From owner-asatru@home.ease.lsoft.com Sun Feb 1 13:51:22 1998 Received: (from mail@localhost) by ratatosk.squirrel.com (8.8.5/8.8.5) id NAA17231 for ; Sun, 1 Feb 1998 13:51:22 -0800 (PST) Received: from home.ease.lsoft.com(206.241.12.9) by ratatosk.squirrel.com via MultiNet SMTP Gateway (V1.3) id sma017228; Sun Feb 1 13:50:46 1998 Received: from home (206.241.12.9) by home.ease.lsoft.com (LSMTP for Windows NT v1.1a) with SMTP id <12.91C45CB0@home.ease.lsoft.com>; 1 Feb 1998 16:50:58 -0500 Received: from HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM by HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM (LISTSERV-TCP/IP release 1.8c) with spool id 9083033 for ASATRU@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM; Sun, 1 Feb 1998 16:50:57 -0500 Received: from magicnet.magicnet.net by home.ease.lsoft.com (LSMTP for Windows NT v1.1a) with SMTP id <8.9132F220@home.ease.lsoft.com>; 1 Feb 1998 16:50:57 -0500 Received: from default (pm53-20.magicnet.net [208.6.200.149]) by magicnet.magicnet.net (8.8.6/8.8.6) with ESMTP id QAA17680 for ; Sun, 1 Feb 1998 16:50:38 -0500 (EST) X-MSMail-Priority: Normal X-Priority: 3 X-Mailer: Microsoft Internet Mail 4.70.1162 MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Message-ID: <199802012150.QAA17680@magicnet.magicnet.net> Date: Sun, 1 Feb 1998 16:48:54 -0500 Reply-To: The Asatru List Sender: The Asatru List From: William Reaves Subject: The Use of the Name Narvi: An Investigation concerning Mimir & Urd Part 1 To: ASATRU@home.ease.lsoft.com Content-Length: 14735 Lines: 261 Here is the investigation of the use of the name Narvi, as promised. Please feel free to comment on the ideas presented. Frankly, I am not concerned with the argument of why Viktor Rydberg's ideas have not been accepted after over 100 years. The fact is they are not, but one must also remember that they are also largely unknown today. Being unpopular does not make a man incorrect. I only mention this because of the nature of some of the responses I have receieved when discussing VR in the past. Look at the ideas, refer to the texts, then decide for yourself--- that is critical thinking. Remember in the popular presentation of this mythology, Narvi is a son of Loki, and the phrase "nipt Nera," and its variations ("Narvi's kinswoman") is taken to mean Loki's daughter whom Snorri calls Hel. As in the Elder Edda, Hel is conceived of as death personified. >From Viktor Rydberg's Teutonic Mythology (translator Rasmus B. Anderson, with slight revisions and commentary by W. Reaves) excerpts from chapters 84-86, which occur within a greater treatise on the underworld and its inhabitants in general: "The following lines in Sigrdrifumal (str. 3, 4) sound like a reverberation from the lost liturgic hymns of our heathendom. Heill dagr! Hail Dag! Heilir dags synir! Hail Dag's sons! Heil nótt ok nipt! Hail Nat and "nipt"! Óreiðum augum With benevolant eyes lítið okkr Þinig Look down upon us ok gefið sitjöndum sigr! And give victory to the sitting! Heilir æsir Hail Æsir! Heilar asynjor Hail Asynjes! Heil sia in fiolnyta fold! Hail bounteous earth! Of the Germans in the first century after Christ, Tacitus writes (Germ. 3) "They do not, as we, compute time by days, but by nights; night seems to lead the day." This was applicable to the Scandinavians as far down as a thousand years later. Time was computed by nights not by days, and in the phrases from heathen times "nótt of dagr," "nótt med degi bœdi um nœtr ok um daga," night is named before day. Linguistic usage and mythology are here intimately associated with each another. According to Vafthrudnirsmal 25 and Gylfaginning 10, Nat bore with Delling the son Dag, with whom she divided the administration of the 24 hours. Delling is the elf of the morning redness. The symbolism of Nature is here distinct, as in all theogonies. Through other divinities, Naglfari and Ónarr (Anarr, Aunarr), Nat is the mother with the former of Unnr, also called Audr, with the latter of the goddess Jord, Odin's wife. Unnr means "wave", Audr means "rich." It has been shown elsewhere that Unnr-Audr is identical with Njord, the lord of wealth and commerce, who in the latter capacity became the protector of navigators, and to whom sacrifices were offered for a prosperous voyage. Gods of all clans-- Asas, Vans, and Elves ---are thus akin to Nat and descended from her. Nat herself is the daughter of a being whose name has many forms. Naurr, Nörr (dative Naurvi, Nörvi, Nott var Naurvi borin--Vafth. 