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The Trouble with Translating
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Codex Regius (Gammel kongelig samling 2365 4to)
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In an increasingly heated
exchange of words between Thor and a belligerent ferryman
calling himself Harbard, Thor makes the following threat in
Hárbarðsljóð 13:
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Þórr
kvað:
"Harm ljótan
mér þykkir í því
at vaða um váginn til þín
ok væta ögur minn;
skylda ek launa
kögursveini þínum
kanginyrði,
ef ek kæmumk yfir sundit." |
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This verse has
been notoriously difficult to translate, primarily
because of the phrase "ok væta ögur minn", "and
wet my ögur," in line 3. The word ögur
is a hapax legomenon,
a word or form occurring only once in a document or
corpus, thus making it difficult, if not impossible, to
interpret. Over the years various definitions and
emendations have been suggested, and thus translators
have rendered it in a number of different ways.
Most recently, two English
language translators, Carolyne Larrington and Andy
Orchard, have interpreted its use in this verse as a
reference to Thor's genitalia:
Carolyne Larrington, Harbard's
Song (1996):
13. "It seems to me that it'd be
an unpleasant labor
to wade over the water to you, and
wet my balls.
I'll pay you back, you babe in
arms,
for your jeering words, if I get
over the water."
Andy Orchard, Hárbarðsljóð (2011):
13. "It seems a dreadful pain to
me,
to wade over the water to you, and
wet my balls:
I'll get you back you dribbling
git,
for your smarmy words, if I get
over the straits."
In her revised translation of 2014, Larrington, changes
Thor's words in the opening lines
of Hárbarðsljóð 13 to read:
"It seems to me that it'd be
an unpleasant labor
to wade over the water to you, and
wet my prick.*"
She qualifes the change in
word-choice from balls to prick with
the note:
"what Thor declines to wet is
unclear, but etymologically it seems to be something
staff-shaped (and thus phallic)."
A review of the available
scholarship on this verse, however, demonstrates that
neither of these interpretations, balls or
prick, is supported by previous international
scholarship or the etymological arguments. A
concise summary of these arguments was published in
the German Kommentar zu den Liedern der Edda
Vol. II (1997), see below.
On the face of
it, the very notion that
Thor is unwilling to confront a foe because he doesn't
want to get his private parts wet is comic. In the known myths, Thor wades
across rivers on numerous
occasions; getting any part of his body wet has never been a concern for him
before. In Þórsdrapa, Thor crosses the Elivagar
rivers on his way to Geirröd's lair, despite one of
Geirröd's daughters standing astride the stream and
urinating into it. In
Hymiskviða
34, Thor's feet
penetrate the bottom of the giant Hymir's boat and he
stands on the ocean floor as he struggles to land the
Midgard serpent which writhes at the end of his
fishing line. In Skáldskaparmál, Thor carries
his good friend Aurvandill, the sorceress Groa's
husband, in a basket on his back over the
freezing cold Elivagar rivers, when he returns home
from Jötunheim after his duel with
Hrungnir. Furthermore,
Grímnismál 29
informs us that Thor wades through no less than four
rivers daily to sit in judgment by Urd's well.
Thus there can be no doubt that Thor is well-accustomed
to wading in cold and deep waters. Presumably, on each of these
occasions, he got his "balls" wet. As
this
has never been a concern of Thor's before, it is highly
unlikely to be a concern of his here in Hárbarðsljóð 13.
So what do the scholars say? What might ögur
actually mean? One thing is certain, the word has
long troubled the translators.
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Ögurr:
the Dictionary
Definitions |
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The Old Icelandic dictionaries produced by Eddic
scholars in the last 150 years are of limited help.
Since the word ögurr only appears once, its
meaning is debatable— more often than not, the purposed
definitions in these dictionaries for ögurr are
based on the context of the verse and applied logic.
Overall, the German Kommentar zu den Liedern der Edda Vol. II
(1997) categorizes these proposals under three headings:
1) an
object that Thor carries with him
2) a piece of clothing
3)
a body part.
Faced with a difficult to define hapax legomenon, many
early scholars simply chose to change or 'emend' the authentic wording of the manuscript. The authors of the Cleasby-Vigfusson Dictionary of Old Icelandic
(p.
