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Signy's Lament

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

William Henry Schofield
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Extract

In the preceding article my friend Mr. Lawrence has shown clearly that all indications point to an Old Norse source for the Anglo-Saxon poem usually termed The First Riddle of Cynewulf. After he had come to a conviction on this point, he communicated his theory to me in private conference, in the hope that I might perhaps be able to supply confirmatory evidence by showing what that source was. It was my fortune to make what I believe scholars will agree to be the correct identification of the material, and, with the new light thus thrown on its meaning, to interpret the poem more satisfactorily, I think, than has hitherto been done.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 17 , Issue 2 , 1902 , pp. 262 - 295
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1902

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References

Note 1 in page 262 The prevailing view from the time of Leo (1857) to that of Mr. Bradley (1888), and not even now entirely abandoned. For a review of previous opinion, see Mr. Lawrence's discussion, above, pp. 247 ff.

Note 2 in page 262 Mr. Gollancz's interpretation, according to Mr. Stopford Brooke (Eng. Lit. from the Beg. to the Norman Conquest, 1898, p. 160). In the Academy, 44, 572, Mr. Bradley is said to have accepted Mr. Gollancz's view.

Note 3 in page 262 Unless we include the late Icelandic Rímur frá Völsungi hinum óborna, ed. Möbius, Edda, Leipzig, 1860, pp. 240 ff.; ed. Finnur Jónsson, Fernir Fornislenskir Rímnaflokkar, 1896.

Note 4 in page 262 Ed. Ranisch, “nach Bugges Text,” Berlin, 1891, chs. 3–8.

Note 1 in page 264 That is, “the descendant of Vols,” Wælses eafera, according to Bēouulf, 896. The Saga by confusion gives Volsungr as the father's name. See Symons, Paul's Grundriss, 2nd ed., iii, 653.

Note 2 in page 264 In the prose introduction to H. H., ii, we read: “Sigmundr konungr ok hans ættmenn hétu V⊘sungar ok Ylfingar.” Cf. H. H., i, sts. 35, 51; H. H., ii, sts. 4, 8, 46.

Note 1 in page 265 Volsungasaga, ch. i: “bá kalla eir hann varg í véum, ok má hann nú eigi heima vera me fer sínum.”

Note 2 in page 265 Examples are cited in Fritzner's Ordbog: “Björn ok ulfr skal hvervetna útlagr vera”; “Eyvindr hafi vegit í véum, ok var hann vargr orinn”; “sá er gengr á görva sætt—hann skal svá vía vargr heita sem veröld er byg, ok vera hvarvetna rækr ok rekinn um allan heim, hvar sem hann verr stadinn á hvjeru doegri” (Grágas); “skal sá rekinn vera frá gui ok frá allri gus kristni svá vía vargr í véum.” In the Rune-Poem we read (st. 1): “fé vældr frænda róge; føesk úlfr í skóge” (ed. Wimmer, Die Runenschrift, pp. 276 ff.). See also examples in Cleasby-Vigfusson, Dictionary, s. v. vargr, ulfr. Ulf- is very common as a component part of proper names of persons.—Cf. H. H., ii, st. 32.

Note 3 in page 265 The laws of Edward the Confessor (§ 6) speak as follows of one who has fled justice: “Si postea repertus fuerit et teneri possit, vivus regi reddatur, vel caput ipsius si se defenderit; lupinum enim caput geret a die utlægacionis, quod ab Anglis wluesheved nominatur. Et hæc sententia communis est de omnibus utlagis”; see Thorpe, Ancient Laws, etc., i, 445. The phrase “to cry wolf's-head,” as synonymous with outlawry, is several times used in the Middle English Tale of Gamelyn (ed. Skeat, ll. 700, etc.; cf. p. 45, where the above passage from the laws is quoted).

Note 1 in page 266 For a discussion of this matter, see below, pp. 280 ff.

Note 2 in page 266 For the difference in the rendering of the passage, see the commentary on stanza 1 below.