25; Nott, Naurvi kenda --Alvism, 29) Narfi, Narvi (niderfi Narfa --Egil Skallagr., 56, 2; Gylfag. 10) Norvi, Nörvi (Gylf. 10; kund Nörva --Forspallsljod 7) Njörfi, Njörvi (Gylf. 10; Njörva nipt ---Sonnatorrek) Nori (Gylf. 10) Nari (Höfudl., 10) Neri (Helgi Hund., 1) All these variations are derived from the the same appellation, related to the ON verb njörva, the OE nearwian meaning "the one that binds," "the one who applies tight-fitting bonds." Simply the circumstance that Narvi is Nat's father proves that he must have occupied one of the more conspicuous positions in the Teutonic cosmology. In all cosmologies and theogonies, Night is one of the oldest beings, older than light, without which it cannot be conceived. Light is kindled in the darkness, thus foreboding an important epoch in the development of the world out of chaos. The being who is night's father must therefore be counted among the oldest in the cosmology. The personified representatives of water and earth, like the daylight itself, are the children of his daughter. What Gylfaginning tells of Narvi is that he was of giant birth, and the first to have inhabited Jotunheim (norvi eda Narfi het jotun, er bygdi fyrst Jotunheima--- Gylf. 10) In regard to this, we must remember that, in Gylfaginning and in the traditions of the Icelandic sagas, the lower world is embraced in the term Jotunheim, and this for mythical reasons, since Niflheim is inhabited by rime-thurses and giants <>, and since the regions of bliss are governed by Mimir and the norns, who also are of giant descent. As father of the lower world-dis Nat, Narvi himself belongs to that group of powers, with which the mythology populated the lower world. The upper Jotunheim did not exist before a later epoch of the cosmogonic development. It was created simulataneously with Midgard by Odin and his brothers (Gylf.) <> In a strophe by Egil Skallagrimson (ch. 56), poetry, or the source of poetry, is called "niderfi Narfa," "the inheritance left by Narvi to his descendants." As is well known, Mimir's fountain is the source of poetry. The expression indicates that the first inhabitant of the lower world, Narvi, also presided over the precious fountain of wisdom and inspiration, and that he died and left it to his descendants as an inheritance. Finally, we learn that Narvi was a near kinsman to Urd and her sisters. This appears from the following passages: (a) Helgi Hundingsbane (1, 3, ff) When Helgi was born, Norns came in the night to the abode of his parents, twisted the threads of fate, stretched them from east to west, and fastened them beneath the hall of the moon. "Nipt nera" cast one of these threads to the north and bade it hold forever. It is manifest that by "Neri's (Narvi's) kinswoman" is meant one of the norns present. (b) Sonnatorrek str. 24. The skald Egil Skallagrimson, weary of life, closes the poem by saying that he sees the dis of death standing on the ness (Digra-ness) near the gravemound, which conceals the dust of his father and his sons, and which is soon to receive him: Tveggja bága Njörva nipt The kinswoman of Njorvi/The Binder of Odin's (Tveggi's) foes a nesi stendr stands on the ness Skal ek thó gladr Then shall I be glad, med gódan vilja with good-will, ok úhryggr and without remorse Heljar bida wait for Hel It goes without saying that the skald means a dis of death, Urd or one of her messengers, with the words "The kinswoman of Njorvi of Odin's foes" whom he, with the eye of presentiment, sees standing on the family gravemound on Digraness. She is not to stay there, but is to continue her way to his hall, to bring him to the gravemound. He awaits her coming with gladness, and as the last line shows, she whose arrival he awaits is Hel, the goddess of death or fate. It has already been demonstrated that Hel in the heathen records is always identical with Urd. <> Njorvi here is used both as a proper and a common noun. "The kinswoman of the Njorvi of Odin's foes," means "the kinswoman of the binder of Odin's foes." Odin's foe Fenrir was bound with an excellent chain smithied in the lower world (dwarfs from Svartalfheim --Gylf. 37), and as shall be shown elsewhere, there was more than one foe of Odin who is bound by Narvi's chains <> (c) Hofudlausn str. 10. Egil Skallagrimsson celebrates in song a victory won by Erik Bloodaxe and says of the battle-field that there "trad nipt Nara nàttverd ara," "Nari's kinswoman trampled upon