Step 5 of 12 · Quarrels, Feuds and Making Peace
Friendship that burns out, and half a loaf
Why this step
Stanzas 51 and 52 describe a friendship that spoils: among bad friends love burns fiercer than fire for five days, and on the sixth it goes out. The second stanza turns to small things. With half a loaf and a tilted bowl, the speaker says, he made himself many a friend. The entry reads it as ordinary kindness doing more than grand gestures.
The text, stanzas 51–52
51.
Fiercer than fire among ill friends
for five days love will burn;
but anon 'tis quenched, when the sixth day comes,
and all friendship soon is spoiled.
52.
Not great things alone must one give to another,
praise oft is earned for nought;
with half a loaf and a tilted bowl
I have found me many a friend.
- Olive Bray (editor and translator), The Elder or Poetic Edda, Commonly Known as Sæmund’s Edda, part I: The Mythological Poems (opens in a new tab) (1908), stanzas 51–52 (Bray’s numbering) Rights: Public domain. Published in 1908, so in the public domain in the United States. Text as edited online by D. L. Ashliman, Folklore and Mythology Electronic Texts, University of Pittsburgh.
From the Lorebook
Among false friends, affection burns fast and dies on the sixth day. Real friends are often made with small things: half a loaf and a tilted bowl.
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