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kappakvæði in a vikivaki metre is by Guðmundur Bergþórsson (ca. 1657–
1705), whose poem from ca. 1680 names heroes from the riddarasögur
and fornaldarsögur.44 In the opening of the 14th stanza of the poem,
Guðmundur presents a challenge to his audience:
14. Látið hef eg lönd um kring
ljóðin telja þegna.
Engan greint þó íslending,
aðrir mega því gegna.
Sá má eiga af sagnar byng
Sónar blandið þýða.
[I have let the poem list
the heroes from the lands all around.
No Icelander though is mentioned.
therefore others may respond.
that person may recite from the “bed of story” (=the mind,
memory),
recite the “mix of Són” (=poem).]
there survive seven such responses to Guðmundur’s challenge, including
one in twenty-one stanzas written by a woman, Steinunn finnsdóttir í
Höfn (ca. 1640–after 1710), whose poem pokes fun at Iceland’s heroic tra-
dition and discourse.45 Jón Helgason argues that “Sprundahrós”, “der han-
44 Guðmundur Bergþórsson, “Kappa-kvæði,” Hafurskinna: ýmis kvæði og kveðlingar eink-
um frá 17. og 18. öld, ed. Konráð Vilhjálmsson frá Hafralæk, vol. 1 (akureyri: Pálmi H.
Jónsson, 1944–45), 5–14. the earliest listing of heroes in poetry is in skaldic verse, i.e.
in Haukur Valdísarson’s “Íslendingadrápa” (late 13th century), see Theodor Möbius, ed.,
Íslendingadrápa Hauks Valdísarsonar: Ein isländisches Gedicht des XII. Jahrhunderts (Kiel: C.
f. Mohr, 1874), 5–8. the first early modern example is “allra kappa kvæði” (ca. 1500), ed.
Gustav Cederschiöld, Arkiv för nordisk filologi 1 (1883): 62–80. See also the examples in Jón
Þorkelsson, “Íslenzk Kappakvæði I–III,” Arkiv för nordisk filologi 3 (1886): 366–84; 4 (1888):
251–83; 370–84.
45 Steinunn finnsdóttir, “Kappakvæði,” Hyndlu rímur og Snækóngs rímur, ed. Bjarni Vil-
hjálmsson (reykjavík: rímnafélagið, 1950): 113–32; Jón Helgason, Íslenzk fornkvæði, 8:
119–20; Helga Kress, “Searching for Herself: female Experience and female tradition
in Icelandic Literature,” transl. alison tartt, A History of Icelandic Literature, ed. Daisy
neijmann, Histories of Scandinavian Literature 5 (Lincoln: university of nebraska Press,
2006), 503–51 at 513.
IN PRAISE OF WOMEN