A brief explanation of the meters I have used is in order, although this is not the place for going into exhaustive detail on how to write modern English versions of the ancient meters. Also, keep in mind that these are modern English versions. They are not and do not purport to be “clones” of the Old Norse or Old English versions, as such a thing is neither possible nor desirable due to the differences in the languages. Additionally, many of my poems may show some intricacies that aren’t described here.
Fornyrðislag. This is the simplest of the meters and is easily recognized in this book by the eight-line stanzas of the poems that use it. I use it quite frequently. It is based on the elder form of the same name, a name which roughly means “meter of ancient words.” This is the form used by many of the poems of the Poetic Edda (such as Völuspá and Thrymskviða), and is also the form that Tolkien used in The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrun. Each line contains two fully stressed syllables and generally a minimum of four syllables overall. (Some of my older poems will have three-syllable lines.) The first stress of the second line of each pair must alliterate with either, or both, of the stresses in the first line of the pair. The second stress of the second line must not alliterate with the first stress of the second line but may optionally alliterate with one of the stresses in the first line. Unstressed syllables are not counted for alliteration purposes, and the number of them in each line is usually two to four but can be more or less than that. All vowels are considered to alliterate with each other. Inspired by Old Norse and Old English practice, I treat the consonant clusters sk, sp, st, and sh as only alliterating with themselves, not with each other or with s by itself. Here is an example of two lines of fornyrðislag from my poem “Heathen Pride”:
We are hearty heathens,
happy and proud.
You can see that the h-sounds of hearty, heathens, and happy all alliterate in accord with the rules just described, as it is the first syllable of each of these words that carries the stress. The p-sound of proud, which is the last stressed syllable of these lines, does not alliterate. (Pronouns such as we, and forms of the verb to be don’t usually bear stress in this sort of poetry, but there are exceptions.) Add another three pairs of lines such as these to get a full stanza.
Runhent. This is a fornyrðislag variant in which the final syllables of a pair of lines are stressed and fully rhyme. Its name means something like “run-rhymed.” Historically, its most significant occurrence was in Egill Skallagrímsson’s poem “Head Ransom.” Here is an example of two lines of runhent from my poem “Yggdrasilsdrápa”:
With worlds all nine,
that Wood does shine.
That poem is the only one of this collection to use runhent systematically, and it does so in the refrain stanzas.
Anglo-Saxon. This is quite similar to fornyrðislag, but with mainly stylistic changes. The half-lines are strictly four syllables minimum, never less. The main difference from fornyrðislag is that it is not broken into stanzas — it runs continuously one line after the other. Also, whereas the two lines in a fornyrðislag pair are printed separately, they are here printed together to make a single line (sometimes called a long line) in this format. As an example, if the above lines from “Heathen Pride” were printed in this form, they would look like this:
We are hearty heathens, happy and proud.
This is how Tolkien’s verse in The Fall of Arthur is rendered, except that the caesura between half-lines is shown by extra space between them. I, however, think the poems look better without it, and the clever reader would be able to figure out where those breaks occurred based on the stress and alliteration. In this book, the form is used only for the prayers in chapter 10 and one of the poems in chapter 12. Historically, the Anglo-Saxons did not develop a plethora of verse forms the way that Old Norse poetry did, and generally used this form for their poetry, running one long line after another without stanza breaks for as long as needed in a particular poem. Beowulf and the Old English Rune Poem are excellent examples of the form in addition to being poems that modern heathens should know. The historical Anglo-Saxon meter tended to have more syllables per line than the historical fornyrðislag, but this was mainly due to the differences in the languages. As my modern fornyrðislag and Anglo-Saxon are both written in modern English, they don’t have this difference in average syllable count.
Ljóðahátt. This is another fairly simple meter (though slightly more complex than fornyrðislag), and it is easily recognized in this book by the six-line stanzas of the poems that use it. Its name means “song-meter.” It is quite common in this book. This meter is also used by many of the poems in the Poetic Edda (such as Hávamál and Vafþrúðnismál). The basic unit is a half-stanza of three lines. The first two lines are as in fornyrðislag, although the first line can be as short as two or three syllables total. The third line of each half-stanza is called a full line, and usually has three stresses, any two of which will alliterate. The structure of the half-stanza is repeated to make a full stanza of six lines. Here is an example of three lines (a half-stanza) of ljóðahátt from a hail to Óðinn:
Hail to Óðinn,
highest of Aesir,
for giving self to self.