Note 3 in page 266 The word āecgan in the text has much disturbed scholars. Mr. Bradley, interpreting it as the causative of icgan, translates “to give food to.” ecgan, however, without the prefix, means “to trouble, to consume,” e. g. hine ege burst (Lchd., ii, 60, 7). The prefix ā-, according to Bosworth-Toller, “is often used to impart greater force to the transitive meaning of a single verb,” as in ābēodan, āslēan. Therefore, āecgan would seem to be best translated “oppress.” Compare also the force of the compound of ecgan, e. g., ecgum of egde willgesias (Gen., l. 2002), “destroyed, slain by the sword.”

Note 4 in page 266 The text reads dogode; but there exists in Anglo-Saxon no verb *dogian of which this can be a part. Hicketier (Anglia, x, 579) amends to hogode, which is doubtless the correct reading, hogode occurs in the Battle of Maldon (l. 133) governing a genitive: āger hyra orum yfeles hogode.

Note 1 in page 267 Ēadwacer, I interpret, not as a proper name, which is nowhere else found, but as a translation of an Old Norse epithet Avvakr, i. e., “The Easily (or, Very) Vigilant One.” Vakr is a name of Odin; see Orimnesmól, st. 54. Arvakr (“Early-Awake”) is the name of one of the steeds that draw the chariot of the sun; see Grimnesmól, st. 37; Sigrdrífomól, st. 15; Gylfaginning, ch. 11.—Au- is an extremely common adverbial prefix in this sense; cf. aumjukr, auvíss, autryggr, avtruinn, auginntr, aumüdingr, etc.; also A.-S. ēadhrēig, ēadmod (ēamod). The O. N. proper name Auunn, Vigfusson derives from Auvinr, “a charitable friend”; cf. A.-S. $Eadwine.

Likewise, on a similar occasion (see below, p. 294), Guthrun addresses her husband, not by his actual name, but by various epithets: ěgill, svera deilir, móugr, gulls mi≤ndr (Atlakvia, sts. 36, 89, 40). Here, it should be observed, the epithet “Very Vigilant One” is especially applicable to Siggeir.

Note 2 in page 267 The text reads giedd geador, “song together.” This makes good sense, metaphorically considered; but Herzfeld (Die Rätsel des Exeterbuches, Berlin, 1890, p. 66, note 1) is probably right in emending to gæd geador, which phrase occurs in another A.-S. poem, Salomon and Saturn (ed. Kemble, ll. 899 ff.), where we read: nolde gæd geador in godes rīce, ēadiges engles and æs ofermōdan.

Note 1 in page 268 Atlakvia, sts. 4, 5 (ed. Sijmons-Gering, i, 424):

skjoldo knego [$ar] velja ok skafna aska,

hjalma gollhrona ok Húna menge,

silfrgyld so⊘klæe, serke valraua,

dafar ok darraar, drosla mélgreypa.

Voll lézk [ykr ok] gefa mundo ví⇛r Gnitaheiar,

af geire gjallanda ok af gyldom stofnom,

stórar mei♂r ok stae Danpar,

hrís at et m⇛ es [mer] Myrkvi kalla.

Cf. also Atlaml, st. 13, where Hgni, in reply to Kostbera's objections to their journey, remarks: “okr mon gramr golle reifa gló⇛uo.” See the paraphrase of the first passage in Vłungasaga, ch. 33.

Note 3 in page 268 It may be, as Mr. Lawrence suggests, that the first line refers to the immediate situation. Signy has reared Sinfj⊗li in the hope of seeing her relatives revenged by his aid. She now sends him forth to her only surviving brother, the best gift she can offer her race, a gift she has bought at a terrible price. Thus the keynote of the poem would be struck in the opening line.

Note 1 in page 269 De Rebus Gestis Ælfredi, a. d. 888, trans. Giles, Six O. E. Chrons., p. 79. Note that the -ey of Athelney is the same word as that used in the poem before us. Sigmund might well have been called Eyjolf, i. e., Island-wolf.

Note 1 in page 271 Cf., for example, Symons's statement (Paul's Grundriss, 2nd ed., 1898, iii, 652): “Die schönen letzten Worte der Signy, bevor sie sich in das Feuer der brennenden Halle stürzt, sind unverkennbar Wiedergabe eines Liedfragments.” Professor Bugge, commenting long ago on the poetic basis of the story, remarked justly that in general it is only where the characters speak in person that the author has followed his sources exactly; where, on the other hand, events are merely related, the prose account varies more from the lays on which it is based. (Norræn Fornkvæi, Fortale, p. xxxvi).

