The Story of Burnt Njal Part 96

[Footnote 19: Grieve, i.e., bailiff, head workman.]

[Footnote 20: Swanbath's beams, periphrasis for gold.]

[Footnote 21: "Thou, that heapest h.o.a.rds," etc.--merely a periphrasis for man, and scarcely fitting, except in irony, to a splitter of firewood.]

[Footnote 22: That is, slew him in a duel.]

[Footnote 23: This shows that the s.h.i.+elds were oblong, running down to a point.]

[Footnote 24: "Ocean's fire," a periphrasis for "gold". The whole line is a periphrasis for "bountiful chief".]

[Footnote 25: "Rhine's fire," a periphrasis for gold.]

[Footnote 26: "Water-skates," a periphrasis for s.h.i.+ps.]

[Footnote 27: "Great Rift," Almannagja--The great volcanic rift, or "geo," as it would be called in Orkney and Shetland, which bounds the plain of the Althing on one side.]

[Footnote 28: Thorgrim Easterling and Thorbrand.]

[Footnote 29: "Frodi's flour," a periphrasis for gold.]

[Footnote 30: "Sea's bright sunbeams," a periphrasis for gold.]

[Footnote 31: Constantinople.]

[Footnote 32: Hlada or Lada, and sometimes in the plural Ladir, was the old capital of Drontheim, before Nidaios--the present Drontheim--was founded. Drontheim was originally the name of the country round the firth of the same name, and is not used in the old Sagas for a town.]

[Footnote 33: The country round the Christiania Firth, at the top of the "Bay".]

[Footnote 34: A town in Sweden on the Gota-Elf.]

[Footnote 35: The mainland of Orkney, now Pomona.]

[Footnote 36: Now Stroma, in the Pentland Firth.]

[Footnote 37: By so doing Hrapp would have cleared himself of his own outlawry.]

[Footnote 38: "Prop of sea-waves' fire," a periphrasis for a woman that bears gold on her arm.]

[Footnote 39: "Skates that skim," etc., a periphrasis for s.h.i.+ps.]

[Footnote 40: "Odin's mocking cup," mocking songs.]

[Footnote 41: An allusion to the Beast Epic, where the cunning fox laughs at the flayed condition of his stupid foes, the wolf and bear. We should say, "Don't stop to speak with him, but rather beat him black and blue".]

[Footnote 42: "Sea-stag," periphrasis for s.h.i.+p.]

[Footnote 43: "Sea-fire bearers," the bearers of gold, men, that is, Helgi and Grim.]

[Footnote 44: "Byrnie-breacher," piercer of coats of mail.]

[Footnote 45: "Noisy ogre's namesake," an allusion to the name of Skarphedinn's axe, "the ogress of war".]

[Footnote 46: Rood-cross, a crucifix.]

[Footnote 47: His son was Glum who fared to the burning with Flosi.]

[Footnote 48: "Forge which foams with song," the poet's head, in which songs are forged, and gush forth like foaming mead.]

[Footnote 49: "Hero's helm-prop," the hero's, man's, head which supports his helm.]

[Footnote 50: It is needless to say that this Hall was not Hall of the Side.]

[Footnote 51: "Wolf of G.o.ds," the "_caput lupinum_," the outlaw of heaven, the outcast from Valhalla, Thangbrand.]

[Footnote 52: "The other wolf," Gudleif.]

[Footnote 53: "Swarthy skarf," the skarf, or _peleca.n.u.s cardo_, the cormorant. He compares the message of Thorwald to the cormorant s.h.i.+mming over the waves, and says he will never take it. "Snap at flies," a very common Icelandic metaphor from fish rising to a fly.]

[Footnote 54: Maurer thinks the allusion is here to some mythological legend on Odin's adventures which has not come dawn to us.]

[Footnote 55: "He that giant's," etc., Thor.]

[Footnote 56: "Mew-field's bison," the sea-going s.h.i.+p, which sails over he plain of the sea-mew.]

[Footnote 57: "Bell's warder," the Christian priest whose bell-ringing formed part of the rites of the new faith.]

[Footnote 58: "Falcon of the strand," s.h.i.+p.]

[Footnote 59: "Courser of the causeway," s.h.i.+p.]

[Footnote 60: "Gylfi's hart," s.h.i.+p.]

[Footnote 61: "Viking's snow-shoe," sea-king's s.h.i.+p.]

[Footnote 62: "Boiling Kettle," This was a hver, or hot spring.]

[Footnote 63: This was the "Raven's Rift," opposite to the "Great Rift"

on the other side of the Thingfield.]

[Footnote 64: "Warrior's temper," the temper of Hauskuld of Whiteness.]

[Footnote 65: "Snake-land's stem," a periphrasis for woman, Rodny.]

[Footnote 66: "He that h.o.a.rdeth ocean's fire," a periphrasis for man, Hauskuld of Whiteness.]

[Footnote 67: "Baltic side." This probably means a part of the Finnish coast in the Gulf of Bothnia.]

[Footnote 68: "Wild man of the woods." In the original Finngalkn, a fabulous monster, half man and half beast.]