762) for example choose to emend the word ögurr to
kögur, "a quilt with fringe." In the same
volume, they define kögurr as:
"kögurr, m., dat. kögri, pl.
kögrar:-- a quilt with fringe, a counterpane;
...a bed-cover, hann bjó þegar rekkju ok yfir
breiddi einn kagur, str. 45; ...kögur ok
handklæði, Vm. 92: of dress, vaða ok væta
kögur minn, Hárbarðsljóð 13: in mod. usage
of fringe or fringed cloth."
In his own translation of Hárbarðsljóð 13, Gudbrand
Vigfusson takes a similar approach:
"Tis a bad job to have to wade through the water to
thee and wet my quiver; I should pay thee, thou
quiver-boy (wee boy), for thy mockery, if I were to
cross the Sound."
The same emendation was used by
later scholars to derive the meaning a piece of clothing,
such as a drape or
mantle; supported by Harbard's condescending statement
in v. 6, that Thor isn't wearing any breeches (þatki,
at þú hafir brækr þínar).
In the Addenda found on p. 776, however,
Cleasby-Vigfusson break away from this reading, refining
their understanding of the word:
"kögurr, m., as to the reference Hárbarðsljóð 13, add, —the
vellum has augur, but the emendation into kögur
is
received by Editors; and is made certain by kögur-sveinn in the same verse; but the sense and origin of
kögurr in this place have been missed by
the interpreters. It is indeed a well-known Teutonic
word: Anglo-Saxon cocur, O.H.G. chochar, German kocher, Dutch koker; the
Danish kogger is probably borrowed from the German as is the Icelandic
koffur from Luther's Bible; once upon a time
it was also a Scandinavian word, which was since displaced by the compounded
örva-malr or ör-malr, q.v.; this
passage being the only place where it occurs in an
uncompounded form, but it remains in kögur-sveinn, a
quiver-boy, who carried the hunter's quiver(?); and
in kögur-barn, Norse kogge-barn."
"Professor Frederich Bergmann has,
with his usual insight in Eddic matters, divined the
sense when he says, p. 123, 'über den Sund zu schwimmen
und dabei seinen feurigen Donner-und blitz-keil, ... im
Wasser zu netzen und abzukühlen.' ['To swim
across the sound and thereby quench and cool-off his
Thunder and Lightning-quiver in the water."] The fact is, Thor is
here represented carrying a quiver full of thunder-bolts
on his back, and so the poet makes the mighty
thunder-god stop at the Sound, embarrassed, and begging
to be ferried over, as he could not wade over from fear
of wetting his quiver and quenching the fire, for he
must 'keep his powder dry:' although in Grímnismál and Þrymskviða Thor
is not much afraid of the water. Whether kögurr, a
quilt, be any relation to kögurr, a quiver, we cannot
tell, probably not; if so, this word should be placed under
a separate head."
Emending the word, one can read into it whatever he
or she wishes.
In his turn, the famous Norwegian philologist
Sophus Bugge proposed the emendation dögurð,
"breakfast", by cleverly adding a letter to front and
back of ögur, which he too believed made
perfect sense in the context of
the poem, as justified by
Hárbarðsljóð 3, where Thor states that he
is carrying leftovers from his breakfast in the basket on his
back.
ALL
EMENDATIONS ASIDE:
GOING SOLELY WITH WHAT'S
IN THE MANUSCRIPT |
When the word ögurr is not emended,
meaning that it is taken exactly as it appears in the
manuscript, only two categories of meanings have ever been proposed:
an object Thor carries and a body part.
Within these two categories, only three
of the possible definitions proposed by scholars over
the last two centuries have gained broad support. None of
these however is "balls" or "prick" which makes the recent
translations cited above all the more troubling!
Most telling, only
two of the three proposed definitions of ögurr are widely cited: those being the definitions purposed by Hjalmer
Falk (1888) and M.B. Richert (1877), which I will present in
detail further down.
Over the years, the Eddic dictionaries have defined the unique word
ögurr in various ways:
Hans Kuhn in his Kurzes Wörterbuch to Die Lieder des Codex Regius
(1928) lists
the word ögurr in
Hárbarðsljóð 13 as
"unerklärt", undefined.
Beatrice LaFarge in her Glossary to the Poetic Edda (1992),
which is based on Kuhn's Kurzes Wörterbuch, defines the word
ögurr as "burden
(Richert) or penis (?
—Hrbl 13, see Simmons-Gering)." As they are not in Kuhn's
edition, these must be LaFarge's additions.