Note 2 in page 271 As Symons says (l. c.): “Der Verlust dieser Lieder aus der Sigmund-sage ist aufs tiefste zu beklagen; noch im Prosagewande der Saga verraten sie eine kernige epische Haltung und eine Altertümlichkeit des Stils, womit nur wenige der erhaltenen eddischen Heldenlieder sich messen können. Und auch die Sage selber wird, wie kaum eine zweite, vom Geiste des germanischen Altertums getragen.”

Note 1 in page 272 Readers will, I hope, recognize that the following part of this investigation is of a different character from what precedes. There are some distinguished scholars, I am well aware, who have a rooted aversion to the “Western hypothesis.” Naturally, they will not incline to the views here expressed. Whether these are right or not, however, is a matter quite independent of the interpretation of “Signy's Lament.”

Note 2 in page 272 See my translation of Professor Bugge's Home of the Eddic Poems, Grimm. Library, xi, London, 1899, p. 374 (original edition, p. 340).

Note 1 in page 273 This is true even if it be held that the Anglo-Saxon poem is not a translation, which is a very improbable view.

Note 1 in page 274 Symons sums up as follows the results of his thorough researches regarding this part of the Saga (Paul-Braune, Beitr., iii, 302): “Diese ersten, die Vorgeschichte behandelnden capitel unserer saga sind also—dies ist das resultat unserer untersuchung—nicht als reine, ungekünstelte niederschrift eines Stückes alter sage aufzufassen, sondern als ein conglomerat von halb zerstörten liederresten, dunkler überlieferung verschiedenster einzelsagen, ausgeweiteten andeutungen der Eddalieder und tendenziöser erdichtung. Für die kenntnis der ältesten gestalt unserer heldensage sind sie im grossen und ganzen ohne gewicht, denn das ächte, das sie bieten, ist uns in den haupsächlichsten punkten auch anderwärts überliefert; ihre eigenen angaben aber unterliegen dem berechtigtsten verdachte.”

Note 1 in page 275 The author of Bēowulf knew Sigmund, and not his son Sigurth (Siegfried), as the slayer of the dragon. In this adventure he expressly states that Fitela was not with Sigmund. In the Eiríksml, composed soon after 950 in honor of a prince of Northumbria, Sigmund and Sinfjotli are mentioned together as both occupying a prominent position in Valholl, being designated by Odin to go to welcome Eric. On the Vłung story in England, see Binz, Paul-Braune, Beitr., xx (1895), 190–192.

Note 1 in page 276 See H. H., i, 43; H. H., ii, prose after at. 16; Frá Daua Sinfjtla. In Skáldskaparml, ch. 64, we are told that Siggeir was “mágr Vłungs.”

Note 2 in page 276 The Wife of Bath's Tale, Its Sources and Analogues, Grimm Library, xiii, London, 1901, pp. 49 ff.

Note 1 in page 277 See Maynadier, l. c., p. 15.

Note 2 in page 277 Child, Ballads, i, 297 ff.

Note 3 in page 277 Fornaldar Sögur Nordrlanda, ed. Rafn, Cop., 1829, i, 30, chap. 15. It should be observed that this saga also contains material apparently borrowed from the English Bēowulf story; see ten Brink, Beowulf, p. 188, and, for other references, Symons, Paul's Grundriss, iii, 649.

Note 1 in page 278 Cf. the words of the Hrólfs Saga, where the king suddenly discovers the former hag “svá væn at eigi ikist hann a⇛ kónu fríari sett hafa.”

Note 2 in page 278 This is the word used to translate the French fée in Strengleikar, p. 12, l. 4 f.: “funndu æir ar æina fria fru sæm alf kona være;” see other passages in Fritzner's Ordbog.

