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The Assembly of The Elder Troth would like to welcome you to our website. Please click on the links to the left to enter the relevant area of our site. Heil and welcome to the Articles section of the Assembly of The Elder Troth website. Here you can find items written by many wide and varied folk. The idea is to provide a venue for discussion, debate and education amongst the folk by giving people an individual flavour to the information provided. Every article here is the work of its' author. The Assembly of The Elder Troth DOES NOT endorse the words or anything that is found herein as being official Assembly of The Elder Troth policy, it is purely the work of the author as provided in each case, and Copyright rests with the Author, reproduction is prohibited without the authors permission. Literal Mythic Geography - by William Reaves I was recently taken aback, when someone on a list made the argument that the ancients did not take the geographical references in the lore literally. In the course of the discussion, it became aparent that others agreed with this position, and assumed that the ancients took the mythic geographical references in the lore symbolically. However, in my studies, I have come to ralize that that they most likely understood them quite literaly, and actually believed that if you traveled far enough you would actually enter into the realms described in our mythology. I say this with the full realization that modern science and our knowledge of world geography doesn't allow us to hold the same view. We know that the land of the giants is not an actual place, and that Asgard cannot be reached by crossing over the rainbow, but just the same, I do not believe that this entitles us to assume that the ancient people believed the same as we do. To them, the mythic lands described in the lore must have been regarded as actual places that could be reached by horse, by foot, and by ship. A very strong indication that the Germanic tribes thought of mythic geography in literal terms is contained in one of the earliest sources that describes the Germanic people and their beliefs in any detail: the comprehensive account of the Germanic people in the Roman historian Tacitus' Germania. The following excerpts are from an 18th century translation of that text by Thomas Gordon, who died in 1750. I hate to use such an old translation, but it is immediately available on the web from the Medieval Sourcebook, and illustrates the point. I encourage interested readers to follow the same passages in a more modern translation of Germania, such as the translation by Harold Mattingly widely available as a Penquin Classic. . Near the end of his Germania, Tacitus describes the remotest Germanic tribes. These include tribes later identified with the Scandinavian people. The passages preceded by numbers are excerpts from Germania. 38. I must now proceed to speak of the Suevians, who are not, like the Cattans and Tencterians, comprehended in a single people; but divided into several nations all bearing distinct names, though in general they are entitled Suevians, and occupy the larger share of Germany. To demonstrate that this is a purely historic account, , we recognize the proto-types of the Viking ships known as knorr employed as early as 100 AD: 44. .Next occur the communities of the Suiones, situated in the ocean itself; and besides their strength in men and arms, very powerful at sea. The form of their vessels varies thus far from ours, that they have prows at each end, so as to be always ready to row to shore without turning nor are they moved by sails, nor on their sides have benches of oars placed, but the rowers ply here and there in all parts of the ship alike, as in some rivers is done, and change their oars from place to place, just as they shift their course hither or thither. To wealth also, amongst them, great veneration is paid, and thence a single ruler governs them, without all restriction of power, and exacting unlimited obedience. Neither here, as amongst other nations of Germany, are arms used indifferently by all, but shut up and warded under the care of a particular keeper, who in truth too is always a slave: since from all sudden invasions and attacks from their foes, the ocean protects them: besides that armed bands, when they are not employed, grow easily debauched and tumultuous. The truth is, it suits not the interest of an arbitrary Prince, to trust the care and power of arms either with a nobleman or with a freeman, or indeed with any man above the condition of a slave. In the passage above, we have a clear description of the Scandinavian kingdom in the north, already powerful and well-organized. Archeology bears out Tacitus' description. Now begin allusions to purely mythic phenomena, regarded as actual geographical features the author (who is also pagan): 45. Beyond the Suiones is another sea, one very heavy and almost void of agitation; and by it the whole globe is thought to be bounded and environed, for that the reflection of the sun, after his setting, continues till his rising, so bright as to darken the stars. To this, popular opinion has added, that the tumult also of his emerging from the sea is heard, that forms divine are then seen, as likewise the rays about his head. Only thus far extend the limits of nature, if what fame says be true. Here "nature" ends and beyond this place the supernatural begins. As Tacitus describes it, beyond the realm of the Suiones (Swedes) is a "heavy", stagnant sea, an apt description of the sluggish Arctic waters heavy with ice, and partially frozen over. This sea is believed to be the same sea that encircles the earth. In other words, this is the sea which circles the whole