SAGA-BOOK - Viking Society Web Publications

KATTAR SONR
By ANNE HOLTSMARK
frHE First Lay of Helgi Hundingsbani (referred to as
H H I hereafter) is the most chivalric of all the eddaic
poems. It is true that Helgi, the hero, has killed his
father's slayer, King Hunding, but this is told in a couple
of stanzas and it is a different exploit altogether that we
are to hear about. Helgi is to save a valkyrie from
marrying a man she does not want as her husband. The
valkyrie, Sigrun, tells Helgi of the proposed match and
says:
en ek hefi, Helgi,
HQl'5brodd kveoinn
konung 6neisan
sem kattar son.
Helgi promises that he will die before such a thing happens,
and the rest of the poem describes the great battle he has
in order to free Sigrun.
It has been generally agreed that Sigrun's words just
quoted are an insult to Horibrodd, but there has not been
general agreement as to what she really means when she
describes the rejected suitor as oneiss sem kattar son.
Gering thinks that oneiss "bedeutet hier gewiss 'schamlos,
frech' ... wahrend das Wort an den iibrigen Stellen,
wo es sich in der Edda findet, keinen verachtlichen
Sinn hat" 1 To this Sijmons adds in parenthesis
that the word could be translated in its usual,
positive sense but interpreted here as ironical in intention.
In the commentary to his Edda edition of 1932 Finnur
Jonsson translates it as "en konge der ellers er daddelfri". 2
Gering elsewhere glosses oneiss as "ohne Schande,
1 Kommentar zu den liedern der Edda II (1931), 0Z.
'De gamle Eddadiiite (1932), 186.