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Roland og Magnus kongen


Roland og Magnus kongen literally "Roland and King Magnus," also known under the English title "Roland at the Battle of Roncevaux" is a Norwegian ballad about the legendary hero Roland of Charlemagne's court. The ballad is cataloged NMB 171 (Ådel Blom () ed., Norske mellomalderballadar), and categorized TSB type E 29. In the ballad, Roland's sword (known in Old French as Durendal) is compared to a sickle, its name corrupted to Dvælje=Dvolg (Dvelgedvolg, Dvergedolg, Dvelgedolgen), explained as meaning "dwarf-fiend" or "enemy of the dwarfs"Storm was of the opinion that the ballad could not be younger than the end of the 15th century, and Halvorsen also said it "must have been handed down orally since the late Middle Ages".

A near-analogue is the Faroese ballad Runsivals stríð, one of the five shorter ballads or comprising the Karlamagnusar kvæði (CCF 106). Both the Norwegian and the longer Faroese piece draw their material from the saga, i.e., Af Rúnzivals bardaga, the eight branch of Karlamagnús saga. However, due to discrepancies in content, the Faroese ballad is assigned a different type index (TSB E 28).

A traditional melody for this ballad originating in Norway had been collected by Hans Seeberg and Olea Crøger in the 1840s from a singer in Seljord in the Telemark region, but it is seldom used; the Norwegians mostly sing the ballad to a Faroese dance melody which was introduced in 1934 by Klara Semb. This includes a Faroese refrain or "burden" (Faroese: omkvæð, niðurlag) translated into Norwegian by Hulda Garborg. For further details on the melody, see §Melodies below.

The following digest follows Groven's text (version 1, 27 stanzas), a field-collected original, and Landstad's composite (31 stanzas) which uses it as base with additional interpolations. Knut Liestøl () and Moe printed a longer reconstructed version with useful annotations (also see §Versions).


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