Note 1 in page 279 In the “Wooing of Emer,” an Irish tale of the eleventh century, but belonging, in the opinion of Prof. Kuno Meyer, to “the oldest, or heroic, cycle of early Irish literature,” to a body of tales which were “written down perhaps as early as the sixth century,” we have a strange parallel to this situation, in the account of how Queen Macha deceived her enemies, the sons of Dithorba, who were then living as exiles in the wilds of Connaught:—“ Macha went to seek the sons of Dithorba in the shape of a leper, viz.: she smeared herself with rye-dough and . . . She found them in Buirend Connacht, cooking a wild boar. The men asked tidings of her and she gave them. And they let her have food by the fire. Said one of them: ‘Lovely is the eye of the girl, let us lie with her.‘ He took her with him into the wood. She bound that man by dint of her strength, and left him in the wood.” In like manner she made captive all the rest one after another. (Translated by K. Meyer, Archeological Review, i, 152; cf. p. 68.) For this parallel I am indebted to Prof. Kittredge.

Note 1 in page 281 Cf. above, p. 265.

Note 1 in page 282 Since the above was written, my attention has been called to the fact that Golther has expressed a similar opinion (Handbuch der Germ. Myth., 1895, p. 102): “Die Sage mag auf einem alten Missverständniss beruhen. Warg, Wolf hiess der Geächtete in der germanischen Rechtssprache. Warg wurde wörtlich als Wolf verstanden, und so bildete sich die Werwolfsgeschichte.”

Note 2 in page 282 See below, p. 287.

Note 3 in page 282 Marie's lay of “Bisclaret” (“Nor♂ndingar kallao hann vargulf”) was translated into Old Norse about the middle of the thirteenth century; but this was not the source of the material in the Vłungasaga. The author drew rather from a floating tale.

Note 1 in page 283 See Die Lais der Marie de France, Warnke, 2nd ed., Halle, 1901.

Note 2 in page 283 Fritzner observes (Ordbog, s. v.) that hreysikttr is regularly used to translate the Latin mustela. In Eliduc (l. 1032) the animal it named musleile. Professor Kittredge has kindly called my attention to the following interesting passage, “De mustelis, earumque naturis,” in the Topographia Hibernica (i, 27) of Giraldus Cambrensis, which shows that the story was familiar in Wales:

“Item fetus haec teneros, læsione quacunque mortificatos, crocei cujusdam floris beneficio, refocillare solet et vitæ restituere. Ut enim perhibent qui viderunt, et catellos peiculi istius causa morti dederunt, primo læsuræ, postmodum ori et naribus quasi inspirando, ceterisque per ordinem corpusculi fenestris omnibus allatum ore florem apponit. Et sic demum tarn floris illius quam oris spiraculo, vel potius herbæ virtuosissimæ tactu, qui penitus expirasse videbantur, aliquo forte vitæ vestigio adhuc manente licet occulto, respirare compellit.” (Opera, ed. Dimock, Rolls Series, v, 60–61.)

Note 1 in page 284 Germania, xvi, 214.

Note 2 in page 284 See Le Roman de Merlin, ed. Sommer, London, 1894, pp. 84 ff.; Huth Merlin, ed. Paris and Ulrich, 1886, S. A. T. F., i, 135 ff.; Malory, Marte Darthur, bk. i, chs. 3, 4.

Note 3 in page 284 Arkiv för Nordisk Filologi, v (1889), 38 ff; xvii (1901), 53.

Note 1 in page 286 Roman de Merlin, ed. Sommer, London, 1894, pp. 136–137; cf. p. 218. Merlin assumes various disguises in this romance to help Arthur; cf. p. 219. The account of “The Birthe and Engendrare of Mordret” in the French prose, and in an English metrical version of it by Lonelich Skynner, a writer of the 15th century, may be found in an edition of Lonelich's Sank Ryal, by Dr. Furnivall, Roxburghe Club, 1863, ii, Appendix; cf. ch. lii, ll. 1145 ff.

Note 2 in page 286 Cf. the Huth Merlin, ed. Paris and Ulrich, S. A. T. F., i, 261.

Note 3 in page 286 Huth Merlin, i, 154 ff.

