edda

Thor’s Visit to Geirrod, Part 1

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Snorri presents a prose telling of this tale, and he also gives the passage from the Old Norse skaldic poem Þórsdrápa by Eilífr Guðrúnarson that tells the story as well. However, it is a fairly difficult skaldic poem, even when translated to English. (If you have Faulkes’ translation of Snorri’s Edda, you can find this tale on pages 81-86, or in chapter 18 of Skáldskaparmál in other editions.) Thus, a more accessible poetic rendition is needed.

My poem is in 14 stanzas of fornyrðislag, and is titled “Thor’s Visit to Geirrod.” The spellings have been anglicized throughout. I present the first half here today, and the second half will follow next Tuesday.

A warm welcome
I wish to have
for telling the tale
of a trip by Thor
to Geirrod’s garth
and the games in the hall;
the draught of dwarves
I draw for you now.

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Learning Icelandic and Old Norse

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The advanced Asatru alliterative poet should also have some knowledge of the older languages, as the best exemplars of the form are in the old languages. Most important are Old Norse and Old English, although some alliterative material also exists in a few other old dialects. Today’s post, however, focuses on Old Norse and Modern Icelandic. The two are so similar (at least in the way they are written) that knowledge of one is almost the same thing as knowledge of the other. The vocabulary of the modern language is, of course, larger. The differences are relatively minor, and in comparing texts of the two, my brain doesn’t even register them as separate languages.

To really ramp up my learning of Modern Icelandic, I’m taking a trip to Reykjavík, Iceland for a four-week summer course in Modern Icelandic at the Árni Magnússon Institute. <http://arnastofnun.is/page/althjodlegt_islenskunamskeid_en>. While I’m there, my internet access will be limited, and this blog will be taking a four-week hiatus — the next post will not occur until July 31. So those who post comments may have to wait a while before they are approved.

Here’s a list of helpful resources for the poet who wants to study Modern Icelandic and/or Old Norse.

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Audio for The Rúnatal

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Four weeks after its posting as text, I now present an audio recording of my poetic translation of the Rúnatal, which is Hávamál stanzas 138-145. For those who seek after the runes, there is much essential lore in these eight stanzas.

Here is the downloadable file of me reciting the poem:
Eirik Westcoat – The Rúnatal

And here is the inline player:

Enjoy! Feel free to share the file. For details, see the Creative Commons link below.

This post is:
Copyright © 2013 Eirik Westcoat.
All rights reserved.

The linked audio file of The Rúnatal is:
Copyright © 2013 Eirik Westcoat.
Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives License.

The Binding of Fenrir, Part 1

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The Binding of Fenrir is another of the famous stories from Snorri’s Edda that does not have a corresponding form in verse in the Poetic Edda. Today I present the first half of my poetic retelling of this story, in seven stanzas of ljóðaháttr. Next week, I’ll post the remaining seven stanzas.

The ale of Ygg
I eagerly brewed,
and here I pour a poem.
Of Fenrir’s binding
and famous Týr,
that spell I speak to all.

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The Skald as Scholar

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In addition to writing poetry in modern versions of the traditional Old Norse and Old English meters, I also study those meters from a scholarly perspective. This week, I’m going to the 48th International Congress on Medieval Studies, where I’ll be presenting a paper on the uses of the galdralag meter in the Old Norse poetic corpus. It is a condensed version of a longer paper that takes a broader look at historical galdralag. In the future, I may post the shorter paper here or on my academia.edu page, and I intended to seek publication for the longer, more comprehensive paper.

As a brief taste, here are the two introductory paragraphs of the shorter paper.

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The Rúnatal: A Poetic Translation

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Now, for the first time on this blog, I am posting my own poetic translation of a short passage from the Poetic Edda. It is of Hávamál stanzas 138-145, which are sometimes called the Rúnatal, because they deal with Odin’s winning of the Runes. Regular readers may notice the rather odd stanza structure here. This portion of the Hávamál is rather irregular in the use of the long lines and full lines of the ljóðaháttr meter (and in stanza length), and I have followed the original pattern of lines rather than try to recast it into completely regular meter. Nonetheless, I have aimed to keep it poetic and alliterative at the expense of absolute literalness. I have tried to maintain consistency in the translation when possible. That is, when particular and important Old Norse words occur more than once in the passage, I try to translate them the same way each time. Man translates two different words, mann and þjóð, but I think it is better that way. In some cases, words were added that don’t have correspondences in the original for the sake of the meter, such as wyrd and mammoth in the first stanza. They are, however, quite appropriate for describing that tree. Translation always involves compromises, and it is at least as much art as science.

For nights all nine,
I know that I hung
on that wyrd and windy tree,
by gar wounded
and given to Odin,
myself to myself I gave,
on that mammoth tree
of which Man knows not
from where the roots do run.

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Valhalla

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It is time for another lore poem. This one is not a narrative like The Six Treasures or The Mead Quest. Instead, it is a synthesis of lore on Valhalla that appears in the Poetic Edda (mostly the Grímnismál) and Prose Edda (various places).

It is written as ten stanzas of fornyrðislag. (Only the first stanza is prior to the break.) It is not anglicized at all, except for the word Valhalla. (The proper Old Norse form would be Valhöll.) A short note on an aspect of composition: the semi-riddle nature of the poem is intentional. I use various bynames of Óðinn prior to the second-to-last line, and I avoid using the name Valhalla itself until the very last word of the poem.

A spell of the lore
I speak to you now
by pouring Hropt’s
powerful drink.
I sing of that hall
high on the Tree;
to warriors dead
‘tis a welcome sight.

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Freyr and Gerd

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As may or may not be thought appropriate for a certain secular holiday, I present a short poem about the betrothal of Freyr and Gerd. It would not be wrong to think of it as a very short poetic summary of the Skírnismál from the Poetic Edda. Numerous interpretations of the Skírnismál are possible, and I won’t try to summarize any of them here. Suffice it to say that there is much going on in that poem.

My poem here is in ljóðaháttr. The spelling has been mostly anglicized here. Note that the Old Norse name “Freyr” is not so much a name as it is a title. It actually means “Lord.” Thus I can assure you that the last half stanza is still a reference to Freyr and not to a certain monotheism.

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