Ossian Collection > Poems of Ossian, the son of Fingal

ON THE POEMS OF OSSIAK. 369
hiftorivan of confiderable note, who flourillied in the thh'-
teenth century, informs us that very many of thefe fongs,
containing the ancient traditionary ilories of the country,
were found engraven upon rocks in the old Runic cha-
rader; feveral of which he has tranilated into Latin, and
inferted into his hiftory. But his verfions are plainly fo
paraphraftical, and forced into fuch an imitation of the
Ifyle and the meafures of the Roman poets, that one can
form no judgment from them of the native fpirit of the
original. A more curious monument of the true Gothic
poetry is preferved by Olaus Wormius in his book de Li-
teratura Runica. It is an Epicedium, or funeral fong,
compofed by Regner Lodbrog; and tranflated by Olaus,
word for word, from the original. This Lodbrog was a
king of Denmark, who lived in the eighth century, fam-
ous for his wars and victories ; and at the fame time an
eminent Scalder or poet. It was his misfortune to fall at
lall into the hands of one of his enemies, by whom he
was thrown into prifon, and condemned to be deftroyed
by ferpents. In this iituation he folaced himfelf with re-
hearfmg all the exploits of his hfe. The poem is divided
into twenty-nine flanzas, of ten lines each; and every
fhanza begins with tliefe words, PugnavimusEnfibus, " We
have fought with our fwords." Olaus's verfion is in many-
places fo obfcure as to be hardly intelligible. I have fub-
joined the whole below, exadly as he has publifhed it;.
3 A and
diftich, it was requifite that three words fliould begin with the fame letter; two
of the correfponding words placed in the firfl. line of the diftich, the third, in the
fccond line. In each line were alfo required two fyllables, but never the final ones
formed either of the fame confonants, or fame vowels. As an example of this
meafure, Olaus gives us thefe two Latin lines conllrudled exadUy according to the
above rules of Runic verfe:
Chrillus caput nofti-um
Coronet te bonis.
The initial letters of Chriftus, Caput and Coronet, make the three correfponding
letters of the diftich. In the firft line, the iirft fyllables of Chrillus and of nof-
trum; in the fccond line, the on in coronet and in bonis make the requHite corref-
pondence of lyllables. Frequent inverfions and tranfpofitions were permitted in
this poetry; which would naturally follow from fuch laborious attention to the
collocation of words.
The curious on this fubjeift may confuk likewife Dr. Hicks's Thefaurus Lingua-
rum Septentrionalium; particularly the 23d chapter of his Grammatica Anglo
Saxonica et Mxfo Gothica; where they will find a full accoun^of the ftruaure of
the Anglo-Saxon verfe, which nearly refemblcd the Gothic. ^They will find alfo
fome fpecimcns both of Gothic and Saxon poetry. An extract, which Dr. Hicks
has given from the work of one of the Danilh Scalders, intitled, Hervarer Saga,
containing an evocation from the dead, ma^ Ije found iu the 6tii YOluiue ofMif-
cellany Poems, publilhed by Mr, Prydeii.