Following her lead then and turning to her source for
the
secondary meaning, penis, an uncertain
hypothetical definition (as indicated by the
use of the question mark), we note that Hugo Gering in his
Vollständiges Wörterbuch zu den Liedern der Edda
(1903)
translates ögorr, as
penis (membrum virile),
based on Hjalmer Falk's etymological observations in
Arkiv för nordisk filologi 3, 341,
(see below).
Broadening the scope of the search, the latest edition of Sveinbjörn Egilsson's
Lexicon Poeticum (1932,
p.
660) states that the word
ögurr is "of uncertain
meaning" [af usikker betydning],
and offers two possible solutions, stating:
1. den rimeligste er Richerts opfattelse, = byrde (madkurven som
Tor bar);
2. Falks forklaring 'membrum virile' ...er næppe rigtig, jfr følg.
ögurstund, Völ. 41:
sótum við Völundr saman í holmi eina ö., af uvis betydning, den
rimeligste forklaring er, at det ...betyder 'en ulvkkesstund',
måske egl. 'byrde-fuld, trykkende stund' (jfr
ögurr). Jfr Falk, Arkiv II 339 f.
which reads,
"1. The most reasonable is Richert's conception, = burden (the
meal-basket that Thor bears);
2. Falk's explanation 'penis' ...is
hardly correct, cf. the following:
"ögurstund,
Völunðarkviða 41: sótum við Völundr saman í
holmi eina ö., of uncertain meaning, the
most reasonable explanation is that it ...signifies 'a difficult
time' i.e. 'burden-filled, a trying time' (cf.
ögurr). Cf. Falk, Archives II 339
f."
So while the latest redactor of Egilsson's Lexicon proposes that
Falk's translation of ögurstund in Völundarkviða 41 is correct,
he does not accept Falk's interpretation of Thor's ögur in
Hárbarðsljóð 13. A closer
look at Falk's argument regarding ögurr reveals why.
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TWO SCHOOLS OF THOUGHT
I.
Hjalmar Falk
Old Norse Etymologies
(1888)
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The citation of a small portion of Hjalmer Falk's etymological
observations regarding the word ögurr in
Arkiv för Nordisk Filologi 3, 341,
is sufficient to demonstrate that his argument is based largely
on speculation concerning an unattested word-form, indicated by an asterix
(*). He writes:
Det ovennævnte substantiv ögurr (el. augurr)
i Hárbarðsljóð faar ved det her udviklede sin fulde belysning;
det forholder sig til *arga som fjöturr til fet (opr. fod, af
samme stamme som ποδ-,
ped-). Dets betydning er, som ogsaa contexten synes at
godtgjøre, membran virile, penis.
which reads,
"From this development, the above-mentioned noun ögurr
(or augurr) in
Hárbarðsljóð 13, receives its full
illumination; it is related to [the unattested form] *arga
as fjöturr, fetter to
fet, step (orig.
fod, of the same
strain as ποδ-,
ped-). Its meaning, as the
context also
makes clear is membrum virile, penis."
Kommentar zu den Liedern der Edda, Vol 2 (1997)
confirms this in its summary of Falk's argument, stating that:
"Falk
(1886, 341) postuliert einen etymologischen Zusammenhang mit
argr ("pervers") and
ergi ("Unzucht"); er
interpretiert ögurr als "(männliches) Glied"....Falk postulierte
Ableitung von einum Fem. *arga *argurr (vgl fet "Schritt">
fjöturr "Fessel") > ögurr philogisch bedenklich (dies deuten
Holthausen [1920, 88]).
which reads:
"Falk (1886, 341) postulated an etymological connection with
argr ("perverse") and
ergi ("fornication");
he interpreted as ögurr
"(male) member" ...Falk postulated a derivation from
(an unattested) feminine *arga *argurr (cf.
fet "step"> fjöturr "fetter")>
ögurr which is
philogically questionable."
So, as the final editor of Egilsson's Poeticum Lexicon
concludes, Falk's translation of ögurr as penis —
which depends on a "philologically questionable" derivation
from an unattested word form, "is hardly correct."
So much for prick.
In 1948, Stefán Einarsson proposed a similar
interpretation of the
word ögurr suggesting that it was a variant of the word
ögur (ögr),
which Cleasby-Vigfusson defines as "an inlet, a small
bay or creek ... 2. a local name in western Iceland."
