Stories and Ballads of the Far Past Part 39

4. _Arngrim and the Earl's lady_, etc. So Svabo. In Hammershaimb's version (_Antiq. Tidss._ 1849-1851) she is described as the daughter of Angantyr.

7. _Better than fighting_, etc. The incident of a _boy_ playing too roughly with his companions and being told by them to go and avenge his father instead of maltreating them is very widespread. Prof. Ker notes its occurrence (_On the History of the Ballads_ 1100-1500, p. 194) in the Irish Romance of Maelduin, in four Norwegian, five Faroese, two or three Danish ballads, in a Literary History of the Arabs and in New Guinea.

8. _Water she cast_, etc. The pa.s.sage is obscure. It is not clear if Hervik had actually been fighting with the 'lads,' so that the cleansing of her armour was an actual necessity; or if she had only been playing rather roughly. _Leika_ can mean both 'to play' and 'to fight'; and _leikvollr_ may mean both a 'playground' and a 'battlefield.' If Hervik had only been playing, the throwing of the water on the armour was possibly a rite performed before undertaking vengeance.

9. _Die on straw._ To 'die on straw' is the regular idiom in Faroese and Icelandic for to 'die in one's bed,' of old age or sickness, as opposed to death by the sword.

10. _Isan's Grove._ Hammershaimb suggests that by _Isan's Land_ here and in vv. 20 and 21 below the Faroese mean _Sams_. On the other hand there was a forest in Holstein in ancient times called _Isarnho_, and some such name may possibly be preserved here. There was a King _Isung_ mentioned in the Danish Ballad _De vare syv og syvsindstyve_, as an opponent of King _Didrik_; but it is improbable that his land is here indicated.

13. _She drew a s.h.i.+rt from out the chest_, etc.--a common ballad motif. A verse almost identical with this is to be found in the _Kvaei of Regin the Smith_, v. 47.

14. _Up then rose Hervik_, etc. vv. 14, 15, 16 and 20 are identical with vv. 12-16 (inclusive) of _Olufu Kvaei_, the only change being that 'Hugin the King' takes the place of 'Hervik the Earl's daughter.' They are practically identical too with the _Kvaei of the Jomsvikingar_, vv. 6-8 (inclusive). Cf. also _Sjurar Kvaei_ (III _Hogna Tattur_, vv. 46-49), and _Ragnarlikkja_, vv. 40-48.

20. _Striped gold on a scarlet ground._ The text has _Gull vi reyan brand_, which is probably a mishearing of the line _Gull vi reyan rand_ ('with a gold stripe on a red ground'). Verse 39 of _Brusajokils Kvaei_ (which is otherwise identical with the above) gives in the second line _Gull vi raum brann_ ('gold blazed on the yardarms'). In Hammershaimb's version of our ballad, vv. 10, 72, the line is _Gulli vovin vi rand_ ('woven with gold in stripes'), as also in v. 22 of the _Kvaei of Ormar Torolvsson_. The line also occurs in the form _Gull vi vagum rann_ ('the margin of the s.h.i.+p was gold down to where it touched the waves'). This is no doubt corrupt, but it is difficult to conjecture as to which of all the variants was the original form of the line.

23. _Cast she down her anchor_, etc. vv. 23, 24 are the almost invariable formula for the landing in the Faroese ballads. They are practically identical with v. 46 of _Olufu Kvaei_ and vv. 24, 25 of the _Kvaei of Ormar Torolvsson_. Cf. also _Sigmundar Kvaei_, v. 32; _Brusajokils Kvaei_, v. 41 and the _Kvaei of Alvur Kongur_, vv. 24-26 and _Sjurar Kvaei_ (_Hogna Tattur_, vv. 71-73).

25. _Herd and fee._ Either the word _jaege_ or the word _fae_ seems to have an unusual sense here.

28. _Though quake now fell and fold._ The original (_kyk gekk jor a fold_) is not clear. I have merely adopted Grundtvig's translation of Hammershaimb's early text in the _Antiq. Tidss_. 1849-1851. The 1855 ed. subst.i.tutes _hon_ for _jor_ which is better.

35. _All in the middle_, etc. There is obviously a lacuna or transference of some kind here. For this and the following verses, cf. _Olufu Kvaei_, vv. 26, 27, which are identical except the names.

Indeed it is a common formula in the Faroese and Danish Ballads, and occurs in the _Kvaei of Ormar Torolvsson_, v. 26; and the _Kvaei of Alvur Kongur_, v. 33.

36. _A hundred men and five_--a stock number in the Faroese ballads.

