Bibliotheca Arnamagnæana - 01.06.1999, Page 327

XII Foreign matter poems
307
As far as the dichotomy West-Germanic/Ijddahåttr is concemed, the
“Eddie praise poems” are a particularly tricky case. In an article in Arkiv
for nordisk filologi Felix Genzmer (1926) had pointed out a series of
similarities between borbjqrn hornklofi’s Haraldskvædi and Atlakvida,
which convinced him that Forbjgrn had composed (translated?) this
Eddie poem, and Kuhn accepted that not only Haraldskvædi, but also
the other “Eddie praise poems” are at least closely associated to the “for-
eign” group (cf. Kuhn 1939: 179 = 1969: 486); Table 25 above shows
that they actually share some of the linguistic features supposed to be
characteristic of that group. But since these poems are composed in a
mixed metre, having verses in Ijddahåttr as well as in fornyrdislag, they
happen to be even more unambiguously associated with the poetry in
Ijddahåttr,18 If the use of the linguistic forms in question must be ex-
plained as an influence from another group of poetry, it is therefore most
difficult to rule out Ijddahåttr, and Kuhn had in the first instance to leave
the question open (Kuhn 1933: 42 n. 2 = 1969: 51 n. 91; cf. 1936: 433 =
1969: 126).
One single instance in Haraldskvædi has no equivalent in Ijddahåttr,
however. St. 19.1, å gerdum sér peira, where the “Satzpartikelgesetz” is
broken because the verb (sér) comes before the second stressed word,
and at the same time the “Satzspitzengesetz” is broken because the sen-
tence begins with a preposition. There are parallels in only three “for-
eign” poems, VQlundarkvida, Atlakvida and Hamdismål (three examples
in all). The construction cannot be explained direetly by reference to any
West-Germanic language, but Kuhn thought it could have arisen as a
compromise between the German source language and the Old Norse
target language.19 Again the figures are very small and Kuhn’s explana-
tion is very complicated.
18 It may be noted that stanzas in Ijddahåttr are found also in a number of Eddie poems,
“foreign” and others (cf. pp. 294—95 above), but Kuhn does not discuss whether this faet
has any possible implication for his explanatory model.
19 “Es scheint, daB die iibersetzer der ‘alten lieder’ an die stelle der in den deutschen lie-
dem schon eingefiihrten neuen zweitstellung die in der nord. dichtung noch herrschende
alte setzen wollten, daB dabei aber wegen des vorausgehens der propositionen die eigenar-
tigen zwitterformen entstanden, die keiner der beiden zweitstellungen gerecht werden. Der
fali im HaraldskvæSi bestatigt die abhangigkeit des gedichtes von den ‘alten liedem’.
Wichtig ist, daB diese falle nicht wie viele andere besonderheiten der fremdstofflieder
durch einfluB der liébahåttr-dichtung erklart werden konnen, sondem nur durch den der
deutschen vorganger dieser lieder” (Kuhn 1933: 96 = 1969: 92-93).