Gripla - 20.12.2008, Blaðsíða 136

GRIPLA134
his ally at this point, who now felt betrayed. Sturla expressed his disap-
pointment and anger in skaldic verse:
Rauf við randa stýfi,
– rétt innik þat, – svinnan
allt, þvít oss hefr vélta,
Óðinn, þats hét góðu.
Skaut, sás skrökmál flýtir,
– skilk, hvat gramr mun vilja,
Gautr unni sér sleitu – ,
slægr jarl við mér bægi.28
It must be an understatement when Magnús Finnbogason comments: “auk
þess [i.e., that Gizurr is an alternative name for Óðinn] kann skáldið að hafa
séð ýmislegt svipað í skapgerð þeirra Gizurar Þorvaldssonar og Óðins.”29
The verse is extremely valuable in that it tells us what characteristics Sturla,
a learned man who possibly studied with Snorri as a young man, associated
with Óðinn. Firstly, Sturla says that Óðinn/Gissur rauf við Sturla þats hét
góðu; secondly, Óðinn/Gissur has vélað Sturla; thirdly, Óðinn/Gissur is
slægr; fourthly, Óðinn/Gissur flýtir skrökmál; fifthly, Óðinn/Gissur skaut
bægi við Sturla; and sixthly, Gautur, which is Óðinn/Gissur, unni sér sleitu.
Gissur is thus compared to Óðinn, whose characteristics are, in sum, to
betray given promises, to be wily, foxy, and a liar, to turn his back on
those he has previously allied with, and to aid trouble. The stanza is not
laudatory. Similar use and understanding of Óðinn references are found
elsewhere in the literature. In Hákonar saga Hákonarsonar, also by Sturla,
we are at a feast:
Hertoginn [i.e., Skúli Bárðarson] spurði einn dag Snorra Sturluson
í skemtan: ,,Hvárt er þat satt”, kvað hann, ,,at þér segit, at Óðinn, sá
er atti forn-konungum saman, héti Gautr öðru nafni?” ,,Satt er þat,
herra”, segir Snorri. ,,Yrk nú vísu at því”, segir hertogi, “ok seg
hversu mjök þessi líkist þeim.”30
28 Ibid., 528. The second helmingur of the stanza is also found in Sturlu þáttur, with the first
line of the helmingur slightly different: “Skýtr, hinns skrökmál flýtir”, Sturlunga saga II,
231.
29 Sturlunga saga I, 607.
30 Hakonar saga, ed. Guðbrandur Vigfússon, Icelandic Sagas And Other Historical Documents