Cf. the _Kvaei of Ormar Torolvsson_, v. 27, where we are also told that the King sat at the board 'with a hundred men and five.' Cf. also _Olufu Kvaei_, v. 27.

37. _Mead or wine_, etc. Cf. _Sjurar Kvaei_ (III, _Hogna Tattur_, v.

181).

52. Perhaps we should here again a.s.sume a lacuna or transposition.

_Uppland_ is the old name for the modern province of Upsala in Sweden.

60. _Her cheeks they are as red and white_, etc. Cf. the _Kvaei of Finnur hin Frii_, v. 18. Cf. also the old Celtic romance of the _Fate of the Sons of Usna_: "I should like," said Deirdre, "that he who is to be my husband should have these three colours: his hair as black as the raven: his cheeks red as the blood: his skin like the snow"

(Joyce's translation). Cf. also Grimm's story of _Little Snowdrop_.

68. _Forth then when his frigate_, etc. vv. 68-84 are found in almost identical form in _Olufu Kvaei_, vv. 22-35.

69. _Angantyr was the first to light_, etc. A common ballad formula, both Faroese and Danish.

88. _I would not that lady Ingibjorg hear_, etc. Lit. "the lady Ingibjorg will learn that I fled." There is a suppressed condition.

"If I let you fight, the lady Ingibjorg would learn, etc."

Hammershaimb's text (_Antiq. Tidss._) v. 37, has a negative and no condition: "The lady Ingibjorg shall not learn," etc.

97. _O Hjalmar, give me now a drink._ This incident appears to be taken from _Gunnlaugs Saga_, ch. 12.

THE FAROESE GATU RIMA

9. _Thunder is the red drum._ Probably _reya_ ('red') is a printer's error for _reia_ ('angry'), though the same form occurs also in the version of the ballad published in the _Antiquarisk Tidsskrift_. In v. 16, however, we find _skari_ whereas in v. 17 the word is written _skari_, the form used in both verses in _Antiq. Tidss._, and the two words are obviously identical in both verses. Moreover in v. 21 _einir_ ('own,' 'single') which gives little sense, is surely an error for _eingir_ ('no,' adj.) as in vv. 11, 17, 19. The negative is also found in v. 21 in the version in the _Antiq. Tidss._, in the form _ei_, 'they have _not_ fathers or mothers.' Indeed the entire ballad would seem to be somewhat carelessly printed in _Faeroiske Kvaeer_.

HILDINA

5. _St Magnus_, Earl of Orkney, 1108 to 1116. A cathedral was built at Kirkwall in his honour by one of his successors, Earl Ronald.

EDITIONS OF TEXTS USED FOR TRANSLATIONS

PART I

_Fornaldar Sogur Norrlanda_, ed. by C. C. Rafn, published at Copenhagen, 1829.

_Fornaldar Sogur Norrlanda_, ed. by Valdimar asmundarson, published by Sigurur Kristjansson, Reykjavik, 1891-1911.

_Die Prosaische Edda im Auszuge nebst Volsungasaga und Nornageststhattr_, ed. with introduction and glossary by Ernst Wilken, Paderborn, 1877. 2nd ed., 1912.

_Sagaen om Hervar ok Kong Heirek_, ed. by N. N. Petersen and published (together with a Danish translation by G.

Thorarensen), by the Norse Literature Society, Copenhagen, 1847.

PART II

_Faeroiske Kvaeer henhrende til Hervarar Saga_, published by V. U. Hammershaimb in the _Antiquarisk Tidsskrift_, 1849-1851, Copenhagen, 1852.

_Faeroiske Kvaeer_, published by V. U. Hammershaimb at Copenhagen, Part I, 1851; Part II, 1855.

_Danmarks Gamle Folkeviser_, Vol. I, collected and edited by Svend Grundtvig, 1853.

_Griplur_, published in _Rimnasafn_, edited by Finnur Jonsson, Copenhagen, 1905-1912, p. 351 ff.

NOTE: TRANSLATIONS

The following is a list of English translations of works referred to in the notes of the present volume. It is not in the nature of a bibliography; but for the convenience of English readers, reference has been given, whenever English translations are accessible, to the translations in preference to the original work.

_Corpus Poetic.u.m Boreale_, 'The Poetry of the Old Northern Tongue from the earliest times to the Thirteenth Century,' 2 Vols., Vigfusson and Powell, Oxford, 1883.

_Five Pieces of Runic Poetry_, including _Hervor and Angantyr_, translated into prose by Bishop Percy, 1763.

_Hickes's Thesaurus_, including _Hervor and Angantyr_, translated into prose, Oxford, 1705.