldr’s home, 90.
The Poetic Edda, passage 2993
5. “Bloody revenge | didst have for thy brothers,
Evil and sore, | when thy sons didst slay;
Else yet might we all | on Jormunrek
Together our sister’s | slaying avenge.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3567
Snǣv′-ar, son of Hogni, 449, 487, 509, 517.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1147
6. “Vegtam my name, | I am Valtam’s son;
Speak thou of hell, | for of heaven I know:
For whom are the benches | bright with rings,
And the platforms gay | bedecked with gold?”
The Poetic Edda, passage 863
3. Word-wielder: Thor. The giant: Ægir. Sif: Thor’s wife; cf.
Harbarthsljoth, 48. The kettle: Ægir’s kettle is possibly the sea
itself.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1042
21. Then home the goats | to the hall were driven,
They wrenched at the halters, | swift were they to
run;
The mountains burst, | earth burned with fire,
And Othin’s son | sought Jotunheim.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1764
41. No gap indicated in the manuscript; some editors combine the two
lines with stanza 40, some regard them as the first instead of the last
lines of a separate stanza, and some assume the lacuna here indicated.
Sogunes (“Saga’s Cape”): of the goddess Saga little is known; cf.
Grimnismol, 7.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1101
20. “‘Wind’ do men call it, | the gods ‘The Waverer,’
‘The Neigher’ the holy ones high;
‘The Wailer’ the giants, | ‘Roaring Wender’ the elves,
In hell ‘The Blustering Blast.’”
The Poetic Edda, passage 1257
39. The manuscript marks both lines 1 and 2 as beginning stanzas.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1594
13. “Helgi his name, | and never thou mayst
Harm to the hero bring;
With iron is fitted | the prince’s fleet,
Nor can witches work us ill.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 1098
17. “Answer me, Alvis! | thou knowest all,
Dwarf, of the doom of men:
What call they the clouds, | that keep the rains,
In each and every world?”
The Poetic Edda, passage 819
Skaldic diction made relatively few inroads into the earlier Eddic
poems, but in the Hymiskvitha these circumlocutions are fairly
numerous. This sets the poem somewhat apart from the rest of the
mythological collection. Only the vigor of the two main stories—Thor’s
expedition after Hymir’s kettle and the fishing trip in which he caught
Mithgarthsorm—saves it from complete mediocrity.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1210
36. Straight from the grove | came striding Rig,
Rig came striding, | and runes he taught him;
By his name he called him, | as son he claimed him,
And bade him hold | his heritage wide,
His heritage wide, | the ancient homes.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1605
24. “Awake now, Helgi, | and Hrimgerth requite,
That Hati to death thou didst hew;
If a single night | she can sleep by the prince,
Then requited are all her ills.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 930
30. “Be silent, Freyja! | for fully I know thee,
Sinless thou art not thyself;
Of the gods and elves | who are gathered here,
Each one as thy lover has lain.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 1436
66. “Alike we yearned; | I longed for thee,
And thou for my love hast longed;
But now henceforth | together we know
Our lives to the end we shall live.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 2627
“Vilmund is he, | the heroes’ friend,
Who wrapped the woman | in bedclothes warm,
(For winters five, | yet her father knew not).”
The Poetic Edda, passage 2800
13. “All women are fearful; | not so do I feel,
Ill I seek not to find | till I soon must avenge it;
The king now will give us | the glow-ruddy gold;
I never shall fear, | though of dangers I know.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 1848
42. “Now am I glad | of our meeting together,
As Othin’s hawks, | so eager for prey,
When slaughter and flesh | all warm they scent,
Or dew-wet see | the red of day.
The Poetic Edda, passage 339
145. Knowest how one shall write, | knowest how one shall rede?
Knowest how one shall tint, | knowest how one makes trial?
Knowest how one shall ask, | knowest how one shall offer?
Knowest how one shall send, | knowest how one shall sacrifice?
The Poetic Edda, passage 746
26. “Thor has might enough, | but never a heart;
For cowardly fear | in a glove wast thou fain to crawl,
And there forgot thou wast Thor;
Afraid there thou wast, | thy fear was such,
To fart or sneeze | lest Fjalar should hear.”
The Poetic Edda, passage 1278
10. “For me a shrine | of stones he made,—
And now to glass | the rock has grown;—
Oft with the blood | of beasts was it red;
In the goddesses ever | did Ottar trust.
The Poetic Edda, passage 3196
Dval′-in, a dwarf, 6, 7, 62, 188, 375.
The Poetic Edda, passage 1323
3. Sijmons suggests that this stanza may be an interpolation.