CORPUS POETICUM BOREALE.*
DR. GODBRAND VIGTeSSON, with the co-operation of Mr. P. York Powell, has again laid heavy obligations on both his adopted and his native country. In two large, well-filled volumes, they have collected, edited, classified, translated, anno- tated, and otherwise elucidated, the poetry of "the Old Northern Tongue," from the earliest times down to the thirteenth century. The name of Dr. Vigfiisson is alone sufficient guarantee of the- excellence of the work ; no living scholar can claim to rival him in the varied equipment necessary for the successful accom- plishment of such a task. The mere reading of the manuscripts requires a long and special training, for in addition to the • Corpus Poeticum Bo.-cale : Out Poetry of the Old Northern Tongue, from the Earliest Times to the Thirteenth Century. Edited, Classified. and Translated, with Introduction, Excursus, and Notes, by Gudbrand Vistas-on, M.A., and F. York Powell, M.A. 2 role. Oxford: Clarendon Press. 1810.
more usual difficulties, the Icelandic manuscripts are written in a systematically contracted form, quite unique in European diplomatics ; and Dr. Vigfilason states somewhere that he "has had in hand and gone through probably every extant early Icelandic vellum or vellum fragment (save those at Wolfen- 'Witte')." The rewards of competent knowledge and untiring industry are seen in his exhaustive investigation of the true age and importance of the manuscripts he has used, as well as in his shrewd endeavours to ascertain the right or the most probable reading in the many blurred or corrupt passages of the texts. Occasionally, the accurate reading of the manuscripts is all that is required to rectify errors in printed editions, while a thorough acquaintance with the phenomena of the manuscripts, and a sympathetic familiarity with the literature, such as enable him to follow the waywardness of the bungling scribe, are the best aids to a successful divination of what ought to have. been written. If Dr. Vigfasson has fallen into numerous errors in the attempt to rectify the obvious blunders of the scribes, and to discern the original under an overpainted text, he only shares the common and inevitable fate of emendators ; but, in any case, the text he furnishes is no doubt the best now attainable. His boldness of method is unquestionably the safest course, although in weaker hands it would prove surely disastrous, and in some cases there will be not a little hesitation in accepting even his "absolutely certain" emendations. However, the editor exem- plifies in detail his different methods for different situations, and in principle we believe he is right ; while throughout the book he gives clear notice of every interference with the text, whether emendation or transposition. On the whole, his special knowledge and critical penetration have achieved most valuable results. The kindly commemoration of all the scholars who helped to preserve the Old Northern Literature forms an interesting portion of the elaborate Introduction, and there, also, the masterly examination of the manuscripts is supple- mented by a useful review of the editions and commentaries of the days of pre-scientific scholarship.
The first volume is devoted to the Eddie poems, the second to the Court poems. By curious chance and change, not un- exampled in linguistic history, the name" Edda," from being the designation of the spirit and essence of the Court poetry, would seem to have come, through the mistaken application of the leaders of the Icelandic Renaissance, to be transferred, and even to be restricted, to the old heroic epic lays. Dr. Vigfasson pro- poses a new explanation of the name, identifying it with "Earth" (Ertha). This is highly probable, indeed ; and it may be that the Edda of the Lay of .Righ, where the word first occurs, is the same as the Edda title, although this identity does not necessarily 'follow. The particular peregrinations of the word, as suggested, increase the number of suppositions on which the explanation is more or less based. But how did the name come to be applied to the poetry P The suggestion is that it passed from the Lay of Righ to a curious list of synonyms (at the bead of which the Lay probably stood), which is the basis of such poetic pucks as 'Snorri's, that thence it was applied to Snores book on the Poetic Art, being used as a synonym for the technical laws of the Court metre for three centuries (1340 to 1640), and that it was mistakenly transferred from this use, as above mentioned, -to designate the old heroic epic lays. There is much to be said in favour of this view, which is certainly developed with much ingenuity and historical knowledge. The role of mere chance, however, is apt to be overlooked in all such oases; and after Nets could entitle the Lex Romana of the Burgundians Responsa