Kommentar
zu den Liedern der Edda, Vol. II (1997) summarizes his argument
in the following fashion:
Stefán Einarsson (1948, 144) dagegen schlägt die interpretation
"spalte (zwischen den Beinen)" vor. Er stützt sich einerseits
auf die nisl. Redewendung vaða upp í klof "bis zu den hüften ins
wasser gehen" (vgl. Blöndal, s.v. klof) andererseits auf die
bezeichnung der 'bein-Gabelung" als skarð ("Scharte, Spalte") in
Ölkofra þáttr k. 4: skarðit, sem er í milli þjóa þér "die Kluft,
die zwischen deinen Oberschenkeln ist" (IF 11, 94) Da skarð auch
eine topographische Bezeichnung ("Einschnitt in einem
Bergrücken, Gebirgspass") ist, sieht Stéfan Einarsson in
ögurr (Hrbl 13) dasselbe Wort wie ögur (Ntr.)
"enge Bucht oder Sund zwischen Klippen", das auch als Ortsname
belegt ist ...Der Unterscheid zwischen dem Mask. ögurr und dem
Ntr ögur is für ihn unproblematisch, da es andrere
Wörter gibt, die in zwei Varianten mit unterschiedlichem
grammatischen Geschlecht belegt sind.
which reads,
"Stéfan Einarsson (1948, 144) on the other hand, suggests the
interpretation "gap (between the legs)". This is based partly on
the modern Icelandic phrase "go up to the hips in the water"
vaða upp í klof, lit. 'wade in up to the cleft' (See
Blöndal, s.v. klof) on the other hand, the designation
of "fork in the legs"as skarð ("notch, gap") in Ölkofra
þáttr ch. 4 skarðit, sem er í milli þjóa þér "the gap
that is between your thighs" (IF 11, 94) Since skarð is
also a topographical name ("notch in a ridge, mountain pass"),
Stéfan Einarsson sees ögurr (Hrbl 13) as the same word
as ögr (neuter) "narrow bay or sound between cliffs",
which also occurs as a place name ... the difference between the
masculine ögurr and the neuter ögr is
unproblematic for him, because there are other words which occur
in two variants with different grammatical gender."
By this argument, Stefán Einarsson suggests that Thor refuses to wade
across the river to Harbard so as not to "wet the cleft between
[his] legs". When evaluating this theory, it's
important to note that the word ögr (ögur),
which means "inlet, a small bay" in Old Icelandic is
never attested anywhere in this sense. Rather Einarsson
attempts to derive the meaning "cleft between the legs"
from ögr through a comparison with a modern
idiomatic use of a different word with a similar
meaning!
While it's entirely possible that Larrington and Orchard derived
the sense "balls" from either this argument or Falk's,
neither Einarsson nor Falk draw that conclusion. As
shown above, Falk argues that ögurr refers to
Thor's male member, while Einarsson's theory merely
concludes that ögur might mean the "cleft" between Thor's legs.
Besides being improbable and unnecessarily complex
linguistic arguments, both theories provide an unlikely
solution.
Thor who, according to Grímnismál 29, goes wading "every day" (hvern
dag) on his way to Urd's fountain, doesn't seem to have an issue with getting
his private parts wet.
It has never been a concern of his before or since.
Therefore, this much is
clear, based on the available evidence, the word ögurr
does not refer to Thor's nether regions.
Thus, we have eliminated two of the three possibilities.
With a high degree of probability, the word ögurr
does not refer to a piece of Thor's clothing or one of
his body parts. That leaves us with one option.
Fortunately for Harbard, on this
occasion, Thor appears to be carrying something he would
rather not get wet.
With this in mind, let's examine the most viable solution,
M.B. Richert's interpretation of ögurr,
which the Lexicon Poeticum calls "most reasonable" and
which LaFarge's Glossary to the Poetic Edda,
a book Carolyne Larrington dubbed "invaluable"
in her own work, endorses
without reservation.
In light of this, Carolyne Larrington's recent comment
that the word ögurr in
Harbarðsljoð 13 while of unclear meaning,
"etymologically"... "seems to be something staff-shaped
(and thus phallic)" is puzzling. The etymological
arguments that resulted in the meanings penis
or crotch in general were actually based on an
otherwise unattested relationship to the words argr
("perverse") and ergi ("fornication"), or in a
more round about way, with ögr (ögur),
meaning inlet, narrow bay, or cleft, ergo the cleft
between one's legs, i.e. crotch. The notion of
something staff-shaped and thus
phallic did not derive from the historical argument.
