fornyrðislag

noun

An Old Norse alliterative verse form used largely in the Poetic Edda, consisting of two lifts per half-line.

OriginOld Norse fornyrðislag →
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Meanings

nounfornyrðislag (uncountable)
  1. uncountableAn Old Norse alliterative verse form used largely in the Poetic Edda, consisting of two lifts per half-line.

    In return, I hope to send you, if I can lay my hands on it (I hope it isn't lost), a thing I did many years ago while trying to learn the art of writing alliterative poetry: an attempt to unify the lays about the Völsungs from the Elder Edda, written in the old eight-line fornyrðislag stanza.

    1967, The Letters of J. R. R. Tolkien, Letter 295

Origin

  1. Old Norsefornyrðislag
  2. Englishfornyrðislag

Learned borrowing from Old Norse fornyrðislag.

More words from Old Norse

Full word history & related roots →
Cite this entry
APA

fornyrðislag. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/fornyr%C3%B0islag

MLA

“fornyrðislag.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/fornyr%C3%B0islag. Accessed November 5, 2026.

Chicago

WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “fornyrðislag,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/fornyr%C3%B0islag.

Source: fornyrðislag on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.