more re wolf and edie:
5 problem lines/phrases/words
and possible solutions/interpretations:
1
lēodum is mīnum swylce him mon lāc gife
(persons is mine should they one offering/game give)
this, the first line, remains most problematic for me personally
even after reading and rereading several times
and thinking about it constantly for several days consecutively
the original is frustratingly unclear
there seem to be 2 distinct ideas: "my people" and "a sacrifice is required"
but nothing to suggest how or why the 2 ideas are connected
or even if they are at all
the translator is left to his own devices here
i have arrived at this, provisionally:
"it is my blood, thus mine to give"
it reflects my first impression of the line's meaning upon first gloss
ie. she had a people (or a blood/bloodline/heritage/kin)
but she would give them up if she had to,
pain of loss notwithstanding
this interpretation diverges radically from the others i have seen
but really you could go in any direction with this line, i think
fortunately i don't know enough about anglo saxon grammar to stop myself
her people ask for a sacrifice?
her people are the sacrifice?
both?
etc
2
āþecgan
(accept)
this word is usually translated as either accept or kill
two words which seem to be in direct contradiction in this context
until one thinks of acceptance in terms of "taking" or "taking in" or "eating"
then one realizes that to accept could also be to kill
also one becomes aware of additional sexual connotations of the word "take"
and possible intersections of sex/killing concepts
or sex/eating
3
on þrēat cymeð
(in threat cometh)
þrēat is translated variously as threat/clan/crowd
on could mean in, or into
so he could be "coming in threat" ie threateningly
or he could be "coming into a threat" ie into danger
or he could be "coming in a crowd/throng"
or he could be "coming into a crowd/throng/clan"
again i think you could go in any direction with this one
4
ungelīce is ūs
(unlike/unalike is us)
maybe the most annoying line in the poem
so clipped and blunt
half-line, "odd line out"
and so hard to understand or appreciate
un=un
gelic/lic=alike/like
but then i discover that lic can also mean body
as in corpse/corpus/corporeal/
this opens out into ideas of family/blood/kin/kind
and changes my understanding of the word like
and it becomes the concept "likeness"
with its suggestion of family and lineage and kin concepts
as in "we are unlikenessed" or
"we are unkinned"
or "unkind"?
(a "kind" being a likeness, a type, a related group, a category
thus unkind could mean "unalike" or not-related)
thus: "we have come unkinned"?
5
wulfes ic mīnes wīdlāstum wēnum dogode
(wolf i mine wide-walking/wide-tracking hope dog-like)
wulfes is possessive, meaning: what wolf has/what wolf has taken/that which is wolf's
wēnum is plural of hope
her hopes "dog" the runaway wolf like a pack of hunting hounds, as in a fox hunt?
note: dogode is disputed by scholars
it is commonly emended to to hogode
due to dogode being otherwise completely unattested in the anglo saxon canon
hogode means: thought (past 1st person singular)
i for one accept dogode as it appears in the ms.
preferring to believe that whoever wrote it down
knew how to spell
how about: "that which is wolf's" i [with] mine far-flung hopes "hunt houndlike"
why not eh
i know eh
more to follow
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