"The Fatal Sisters"

• Archive Work ID: poems.fsio
• Uniform Title: "The Fatal Sisters" [e-text]
• First Line: Now the storm begins to lower,
• Language: English
• First Published: 1768
• References: Starr/Hendrickson (eds.), Complete Poems (1966), 27-31; Lonsdale (ed.), Poems (1969), 210-220
• Summary: Written at London not later than the beginning of May 1761, based largely on a Latin translation of the original poem preserved in the late 13th-century Njáls Saga, ch. 157. This untitled Old Norse poem is a prophetic account of the Battle of Clontarf, fought on Good Friday 1014. First published in Poems (1768).

8 Manuscripts:

• • Archive MS ID: mss.0063 (Source: EAD/XML)
  • Title: [untitled]
  • Date: [1761]
  • Physical Description: 3 pages, 203 mm x 159 mm; autograph fair copy, revised
  • Language: English
  • Location: MA 3390, Literary and Historical Manuscripts (LHMS), Morgan Library & Museum, New York, NY, USA <http://www.themorgan.org/collection>
  • Alternate Form: Facsimile and description in Verlyn Klinkenborg et al., British Literary Manuscripts, Series I. From 800 to 1800 (New York, 1981), no. 99
  • References: Smith (ed.), Index (1989), item GrT 49, 83-84; Munby (ed.), Sale Catalogues (1971), Evans sale (27-29 November 1845), lot 604, 9
  • Contents: Autograph fair copy, revised, here untitled but referred to in the preface as a "magic song", beginning "Now the storm begins to lour", with the preface and a prose epilogue beginning "Having finish'd their incantation they tore the web they had woven into twelve pieces...", endorsed in another hand on verso. Bound into a copy of Poems (1768), following p. 71.
  
  
• • Archive MS ID: mss.0064 (Source: EAD/XML)
  • Title: "Ode (from the Norse-tongue) in the Orcades of Thormodus Torfaeus. Hafniae. 1697. Fol: & also in Bartholinus"
  • Date: [1?] February 1768
  • Physical Description: 3 pages, 324 mm x 200 mm; autograph fair copy
  • Language: English
  • Location: Add. MS 38511, ff. 4v-5v, Manuscripts Collection, British Library, London, UK <http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/bldept/manuscr/>
  • References: Smith (ed.), Index (1989), item GrT 50, 84; Sutton (ed.), Location Register (1995), 414; Nelson (ed.), Union First Line Index. Mar. 2010. Folger Shakespeare Library. 19 March 2010. <http://firstlines.folger.edu/detail.php?id=136436>
  • Contents: Autograph fair copy, numbered 7. and here entitled "Ode (from the Norse-tongue) in the Orcades of Thormodus Torfaeus. Hafniae. 1697. Fol: & also in Bartholinus", followed by the first line of the original poem "Vitt er orpit fyrir valfalli &c:", including "Advertisement", "Preface", and explanatory notes, used for printer's copy for Poems (1768), in MS instructions to Dodsley, sent in a letter, [1?] February 1768.
  
  
• • Archive MS ID: mss.0065 (Source: EAD/XML)
  • Title: [untitled]
  • Date: 1 February 1768
  • Physical Description: [3?] pages, 324 mm x 200 mm; autograph fair copy
  • Language: English
  • Location: Modern (Bound) Manuscripts, Vol. 52, Robert H. Taylor Collection of English and American Literature, Princeton University Library, Princeton, NJ, USA <http://rbsc.princeton.edu/>
  • Alternate Form: Facsimile, showing the last seven lines and the note, on page six of the MS Instructions, the upper three-fourths of which are reproduced, in Smith (ed.), Index (1989), no. 5, following p. xvii, where it is described
  • References: Smith (ed.), Index (1989), item GrT 51, 84; Heist, Michael, "RE: Modern (Bound) Manuscripts, vol.52, Robert H. Taylor Collection". E-mail to the editor, 11 January 2007
  • Contents: Autograph fair copy, untitled but numbered 7. and identified from the table of contents as "7. The Fatal Sisters (from the Norse-tongue)", and headed "From the Orcades of Thormodus Torfaeus. Hafniae. 1697. Fol: Vitt er orpit Fyrir valfalli &c:", preceded by a "Prefix", followed by a note on the Valkyriur, and, elsewhere in the MS (p. 9) an advertisement and two notes, in MS Instructions to Beattie for the 1768 Glasgow edition, originally sent in a letter, 1 February 1768.
  • Separated Material: The letter in which these instructions were originally sent is now at Historic Collections, King's College, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, UK.
  
