Gripla - 20.12.2004, Blaðsíða 110

GRIPLA108
En fló berr konungi vel fyrir at sjá at eigi vísi hann fleim til ókœmiligra
〈h〉luta ok eigi til fless sem gu›i sé óflekkt í, eigi ok til fless sem ofmikit
ofrefli er í. fieir eigu ok sjálfir vandliga at at hyggja til hverja hluta fleir
eru sendir.
The risk of deploying the gestir in inappropriate tasks, of displeasing God, of
ofrefli, excess — the opposite of the virtue of hófsemi, temperantia — and the
necessity of the gestir themselves acting as a check on their own use by the
King all give the impression that the gestir are a weapon one could easily be
tempted to misuse. The danger is temptation of the King over the line between
being a good Christian ruler and being an excessive tyrant. As we shall see
below, this chimes with some of the dangers implicit in Ó›in’s visit to Óláfr
helgi.
5. GESTR IN THE FOUR TEXTS
What remains is to take up the semantics of gestr in the individual texts at
hand, where the primary associations vary from one to the next and make
sense of the workings of this word in the narrative group as a whole.
5.1 Nornagests fláttr
The semantic slipperiness of the word is brought to the reader’s attention early
in the fláttr, as soon as the King engages the stranger in conversation. He says
his name is Gestr (hann sag›iz Gestr heita), to which the King replies that he
will be a guest there, whatever his name might be (gestr muntu hér vera,
hversu sem flú heitir). The reply extends hospitality while simultaneously
nodding to the possibility that a man who calls himself Gestr is quite possibly
not what he claims to be. The visitor protests that he has given his name truth-
fully, but accepts the offer of hospitality: satt segi ek til nafns míns herra, en
gjarna vilda ek at y›r gisting fliggja ef kostr væri. This exchange activates the
senses of gestr that have to do with hospitality (gisting), with dulnefni and dis-
guised guests, even though this one maintains that he is not one such, and with
the personal name Gestr. The text takes him at his word, for he is referred to
throughout as Gestr.11 Mostly the word appears to be a personal name, rather
11 The nickname Nornagestr has been given to him by Sigur›r and his fellows: Í flessa fer› var
me› Sigur›i Hámundr bró›ir hans ok Reginn dvergr. Ek var ok flar og köllu›u fleir mig flá