Talk:Odin

Wotan
Wagner did not 'invent' this spelling - it is attested in the Latin of Paulus Diaconus' History of the Langobards. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Raschau (talk • contribs) 01:35, 23 October 2020 (UTC)

Eight legs
Regarding this edit (the citation does not work, but I expect that will be fixed soon so I will let that rest). I am a bit befuddled by the edit comment "Superfluous as it is common knowledge". Is it common knowledge that a bier or coffin is carried by four persons? My guess would have been that the number of men needed to carry such an object would vary depending on size. But my main problem is what this statement is that you fail to provide any explanation why this information is relevant, or who it is that have proposed an interpretation that Sleipnir symbolises four men carrying a bier. --Saddhiyama (talk) 16:41, 5 January 2010 (UTC)
 * As there has been no explanation I have reverted the changes. The citation was also spurious as it only mentioned authors last name, no title or anything else. --Saddhiyama (talk) 21:13, 6 January 2010 (UTC)
 * The reference was from within Wikipedia: perhaps I just didn't cut&paste correctly, although the link appeared to work when I tested it. It should be "* Ellis Davidson, H. R. (1990). Gods And Myths Of Northern Europe. Penguin. ISBN 0140136274". Certainly following the link to the Sleipnir entry would have provided an expansion of this interpretation as well as filling in omissions. As this is a communal pooling of information, perhaps editing would have been better than removing it, especially as not all of us can log on daily. Point taken about the number of pallbearers, however. I don't believe this interpretation is unique to Davidson, and it seems to be common knowledge, at least at the undergrad level. It is readily verifiable, both within the wiki and academically, so satisfies Wikipedia's criteria. The relevance is Odin's and Sleipnir's connection with death. The former's role as psychopomp had already been mentioned. I feel this needed emphasizing and certainly the description begs the question: why 8 legs? I would think further explanation would be more appropriate in the Sleipnir article. -Aikidoshi (talk) 18:12, 4 February 2010 (UTC)
 * Okay, I can't edit the references for some reason. I will hold off on editing the section until I can figure that out. -Aikidoshi (talk) 18:45, 4 February 2010 (UTC)

"A Recurring Summon"
Final Fantasy is a high-profile series of computer games, and so I think it's a reasonable thing to link to here under the modern culture heading. But what does it mean that Odin is a "recurring summon" in the game? The noun is actually "a summons", but even so it doesn't make much sense. Could someone clarify with a few words what role Odin plays in the games? Can the player summon him? What for? Martin Rundkvist (talk) 20:33, 23 February 2010 (UTC)
 * whatever it means, I do not think its inclusion adds any value to this article. --dab (𒁳) 22:32, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

The role of Odin in the Final Fantasy series is to work as a mystical force, mainly called a summon. You can summon him in a fight to deal additional damage or even kill your enemies instantly. It depends on the number of the series what you can do. For example in FFVIII you can't summon Odin on command, it happens randomly but when it does, he kills instantly. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 193.244.33.47 (talk) 17:19, 4 November 2010 (UTC)
 * this tells us something about the Final Fantasy video game, but it tells us nothing about Odin. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.105.38.129 (talk) 21:48, 21 October 2012 (UTC)

PLEASE TELL US MORE ABOUT VIDEO GAMES. NO WAIT DON'T. THIS ISN'T THE PLACE. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.105.38.196 (talk) 10:43, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

Needs a rewrite.
"In the compound Wednesday, the first member is cognate to the genitive Odin's."

