Page:History of the Literature of the Scandinavian North.djvu/51

Rh times by different persons, for the purpose of serving as a hand-book for skalds. It contains in the first place a general synopsis of the asa-faith in two parts; one greater, called Gylfaginning (The Fooling of Gylfe); and one lesser, called Bragarædur (Brage's Speech). Then follows Skáldskaparmál (the art of poetry), in which we find a collection of the various kinds of characteristic paraphrases, etc., used by the skalds, with stanzas of poems quoted by way of illustration. How much of these three divisions owe their origin to Snorre has not been determined. On the other hand, it is quite certain that he is the author of the fourth division of the work, the so-called Háttatal (Enumeration of Metres, a sort of Clavis Metrica), which is a treatise on the various metres employed in Old Norse poetry. To these four divisions there are added as an appendix four additional chapters on grammatical and rhetorical subjects. The author of the first grammatical work ever produced in Iceland, was as is generally and not without reason supposed, one Thorodd, surnamed Runemaster, i.e., the Grammarian, who lived in about the middle of the twelfth century, and the third chapter of the appendix is doubtless written by the Icelander, Olaf Thordsson Hvitaskald (the white-haired skald), the nephew of Snorre, a scholar, who spent some time at the court of Valdemar the Victorious, who ruled Denmark from 1202 to 1241.

It may not be improper to dwell for a few moments on the form of Old Norse poetry. A leading characteristic, and one which the Edda lays possess in common with the later poems, and which we find in all the oldest remnants of the poetry of the Teutonic race, is the use of alliteration (stave-rhyme). The strophe or song as it is called generally contains eight verses or lines, four of which are so united that every half of the strophe contains an independent thought,