With heads to be embellished: a host hoarded
Ozurr, Breaker of Rings, the Eastern Jarl
Fortune, Ides Precious Oak of the Jarldom!
We have here Our Hrothgar of An Dubhaigeainn
Working the Thrown Weapons range as watcher
Longsome and latest folk learning from him
We guard against a gap in today’s glee
In Our royal ring-hall, We receive thee
Hrothgar bold bearer of the blood-ember
Deed-valiant, not adorned with distinction
Shifts season’s day, now with Silver Mantle
Accomplished this day, April 27th,
In Anno Societas LIII
At Balfar's Challenge in the Barony of Dragonship Haven
Word Count 103
Calligraphy by Violet Hughes
Illumination by Fiona the Volatile
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Red font indicates a kenning
The parentheses are the meaning of the kenning
During this day dawned with dusk of morning
With heads to be embellished: a host hoarded
Ozurr, Breaker of Rings, (King) the Eastern Jarl
Fortune, Ides Precious Oak of the Jarldom! (Noble woman, in this case Queen)
We have here Our Hrothgar of An Dubhaigeainn
Working the Thrown Weapons range as watcher
Longsome and latest folk learning from him
We guard against a gap in today’s glee
In Our royal ring-hall, (place for feasting) We receive thee
Hrothgar bold bearer of the blood-ember (axe)
Deed-valiant, not adorned with distinction
Shifts season’s day, now with Silver Mantle
Accomplished this day, April 27th,
In Anno Societas LIII
At Balfar's Challenge in the Barony of Dragonship Haven
It's Blo-og, It's Blog, it's big, it's happy, it's blog
It's Blo-og, It's Blog, it's big, it's happy, it's blog
I got the description for Hrothgar of An Dubhaigeainn and turned toward Norse writing styles. At first I toyed with the idea of using one of the different meters in Norse Poetry. Then I found out that Hrothgar had chosen his name directly from Beowulf. With that in mind, I decided that the scroll should be in the alliterative verse of Beowulf.
I use the basic I pattern of 10 syllable sentences with at least 2, preferably 3 words, or more starting with the same letter.
For this scroll I tried to make use of kennings for the first time. A Kenning is an ambiguous or roundabout figure of speech. In modern language a kenning would be “The first Lady” used to refer to the wife of the President of the United States.
I had never used these before and was excited to add this nuance to the scroll. I used Skaldic Poetry of the Scandinavian Middle Ages and Wiki entry (because it’s just so easy and right there!) as my main sources. I found a kenning for axe right off the bat. I am actually amused that in the description I got to work with axes were mentioned several times as his primary interest, and I didn’t use the word axe once in his scroll; I used the kenning Blood-Ember.
As with many scrolls I find that I need to abandon whatever poetic form I am using in the final paragraph. Fitting in the information on the date, the event and location usually exceeds to syllable count and sometimes location names are difficult to fit into a rhyme scheme.The times that I can work them into the rhyme scheme I am very proud of that accomplishment. This, alas, was not one of those times.
For the lines where I named Their Majesties, this time, I abandoned the alliterative verse in favor of adapting the kennings for the King and Queen with the information needed for and East Kingdom scroll.
The one Kenning that was causing an issue was that of Queen. King/war chief was relatively easy to find, but queen proved elusive.
Apparently mentioning women or rather, having women play major roles in Norse Poetry was considered rather vulgar. Any Norse god could be used as an allusion to the Queen, and I found a couple of references to the wife of the king or mistress (depending on the translation) and I chose to use that.
Many thanks to Grim the Skald for his help on this scroll.
