Hi Sarah!
And thank you for your replies.
I cannot help myself but take up a few of your points !
Actually, the text is _full_ of small problems,
problems that don't affect the over all meaning of
the text, but are nevertheless vital if you want to
be able to say that you understand the text.

I pick out a few points that don't seem entirely
clear to me. That means that I may be mistaken
that there is a problem, but nevertheless, taking
a closer look is always a god excercise.

> ok vildu þeir láta drepa manninn.
> and now they wanted to kill the man.
> I think we need to get the sense of "láta" into the English here.
> E.g. and they wanted to have the man killed.

láta ought to be the same as English "to let", literally
"they wanted to let kill the man", which is not good English.
Somehow English wants to say it like
"they wanted to let the man *be* killed".

German syntax "Und wollten sie den Mann töten lassen",
is more like Old Norse, except that German puts the
verbs at the end of the sentence. Danish is also
close to ON "og vilde de lade dræbe manden".
But I think it is better Danish to say:
"og vilde de lade manden dræbes", i.e. they use
the passive 'dræbes'.

> "Því var næsta",
> "very close"
> This is a phrase or expression in ON and is translated in English

as "very nearly so" or "almost".

> For what it's worth, the grammar is
> næsta - nearly (adverb)
> því - (to) that (demonstrative pronoun in the dative)

I believe því also has some other meanings, beside
the pronoun. I recall reading about this once, and
the conclusion was that the Danish "thi" is the same
word. {An example from H.C. Andersen is: "Der var engang
fem og tyve Tinsoldater, de vare alle Brødre, thi de vare
fødte af en gammel Tinskee", from "The Tin Soldier"}

But here in this example, "Því var næsta", I just don't
know. Why a dative? If the pronoun was subject
(i.e. "it was almost"), then the logic demands a nominative.

The dictionary remarks that því is sometimes used as a
reinforcer for comparatives. Also, about things temporal
it says that því næst means "right after". A kind of
explanation might be to read it in "pseudo-English"
as "next after that"; then the dative would presumably
derive from a suppressed preposition "after".

Our phrase "Því var næsta" might then be read as
"[it] was next to that" (where "next" stands for "close").

> Kómusk þá fyrir Hrólf konung oll sannindi hér um. Hrólfr konungr

sagði þat skyldu fjarri, at drepa skyldi manninn

> They told the king how this had happened. When whole the truth had

been revealed to the king he told them not to kill the man.

> Again, you've conveyed the meaning but the English words do not

stick very close to the original. More literally, it would be...

>
> Then all the truth about this came out before King Hrolf. King

Hrolf said that by no means should they kill the man.

Here I thought I saw a problem in what the subject of
the verb 'koma' is. It has to be a plural, and it
could be the people, as a plural group, who come
to talk about it with the king. Fyrir should take
accusative for the situation of a meeting, and this
agrees with the accusative Hrolf. But the plural could
also be sannendi. What does the adjective öll have to
say about this? It can be plural neutrum nom/acc,
but also singular feminine nom. The solution might
be that "truth" (sannendi) is the plural that comes
before the king. (which agrees with the translations)

With best regards
Xigung

P.S. Keep your posts coming !