Papiani, anything in this kind is possible. The fictions, often doubted, though commonly accepted, according to which a Song Edda was attributed to Sinmund, and a Prose Edda to Snorri Sturlason, undergo a complete historical exposure, decisive and final. Still more interesting and more indicative of thorough command of the subject and critical acumen, is the editor's searching discussion of the place and date of the Eddie songs. These, he concludes (as in a previous work), did not take origin in Iceland, nor yet on the Scandinavian mainland, but in the Western Isles, whence principally Iceland was colonised. This conclusion he reaches after a patient consideration of the kind of life and thought, the subjects, and the style of the poems, in connection with the known condition of the various Scandinavian lands and the neighbour- ing countries, in the ninth and tenth centuries. From various minute considerations, he even essays to fix the original home of the authors of these poems, holding them to have been Scandi- navians of the heroic age of the North, associated with
the Southern (rather than with the Northern or Western) emigration, and influenced on one side by the fervour and imagination of the Irish Church, and on the other side by the splendour of the Court of Eadgar or of Canute. Probably some of the younger bards would owe their passion and fluency to a dash of Irish blood. The theory is original, and acutely deve- loped from the phenomena, and it is hardly fair to throw any doubt upon it, without some detailed discussion. But a fuller exposition is certainly desirable, and a serious handling of the objections that lie on the surface. At the same time, it receives strong indirect confirmation from recent views of Professor Bugge. In like manner, the classification of the Eddie lays adopted in this work is pretty fully discussed, and although open to endless dispute at most points, fairly commends itself as a reasonably probable working arrangement. Whether the poems attributed to "the Helgi poet," "the Ballad poet," the "Norse Aristophanes of the Western Isles," and so forth, were really written by particular individuals, as suggested, may be debated at any length, and with as much plausibility, as the authorship of the Iliad and the Odyssey. It is enough, in the meantime, that the grouping is convenient, and based on a careful comparison of outstanding characteristics.
The Court poems, which are included in the second volume, really form a versified. history of the exploits of successive princes, interspersed with abundant laudation. The earliest of these, belonging to the tenth century, are the Shield Songs, mythical as to incident, and dedicated to a king or patron. The annalistic poems follow, consisting of regular encomia, addressed to particular princes, and fashioned in commemoration of their deeds ; and with these are classed occasional Odes and Dirges in eulogy of the:mighty dead.. The Christian chronicles begin with the reign of Olaf Tryggwason (995-1001), the great Christianising king; and the Court poetry was at its zenith contemporaneously with the Norman Conquest of England. In the following century, Ad the historian separated the bare facts with much care and sober judgment, and formed them into his famous book of the Lives of the. Kings of Norway. The later remodelling of the original verses :used by An, by the facile pen of some unscrupulous versifier, forms the subject of an exceedingly acute investigation, with results that can hardly fail to carry conviction. The introductory remarks to the several poems are most elaborate, concise, and instructive.
The ample Excursus, embodying a vast collection of facts, with suggestions pointing to probable inferences on important heads, especially the old Northern beliefs and chronology, must be simply commended to diligent perusal. The attempt to dis- entangle the Scandinavian and the common Teutonic myths ; the separation of the Walhall and Walkyrie system as a Wicking faith merely, and as lasting only "some three generations at most," while "our older authorities all point to the habitual and household worship of ancestors as being the main cult of the older religion ;"—these are exceedingly important matters, which we must be content to note. It is evident, however, that these speculations, especially when taken into consideration with the views of Professor Bugge, throw the whole of the accepted ideas of Scandinavian mythology into dispute, and that the vigorous editorial research displayed in this work must modify in no slight degree the histories of Norse literature. The translation, with all its serious difficulties, needs but a single word of unalloyed praise ; and this we heartily accord. When shall we have the pleasure of welcoming some similar work on our own earliest literature P
Previous page
