Alfaleith.org - The Prose Edda

“One is called Bragi: he is renowned for wisdom, and most of all for fluency of speech and skill with words. He knows most of skaldship, and after him skaldship is called bragr,¹ and from his name that one is called bragrman or -woman, who possesses eloquence surpassing others, of women or of men. His wife is Idunn: she guards in her chest of ash those apples which the gods must taste whensoever they grow old; and then they all become young, and so it shall be even unto the Weird of the Gods.” Then said Gangleri: “A very great thing, methinks, the gods entrust to the watchfulness and good faith of Idunn.” Then said Hárr, laughing loudly: “'T was near being desperate once; I may be able to tell thee of it, but now thou shalt first hear more of the names of the Æsir. [40]

1. Bragr, as a noun, means “poetry ;“ as an adjective, it seems to mean “foremost” (Cl.-Vig.). Thus the phrase bragr karla seems to be “foremost of men,” with apparent reference to poetic preëminence.

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