Talk:Norse mythology/Archive 2

"The problem with giants is just that they are [frequently] rude, boisterous, malignant, treacherous, uncivilized and homicidal."

- In contrast with the gods, who were [frequently] rude, boisterous, malignant, treacherous, uncivilized and homicidal. :-)

Regarding the two families of gods: the Germanic lanaguage contains a lot of non-Indoeuropean roots, which indicates a strong interaction with an aboriginal people


 * care to add a note in the article detailing this? user:sjc

OK, I just did. I was tempted to point out that of the mythical lands of origin Asgard and Vanaheim, the element -gard and -heim both denote 'home' or so. The root -gard is definitely Indoeuropean (compare -gorod or -grad in Slavic and hortus in Latin). I do not know about -heim. It may well be non-IE. If it is not, we might as well call the non-IE laguage 'vanic' or so.


 * Yes, nicely put. Thanks for your input. You might care to extend this argument in a separate article. user:sjc

The list of gods and other figures from Norse mythology gets rather long. Should we split it off at a separate list article? I'm not really sure, since I really hate unannotated lists. Many figures are already discussed in the text of course, but a list is also useful in some cases. Any suggestions? Jeronimo

Yes, I think that I would like to discuss this with Anders Torlind prior to doing this since his contributions to this article have been very significant first though. It would probably make sense to do so sometime in the future in my view, keeping lists in this article to the absolute minimum, i.e. retaining a listing of only the most significant deities, etc. user:sjc

OK, I'll leave it to you experts then. Jeronimo


 * I might recommend keeping a list of the real important ones on the page and spinning a new page off for a complete list. Greek mythology does this.


 * That would be a good idea. The lists in 'See also' are too long for the main article, but I'd like to see a small list (with ilinks in one place, instead of spread all over the article) *and* the mention of full lists sooner then at the very end of the article. You may also want to create a redirect or article/list on Norse pantheon while doing that. --Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus 12:27, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Lauritz writes: I failed to find a complete mention of the view of the cosmos in this article. While it is mentioned that the sea encircles the world, this is not complete without the "tree stub" view, with the home of the gods in the centre and "Midgard" in the middle, followed by the home of the jotne before reaching the sea and the serpent. (Explains Tolkiens naming "Middle Earth") That is, if this is well-documented as an actual worldview, I got a lot of new info from this article and could well be wrong.

I am wondering if a sketch would do the trick. Of course, a sketch would be incomplete without Ratatosk scampering about the branches of Asken Yggdrasil, but I can't draw squirrels. I am no good with ash trees either come to think of it. AlainV 02:08, 2004 Feb 1 (UTC) - (The Sabine and Oscian tribes that formed the Roman Republic and Patrician class, and the Ionian and Dorian peoples who formed Greece of the heroic and classical eras were Nordic peoples who migrated from the north).

Care to substantiate that claim? It clearly seems POV to me, so I will remove it until it is proven as something other than a wannabe connection with southern grandeur by the north, written half-convincingly by propagandists ala saga-revisers and de-heathenisers in love with the Mediterranean braggarts versed in Rome, Athens and Troy,(oh-Thor's Thrudheim, and trying to make Odin's Aesir be Asiatic warriors(the Aesir meant Ash, but they were Indo-European), etc. From the same people who claimed Vinland meant Wine-land when in fact there is a completely different meaning, actually based upon REAL Norse words.  That's right folks, WE DO have a past filled with culture and civilization, not just some bloodlusty "barbarians", as those brainwashed by Christian teachings over the many oppressive hundreds of years have been 'led to believe'!)  User:Kenneth Alan

- On my hunt for references to Vanir/Aesir, I find a curious juxtaposition in this page:

"The Scandinavians recognized two "families" of deities, the Aesir and the Vanir. The distinction is relative, for the two were said to have made peace, exchanged hostages, intermarried and reigned together after a prolonged war, which the Aesir had finally won. Some gods belonged in both camps. Some scholars have speculated that this tale symbolized the way the gods of the invading Germanics supplanted the older nature-deities of the aboriginal peoples, although it should be firmly noted that this is conjecture."

So far so good. Notes interesting but definitely conjectural speculation by some scholars. Then however we go into the following:

"The Germanic Vanir corresponds to the Lake Vaanern as the children of Venus, Norse(Nerthus/Njord), Ynglings/Angles-Frisians/Franks (Yngvi-Freyr/Freya/Frigg). The Wane term comes from the same source as Vin/Win, meaning "friend", as in such names Ke-vin, Ga-vin, Bald-win, Wini-fred, etc, and resembling the words "vain" and "want", signifying desire and love. The Aesir are composed of the Donar/Danes(Thor/Thunder), Jutes/Geats/Gothen(Odin/Wotan/God/Good) and Teutons/Deutsch(Tue/Tyr) and the term Aesir comes from Aegir/Yggr of the Yggdrasil Ash tree, a blend between the words (ash)Ask-Aegir. The Saxons came from the Aesir, judging by their political maneuvers, and may be safe to assume they were newer formed than these other tribes, yet still behaved more like assertive Aesir than peaceful Vanir, despite their long history side by side with the Anglo-Frisian/Franks of the Vanir."