Note 1 in page 287 According to Sievers and Koegel, the very name of Fitela (O. H. G. Fizzilo, Fezzilo) reveals his incestuous origin (See Paul-Braune, Beitr., xvi, 363, 509; cf. Kluge, Engl. Stud., xvi, 433; Symons, Paul's Grundriss, 2nd ed., iii, 653). For a discussion of “The Sister's Son” in mediæval literature, see an important article by Prof. F. B. Gummere in An Eng. Miscellany, presented to Dr. Furnivall, Oxford, 1901, pp. 133 ff.

Note 2 in page 286 H. H., i, sts. 38, 43.

Note 1 in page 288 In the Saga (ch. 10) the circumstances of Sinfjtli's murder of Borghild's brother are told as follows:

“Sinfjotli leggz nú í herna af nýju; hann sér eina fagra konu ok girniz mjk at fá hennar; eirrar konu ba ok bróir Borghildar, er átti Sigmundr konungr. eir reyta etta mál me orrostu, ok fellir Sinfjtli ěna konung; hann herjar nú vía ok á margar orrustur ok hefir ávalt sigr, geriz hann manna frægstr ok ágætastr ok kemr heim um haustit me m®um skipum ok miklu fé.”

There is no more question of Mordred's than of Sinfjtli's power. Geoffrey calls Mordred “the boldest of men.”

Note 1 in page 289 She is the cause of the dispute which led to this battle, even as Guinevere that which occasioned Camlan. On the possible confusion of Hjrdis and Sigrlin, see Home of the Eddie Poems, pp. 273 f.

Note 1 in page 290 We may note also the appearance of pillagers on the battlefield. In Malory (xxi, 4), it is said of Lucan: “And so as he went, he saw and hearkened by the moonlight, how the pillers and robbers were come into the field to pill and to rob many a full noble knight of broaches and beads, of many a good ring, and of many a rich jewel,”—with which compare the following from the Saga (ch. 12): “She [Hjrdis] sees that many ships are come to land; . . . the vikings behold the great slaughter of men . . . and they find abundant treasure, so that the men deem they have not seen equally much together in one place, or more jewels: they bear it to the ship of King Alf.”

Note 2 in page 290 The same story is told in the prose passage Frá Daua Sinfjtla, which follows the Helgi-lays in the Poetic Edda.

Note 1 in page 291 Ok gekk harmr sinn nær bana.

Note 2 in page 291 In early saga Arthur, like Sigmund, was famous for his physical prowess. In Bēowulf it is Sigmund who is said to have slain the dragon in an adventure attributed later, according to a common shift in mediæval romance, to his son. Already in Nennius's Historia Britonum, mention is made of Arthur's famous fight with the wild boar Troynt; and one of his most celebrated achievements was his struggle against the demon-cat of Lausanne.

Note 1 in page 292 To say nothing of Odin and Merlin, of King Siggeir and King Lot, of their respective queens, or of Helgi and Gawain, all of whom are in certain respects parallel. Lot, it may be observed, was very early represented as a king of the Orkneys, and no doubt his history was familiar to the Scandinavian settlers there.

Note 2 in page 292 In a recent number of the Arkiv för Nord, Filologi, xvii (1901), 52, Professor Bugge argues that the story of Sigi, Skathi, and Brethi, in the first chapter of the Saga, was composed, not earlier than the ninth century, by a West-Norwegian poet in Britain, most likely in Ireland, under the influence of narratives accessible there. (Professor Finnur Jónsson states his unbelief in Litt. Hist., ii, 843 note). Professor Bugge thus expresses himself in conclusion: “Den norske Digtning om Sigurd Faavnesbanes Forfædre opstod tidligst hos Normændene i Britannien ved en Omdigtning af angelsaksiske Sagn og kvæder om Wælsingerne under Inflydelse fra andre vesterlandske, germanske og celtiske Sagn.”

Note 1 in page 294 This adder is represented as Atli's mother in disguise. Likewise the she-wolf who devoured Signy's brothers is said in the Vłungasaya (ch. 8) to have been the mother of Siggeir. But the writer only reported it as the “sogu sumra mňa” and this feature of the Saga is best regarded as a borrowing from the Guthrun story. Cf. Symons, Beitr., iii, 351.

Note 1 in page 295 See Symons, Beitr. iii, 296 ff; id., Paul's Grundriss, 2nd ed. iii, 653; cf. Finnur Jónsson, Lit. Hist., ii, 843.