You can see that the first two lines are like in fornyrðislag. The h-sound of hail alliterates with the h-sound of highest. Also, there is secondary alliteration, where the vowel-sound of Óðinn alliterates with the vowel-sound of Aesir. (I tend to use such secondary alliteration far more frequently than the ancient poets did, in both fornyrðislag and ljóðahátt.) In the third line, the stresses are on the g-sound of giving and the s-sound of both instances of self, and thus the alliteration is on the two s-sounds. Add another three lines such as these, and you get a full stanza.
Galdralag. This is an important variant of ljóðahátt that I occasionally use, especially in sumbel toasts. Its name means “meter of magic.” This occurs whenever one or more additional full lines follow the usual single full line in a half-stanza of ljóðahátt. (Examples of galdralag occur most frequently in Hávamál but are found in other poems of the Poetic Edda as well.) Often (but not always), this additional full line will repeat the preceding full line but with a slight variation of some sort. Here’s an example of an extra line added to the Óðinn hail to make galdralag:
Hail to Óðinn,
highest of Aesir,
for giving self to self,
for giving Mead to Man.
You can see that the fourth line is a clone of the third, with only two words changed. The rules for alliteration in a full line still apply. It’s not always necessary for the lines to look so similar. I could have done this instead:
Hail to Óðinn,
highest of Aesir;
by giving self to self,
he won and wrote the Runes.
It’s still galdralag that way, even though it lacks the repetitive character. [For more on the historical uses of this meter, I refer the reader to my scholarly article, “The Goals of Galdralag: Identifying the Historical Instances and uses of the Metre” in the Viking Society’s Saga-Book 40 (2016), pages 69–90.]
Dróttkvætt. If you have ever heard that one of the meters of Viking poetry was fiendishly difficult, this is the meter you heard about. Its name means “court-meter.” Like fornyrðislag, it is written in pairs of lines, eight lines total to a stanza. Unlike fornyrðislag, each line has exactly six syllables and usually three main stresses. Two stressed syllables in the first line will alliterate with the first stressed syllable of the second line. (Secondary alliteration is possible but seldom used since meeting the rhyme requirements must come before it.) The first line features a slant rhyme between the last syllable and one of the preceding syllables. (A slant rhyme is one where the consonant sounds match but the vowel sounds differ, such as in code and made.) The second line features a full rhyme between the last syllable and one of the preceding syllables. (This is the kind of rhyme that everyone is familiar with, such as in might and sight.) Here is an example from my poem “A Tale of Wisdom’s Well”:
With mead I rightly made
from might of lore tonight.
The alliteration is on the m-sound, the slant rhyme is mead/made, and the full rhyme is might/tonight. Just like in fornyrðislag, add another three pairs of lines such as these to get a full stanza. “A Tale of Wisdom’s Well” is the only poem in this book to use dróttkvætt. (My modern dróttkvætt differs a bit from the older style in the placement of alliteration and rhymes in order to accommodate language differences.)
Now for some final notes on the meters. In all the examples here, the stress was on the first syllable of multi-syllable words such as hearty, heathens, happy, giving, highest, etc. This isn’t always the case. Most prefixes in modern English aren’t stressed. Thus, in words like become, provide, and away, the stress is on the second syllable, not the first. (Thus, it is on c, v, and w instead of b, p, and a, respectively.) Not sure where the stress is supposed to fall on a word? Consult a dictionary — I do so frequently. Also, to make sure there is no confusion, it is the sound that matters, not the spelling, for the purposes of alliteration. Although spelled differently, kick and come alliterate because they start with the same sound; cent and come do not alliterate — their initial sounds are different although they start with the same letter. Regarding stanza length, the old poetry wasn’t always as consistent as described above. Longer and shorter stanzas occurred. I am consistent with stanza lengths, with the exception of my short calls, ritual dramas, and sumbel toasts — in these cases, it is usually more appropriate to break the poetry between calls, speakers, and toasts instead.
Some words may be said about the history of these meters. Ultimately, they would all go back to a form of long line verse common to the Germanic peoples (roughly around the beginning of the Common Era but perhaps earlier as well) that was probably not broken into stanzas — something more or less like the Anglo-Saxon form described above, except that the language would have been at the stage of Proto-Germanic or Common Germanic, languages that had more syllables per word on average than the descendant Old English and Old Norse languages — and so its long line, however exactly it worked, would have had a higher syllable count. In what became Old Norse culture, that Proto-Germanic long line developed into fornyrðislag. From there, by various changes, including the addition of rhymes, the other forms — ljóðahátt, galdralag, runhent, dróttkvætt, and more — arose, but exactly how and why this happened is still a matter debated by scholars.