  
• • Archive MS ID: mss.0066 (Source: EAD/XML)
  • Title: "The Song of the Valkyries"
  • Date: 1761
  • Physical Description: 2 pages; autograph fair copy, revised
  • Language: English
  • Location: Commonplace Book, Vol. III, 1067-1068, College Library, Pembroke College, Cambridge, Cambridge, UK <http://www.pem.cam.ac.uk/>
  • Alternate Form: Microfilm copy available in Poetic Commonplace Books and Manuscripts of Thomas Gray, 1716-1771, from Pembroke College, Cambridge (1999), reel one
  • References: Smith (ed.), Index (1989), item GrT 52, 84; Poetic C. B., Pembroke College (1999), 30; Martin, Chronologie (1931), 147
  • Contents: Autograph fair copy, revised, under the heading "Carmina", here entitled "The Song of the Valkyries" and headed "(see above P: Art: Gothi)", in Gray's Commonplace Book, vol. III, 1067-1068.
  
  
• • Archive MS ID: mss.0067 (Source: EAD/XML)
  • Title: [untitled]
  • Date: [1761?]
  • Physical Description: 1 page; autograph draft, partial [preface only]
  • Language: English
  • Location: Commonplace Book, Vol. III, 1041, College Library, Pembroke College, Cambridge, Cambridge, UK <http://www.pem.cam.ac.uk/>
  • Alternate Form: Microfilm copy available in Poetic Commonplace Books and Manuscripts of Thomas Gray, 1716-1771, from Pembroke College, Cambridge (1999), reel one
  • References: Smith (ed.), Index (1989), item GrT 53, 84; Poetic C. B., Pembroke College (1999), 30; Martin, Chronologie (1931), 147
  • Contents: Autograph draft of the "Preface", here untitled but under the heading "Gothi", beginning "About the year 1029 Sigurd, Earl of the Orkney-Islands...", in Gray's Commonplace Book, vol. III, 1041.
  
  
• • Archive MS ID: mss.0068 (Source: EAD/XML)
  • Title: [untitled]
  • Date: [1761?]
  • Physical Description: 1 page; autograph draft, partial [note only]
  • Language: English
  • Location: Commonplace Book, Vol. III, 1044, College Library, Pembroke College, Cambridge, Cambridge, UK <http://www.pem.cam.ac.uk/>
  • Alternate Form: Microfilm copy available in Poetic Commonplace Books and Manuscripts of Thomas Gray, 1716-1771, from Pembroke College, Cambridge (1999), reel one
  • References: Smith (ed.), Index (1989), item GrT 54, 84; Poetic C. B., Pembroke College (1999), 30; Starr/Hendrickson (eds.), Complete Poems (1966), 28n; Lonsdale (ed.), Poems (1969), 216
  • Contents: Autograph draft of the note on the Valkyries under the heading "Gothi" in Gray's Commonplace Book, vol. III, 1044.
  
  
• • Archive MS ID: mss.0069 (Source: EAD/XML)
  • Title: "The Song of the weird Sisters Translated from the Norwegian written about 1029."
  • Date: [1761?]
  • Physical Description: 3 pages, 229 mm x 186 mm; transcript in the hand of Thomas Wharton
  • Language: English
  • Location: MS Egerton 2400 (Wharton MS), ff. 228-229r, Manuscripts Collection, British Library, London, UK <http://www.bl.uk/reshelp/bldept/manuscr/>
  • References: Smith (ed.), Index (1989), item GrT 55, 84
  • Contents: Transcript in the hand of Thomas Wharton, here entitled, "The Song of the weird Sisters Translated from the Norwegian written about 1029."
  
  
• • Archive MS ID: mss.0223 (Source: EAD/XML)
  • Title: "The Fatal Sisters, an Ode. (From the Norse-tongue.) in the Orcades of Thormodus Torfaeus; Hafniae, 1697, Folio and also in Bartholinus"
  • Date: 1780[?]
  • Physical Description: 8 pages, 180 mm x 110 mm; transcript in an unidentified neat and legible hand on Whatman paper
  • Language: English
  • Location: MS Add. 439, "Poems" section, 75-82, The Archives, York Minster Library & Archives, York, UK <https://yorkminster.org/treasures-and-collections.html>
  • Contents: Transcript in an unidentified neat and legible hand, entitled "The Fatal Sisters, an Ode" (p. 75) ("Ode. VIII." [p. 77]), followed by the first line of the original poem. The poem, the preface of which is here entitled "Argument" and to which Gray's note on the Valkyriur has been appended, is part of a section called "Poems", which is separately paginated and has its own table of contents (p. 129), in a volume entitled Gray's Poems. The book carries the bookplate of Gray's friend and biographer William Mason.