Hymiskviþa
The Lay of Hymir
Old Norse Poetry
English translation (1928) by Lee M Hollander.
Transcription by Eiður Eyþórsson.
I
About this translation
This Lee M. Hollander’s translation of Hymiskviða comes from his 1928, 1st edition of The Poetic Edda. In that work, the poem is presented in English translation, accompanied by Hollander’s notes and commentary.
Hollander’s work has been preserved as closely as possible to the form in which it was originally presented. The poem and its accompanying commentary remain unchanged.
Hollander’s notes on individual stanzas have been moved, so that they now appear directly beneath the relevant stanza; in the printed edition they were placed at the bottom of each page. At the end of this page you will find Hollander’s original introductory to Hymiskviða.
Here Begins Hymiskviða
1
Much game gathered the gods, of yore;
on wassail bent the wands they shook,
with blood besprent,¹ for brewing kettle,
and found that Ægir full many had.²
¹ The future was foretold from wands dipped in the blood of sacrificial animals.
² According to the reading of Cod. Reg. the passage may mean: “they found that Ægir had plenty of ale.”—Ægir (whose name is etymologically connected with the word for ‘water’) is the god of the sea.
2
Sate the sea-god, smiling blandly,
before Mistarblindi’s mighty offspring.³
With threat’ning eye Ygg’s son him faced:
“To æsir aye thou ale shalt brew.”
³ Following Boer’s emendation, Mistarblindi is Óthin; his son, Thór. Cf. the same kenning (Ygg’s son) below.
3
Quick in quarrel he quelled the thurs—⁴
he vengeance vowed on vanir⁵ thereafter;
bade Thór fetch him a fit caldron:
“in which for all ale I shall brew.”
⁴ Ægir, who is of giant kin.
⁵ General for ‘gods’.
4
Nor did they know, the noble gods,
the glorious ones, where got it might be;
till, trustingly, Týr⁶ did give
a helpful hint to Hlórrithi.⁷
⁶ (Anglo-Saxon Tīw; cf. Latin divus, etc.) ‘god’, originally doubtless the predecessor of Óthin. In Old Norse mythology Týr is more specifically the god of war.—Stanza 8 shows that he is here conceived to be the son (by Óthin?) of Hymir’s wife—some goddess, possibly, who is united with the giant against her will.
⁷ Thór.
5
Týr said:
“There lives eastward of Élivágar⁸
wisest Hymir, at Heaven’s end;
a kettle there keeps my kinsman mighty,
a rost⁹ around is the roomy caldron.”
6
Thór said:
“Knowest thou if we may win that boiler?”
Týr said:
“Ay, friend, if wily we work this deed.”
7
Then forth they fared, a full day’s ride,
etinhome-ward, till to Egil¹⁰ they came—
he guarded the goats with golden horns;
then went to the hall where Hymir dwelled.
¹⁰ A giant; cf. 39, note.
8
His grandam¹⁰a loathly there greeted Týr:
swart heads she had a hundred times nine;
but an other dame, all dight in gold,
and brow-white, bore the beer to her son.
¹⁰a Týr’s grandam by actual relationship; cf. 4, note. The pantastic number of heads point to late invention.
9
(The fair one said:)
“Sib-of-the-etins, I shall set you twain
’neath Hymir’s kettles to hide you from him:
my wedded mate many a time
is glum with guests, grim in his mind.”
10
The lubberly fiend was late in coming
home from hunting, heavy laden.
The icicles clinked as in he strode:
the churl had his chinbeard frozen.
11
(His leman said:)
“Welcome, Hymir, my well-beloved:
thy kinsman is come, and crossed thy threshold,
him we looked for from long wayfaring.
With him he has Hróthr’s slayer,¹¹
man’s well-wisher, who is Véurr hight.
¹¹ Kenning for Thór. Nothing is known of Hróthr. Véur ‘protector’ (?).
12
“They hide them here ’neath the hall’s gable,
back stone-post standing, to withstand thy glance.”
The beam did burst and brake asunder,
straight as struck them the stare of the etin.
