Málaháttr (
Old Norse
Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and t ...
: ) is a
poetic metre
In poetry, metre ( Commonwealth spelling) or meter (American spelling; see spelling differences) is the basic rhythmic structure of a verse or lines in verse. Many traditional verse forms prescribe a specific verse metre, or a certain set o ...
in
Old Norse poetry
Old Norse poetry encompasses a range of verse forms written in Old Norse, during the period from the 8th century (see Eggjum stone) to as late as the far end of the 13th century. Most of the Old Norse poetry that survives was preserved in Iceland ...
, which is usually described as "conversational style." It is similar to
fornyrðislag
In prosody, alliterative verse is a form of verse that uses alliteration as the principal ornamental device to help indicate the underlying metrical structure, as opposed to other devices such as rhyme. The most commonly studied traditions of ...
except that there are more
syllable
A syllable is a unit of organization for a sequence of speech sounds typically made up of a syllable nucleus (most often a vowel) with optional initial and final margins (typically, consonants). Syllables are often considered the phonological "bu ...
s in a line; usually five.
Poems with verses in this metre:
*
Atlamál
''Atlamál in grǿnlenzku'' (''The Greenlandic Lay of List of names of Thor, Atli'') is one of the heroic poems of the ''Poetic Edda''. It relates the same basic story as ''Atlakviða'' at greater length and in a different style. The poem is beli ...
(the only eddic poem composed entirely in Málaháttr)
*
Atlakviða
''Atlakviða'' (''The Lay of Atli'') is one of the heroic poems of the ''Poetic Edda''. One of the main characters is Atli who originates from Attila the Hun. It is one of the most archaic Eddic poems, possibly dating to as early as the 9th centu ...
(partly)
*
Hárbarðsljóð
''Hárbarðsljóð'' (Old Norse: 'The Lay of Hárbarðr') is one of the poems of the ''Poetic Edda'', found in the Codex Regius and AM 748 I 4to manuscripts. It is a flyting poem with figures from Norse Paganism. ''Hárbarðsljóð'' was first writ ...
(partly)
*
Hávamál
''Hávamál'' ( ; Old Norse: ,Unnormalised spelling in the :Title: Final stanza: ../ref> classical pron. , Modern Icelandic pron. , ‘Words of he High One€™) is presented as a single poem in the Icelandic , a collection of Old Norse poems fr ...
(partly)
*
Hrafnsmál
''Hrafnsmál'' (Old Norse: ; "raven song") is a fragmentary skaldic poem generally accepted as being written by the 9th-century Norwegian skald Þorbjörn Hornklofi. ''Hrafnsmál'' largely consists of a conversation between an unnamed valkyrie an ...
References
Carmina Scaldica
Old Norse poetry
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