Bern Riddle 38: De glacie
NEVILLEMOGFORD
Date: Sat 28 Nov 2020Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Bern Riddle 38: De glacie
Original text:
Corpore formata pleno de parvulo patre,
Nec a matre feror, nisi feratur et ipsa.
Nasci vetor ego, si non genuero patrem,
Et creta rursus ego concipio matrem.
Hieme conceptos pendens meos servo parentes,
Et aestivo rursus ignibus trado coquendos.
Translation:
Created with full body by a lowly father,
I am not born of woman unless she herself is born.
I am not allowed to be born unless I give birth to my father,
and once born, I conceive my growing mother again.
Hanging in winter, I look after my conceived parents,
and when summer returns, I hand them over to be cooked on fires.
Ice
Notes:
This edition is based on Karl Strecker, ed., Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, Vol. 4.2 (Berlin, MGH/Weidmann, 1923), page 750.
A list of variant readings can be found in Fr. Glorie, ed., Variae collectiones aenigmatum Merovingicae aetatis, Corpus Christianorum, Series Latina 133A (Turnhout: Brepols, 1968), page 584.
Tags: latin Bern Riddles