Could someone rewrite the first paragraph so that it makes some sense. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.144.225.163 (talk) 18:53, 7 April 2011 (UTC)

I second this. This is vague at best and highly esoteric at worst. --DanielRenfro (talk) 04:03, 15 January 2012 (UTC)

Another rewrite needed for clarity: 'His name is related to ōðr, meaning "fury, excitation", besides "mind", or "poetry".' By "besides" I'm guessing someone meant "in addition to", but it parses oddly. --hexalm

Mercury and Tacitus
The statements associating Odin and Mercury are confusing, and in particular the statement that Tacitus was likely referring to Odin when writing of Mercury is especially confusing. Is this claiming that Odin is based on/evolved out of the Roman god Mercury? And, it seems a bit odd to claim Tacitus was writing about Odin when he uses "Mercury." Does this mean to say that in discussing Germanic gods, Tacitus imposes the name "Mercury" on Odin because he interprets the similarities of the gods as being the result of the Germanic tribes worshiping Mercury under a different name? Otherwise, why would we suppose he is referring to Odin, when Mercury is a well-established Roman god in large part based on a Greek antecedent (Hermes)? I'm not (necessarily) doubting that good, scholarly sources have established (or at least argue) that there is a connection between Mercury and Odin, but this connection could be much more clearly established in the article. As is, it is so confusing and vague as to be unhelpful. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.191.217.208 (talk) 20:04, 9 May 2011 (UTC)

Lengthy section under Prose Edda
The lengthy section under the heading Prose Edda before the heading "Prologue" appears to be misplaced. It's a broad description of Odin's attributes with little reference to the Prose Edda and some reference to other literary and archaeological sources. It either needs to be trimmed or moved. --Simon Peter Hughes (talk) 11:03, 3 July 2011 (UTC)

Blot
It is interesting that slavery was practised in 9th century Sweden (and presumably elsewhere in Northern Europe at that time), and that male slaves were sacrificed on trees (compare this practice to the sacrifice of males and male slaves on trees in Benin http://www.edo-nation.net/expedition7.htm - although this Victorian photo describes the victim as a criminal, the method was also described by the Portuguese who made first contact in the 11th century. They observed males and slaves being sacrificed in the same manner.) However, my query relates to the phrase "Male slaves and males of each species were sacrificed and hung from the branches of the trees."

Could the author please clarify what is meant by 'males of each species'? Is this referring to men of the local tribe and the male slaves taken from other local tribes, or to males from aboriginals taken from the taiga (or elsewhere) as well?

In the Benin case, the sacrifices related to the use of blood and the offering of flesh to the air spirits of the Otherworld as a means for the priest-king (the Oba) to gain the power to communicate with the Otherworld and to then draw down power from it for the benefit of himself and his people. It seems likely that the practice initially obliged the sacrifice of tribal members, but later shifted to slaves and transgressors - much as was the case with South American tribes of the same period. I conjecture that in all these cases, the situation paralleled that of king Aun's sons. Once the priests had sacrificed a critical mass of tribesmen - who doubtless went willingly in a noble cause - they were stopped by the tribespeople and an alternative source of victims was sought. Slaves taken from neighbouring tribes was the solution - no need to expend members of the god's chosen/created people when non-chosen/created and therefore non-human people were on hand, and clearly put there in readiness for such a purpose. In the case of the blot, which I assume means blood, I was wondering if one of the neighbouring Swedish tribes also happened to be aboriginals. Furthering thought (talk) 07:23, 2 December 2011 (UTC)

Odins pig
Didn't Odin also have a giant pig? Does anybody know the name of the pig?AT Kunene (talk) 09:21, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
 * I think you may be referring to Sæhrímnir, however the race of that particular animal has not been finally established it seems. --Saddhiyama (talk) 09:23, 13 March 2012 (UTC)

Indeed there was a pig called "Sæhrimner", though it did not belong to Odin in particular. Sæhrimner stood in a giantic cauldron full of boiling water, and when meat called "flæsk" was needed, it was simply cut off from it. >Luckily sæhrimner had the ability to regrow itself in a matter of mere seconds. Another particular pig is "Gyldenbørste". It's hair was made of the finest gold, and it shone like a second sun. 94.191.184.115 (talk) 14:50, 8 February 2013 (UTC)DukeJuke

Santa Claus
Regarding this semi-fringe myth, a book by one Phyllis Siefker which poses the claim that Odin is the origin of the modern Santa Claus myth is being paraphrased in the following way: "According to Phyllis Siefker, children would place their boots, filled with carrots, straw, or sugar, near the chimney for Odin's flying horse, Sleipnir, to eat. Odin would then reward those children for their kindness by replacing Sleipnir's food with gifts or candy."

