The Prose Edda (30 page)

1.
Thor was too startled… with the hammer
: This story about Thor is filled with humour. The wording gives the impression that Thor, who was something of a bungler, rather than being frightened, which is a possible translation, was surprised and
startled, having acted before taking the time to think out the best course of action.

2.
Skrymir
: Different meanings have been proposed for the name Skrymir (
Skrýmir
), among them braggart and big fellow.

3.
dragged away my glove
: Another example of medieval Icelandic humour. The words and the image of dragging away a glove give the impression of the work of a child or small animal like a puppy.

4.
some leaves or twigs
: The word used is
tros.
It means rubbish, including leaves or twigs from a tree gathered and used for fuel.

1.
iron wire: Grésjarn
is some kind of iron fastening, perhaps magical.
Grés
is probably a loan word from Old Irish, where it meant deception and trickery.

1.
Even those… know that Thor made amends
: The myth of Thor fishing for the great serpent that encircles the earth is ancient. It is the subject of the eddic poem
The Lay of Hymir
(
Hymiskviða
), and is mentioned in several ninth-and tenth-century skaldic poems, including
Ragnarsdrapa
and
Husdrapa.
Thor'S fishing expedition is also represented on four Viking Age pictorial stones from Altuna (early eleventh century), Hørdum (eighth to eleventh century), Ardre VIII (eighth century) and Gosforth (tenth century).

2.
neither weaker nor less firm
: An ironic understatement that does not translate well into English.

1.
ruin for the Æsir
: Odin, who sees into the future, is apparently thinking of the coming of Ragnarok.

2.
log rollers underneath the keel
: When a ship was hauled up on the shore, logs were placed as rollers under the keel.

3.
the gold ring Draupnir
: Magical rings such as Draupnir had creative powers and play significant roles in Norse myth and legend.
Skaldskaparmal
,
The Saga of the Volsungs
and the Sigurd poems in the
Poetic Edda
speak of a magical ring called Andvaranaut (Andvari'S Gift). In his retelling of the tale of Baldr'S death, the medieval Danish writer Saxo Grammaticus also refers to a gold ring that made wealth for its owner.

4.
the Gjoll Bridge
: The boundary separating the world of the living from the world of the dead.

5.
all things in the world, alive or dead
: Alive or dead (
kykr ok dauðr
) means things possessed of the quickening of life, as opposed to objects that are dead, that is, inanimate. This has a similar meaning to the biblical phrase the quick and the dead.

6.
Thokk will weep… Let Hel hold what she has
: This verse, which is not known elsewhere, may come from a lost poem about Baldr's death.

1.
the collapse of kinship
:
Sifjaslit
means the breaking of kinship bonds, but there is also the connotation of incest.

2.
a hundred leagues in each direction
: If the figure referred to here is the long hundred, then the resulting size of the field is 120 leagues in each direction.

3.
the hound Garm… Gnipahellir
: Garm is mentioned in
The Lay of Grimnir
and in
The Sibyl's Prophecy. Baldr's Dreams
speaks of a hound in Hel, which might not be Garm.
Hellir
in the name
Gnipahellir
means cave. The whole word could be translated as a jutting or overhanging cave, and
Gnipahellir
is perhaps an entrance to Hel. Garm could be another name for Fenrir.

4.
the giant breaks free
: The giant who breaks free could be the
Fenriswolf, the hound Garm or Loki. All were bound, and all will break free at Ragnarok.

5.
Nidfol rips apart corpses
: If a proper noun, Nidfol (darkly pale) is perhaps the same as Nidhogg, who rips apart corpses at Hvergelmir (chapter 52). Possibly the reference is to Hraesvelg.

6.
There with the Wolf
: The line uses the name Freki, which means a wolf, perhaps also with the connotation of greedy, hence greedy wolf. Freki can be a name for Fenrir and the reference is probably to him.

7.
Surt comes… the sky splits apart
: The same verse is found at the end of
chapter 4.

8.
Steps back… son of Earth
: The first part of this stanza, containing the words
nepr at naðri
, is unclear. The great son of Earth is Thor. Earth, Thor'S mother, was also named Hlodyn and the verse uses the kenning ‘the son of Hlodyn'. The line foretells Thor'S death from the serpent'S poison.

9.
the fire rages
: The term used is
aldrnari
, meaning nourisher of life, that is, fire. The line is perhaps ironic, as fire is destroying rather than nourishing.

1.
the hall called Brimir
: In
The Sibyl's Prophecy
Brimir is not the hall, but the name of the giant that owns the hall. The name Sindri, a few lines later, is the name of a dwarf.

2.
Nastrandir [Corpse Strands]
: The Old Norse word
nár
had two meanings. It meant corpse, that is, an actual dead body, but the word also had the more general meaning of a deceased person. With the second, more general meaning in mind, the Corpse Strands, that is, the beaches of the dead, might be another realm of the dead. Strand is plural in the prose and singular in the verse immediately following.

3.
walls woven from branches
: The text reads
sem vandahús
(like a wattle house), a building whose walls are made from poles and thin branches covered with mud. Here the wattle is live snakes.

1.
Vingnir's
: Vingnir here most probably refers to Thor, who elsewhere is called Vingnir'S foster son. Vingnir is also one of Odin'S names as well as the name of a giant.

2.
Hoddmimir's Holt
: It is not clear who Hoddmimir is;
hodd
can be a hoard, but also has the meaning of holy place, temple or sanctuary where precious things are hoarded. ‘Hoddmimir' could be translated as Hoard Mimir. The word
holt
means woods, but could be a tree. Hence Hoddmimir'S Holt (the wood or tree of Mimir) is perhaps Yggdrasil, the World Tree.