world, the sea where Jormungand lies. Since the words for bitter cold and venom (eitr) are identical, one can logically conclude that this is the very place Jormungand's head can be found, biting its tail. The Midgard serpent's venom is strongest here, near its mouth, making the waters poisonously cold. Logically, this is the same sea in which Thor and Hymir, according to sources written down 1000 years later, fish for the Midgard serpent. Tacitus clearly describes this as an actual place. Here the sun hovers around the horizon, night and day (a real phenomena seen in extreme northern latitudes which we know as "the midnight sun"). "Popular opinion" says the divine figure of the sun can be seen here, including "the rays about his head". A more modern translation of this passage by Harold Mattingly is much clearer, it reads: "Popular belief adds that you can hear the sound he [the sun] makes as he rises from the waves and you can see the shape of his horses and the rays of his head. So far and no further does the world extend." In other words, when one travels far enough north into the heavy, stagnant sea one is close to the edge of the world that the chariot of the sun and its horses can be seen. The comparisons with later sources aside, in Tacitus' account, actual geography clearly meets mythic geography. But how consistent is this geographical description with later sources of the same region? More than 900 years later, Saxo tells a similar story. In Book 8 of his history, the adventurer Thorkill sails due north to the land of the giants. The description is remarkably consistent with that of Tacitus:
"And being desirous to go and see all things foreign and extraordinary, he thought that he must above all test a report which he had heard from the men of Thule concerning the abode of a certain Geirrod. For they boasted past belief of the mighty piles of treasure in that country, but said that the way was beset with peril, and hardly passable by mortal man. For those who had tried it declared that it was needful to sail over the ocean that goes round the lands, to leave the sun and stars behind, to journey down into chaos, and at last to pass into a land where no light was and where darkness reigned eternally." Saxo describes how a human sailor, Thorkill, and a few hundred men sail "over the ocean that goes round the lands" and "leave the sun" in their quest to find the giant Geirrod. That this is the same giant that Thor encounters in the Younger Edda is made clear by the description of the giant Saxo provides:
"Then they found the rocky dwelling which Geirrod was rumoured to inhabit for his palace. They resolved to visit its narrow and horrible ledge, but stayed their steps and halted in panic at the very entrance." ".Going on through the breach in the crag, they beheld an old man with his body pierced through, sitting not far off, on a lofty seat facing the side of the rock that had been rent away. Moreover, three women, whose bodies were covered with tumours, and who seemed to have lost the strength of their back-bones, filled adjoining seats. Thorkill's companions were very curious; and he, who well knew the reason of the matter, told them that long ago the god Thor had been provoked by the insolence of the giants to drive red-hot irons through the vitals of Geirrod, who strove with him, and that the iron had slid further, torn up the mountain, and battered through its side; while the women had been stricken by the might of his thunderbolts, and had been punished (so he declared) for their attempt on the same deity, by having their bodies broken." The passages from Saxo are written in Denmark about 80 years before Snorri Sturlusson composed his Edda in Iceland. They tell almost identical tales, and, in turn, Saxo's account of the mythic geography is nearly identical to that of Tacitus' Germania, written 900 years earlier! Talk about consistency! Now, returning to Tacitus, again we find another verifiable historic description of northern tribes, followed by a description of mythic geography. Tacitus makes no distinction between the two, demonstrating that the Germanic tribesman who informed the Romans of this, made no distinction between actual and mythic geography. In Germania, Tacitus writes: 44 (con't): Upon the right of the Suevian Sea the Aestyan nations reside, who use the same customs and attire with the Suevians; their language more resembles that of Britain. They worship the Mother of the Gods. As the characteristic of their national superstition, they wear the images of wild boars. This alone serves them for arms, this is the safeguard of all, and by this every worshipper of the Goddess is secured even amidst his foes. Rare amongst them is the use of weapons of iron, but frequent that of clubs. In producing of grain and the other fruits of the earth, they labour with more assiduity and patience than is suitable to the usual laziness of Germans. Nay, they even search the deep, and of all the rest are the only people who gather amber. They call it glasing, and find it amongst the shallows and upon the very shore. From here, he passes to the nation of the Finns (Fennians) in the furthest North: "In wonderful savageness live the nation of the Fennians, and in beastly poverty, destitute of arms, of horses, and of homes; their food, the common herbs; their apparel, skins; their bed, the earth; their only hope in their arrows, which for want of iron they point with bones. Their common support they have from the chase, women as well as men; for with these the former wander up and down, and crave a portion of the prey. Nor other shelter have they even for their babes, against the violence of tempests and ravening beasts, than to cover them with the branches of trees twisted together."