13
And shattered rolled from their shelf eight kettles—
but hard-hammered, one whole stayed of all.
Then forth they came. The fell etin
grimly eyed then his old foeman.
14
Evil him thought the Thund’rer to see—
he oft made sorrow the sib of the etins.
Three stout steers then from their stalls were ta’en:
to broil he bade the beeves together.
15
To death were done the doomed bullocks.
Then on the spit they speared the three.
Ate Sif’s yokemate,¹² ere to sleep he went,
twain of the oxen all by himself.
¹² Thór; cf. Hárb. 48.
16
A mighty mouthful Thór’s meal did seem
to hapless Hrungnir’s hoary playmate.¹³
(He said:)
“Another evening, when out we row,
what we bag shall be our bellies’ fill.”
17
Full ready was Thór to row out to sea,
if the blustering thurs a bait him gave.
18
Hymir said:
“Turn to the herd if thou trustest thee,
breaker-of-thurs-heads, a bait to find;
I ween that there, wielder of Miolnir,¹⁴
a bait from my bulls best thou fetchest.”
¹⁴ Thór’s hammer; cf. Vaf. 51.
19
To the woods wended his way the swain;
a black bull there bellowing stood.
Broke from the bull the breaker-of-thurs-heads
the high head-castle, horny-guarded.¹⁵
¹⁵ Kenning for ‘the bull’s head.’—To judge from Snorri’s paraphrase, Gylfag. chap. 48, some lines describing their setting out are missing here.
20
Hymir said:
“Thy work meseems much worse by far,
steerer-of-ships, than when still thou sittest.”
21
Threat’ning him, Thór bade the thurs to row,
the offspring-of-apes,¹⁶ farther out to sea;
but little he listed longer to row
the roller-horse¹⁷ for the reiner-of-goats.¹⁸
¹⁶ Late kenning for ‘giant’.
¹⁷ Kenning for ‘ship’. Boats were drawn up on land, after use, by the help of rollers.
¹⁸ Kenning for Thór; cf. 38.
22
Up with his angle the etin drew
from midmost main two mighty whales;
but aft in the stern did Óthin’s son,
wise Hlórrithi, hook a strong bait.
23
To the hook fastened the head of the ox
the Serpent’s slayer¹⁸a and savior-of-men:
gaped on the angle the all-engirding
mighty monster, the Mithgarth’s-worm.¹⁹
24
Doughtily drew undaunted Thór
on board the boat the baneful worm;
his hammer hit the high hair-fell²⁰
of grisly Garm’s greedy brother.²¹
²⁰ Kenning for ‘head’.
²¹ Both are begot by Loki with the giantess Angrbotha, Vsp. 32, note.
25
Then screeched all scars and screamed all fiends,
then shook and shivered the shaggy hills,
In the sea then sank that serpent again.²²
²² In the version of the Gylfag. chap. 44 this is due to Hymir’s cutting the line.
26
Down-hearted was Hymir as homeward they rowed;
nor at the oar would ought he speak,
when back the twain brought the boat to shore.
27
Hymir said:
“Wilt thou still win half the work with me,
and help to hoist homeward the whales
through wild wooded wolds to the hall,
(or fetter and fasten firmly our sea-buck)?”²³
²³ Transferred here from the end of 29, with Grundtvig.—Sea-buck is a kenning for ‘ship’.
28
Stem and stern raised, unstaggered, Thór;
both boat and bilge he bore up amain,
alone lifted the laden sea-horse,²⁴
hauled the surf-hog²⁴ to the home of the thurs.
²⁴ Kennings for ‘ship’.
29
But still stubbornly his strength likened
the uncouth etin to Óthin’s son:
said a man not proved though he pulled an oar,
if the crystal cup he could not shatter.
30
In his hand when he had it, Hlórrithi threw
the gleaming glass through the granite walls,—
sitting, struck through the stone pillars;
yet whole they handed to Hymir it back.
31
Till that his lovely leman did give
a helpful hint to Hlórrithi:
“strike Hymir’s head! That harder is,
foe-to-etins, than any cup.”
