Page:Poeticedda00belluoft.djvu/151

This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.

Skirnismol

Be like to the thistle  that in the loft
Was cast and there was crushed.

32.[1] "I go to the wood,  and to the wet forest,
To win a magic wand;
..................
I won a magic wand.

33.[2] "Othin grows angry,  angered is the best of the gods,
Freyr shall be thy foe,
Most evil maid,  who the magic wrath
Of gods hast got for thyself.

34.[3] "Give heed, frost-rulers,  hear it, giants.
Sons of Suttung,
And gods, ye too,
How I forbid  and how I ban
The meeting of men with the maid,
(The joy of men with the maid.)


  1. No gap indicated in the manuscript; Niedner makes the line here given as 4 the first half of line 3, and fills out the stanza thus: "with which I will tame you, / Maid, to work my will." The whole stanza seems to be either interpolated or out of place; it would fit better after stanza 25.
  2. Jonsson marks this stanza as interpolated. The word translated most evil is another case of guesswork.
  3. Most editors reject line 3 as spurious, and some also reject line 6. Lines 2 and 3 may have been expanded out of a single line running approximately "Ye gods and Suttung's sons." Suttung: concerning this giant cf. Hovamol, 104 and note.

[117]