Gripla - 01.01.2003, Page 175

ÝSETURS ELDS HATI
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ÓlOGroth: Det Arnamagnæanske Haandskrift 310 qvarto. Saga Olafs konungs
Tryggvasonar er ritaði Oddr muncr. Udgivet af P. Groth. Christiania, 1895.
ÓTEA: Oláfs saga Tryggvasonar en mesta. Editiones Arnamagnæane A 1-3. K0ben-
havn, 1958-2000.
Sigurður Nordal (útg.). 1952. Völuspá. Önnur prentun. Helgafell, Reykjavík.
Skjd. AI og B I: Den norsk-islandske skjaldedigtning. Udgiven af Kommissionen for
det Arnamagnæanske Legat ved Finnur Jónsson. A. Tekst efter hándskrifteme. I.
bind. — B. Rettet tekst. I. bind. Kpbenhavn og Kristiania, 1912.
Whaley, Diana. 1998. The Poetry of Arnórr jarlaskáld. An Edition and Study. London.
SUMMARY
Codex Frisianus, AM 45 fol, a vellum manuscript from the beginning of the fourteenth
century, is one of the principal manuscripts for the first and third parts of
Heimskringlœ, it is of special importance for the additional material it contains, taken
from other sources than the main text from which it was copied. In Ólafs saga
Tryggvasonar in Codex Frisianus, one bit of additional material is a scaldic stanza,
obviously taken from a poem about King Óláfur Tryggvason, probably a drápa, and
attributed to Hallar-Steinn.
Finnur Jónsson printed this stanza at the bottom of the page in his edition of
Heimskringla (HkrFJ 1:292) with this note: ‘Verset er af Hallfrpðr.’ He printed the
stanza later in Skjd. A 1:156 and B 1:148, as the fírst stanza of what remains of the
Óláfsdrápa of Hallfreðr vandræðaskáld, noting (in A I) that the first three lines were
nearly identical with the last three lines in the first stanza of Amórr jarlaskáld’s
Magnúsdrápa and were probably taken from that poem, but that Hallfreðr’s original
text had been lost. Diana Whaley is of the same opinion — see pp. 183-84 of her book
on Amórr jarlaskáld.
This article considers whether the stanza was correctly attributed in Codex Frisia-
nus and whether it then might be from Rekstefja, Hallar-Steinn’s drápa about Óláfur
Tryggvason; in this case the stanza would fit in well as the third stanza of the poem.
But if Finnur Jónsson’s surmise is correct — that the stanza is by Hallfreðr — it is
probable that it came from near the beginning of his Óláfsdrápa. Six stanzas from that
poem are preserved in their entirety in Fagrskinna and copied from there in the other
principal manuscript of Ólafs saga Tiyggvasonar of Oddr Snorrason, AM 310 4to; five
and a half stanzas are in Heimskringla, distributed wholly or partially throughout the
text at appropriate places in the narrative.
This article compares the subject matter of the stanza with written sources about
Óláfur Tryggvason and finds no evidence that the composer of the stanza followed
written sources, or that the authors of the written sources made direct use of the stanza.
As to whether it is probable that the first three lines of the stanza go back to Amórr
jarlaskáld’s Magnúsdrápa, examples are gathered here showing that Amórr was not
shy about borrowing from the poems of others. In this light he is more likely to have
been the receiver than the donor. Finally, the article compares the meters employed in
the Rekstefja of Hallar-Steinn, the stanza in Codex Frisianus and what is preserved of
Hallfreðr’s Óláfsdrápa.