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p. 85

THE RIDDLES OF KING HEITHREK1
[HEITHREKSGÁTUR]

RIDDLES belong to the popular amusements of probably all races endowed with sufficient intellectual vivacity and reflective power to discover analogies. Yet but few collections of them possess literary value, or even originality, of any sort.

 As is so frequently the case, our Old Norse representative of this genre does show originality, both in subject and treatment. Moreover, though the collection is restricted in extent, and cannot, as a whole, lay claim to great esthetic merit, it is of exceeding interest through its revealing autochthonous, naïve folk-thought. Most of its riddles are based on specifically North Scandinavian, or at least, Northern, environment, beliefs, and conceptions; and are presented in the patterns evolved in the same region—the greater part in more or less regular fornyrthislag and lióthaháttr stanzas. Again, the plastic genius of the North is evident in the many sharply observed traits of nature, whose outlines are not blurred by too great subtlety. Compared with them, the only other notable extant Old Germanic collection, viz., the Anglo-Saxon riddles of the Exeter Book, will at once be seen to have all the earmarks of sophistication. And, notwithstanding the several distinct levels of style, ranging from the homespun manner of such riddles as the seventh, twelfth, sixteenth, and twenty-eighth, to the elaborate skaldic diction, with involved kennings, of a few others, these Northern riddles nowhere smack of “learning.”

 Intrinsically, the collection has nothing to do with the Hervarar saga in which it occurs, but has been rather skillfully connected with it by means of the widespread folklore motif of a king or giant allowing some one in his power to ransom himself, or attain the sought object, by guessing or propounding riddles. With variations, it is used in Old Norse literature in such poems as Vafthrúthnismól, Alvíssmól, Baldrs draumar, Fiolsvithsmól; p. 86 but, to be sure, for the ulterior purpose of inculcating the knowledge of mythical lore.

 The translation here offered follows the arrangement of the Hauksbók MS—or rather, its derivatives—which is according to form, rather than to contents; which latter is the principle followed by the other main MS of the Hervarar saga.

 According to the saga, Hervor has two sons by King Heithrek, Angantýr and Heithrek; of whom the latter inherits both the ruthlessness of his mother and the wisdom of his father. When king, he makes the vow “that, however much a man had wronged him, he should have the chance of trial by his councillors, and that he should go scotfree, if he could propound any riddle the king could not solve, or else lose his head.” A certain thane of Heithrek’s, Gestumblindi,2 had incurred the wrath of the king. In his distress he sacrificed to Óthin. One night a man came to Gestumblindi, so like him that no one could tell them apart. They exchanged garments and the stranger went up to court as Gestumblindi and insisted on his right to free himself by propounding riddles to the king.

Then the king drew the sword Tyrfing and struck at Gestumblindi, but he changed himself into a hawk and flew out through the opening of the roof. The sword reached the hawk’s tail, and that is why it now has a short tail, so heathen folk believe. But Óthin was now enraged at Heithrek, because he had struck at him. That same night the king was killed with Tyrfing (by thralls who sought revenge and their freedom).

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Footnotes

p. 85

1 More properly, they are to be solved by him.

p. 86

2 I.e., probably, Gest hinn blindi, “Gest the blind.” This name, of course, properly belongs to Óthin himself.

p. 87

3 In the sense of food in general.

4 In the Old Norse conception, the edges of a tool are called “mouths.”

p. 89

5 Possibly, a kenning for “dawn.”

6 To be sure, only according to the Old Norse figure.

7 Kenning for “sword.” It is “boiled,” i.e.. the metal for it is melted by the bellows fanning the fire.

p. 90

8 The solution would seem to be, rather, “melting hail.”

p. 91

9 The translation of this half-stanza is conjectural.

10 The text is uncertain; possibly, “water (fog) swallows it.”

11 Cf. Grímnismól, 39; where they are called Skoll and Hati.

p. 92

12 In the original: “than the raven.” In Old Norse, volcanic glass—exceedingly common in Iceland—is called “raven-flint.”

13 Or rather, than the inner membrane of the egg.

14 Or “eager.” Both in malam partem.

p. 93

15 In Old Norse this is called the “young” of the (Arch)angelica plant, much prized in Scandinavia as a delicacy.

16 I.e., to assail him.

17 I.e., the “dark ones.”

18 This game was played on a checkerboard, with hemispherical figures of bone or glass, 12 against 13, the one party white, the other dark. The game turned on one main figure (hnefi) belonging to the dark party. The turns were decided by dice.

19 I follow Kock’s suggestion for the translation of this formula.

p. 94

20 The god of the sea. This and the following riddles closely resemble the one in Baldr’s Dreams, 12, which there brings the dénouement. The billows “weep,” casting their kerchief-corners to the sky—a figure easily interpreted.

p. 95

21 Kenning for “worm” or “snake.”

22 Kenning for “sea.”

p. 96

23 “She-bear.” The game here referred to may have had some resemblance to “Hound and Hare.” The figures are imagined as cattle killed by a bear. The húnn must have had the shape of a die since it is said to have eight corners (Old Norse horn may mean both “horn” and “corner”). One such figure was found in Iceland together with twenty-four others of which half were red and half, white. Bugge, Norröne Skritter at Sagnhistorisk Indhold, p. 358.

24 Literally: “the biting-blades-of-the-straw”: Kenning for the “jaws” of an ox.

25 Kenning for “skull”: the skull bones are compared to a passage, through stones, or a “cave,” for drink.

p. 97

26 Conjectural. The whole stanza of course in malam partem.

p. 98

27 Obviously, the two are interchanged.

28 That is, the yarn of the woof must be alternately lifted up and pressed down with the help of the crosspiece. Bugge, loc. cit., p. 360.

29 These are the names of the kings in a modification of chess.

p. 99

30 This is a good example of the homonym riddle. Says Bugge, ibid., p. 361: “The words that are to be guessed have two, altogether different, meanings in the original. Instead of these words, the riddle has expressions which may be said to have the same meaning as the one sense of the words to be guessed.” Thus, “dead men” is put for valr “falcon,” because this word may also signify “those fallen in battle.” Instead of æthr “eider duck” is set blóthshól “vein,” because æthr has also that sense. And apparently, according to Egilsson, segl “sail” is set for væggr “wall,” which word may also mean “wedge”—the shape of the triangular sail. The last line has so far defied explanation.

31 Óthin’s steed which has eight legs; cf. Grímnismól, 44. Óthin himself has but one eye, having pledged the other to Mimir; cf. Voluspó, 21. This riddle properly leads to the next, and the dénouement.

p. 100

32 Prose in the original, but probably representing a half-stanza. Restored here after Bugge’s suggestion.

33 The same, insoluble, question—and thus not really a riddle—is propounded in Vafthrúthnismól, 55.

34 This stanza, likewise, is in the best MSS resolved into prose. Cf. the similar situation at the end of Grímnismól.