Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1999, Blaðsíða 281
X The Proto-Nordic frontier
261
(According to a rule established by Bugge [...] the full line most fre-
quently ends in a separate bisyllabic word whose first syllable is short
(4 x), or, about half as frequently, in a monosyllabic word (—); less
frequently the line ends in a trisyllabic word; in this case the penul-
tima may be indiscriminately short (— ^ x) or long (— — x). Accord-
ing to Bugge the following examples are thus correct:
sins of freista frama - Hav. 2.6 Jrerru ok J)jo51a5ar - Hav. 4.3
hvar skal sitja sjå Hav. 2.3 hiær at hvfvetna Hav. 22.3
Trisyllabic words with secondary stress in the last syllable (— x —) are
also allowed according to the main rule, e.g. våfa virgilnå Hav. 157,
kranga kostalaus, kranga kostavgn Skm. 30 (9 examples in all). As a
rare exception two syntactically closely connected words may occur
instead of a trisyllabic composite word, e.g. gestr at gest hædinn Hav.
31, un nir yfir glymja Grm. 7 [...]. A bisyllabic word with secondary
stress in the last syllable -x) is on the other hånd so rare (cf. ok
versnar alir vinskapr Hav. 51, en sjå hQlfhynott Skm. 42), that it - in
spite of Heusler’s objection on p. 48 - seems as problematic as a bi-
syllabic word with unstressed last syllable (— x), e.g. heilir jyeirs
hlyddu Hav. 164 etc., Heusler p. 49f.)
Sievers refers to Heusler’s study of Ijddahdttr from 1889, where he had
asserted that bisyllabic words with secondary stress in the last syllable
(hynott), did not violate Bugge’s rule (Heusler 1889: 136 = 1969: 724). A
crucial difference in Heusler’s view on the Ijddahdttr full line compared
with that of his predecessors was that the full line according to him never
contained more than two full stresses and, moreover, consisted of two
bars.2 The ending of the line is thus defined as everything following the
vokal (tvelyd) foran kort vokal: første stavelse i fdi, véum, ntu, gloir, truir, deyi. Også må
oprindelig lang vokal foran m kunne gælde som kort, således forekommer f. eks. Gymis,
Mtma som sidste ord i langlinjen. - Når der i Ijddahdttr følger flere linjer umiddelbart ef-
ter hinanden, af hvilke hver har allitteration for sig, da opretholdes vistnok oftest den
nævnte regel, at sidste hovedtone ikke må hvile på lang næstsidste stavelse; men her synes
dog undtagelser sikre og oprindelige: Hav. 164; Skim. 31; Hårb. 18. Sådanne verslinjer
står imellem kviduhåttr [i.e. fornyrdislag] og Ijddahdttr. Alle andre afvigelser fra regelen
grunder sig efter min mening på forvanskning” (Bugge 1879: 142-43).
2 “Die unpaarige Kurzzeile des Ljopahåttr ist ein Vers von zwei Takten” (Heusler 1889:
131 = 1969: 720).