Published on September 29, 2024
INTRODUCTION
Norse mythological traditions can be found in the anonymous work now called The Poetic Edda – a collection of poems that tells the sacred storied about gods, dwarfs, and people who inhabited nine worlds and faced an apocalypse (the Ragnarök).
The poems were found in a manuscript, broadly named Codex Regius, dated c. 1270, from Iceland, which is considered only a copy of the original manuscript, now lost.
All we know is that the document was, in 1662, in the possession of Brynjólfur Sveinsson, bishop of Skálholt, who, in 1662, sent it as a gift to the king of Denmark. (Pettit, 2023, p. 1)
The precise era when the poems are unknown, and so the author/s.
Snorri Sturluson was a prominent figure in Iceland in the 13th century. Being himself a poet, he compiled a reiteration in prose of these myths, known as Prose Edda, with the purpose to create a manual for poets.
Though the authorship of Snorri is quite debatable, at present there is a consensus, started during Renaissance time, that he is the creator of Prose Edda, also known as The Young Edda.
Nordic myths functioned as a source of inspiration for great musical, cinematographic, and literary works. Richard Wagner’s musical composition The Ring of Nibelungen is a magnum opus adaptation of The Poetic Edda and Prose Edda. (Gale, 2016, p. 11)
In this paper, we will focus on the Norse traditions presented by the myths that are found in both works, The Poetic Edda and Prose Edda, trying to define and explain their main characteristics and functionality.
RESULTS
The corpus of Norse myths, as they are revealed in The Poetic Edda and Prose Edda, depicts a universe where gods coexist with giants, dwarfs, elves, and monsters.
There is love, hate, rage, and wisdom – an array of human feelings that conduct to the idea that the authors created an anthropomorphic society. Gods look like humans. Some have great qualities, while others are marked by flaws. Giants are very tall. Dwarfs are short, but they are great craftsmen. Therefore, this is a universe based on euhemerism, and this idea makes Norse mythology to be more accessible to the public.
The tales found in The Poetic Edda and Prose Edda are interconnected by recurrent elements that act as topoi. These motifs can be considered traditions that play an important role in the narrative economy of Norse mythology.
The most significant are the ones that generate intrigue by creating a conflict that will change the face of the world, as we will see in the following.
Ginnungagap, the primordial void, is mentioned in The Poetic Edda, in the first poem Völuspá, and the Prose Edda. The third stanza of Völuspá (known as The Prophecy of the Seeress) presents the image of nothingness, when the only existing thing was the initial giant called Ymir. There was no sand, earth, waves, grass, waves or sea, but “a gap of gaping abysses”. (Pettit, 2023, p. 39, stanza 3)
The same depiction of Ginnungagap is met in Prose Edda, when Swedish King Gylfi goes to Aesir-people to understand why everything happens accordingly to their will.
In the story said by Gangleri, which some scholars say is god Odin, the Yawning Gap is presented as the preexisting reality before everything started to be born. (Sturluson, 1916, p. 16)
Ymir, the giant and the first thing that ever existed, is used by gods for the creation of the world and Miðgarðr.
In The Poetic Edda, the poem called Grímnismál, stanzas 40 and 41, gods are decomposing Ymir to create the physical world in this way: from Ymir’s flesh will be born the Earth, from his sweat will reveal the sea, “boulders from his bones, trees from his hair, and from his skull the sky” (Pettit, 2023, p. 183) and from his brains, gods made the clouds.
An interesting part of the creations’ myth is that the human world, Miðgarðr, is made out of Ymir’s eyelashes (this is the variant of translation of Edward Pettit that was used for the purpose of this paper), though in Prose Edda, gods used Ymir’s eyebrows to fulfil this task. (Sturluson, 1916, p. 21)
The noun brám is the dative plural of the noun brá (m.sg) whose signification is the eyebrow. The creation of the world is a sacrificial gesture that implies an act of extreme violence.
In this context, there is no specification, nor in The Poetic Edda nor in Prose Edda, if Ymir suffered and willingly gave his being for this objective.
Thus, the making of the world stands on an antithetic situation: the death of Ymir becomes life in the hands of gods.
Yggdrasil, the ash tree, is represented both in The Poetic Edda and in Prose Edda as an image of the axis mundi, the element that supports all the nine worlds.
