Teutonic Mythology vol#03.pdf

Teutonic Mythology

Gods and Goddesses

of the Northland

Viktor Rydberg

IN THREE VOLUMES

Vol. III

NORRŒNA SOCIETY

LONDON - COPENHAGEN - STOCKHOLM - BERLIN - NEW YORK

1907

TABLE OF CONTENTS

VOLUME III

94. Story of the Seven Sleepers — 707

95. The Anthropology of the Mythology — 729

PART V — THE IVALDE RACE

96. Svipdag and Groa — 747

97. Menglad’s Identity with Freyja — 751

98. The Sword of Revenge — 759

99. Orvandel, the Star-Hero — 767

100. Svipdag Identical with Otharus — 770

101. Svipdag in Saxo’s Account of Hotherus — 781

102. Ericus Disertus in Saxo — 793

103. The Svipdag Synonim Eirikr — 803

104. Later Fortunes of the Volund Sword — 808

105. The Svipdag Epithet “Skirnir” — 815

106. Transformation and Death of Svipdag — 819

107. Reminiscences of the Svipdag Myth — 830

108. Orvandel, Egil and Ebbo — 847

109. Frey Fostered in the Home of Orvandel — 865

110. Ivalde, Svipdag’s Grandfather — 870

111. Parallel Myths in Rigveda — 874

112. Judgment Passed on the Ivalde Sons — 884

113. Olvalde and Ivalde Sons Identical — 890

114. A Review of Thorsdrapa — 932

115. Of Volund’s Identity with Thjasse — 952

116. The Worst Deed of Revenge — 956

117. the Guard at Hvergelmer and the Elivagar — 968

118. Slagfin, Egil, and Volund — 971

119. The Niflung Hoard Left by Volund — 975

120. Slagfin-Gjuke a Star-Hero — 981

121. Slagfin’s Appearance in the Moon Myth — 985

122. Review of the Synonyms of Ivalde’s Sons — 991

123. Ivalde — 992

DICTIONARY OF GODS AND GODDESSES — 1013

INDEX OF PERSONS AND PLACES — 1041

707

THE MYTH IN REGARD TO THE LOWER WORLD

( Part IV. Continued from Volume II )

94.

THE SEVEN SLEEPERS.

Völuspa gives an account of the events which forebode and lead up to

Ragnarok. Among these we also find that leika Mims synir , that is, that the sons of

Mimer “spring up,” “fly up,” “get into lively motion.” But the meaning of this has

hitherto been an unsolved problem.

In the strophe immediately preceding (the 44th) Völuspa describes how it

looks on the surface of Midgard when the end of the world is at hand. Brothers and

near kinsmen slay each other. The sacred bonds of morality are broken. It is the

storm-age and the wolf-age. Men no longer spare or pity one another. Knives and

axes rage. Volund’s world-destroying sword of revenge has already been fetched

by Fjalar in the guise of the red cock (str. 41), and from the Ironwood, where it

hitherto had been concealed by Angerboda and guarded by Egther; the wolf-giant

Hate with his companions have invaded the world, which it was the duty of the

gods

708

to protect. The storms are attended by eclipses of the sun (str. 40).

Then suddenly the Gjallar-horn sounds, announcing that the destruction of

the world is now to be fulfilled, and just as the first notes of this trumpet penetrate

the world, Mimer’s sons spring up. “The old tree,” the world-tree, groans and

trembles. When Mimer’s sons “spring up” Odin is engaged in conversation with

the head of their father, his faithful adviser, in regard to the impending conflict,

which is the last one in which the gods are to take a hand.

I shall here give reasons for the assumption that the blast from the Gjallar-

horn wakes Mimer’s sons from a sleep that has lasted through centuries, and that

the Christian legend concerning the seven sleepers has its chief, if not its only, root

in a Teutonic myth which in the second half of the fifth or in the first half of the

sixth century was changed into a legend. At that time large portions of the Teutonic

race had already been converted to Christianity: the Goths, Vandals, Gepidians,

Rugians, Burgundians, and Swabians were Christians. Considerable parts of the

Roman empire were settled by the Teutons or governed by their swords. The

Franks were on the point of entering the Christian Church, and behind them the

Alamannians and Longobardians. Their myths and sagas were reconstructed so far

as they could be adapted to the new forms and ideas, and if they, more or less

transformed, assumed the garb of a Christian legend, then this guise enabled them

to travel to the utmost limits of Christendom; and if they also contained, as in

709

the case here in question, ideas that were not entirely foreign to the Greek-Roman

world, then they might the more easily acquire the right of Roman nativity.

In its oldest form the legend of “the seven sleepers” has the following

outlines ( Miraculorum Liber , vii., i. 92):

“Seven brothers”* have their place of rest near the city of Ephesus, and the

story of them is as follows: In the time of the Emperor Decius, while the

persecution of the Christians took place, seven men were captured and brought

before the ruler. Their names were Maximianus, Malchus, Martinianus,

Constantius, Dionysius, Joannes, and Serapion. All sorts of persuasion was

attempted, but they would not yield. The emperor, who was pleased with their

courteous manners, gave them time for reflection, so that they should not at once

fall under the sentence of death. But they concealed themselves in a cave and

remained there many days. Still, one of them went out to get provisions and attend

to other necessary matters. But when the emperor returned to the same city, these

men prayed to God, asking Him in His mercy to save them out of this danger, and

when, lying on the ground, they had finished their prayers, they fell asleep. When

the emperor learned that they were in the above-mentioned cave, he, under divine

influence, commanded that the entrance of the cave should be closed with large

stones, “for,” said he, “as they are unwilling to offer sacrifices to our gods, they

must perish there.”

* For “brothers” the text, perhaps purposely, used the ambiguous word germani . This would,

then, not be the only instance where the word is used in both senses at the same time. Cp.

Quintil., 8, 3, 29.

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