The argument was either the whole area in general, or
the full monty, specifically the membrum virile
or penis.
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II.
M.B. Richert
Attempt to
Illuminate the Dark and
Obscure
Passages in the Poetic Edda
(1877) |
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In an article titled "Försök till belysning
afmörkare och oförstådda ställeni den poetiska eddan"
published in
Uppsalas Universitets Ársskrift 1877, Mårtin Berger
Richert makes the following argument concerning the phrase
ok væta ögur minn found in Harbarðsljoð 13, 3:
För de från olika håll framstälda förslagen till ändring af
det oförstådda
ordet ögur redogör Holtzmann S. 232. Bugges skarpsinniga
gissning dögurð (upptagen af Grundtvig) är utan
all jämförelse den mest beaktansvärda. Stället synes oss
dock kunna godt förklaras utan ändring af
handskriftens ögur. Enligt Bugge är detta ord “ellers
ukjend”, men, så vidt vi kunna förstå, förekommer det på
ännu ett annat ställe i eddan nämligen Völ.kv. 41 i
sammansättningen ögurstund. Den germ. ordroten ag =
indoeurop. agh, gr. άχ (eller med
nasalljud άγχ, motsvarad af den germ. formen ang), har till
hufvudbetydelse klämma, prässa, trycka. Däraf i skilda
indoeuropeiska språk en mängd ordbildningar, som
utmärka tryck, börda dels i yttre, fysisk mening, dels ock i
inre, andlig (=beklämning, ängslan, fruktan). Enligt vår
mening är ögur i
sammansättningen ögurstund
att fatta i den senare betydelsen, under det att den mera
ursprungliga fysiska bemärkelsen tyngd, börda tillkommer
ordet i Hårbardsljóð ögur
minn utmärker således min
börda, hvad jag har att bära på, ett uttryck som
finner sin förklaring af v. 3.
which reads,
"Holtzmann p. 232 describes the proposals put forth from
different directions for the emendation of the misunderstood
word ögur. Bugge’s astute guess
dögurð
(adopted by Grundtvig) is without comparison the most
noteworthy. The passage seems to me, however, to be explainable
without emending the ögur of the manuscript. According to Bugge
the word is "otherwise unknown" but, as far as I
know,
it appears in another place in the Edda, namely
Völundarkviða 41 as part of the compound ögurstund. The German
word root ag = indoeurop. agh, gr. άχ (or with nasal sound
άγχ, parallel with the German ang, shape), has
as its primary
meaning “clamp, press, put pressure on”. Thus in various
Indo-European languages we find a variety of word formations, which
denote pressure, burden —partially in an outer, physical
sense, but also in an inner, spiritual sense (= oppression,
anxiety, fear). In my opinion ögur in
ögurstund can be taken in the latter (inner,
spiritual) sense, while the more
original physical sense of weight, burden explains the word
in Harbardsljod: ögur minn therefore denotes my burden,
what I carry, an expression that finds its
explanation in v. 3:
-----
meis hef ek á baki,
verðr-a matr in betri;
etc.
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-----
I have a basket on my back
No food could be better
etc."
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Richert's theory has the advantage of being the
simplest. Moreover, it agrees with the
etymological history of the word, and naturally explains
its only other known usage as part of the compound word
ögurstund in Völundarkvida 41.
Thus, in
agreement with Egilsson's Poeticum Lexicon (1932), I
must conclude:
The most reasonable explanation
of the phrase minn ögur is Richert's. The phrase
found in
Hárbarðsljóð 13 most likely
refers to Thor's burden, i.e the meal-basket that he
carries on his back, as stated in
v. 3.
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The Burden Lifted |
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In light of the foregoing scholarly arguments, the best translation of
Hárbarðsljóð 13 appears to be
the one suggested by M.B. Richert's astute analysis:
Þórr
kvað:
"Harm ljótan
mér þykkir í því
at vaða um váginn til þín
ok væta ögur minn;
skylda ek launa
kögursveini þínum
kanginyrði,
ef ek kæmumk yfir sundit." |
Thor said:
"Sore grief
it seems to me
to wade over the waves to you
and wet my burden;
I'll duly reward,
swaddled boy, your
wounding words
if I come over the sound." |
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by William P. Reaves
for Carla O'Harris on her Birthday
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For additional
insight on Thor's wading, see
Ásmegin: Thor's Might
and the
Belt of Strength
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