Gripla - 01.01.1975, Qupperneq 90

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GRIPLA
Brodd-Helgi is described in the poem as the father of Sörli (v. 3),
but Sörli is not mentioned either in Vápnfirðinga Saga, which here
would be the potential written source, or in any of the versions of
Landnámabók. There is, however, a separate þáttr about him con-
nected with Ljósvetninga Saga in a number of manuscripts. The intro-
duction to íslenzk Fomrit, vol. 10, dates the þáttr from the second
half of the thirteenth century.
In the fourth stanza of the poem we are told that Bjarni Brodd-
Helgason killed, in addition to Geitir, most of the other men who
were responsible for his father’s death, whereas in Vápnfirðinga Saga
only one man extra is named as having been killed in this connection.
There is no mention in the sagas of Glúmr Geirason’s battle along-
side King Haraldr Gráfeldr at Fitjar, which appears in verse eleven of
the poem, despite the fact that some verses about this battle in the
konungasögur are attributed to Glúmr himself. More noteworthy still
is the fact that in Reykdæla Saga, which contains the greatest amount
of material about Glúmr, it is Þorkell his brother and not he himself
who received a sword from a dead man.
In Orms Þáttr Stórólfssonar it is said that Jarl Eiríkr Hákonarson
commanded sixty men to attack Ormr on an open plain, and that he
took a pole, and swung it in all directions so that no one dared to
come near him. The account in the drápa states that Ormr challenged
twelve of Eiríkr’s men to single combat, and that Eiríkr told them to
try their skill with Ormr (‘leitask fyrir’), when he began to attack
them with the pole.
In íslendingadrápa there is mention of two heroes who are other-
wise apparently almost unknown: Bjarni Skáld (v. 16) and Þórarinn
Kappi Steinarsson (v. 26).15
These discrepancies between the drápa and the sagas would natur-
15 Möbius suggests that Bjarni Skáld is the poet named in one of the main
manuscripts of Skáldatal, who is thought to have composed an elegy on Ólafr
Tryggvason, but it is probably Jarl Hákon Sigurðarson who is referred to in the
drápa. However likely this may be, is does not bring us much closer to discovering
who Bjarni Skáld actually was. Þórarinn Kappi Steinarsson is most likely the
same man as Þórarinn Illi who is mentioned in Vatnsdæla Saga. In the saga it is
clear that he was involved in a duel with Hólmgöngu-Starri, but we are not told
how the duel ended. The drápa however suggests that Starri was the victor.