1.
Epilogue to Gylfaginning
: Because this short concluding paragraph is so different from the main body of
Gylfaginning
in style, subject matter, sentence structure and word choice, scholars have often treated it as an epilogue added by a later scribe.

1.
Ægir… Bragi
: Both Ægir and Bragi have their own histories. Ægir is either a giant or a god of the sea. The
Edda
calls Bragi a god, but he may originally have been Bragi Boddason the Old, a famous ninth-century court poet perhaps elevated to the rank of a god.

2.
her falcon shape
: This object, a falcon skin or cloak (
valshamr
), gave the possessor the ability to change shape into a falcon.

3.
I choose… Njord
: She meant to choose Baldr, assuming that his feet would be the most beautiful. Instead she chose Njord, the god of the sea, because his feet were clean. The story of their marriage is told in
Gylfaginning
,
chapter 23.

1.
Suttung, Gilling'S son
: Although some manuscripts call Suttung the son of Gilling's brother (
bróðurson
), that is, his nephew, son makes more sense.

2.
they slit each other's throats… scythes
: Rather than fighting among themselves, which is a possibility, the wording gives the impression that these workers, probably giants, were so clumsy that they ended up killing each other as they jostled about.

1.
no end to his boasting
: Describing Hrungnir's boasts, the text uses the term
stór orð,
meaning ‘big words', and the scene has the flavour of depicting ritual drinking oaths.

2.
Mokkurkalfi… wet himself
: ‘Mokkurkalfi' (
Mökkurkálfi
) has sometimes been translated as Mist Calf. However, the first part of the word,
mökkur
, most probably means earth or dirt such as clay. There has been confusion because
kálfi
, which specifically means the calf muscle of the leg, resembles the word
kálfr
, meaning a newborn cow. Given the story, it would make sense if the meaning of this name were something like ‘clay foot', indicating the weakness of this clay creature, especially when wet.

3.
three years old
: Some manuscripts say three nights rather than winters (years).

4.
the star called Aurvandil's Toe
:
Aurvandilstá
is a star or perhaps a planet. Aurvandil is Earendel in Old English and may be the Morning Star.

1.
rowan branches
: The rowan tree, thought to be holy, was associated with Thor.

1.
awl… punched holes through the lips
: An awl is a sharp pointed tool, usually of iron, for making holes in wood or leather.

1.
Why… gold called Otter's ransom
: The story recounted here agrees in the main with the material found in both the eddic poems and
The Saga of the Volsungs.

2.
coin
: The Old Norse word is
penningr
, a coin.

3.
Gjukungs, also called the Niflungs
: King Gjuki's sons, the Gjukungs, were also called Niflungs, a name related to the Nibelungs of the South German epic the
Nibelungenlied.

4.
linen fee
: The linen fee (
línfé
) was a gift paid by the bridegroom to the bride on the morning after the marriage was consummated.

5.
Gudrun… King Jonak… three sons
: This part of the story is also known from
The Lay of Hamdir
and
Gudrun's Incitement
, as well as from
The Saga of the Volsungs.
Skaldic verses by the poet Bragi Boddason also allude to the events.

6.
King Jormunrek the Powerful
: The Gothic King Jormunrek is based on a historical figure, known to the Romans as Ermanaric, Hermanaric or Ermenrichus. In the fourth century, this king ruled a vast Ostrogothic empire of horsemen north of the Black Sea on the steppes of what is today Ukraine. The contemporary Roman historian Ammianus Marcellinus, in his
History
, claims that Ermenrichus (d. 375) killed himself rather than face attack by the Huns. The sixth-century Gothic historian Jordanes relates in his
History of the Goths
an old story about the killing of a woman, Sunilda, which is remarkably close to the Norse version. Jordanes' story includes the vengeance of the woman'S brothers Sarus and Ammius. The legend of Ermanaric was known throughout the northern lands and his tragedy is mentioned in the Old English poem
Widsith.

7.
Bikki
: According to
The Saga of the Volsungs
Bikki is King Jormunrek's adviser.

8.
Aslaug
:
The Saga of the Volsungs
tells that Aslaug is the daughter of Sigurd and Brynhild.

9.
Sinfjotli… Sigurd
: Sigurd and Sinfjotli are half-brothers, both the sons of Sigmund, the son of Volsung. In
The Saga of the
Volsungs
, Sinfjotli is said to be Sigmund'S son by an incestuous union with his sister Signy, and Sigmund and Sinfjotli live in the forest as wolves while seeking vengeance for the killing of Volsung.

1.
the Danish tongue
: Scandinavians in the Viking Age tended to call their common language the Danish tongue (
Dönsk tunga
). Just when and why they used this term is unclear, but it may be because Denmark became a powerful royal state earlier than the other regions of the north. At times Danish kings controlled large parts of Scandinavia.

2.
Jalangr's Heath
: A heath on Jutland near Jelling, the ancient royal seat of the Danish kingdom.

1.
a thin pole
: Acccording to the Danish historian Saxo Grammaticus, writing about 1200,
kraki
refers to a tree trunk trimmed so that it can be used as a ladder. The place Hleidra (
Hleiðra,
modern Danish Lejre) on Sjaelland was an ancient seat of Danish chieftains where archaeological remains of large halls and burial mounds have been found, dating at least from the fifth and sixth centuries.

2.
It takes little to please Vogg
: An expression still in use in modern Icelandic, used when indicating that someone is easily pleased.

3.
Uppsala
: Just north of modern-day Stockholm, Uppsala was the seat of the ancient Swedish kings and a centre of religious observance.