Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1999, Side 232

212
Part Two
First of all it will be necessary to take a doser look at Kuhn’s statis-
tics conceming the frequency of the particle in skaldic poetry (Table 4),
which is clearly unsatisfactory. Obviously, calculations of the ratio of
particles per 10 pages according to centuries is too crude. The most im-
portant consequence is that the considerable variance within the skaldic
poetry of each century is covered up.
We will therefore have to account in some detail for the material from
which Kuhn drew his conclusions. I follow Kuhn’s readings and inter-
pretations in all essentials, but have confined my survey to volume one
of Finnur Jonsson’s edition (1912-15, A 1), i.e. down to the year 1200
according to his chronology. This is the period that is most relevant to
the dating of Eddie poetry, and, in addition, by not considering more re-
cent poetry the problems created by possibly spurious stanzas and other
particular problems of dating are minimised (cf. p. 210 above).4
The question now is to what extent the correlation between age and
frequency of the particle will remain as unambiguous if the material is
dissolved into its component parts as it is when the centuries are taken as
a whole.
Even if skaldic poetry as such is firmly situated in history, it would be
an exaggeration to affirm that the age of every skald is well known, but
I assume that for our purpose we will get a sufficient approximation to
the relative age of the skalds by following the estimations in Finnur
Jonsson’s history of literature and by gathering into groups skalds who
appear to have been bom in the same decade. What we need is no more
than an approximate ranking of the skalds according to when they lived.
4 For the period until 1200 there are according to Kuhn 311 occurrences of the particle
(including the “potential” of) in skaldic poetry. I have been able to identify 303 of these,
namely:
Bragi I 3.8,4.4, 8.6, 10.8, 14.4, 15.4, 18.3, II 3.1, AuGun 1.2, 2.4, Qlv II 2.1, t>j65 I 1.8,
3.6, 5.12, 6.4, 6.8, 7.12, 8.4, 9.6, 11.8, 12.2, 12.4, 13.4, 14.2, 14.3, 14.8, 15.4, 16.12, 18.4,
20.8, 21.4, 22.4, 25.4, 26.12, 28.8, 32.8, 34.8, 35.4, 36.4, 37.8, II 1.6, 3.5, 8.5, 8.6, 9.5,
13.5, 14.1, 14.2, 16.1, 17.7, 19.7, 20.6, Hornkl II 7.6, III 1.1, Eg I 1.5, II 1.4, 2.2, 2.8, 3.4,
3.5, 3.8, 4.8, 5.7, 6.3, 9.3, 18.8, 19.4, 20.8, III 5.4, 6.2, 6.8, 8.2, 8.6, 11.8, 12.8, 18.4, 21.2,
22.8, 23.6, 24.2, IV 2.8, 3.8, 6.2, 9.8, 11.2, 13.8, 16.2, 17.6, 19.2, 22.3, 23.2, VI 1.6, VII
2.7, 3.7, 8.8,9.1,13.6,16.6,24.8,34.2, 34.7,42.3,43.7,43.8,47.2, Jor 4.7, Sindr 5.6, Eyv
I 2.7, 9.2, 10.6, 15.6, 18.3, 19.2, 21.6, II 10.8, 12.5, III 6.6, 8.8, 9.6, 12.3, 13.7, Glumr II
2.7, 4.4, 7.5, III 1.3, Korm I 6.6, II 10.1 (cf Kuhn 1929: 41, n. 2), 14.4, 23.3, 24.1, 26.1,
29.1, 32.1, 32.5, 41.7, 48.1, 48.7, 49.1, 49.4, 50.1, 50.4, 56.1, 58.5, 58.7, 60.7, Bersi 1.3,
3.5, Hrom 2.4, 2.7, Tjprvi 1.4, GSurs 8.3, 8.6, 8.7, 21.1, 23.2, 25.3, Halli 1.1, Leiknir 1.2,
VG1 1.4, 3.4, 5.7, 7.5, 11.1, 11.8, Eskål II 2.4, III 9.4, 11.3, 15.3, 22.4, 25.3, 26.6, 26.8,
31.7, 35.4, 37.3, BbreiØv 4.1, Ulfr 11.3, f>veil 1.2, 1.7, Tindr 9.1, Eil II 18.2, 19.7, 20.8,