32
Then rose in wrath the reiner-of-goats,
on his knees standing he strongly hurled it:
whole stayed Hymir’s head-piece above,
but the shock shattered the shining wine-cup.²⁵
²⁵ A motif which recurs frequently in Northern lore.
33
Hymir said:
“A treasure great is gone from me
since I lost from my lap my lief goblet.”
And quoth also: “Nor, either, can I
unsay the word which unwitting I gave.”²⁶
²⁶ After Bugge’s emendation of this difficult passage.—We must suppose that they were promised the caldron provided they could shatter the goblet.
34
“Ye may keep the caldron if fetch ye can
the ale-mixer out of our hall.”
Twice did stout Týr try to budge it;
but stood without stirring, though he strained, the kettle.
35
The goat’s-reiner then grasped the rim,
from the dais striding down through the hall,
heaved on his head the heavy kettle:
hard on his heels the handles rang.
36
Nor long they fared ere looked behind him
Óthin’s offspring on etin-home:
beheld out of hills with Hymir rush
a many-headed host of etins.
37
Standing, he lowered the lifted caldron,
swung murderous Miolnir with mighty hands:
the whales-of-the-waste²⁷ he whelmed altogether.
²⁷ Kenning for ‘giants’.
38
²⁸ Nor long he fared ere lay in the traces,
half-dead, one of Hlórrithi’s goats.
Was the harness-horse halt on one leg:
brought this about baleful Loki.
²⁸ This and the following stanza (rather irrelevantly) introduce material which is otherwise found in a different connection (Thór’s journey to Skrymir). According to Gylfag. chap. 44, Thór in company with Loki drives to the world of giants in his goat chariot. They spend the night with a ‘farmer’ (=Egil). Thór slaughters his goats, flays them, and has them boiled for supper. He invites the inmates of the house to partake, warning them, however, to throw all the bones back on the skins; but the son of Egil had (on Loki’s malicious advice?) already split one of the shank-bones to get at the marrow. Next morning when Thór resuscitates the goats, one of them is lame. The frightened farmer appeases Thór’s wrath by giving him his son Thialfi and his daughter Roskva as servitors.
39
And heard ye have— or who of you can,
more learned in lore, enlighten us better?—
what amends did make for the maimed one the thurs,
who begged Thór take both his children.
40
Thus did Thór come to the thing of the gods,
hauling the kettle Hymir had owned.
Now the æsir shall until winter²⁹
drink their ale at Ægir’s beer-hall.
²⁹ The rendering of this line is purely conjectural.
III
Introductory note
Were it not for the striking ballad motifs and some unforgettable scenes thoroughly representative of Northern creative imagination, the Hymiskviða would hardly be reckoned among the best known and best liked lays of the Edda; for on closer examination it is seen to be pieced together of at least four distinct Thór myths which the poet has not succeeded in welding into an organic whole. The main story, the fetching of the brewing kettle, is thrown into the shade by the tremendous motif of Thór’s fishing for the Mithgarth’s serpent, and equalled in interest by his other feats of strength. The allusion to still another myth, the maiming of the goat, has so little to do with the lay as a whole that the stanzas dealing with it have been suspected of being an interpolation.
Again, notwithstanding the conscientious and mediating labor of scholars, there is evident a vagueness, and looseness of structure which seems inherent in the original.
For another matter, the subordinate rôle played by Týr is unworthy of the redoubtable god of war. It would seem as though he is here—ill-advisedly—substituted for crafty and resourceful Loki who so often functions as the intermediary between gods and giants.
Fornyrðislag is used, the typical metre for narrative lays.—In point of language the Hymiskviþa is notable for a superabundance of kennings ¹a bordering on the mannerism of the skalds, which render the style turgid in places, in others, to be sure, peculiarly impressive. A number of points speak for fairly late Icelandic origin (Eleventh or Twelfth Century?), notwithstanding the naively Heathen spirit that seems to pervade the poem.
The text is handed down complete both in Cod. Reg. and Cod. Arn. It is not mentioned by name in the Snorra Edda whose excellent paraphrase is, indeed, based on other sources.
¹a Cf. General Introduction, p. xxi.
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