I don't have access to the book in question, but is this an accurate wording? Besides the obvious questionable claims about apparently rather detailed knowledge of the activities of children during the Viking Age, I am rather sure that Norse houses at that time did not have chimneys, and the carrot wasn't introduced in Scandinavia until the 1500s, and there weren't sugar either. So the question remains whether this is an accurate paraphrasing, and if it is, does a book containing such claims really qualify as a reliable source? --Saddhiyama (talk) 17:25, 18 December 2012 (UTC)


 * I deleted the entire section, since further inspection of the claims and sources turned up several more questionable instances, for example the source Colliers Encyclopedia as citation for the claim that Sleipnir gave rise to Santas reindeer (it doesn't say anything about that), the synthesis about "a great Yule hunting party through the sky", or even the citation to the claim that Santa "largely based on Odin" is doubtful, since that book (not available in for full or snippet view to me, unfortunately) only spends a very short last chapter on the "Pagan Heritage of St Nicholas" (p. 146 out of 153 pages in total, while the rest of the book is entirely about St. Nicholas, making it dubious that such a strong claim about Odin would be made by him. --Saddhiyama (talk) 11:22, 20 December 2012 (UTC)
 * Good call. There's certainly something to be said here, but a mess like that isn't the way to do it. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 11:31, 20 December 2012 (UTC)
 * I removed that paragraph also from Santa Claus. Please take a look at Santa_Claus and see if you can use some content here. --Enric Naval (talk) 13:35, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

Wednesday
Strictly speaking, Wednesday isn't named after Odin, but rather after Woden, an Anglo-Saxon god. Both descend from the Germanic god Wodanaz, so the names are cognate, but they are distinct. Saying Wednesday is named after Woden is like saying the planet Jupiter is named after Zeus. Again, the names are cognate, but they have a distinct history.

To say the days of the week are named after Norse gods is wrong, as this states the names were taken from the names the Norsemen used for their gods, rather than from the names the Anglo-Saxons used for their gods.


 * Etymologically the names of the days of the week derives from the Anglo-Saxon names of the gods (except Saturday). Why particular gods are assigned to particular days is a different question. 24.21.130.185 (talk) 03:40, 29 March 2014 (UTC)

98.246.211.17 (talk) 18:27, 3 October 2013 (UTC)

Thursday, however, is named after Thor, a norse god. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 223.239.253.217 (talk) 13:02, 29 October 2013 (UTC)


 * Actually, the planets were named by Mesopotamians after their deities and assigned by Hellenistic astronomer Vettius Valens to the days of the week. Through interpretatio graeca, interpretatio romana and interpretatio germanica the gods were mapped to their respective counterparts in each culture. Mesopotamian Nabu (Nebo in the bible) was the point of departure for the Greek Hercules, the Roman Mercury, and the GermanicWotan/Odin; therefore it is wodensdag in old high german, woensdag in Dutch, odensdag in Swedish as well as in Norwegian, and wednesday in English.


 * Etymologically it derives from Woden and not Odin...thus explaining the 'W'...which was the point. Of course, both derive from Wodanaz, but the 'W' is lost in Norse, so if you say "Wednesday" comes from "Odin" you have to explain why the 'W' reappears. 24.21.130.185 (talk) 03:38, 29 March 2014 (UTC)


 * No, it comes from "Thunresdaeg" from "Thunor", the Anglo-Saxon equivalent of "Thor", the 'N' is dropped. The day that isn't derived from an Anglo-Saxon god is Saturday. 24.21.130.185 (talk) 03:38, 29 March 2014 (UTC)