Being the standing component of Norse cosmology, the ash tree Yggdrasil will interconnect the worlds and will offer gods the place for their daily meetings to give judgments. (Sturluson, 1916, p, 27)
In chapter 15 of Prose Edda, there is a description of the ash tree as the holy of the holy, the place where exist the most sacred thing for the gods.
The branches of this tree reach heaven and its three roots are going towards the following three worlds: Hel’s kingdom – which was the place where dead people (the ones that were sick, old, or even unhappy) went into the afterlife; frost giant’s habitat and the universe of humans. (Pettit, 2023, p 181, stanza 31, The Sayings of Grímnir)
Yggdrasil appears to be similar to a cathedral that imposed its greatness and ruled the place. In medieval times, the church was the only tall building in a city and other constructions were forbidden to surpass it in height.
The Mead of Poetry is a mythical story about a magic beverage that was capable to give anyone who drinks it the gift of solving any question and composing the most magnificent poem.
The tale can be found in the poem Hávamál of The Poetic Edda and, to a complete extent, in Prose Edda, more precisely in the second part of Snorri’s work, called Skáldskaparmál (The Language of Poetry)
At the end of the war between Aesir and Vanir, the gods sealed their peace by spitting in a vat. Being pitiful to throw it away, the gods decided to make a man out of the spitting. Kvasir, the human creature that was shaped, was named Kvasir and could produce wonderful poems and ask any question. He wandered the world giving his wisdom and his answers to all in need.
But two dwarfs, Fjalar and Galarr, killed them and collected his blood into a vessel, blending it with honey. From this mixture was created the mead of poetry.
The story goes with the drowning of Gillingr and the killing of his wife. Being punished by Suttungr, the son of the dead giants, the two dwarfs will give him the mead as an act of reconciliation. Placing the mead in a secret place, the giant will appoint his daughter, Gunnlod, to guard the precious beverage.
Odin will be the one who skilfully steals the mead from the giants by tricking Suttungr and changing his shape into an eagle. The mighty god will bring the mead to Asgard. (Sturluson, 1916, pp. 93-96, chapter I Skáldskaparmál)
The motif of the poetic mead can be found in The Poetic Edda, poem Hávamál, stanzas 104-110. Odin reminds there of his journey to the giant Gunnlǫð and how he deceives her by swearing on his love for her.
The Mead of Poetry is a complex myth that gives a glimpse of antithetic things: greed, lust, love, death, etc., and how these realities rule the world.
DISCUSSION
Norse mythical traditions, not only the ones presented by this paper due to the economy of the work but others to such as the gods’ pantheon (Odin, Thor, Freyja), the problem of death (Hel, Valhalla, Freyja’s Fólkvangr), is a complex matter that gave inspiration for new and interesting artistic works.
Literary productions – A Song of Ice and Fire by George R. R. Martin, The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien, films – Thor (2011), Vikings (2013-2020), The Northman (2022), musical masterpieces – opera Der Ring des Nibelungen by Richard Wagner – are all inspired by the Nordic tales as if these myths are functioning as a mead of poetry.
SUMMARY
Mythical Nordic traditions, such as the primordial void (Ginnungagap), creation of the world (Ymir), axis mundi (Yggdrasil – the sacred ash tree), the mead of poetry, are the main themes of Norse writings The Poetic Edda and the Prose Edda.
Nordic mythology presents an anthropomorphic universe that shows violence (see how the world was created by dismantling Ymir), lust and love (as in the tale about the Mead of Poetry), and holiness (Yggdrasil), to name just a few of them.
For its complexity, Norse Myths constituted a source of inspiration for many artistic creations.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Gale, C.L. (2016). A Study Guide for Anonymous’s ‘Poetic Edda’. Gale, Cengage Learning.
Herbert, W. (1804). Select Icelandic Poetry.
Pettit, E. (2023). The Poetic Edda: A Dual-Language Edition. Open Book Publishers.
Snorri Sturluson (1987). Prose Edda. Translated and edited by Anthony Faulkes ed. Everyman Paperback Classics.
Sturluson, S. (1916). The Prose Edda. Oxford University Press: London: Milford.
