Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1981, Page 155
compassionate question, but also the maiden’s pitiful State. The third
question is an interpolation, for in Perceval the hero merely asks, Bele,
que vos plait? Por coi estes vos venue chi? (w. 1980-81 ‘Fair one, what is
your pleasure? Why have you come here?’). Despite the faet that he has
been awakened by her crying, Perceval’s questions are rather matter-of-
fact and indicate no wonder at her readily apparent unhappiness, but
only at her presence.
One bit of amplification in Mottuls saga takes the form of a semantic
progression in space. The observation in the fabliau, car n’i a dame si
osee/ne damoisele qui(l) l’ost prendre (w. 358-59 ‘For there was no lady
so daring, or maiden who dared take it’) - a comment on the ladies’
reaction upon learning of the unusual properties of the mantie - is trans-
lated in the saga by four variations of qui(l) l’ost prendre:
frar fannsk engi i ollum jreim fjolda ok mug,
su er fryråi mottulinn yfir sik at leggja
edr sik honum at klæda
né \ hondum at hafa
edr nær koma. (ch. 6, p. 15)
(There was no one in that whole multitude and crowd, who dared
put on the mantie, or clothe herself in it, or hold it in her hånds, or
come near it.)
The saga substitutes for the French dame:damoisele a semantically differ-
ent pair, fjdldi:mugr, and then expands the following words (for which
the closest translation is i hondum at hafa) into four clauses that become
progressively shorter and syntactically simpler while at the same time
their content suggests ever greater distance between the mantie and the
ladies. The author starts with two nearly synonymous and syntactically
similar clauses evoking the image of being covered by the garment, the
first image being slightly more specific and concrete than the second;
then the cloak is removed to the extremities of the body, the hånds;
finally, an indefinite distance between the mantie and those to be tested
is intimated. By a progression of images that can be likened to poses
caught by the shutter of a camera, the author has effeetively conveyed the
ladies’ antipathy toward the garment.
In the preceding example from Mottuls saga the author decided to
augment the French passage and hence stress the same through variation.
Although the expansion is primarily a stylistic one, and does not change
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