[They are described as archers, dressed in skins, living close to the land. In later sources, they are said to be familiar with magic, and are often compared with elves. In Anglo-Saxon sources, diseases are said to be caused by "elf-shot"] Beyond the Finns, Tacitus says lies a "fabulous land", in other words a land even Tacitus recognizes as fable or myth: "What further accounts we have are fabulous: as that the Hellusians and Oxiones have the countenances and aspect of men, with the bodies and limbs of savage beasts. This, as a thing about which I have no certain information, I shall leave untouched." This is an apt description of the giants in our lore, who are often described as wolves or dog-like in their behavior. Saxo describes them as howling and barking like dogs in his text. Icelandic sources typically intermingle descriptions of giants and wolves. Giantesses are called "wolf-riders" in skaldic kennings, and wolves are called "horses of giants". In the eddaic poem Hrafnagaldur Odins, when Idunn "falls from Yggdrassil" and resides in a winter-cold land, she too is "wrapped in wolfskin". This poem most likely describes her time with the giant Thjazi. Voluspa also says that "the old one" in the Ironwood breeds "the brood of Fenrir" in the east. Similarly, when Thor travels to Jotunheim, he is said to travel along "eastern-paths". At any rate, beyond the land of the Finns, Tacitus says lies a land inhabited by mythic creatures with human faces, but the bodies and limbs of wild animals; creatures which are clearly comparable to giants in our lore. Can we find a similar association of Finns and giants in the later Scandinavian sources? In fact we can. When Thor travels to the land of the giants, he typically leaves his goats behind at the house of a "peasant" and crosses a body of water to enter Jotunheim (Snorri's accounts in Gylfaginning confirm this). In the Eddaic poem Hymiskvida verse 7, we find the name of the peasant, he is named Egil. In Hymiskvida 37, 38, we learn that this is the same place that Thor picked up his servants Thjalfi and Roskva. Thjalfi and Roskva are children in Egil's house. Egil is the keeper of Thor's goats, on his way to Jotunheim. Thjalfi cracked a leg-bone of one of Thor's goats, laming it. Hymiskvida 38 tells us the story is well-known, and makes only the briefest allusion to it. Later, Snorri tells us the details of the myth as he knew them. There is no evidence that Snorri knew the poem Hymiskvida. From the oldest source of the tale, Hymiskvida, it is clear that Egil is a mythic personage that lived near the shore of the waters that separated Midgard from Jotunheim. Egil lives on one side of the water and the giants live on the other. Egil's house forms a way-station for Thor on his way to the giants. He leaves his goats there and spends the night before embarking in the morning on foot into Jotunheim.
In the mythological poems of the Elder Edda, we find only one other character named Egil. In the poem Volundarkvida, which is squarely placed between the "Thor-poems" Thyrmskvida and Alvismal among the mythological poems in Konungsbok (or Codex Regius) manuscript of the Elder Edda, we find Egil as a brother to the famous smith Volund. These brothers are referred to as "elf princes" in the poem twice. In the prose introduction to the piece, they are said to be sons of a Finnish king. Thus, they are elves and Finns at the same time. This description corresponds exactly to what Tacitus says of the ancient Germanic geography: beyond the land of the Finns is a "fabulous" land inhabited by beings with the faces of humans, but the limbs and bodies of savage beasts. Their land lies at the very edge of the world, near a heavy, stagnant sea, beyond which lies utter darkness. The land of the Finns (or elves) is a way-station on the way to the land of the giants. No doubt this is why the Aesir and the Elves are so often mentioned together in our sources. This geography is further confirmed by what the Eddic poem Grimnismal tells us about the proximity of the homes of Thor and the elves. The lands of the Aesir and the elves are closely connected. Thor's home Thrundheim is associated with Alfheim, no doubt because Thor often travels to the land of the elves, on his way to the land of the giants: 4. Holy is the land, 5. Ydalir it is called, Ull's home Ydalir is mentioned in between because Thor's stepson Ull himself is of elven descent. He is an archer. His home Ydalir means "the Yew-dales". Yew is the wood most commonly used to make bows in the north. Ull's father is not named in our surviving sources. But from a comparison of the primary sources, he is most likely the son of Sif and her first husband Egil, Thor's friend and closest ally in the fight against the giants. Egil's name is commonly found in kennings indicating his role as an archer. Arrows are likened to "swift-herrings" that fly from Egil's hands, perhaps also referring to Egil's position near the ocean, the same ocean upon which Thor and Hymir fish for whales. For the sake of simplicity, I'll leave it there. However, I could easily go on providing example after example from the primary texts to support these views, showing not only a consistency of ideas in the primary sources, but also a consistency of ideas across time, as far as the sources extend. There is simply no demonstrable radical change in the heathen worldview in the 1000 or so years we have records, and it is apparent that the ancient heathens understood their mythical geography as an extension of their actual physical geography. The mythic lands of course were conceived of as lying beyond the known lands, but were conceived of as firmly affixed to them in consistent directions. HOME | Articles Home | Top Of Page Images and Contents Copyright © Assembly of The Elder Troth 2002 - 2007 or as specified. For communications regarding this website please e-mail webmaster@aetaustralia.org Page maintained by Schmitt Services Last Update: Thursday, September 28, 2006
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