Gripla - 20.12.2013, Blaðsíða 32

GRIPLA32
A further elaboration, using two different tmetic types within a single
helmingr, may be exemplified by a verse ascribed to eyvindr skáldaspillir,
from the later tenth century:
fengum feldarstinga
fjǫrð- ok galt við -hjǫrðu,
þanns álhimins- útan
oss -lendingar sendu.151
‘I received last year a cloak-pin, which Ice- [the channel-
sky’s]-landers sent to me from across the sea, and I spent it on fish
[fjord-livestock].’
In the second tmesis, the phrase álhimins lendingar (‘inhabitants of the
channel-sky’) contains an ofljóst for ‘Icelanders’, the ‘sky’ of the ‘channel’
being resolvable as ‘ice’.152 the first tmesis is not entirely secure, since a dif-
ferent interpretation of fjǫrð, avoiding the tmesis, is possible, though not
favoured by most scholars.153
Another type of tmesis involves the separation of kenning elements
that would logically belong together in a nonce compound. the first of the
poets to use it is Bragi. this is the unique example of tmesis in the Bragi
canon, and it is evidently not from Ragnarsdrápa, but a separate expression
of thanks to a generous patron.
Þann áttak vin verstan
vazt- rǫdd en mér baztan
Ála -undirkúlu
óniðraðan þriðja.154
‘I had him as a third not demeaned friend, worst to gold [the
fishing-ground- voice of Áli -under-globe] but best to me.’155
151 ‘eyvindr skáldaspillir: lausavísur’, ed. Russell Poole, in Poetry from the Kings’ Sagas, 1:234–5.
Cf. Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning, 3 (B.1):65.
152 Reichardt, ‘A Contribution’, 201–2.
153 Heimskringla, 1:223–4.
154 fragment 6: Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning, 3 (B.1):5; Edda: Skáldskaparmál, 1:44.
155 Edda, 99, with modifications.