the supper of eagles," (that is to say upon the bodies of the fallen warriors). The psychopomps of disease and old-age have nothing to do on a battlefield. Thither come the valkyries to the elect. "Nipt Nara" must therefore be a valkyrie, whose horse tramples upon the heaps of dead bodies; and as Egil refers to a single one of these, he doubtless has had the most representative, the most important one in mind. That one is Skuld, Urd's sister, and thus a "nipt Nara" herself, like Urd. <> (d) Ynglingatal (Ynglingasaga, ch. 20). Of King Dygvi, who died from disease, it is said that "jódis Narva (jódis Nara) chose him. The right to choose belongs to the norns alone. "Jódis, a word doubtless produced by a vowel change from the Old Germanic "idis," has already in olden times been interpreted partly as horse-dis (from jór, horse), partly as the dis of one's kin (from jod, child, offspring). In this case, the skald has taken advantage of both significations. He calls the death-dis (Hel-Urd) "ulfs ok Narva jódis," the wolf's horse-dis and Narvi's kin-dis. In regard to the former signification, it should be remembered that the wolf is horse for all giantesses, the honoured norns not excepted. Cp. (compare) "grey norna" as a paraphrase for wolf." Thus what our mythic record tells us about Narvi is: (a) He is one of the oldest beings of the theogony, older than the upper part of the world created by Bur's sons. (b) He is of giant descent (c) He is father of Nat, father-in-law of Naglfari, Onnar, and Delling, the elf of the rosy dawn; and he is the father of Dag's mother, of Unnr, and of the goddesses Jord, who becomes Odin's wife and Thor's mother. Bonds of kinship thus connect him with the Asas and gods of all other ranks. (d) He is near akin to the dis of fate and death, Urd, and her sisters. The word "nipt," with which Urd's relation to him is indicated, may mean sister, daughter, and even sister's daughter, and consequently does not state which particualr one of these she is. It seems upon the whole to have been applied well-nigh exclusively in regard to mythic persons, and particularly in regard to Urd and her sisters, so that it almost acquired the meaning of dis or norn. This is evident from Skaldskaparsmal, ch. 75: Nornir heita thœr er naud skapa; Nipt ok Dis nú eru taldar, and from the expression Heil Nótt ok Nipt in the above cited strophe from Sigrdrifumal. There is every reason for assuming that the Nipt, which is here used as a proper noun, in this sense means the dis of fate (Urd) as a kinswoman of Nat. The common interpretation of "heil Nótt ok Nipt," is "hail Nat and her daughter," and by her daughter is meant the goddess Jord; but this interpretation is, as Sophus Bugge has shown, less probable, because the goddess Jord immediately below gets her special greeting in the words: heil sia in fiolnyta Fold!, Hail the bounteous Earth! (e) As the father of Nat, living in Mimir's realm, and kinsman of Urd, who with Mimir divides the dominion over the lower world, Narvi is himself a being of the lower world and the oldest subterranean being; the first one who resided in Jotunheim. (f) He presided over the subterranean fountain of wisdom and inspiration, that is to say Mimir's fountain. (g) He was Odin's friend and binder of his foes <> (h) He died and left his fountain as an inheritance to his descendants. As our investigation progresses, it will be found that all these facts concerning the name Narvi apply to Mimir, that "he who thinks" (Mimir) and "he who binds" (Narvi) are the same person. Already these circumstances (a-h above)...point definitely to Narvi and Mimir's identity. Thus the Teutonic theogony has made Thought the older kinsman of Fate, who through Night bears Day to the world. The people of antiquity made their first steps toward a philosophical view of the world in their theogony." End of Part I: The investigation will continue with a look into Snorri's use of the name Narvi as the name of one or both of Loki's sons (he does both) and how the name of Odin's son Vali came to be confounded with the name of one of Loki's sons (Hint: Voluspa 34 which contains the phrase "Vàli vigbönd" holds the key.) As always, please feel free to comment! Wassail~William Reaves --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe send w/o quotes "SIGNOFF ASATRU" to LISTSERV@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM If you have questions, write to: ASATRU-REQUEST@HOME.EASE.LSOFT.COM