This all seems rather too definite and contractics the previous. The paragraphs seems to imply that various Germanic tribes split up under the banners of particular Norse gods and went their own separate ways, becoming important European peoples. This sounds like a theory, and should not be a statement of fact. Martijn faassen 22:16, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

If you wish, describe it as a theory, just please don't delete it. User:Kenneth Alan
 * I did not delete it. I've only deleted a single reference on Germanic languages. I do dispute that this is historical consensus and therefore should not be added as factual statements to wikipedia, but I may be flat out wrong. Show me. Martijn faassen 22:45, 28 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I notice the article, though long, lacks structure. Besiddes discussing nordic mythology there is also a lot of analysis without a clear separation between the two. It also contains rather blatant POV statements like "An important insight into the laconic and pragmatic character of Norse mythology often neglected in encyclopedic works is that". A good first step would be to split off the analysis section more clearly. I'll get around to it eventually if nobody else is first. Martijn faassen 22:59, 30 Mar 2004 (UTC)

I deleted the clause which said that Saemundur wrote the poetic edda. This was believed until the nineteenth century, but is now not assumed to be possible, as Saemundur died before people started writing scripts in Iceland.

I removed most the following:


 * An interesting aspect of this mythology is that it (along with many other polytheistic religions) is utterly lacking in dualism. Though often portrayed as the "bad guy", Loki is not primarily an adversary of the gods.  In fact he is often an ally and resource for Asgard.  He is also one of the four gods (under his alternate name of Lodur) that create mankind, along with Odin, Vile and Ve.

It is debatable (though likely enough) that Loki is identical to Lodur and the account the creation of mankind here is an idiosyncratic invented one based on two separate accounts in the extant texts, one naming Odin, Vili and Ve and one naming Odin, Hoenir and Lodur.

I reversed the point made about dualism which suggested uniqueness for Norse Mythology for features that are not very unique.

I agree with Martijn on the POV problem. This article jumps too much into pro-Nordic chauvinism. Even the word "Nordic" used here is one closely associated with particular racist theories. J.R.R. Tolkien strongly rejects the word in one of his letters for that reason. Much of what appears here about Nordic culture is is just as true of many other cultures. For example the futharc was only slightly developed by the Scandinavians in the letter shapes and meanings after being taken from southern Germans who themselves adapted it from north Italic variants of what became the Latin alphabet. Other cultures also adapted or borrowed writing systems. What has this to do with Norse mythology?

I suggest all this cultural irrelevance be removed. Discussion of common features of Scandinavian peoples and development of Scandinavian culture or cultures belongs in an article on Scandinavia. 204.101.137.194 18:24, 13 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * I have divided the text into chapters to make the text less confusing. Concerning the Scandinavian chauvinism of some contributors, I believe we'll have to live with it, since the mythology is a matter of pride for many Scandinavians. This is very unfortunate, though, since Norse mythology is Germanic mythology, or rather the best known version of Germanic mythology, and thus it concerns a vast amount of people. Wiglaf


 * I agree with the points raised in the above discussion - too much nordic cultural praise for my liking - the article needs to be to the point! I don't have much time to go into it now and edit it myself at the present, but will have a second look later.


 * Being a scandinavian myself, as well as a student of history, there is a lot of things that doesn't make much sense. A minor discussion on the geography shaping Nordic culture is fine, but I would like the sections on how 'technologically' and 'philosophically' superior Nordic people are, completely removed, or alternatively, discussed in the article on Scandinavia or similar. It is not dark 18 hours a day where I live, not even during winters, and I doubt it was in previous times. It seems in this article like nordic culture or nordic peoples have been completely severed from the history of Europe since the viking age, and hence blossomed, where everybody else has degenerated. While it is interesting to discuss how geography shapes culture and mythology, I feel this is way too much.


 * Additionally, the discussion on human sacrifice belongs in an article of its own, it is ludicrous, speculative and without any historical evidence whatsoever to connect Tollundmanden to Norse mythology. Other points in this section bear similar highly speculative traits, without historical grounds.


 * I would like to edit the article more thoroughly, when I find the time. Kind Regards, Morten 12:42, 28 Jul 2004 (UTC)

There could perhaps be some mention about how often these characters also end up in other fictional work. I now recall at least Douglas Adams' The Long Dark Tea-time of the Soul and Neil Gaiman's American Gods. There is quite a bit of duplicate text with other pages. I understand this page is being edited, though. --blades 01:22, May 17, 2004 (UTC)

Some explanation of the recent mass deletion would be appreciated. I have posted a message to this effect on the deleter's discussion page. AlainV 23:07, 4 Jul 2004 (UTC)

Since there seems to be no standard for the names of the gods, we have started a page called Naming conventions (Norse mythology). Any opinions on what convention to choose are welcome.--Wiglaf 19:49, 21 Jul 2004 (UTC)

One more thing. How long is that BS about "Fågelkatt" going to remain in the article?--Wiglaf 22:33, 22 Jul 2004 (UTC)