(59) [The Gold Horns: 1913]
The Gold Horns / Translated by / George Borrow / from the Danish of / Adam Gottlob Oehlenschläger / Edited / with an Introduction by / Edmund Gosse, C.B. / London: / Printed for Private Circulation / 1913.
Collation:—Square demy octavo, pp. 25; consisting of: Half-title (with blank reverse) pp. 1–2; Title-page, as above (with a note regarding the American copyright upon the centre of the reverse) pp. 3–4; Introduction pp. 5–9; and Text of The Gold Horns, the Danish and English texts facing each other upon opposite pages, pp. 10–25. The reverse of p. 25 is blank. There are head-lines throughout,
each recto being headed The Gold Horns, and each verso Guldhornene. The book is completed by a leaf, with blank reverse, and with the following imprint upon its recto: “London: / Printed for Thomas J. Wise, Hampstead, N.W. / Edition limited to Thirty Copies.” The signatures are A (a half-sheet of four leaves), B (a quarter-sheet of two leaves), and C (a full sheet of eight leaves), each inset within the other.
Issued in bright green paper wrappers, with untrimmed edges, and with the title-page reproduced upon the front. The leaves measure 8½ × 6⅞ inches.
Thirty Copies only were printed.
Although the poem was not printed until 1913, it is quite evident that the translation was made by Borrow in or about the year 1826. The paper upon which the Manuscript is written is watermarked with the date 1824, whilst the handwriting coincides with that of several of the pieces included in the Romantic Ballads of 1826. “There can be little doubt,” writes Mr. Gosse, “that Borrow intended The Gold Horns for that volume, and rejected it at last. He was conscious, perhaps, that his hand had lacked the skill needful to reproduce a lyric the melody of which would have taxed the powers of Coleridge or of Shelley.”
“The Gold Horns marks one of the most important stages in the history of Scandinavian literature. It is the earliest, and the freshest, specimen of the Romantic Revival in its definite form. In this way, it takes in Danish poetry a place analogous to that taken by The Ancient Mariner in English poetry. . . .
“Oehlenschläger has explained what it was that suggested to him the leading idea of his poem. Two antique horns of gold, discovered some time before in the bogs of Slesvig, had been recently stolen from the national collection at Rosenberg, and the thieves had melted down the inestimable treasures. Oehlenschläger treats these horns as the reward for genuine antiquarian enthusiasm, shown in a sincere and tender passion for the ancient relics of Scandinavian history. From a generation unworthy to appreciate them, the Horns had been withdrawn, to be mysteriously restored at the due romantic hour.”—[From the Introduction by Edmund Gosse.]
There is a copy of The Gold Horns in the Library of the British Museum. The Press-mark is C. 57. d. 19.