H. A. Guerber, in his book Myths of the Norsemen; from the Eddas and Sagas, makes the suggestion that Saturday could be derived from Saturaæ, or Loki-Saturæ, the thief in ambush, one of Loki's many aspects and a patron of poor peasants. (Robin Hood?). — Preceding unsigned comment added by ÆsatruBard (talk • contribs) 14:33, 4 July 2015 (UTC)

Addition to "Popular Culture" Section
In recent weeks, I've made minor changes or additions to other Wiki articles, and some of them have been undone because those that are monitoring the pages felt they weren't needed or didn't fit the bill, even though they did. So before I take it upon myself to just add an addition to this particular section referenced above, I thought I'd check here first so as to not step on any toes. It should probably be noted that Odin was also featured in at least two episodes of Disney's Gargoyles, both of the episodes occurring during season two. The first being Season 2, Episode 36 Eye of the Storm, and the episode description actually links back to this article on Odin. The second one is Season 2, Episode 44 The Gathering (Part 1). Odin makes a brief appearance in episode 44 at the beginning, but is primarily featured in episode 36 when he comes upon the main character Goliath, to reclaim his eye which Goliath has. Goliath dons the "Eye of Odin" talisman to prevent the stranger from obtaining it, and struggles with its immense power. Aidensdaddy2k9 (talk) 04:15, 6 January 2014 (UTC)


 * By what stretch of the imagination is this noteworthy? 24.21.130.185 (talk) 03:29, 29 March 2014 (UTC)

Because he has been featured in other media. Aidensdaddy2k9 (talk) 19:33, 18 April 2014 (UTC)


 * So? I'm sure Odin, being a well-known cultural figure, has been featured in loads of other media.  We obviously aren't going to list every last appearance in other media.  What makes a single episode of Gargoyles noteworthy?  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.246.211.17 (talk) 21:56, 21 April 2014 (UTC)

Infobox
I have re-reverted the addition of an infobox to this article. Infoboxes are misleading in articles about Norse deities, because they oversimplify, and that is especially true of Óðinn, whose huge number of names indicates his complexity. His "function" has been debated by scholars for generations and cannot be summed up as if he were a Christian saint of three or four things. Even his family relationships are debatable and complex. Yngvadottir (talk) 05:03, 19 August 2014 (UTC)


 * So expand it a bit or create a better summary that people can read more about in the article text. The lead is also oversimplified, if you want to go down that road. But Zeus has an infobox, as does Ra, even Jesus has an infobox!   Montanabw (talk)  05:58, 19 August 2014 (UTC)
 * None of those are as complex as Óðinn. In fact the "god of" formulations are all modern in relation to the Norse deities; they have a better basis wiht respect to other pantheons, although I won't judge the specific cases you mention. This article is problematic in several ways, and in fact has the beginnings of a rewrite in userspace (to which I have contributed a bit); it would be better to do a complete rewrite than to tinker with the lead section, or even the lead and some other parts. But my objection to an infobox here is more fundamental. This god is simply not reducible to a few lines in an infobox, and it does both the topic and the reader a disservice to have one. It makes it seem as if Marvel's version is not far off. There is no requirement for an infobox, and in this case it makes the article worse, not better. Yngvadottir (talk) 07:23, 19 August 2014 (UTC)


 * I think that "none are as complex as Óðinn" is an insult to other major mythological deities, or at least to the scholars who study them, tough indeed, not judging the other cases is wise on all sides. One could equally argue that no god can be reduced to an infobox, but that's just getting silly.  (though I did note God doesn't have an infobox, either)  I take no position on the article overall and if someone is sandboxing a better version, I have no disagreement there. I am merely arguing for the addition of infoboxes to create consistency throughout the mythology articles.   To the non-scholar, particularly younger students, the infobox, as in all other articles where they are used (such as complex scientific articles), presents basic information in a concise way for the drive-by user.  The "infoboxes make an article worse" argument is nonsense, well over half of all wikipedia articles have them, they are a standardized feature and it is really only a matter of deciding what should go into one, the format is very useful. As far as I can tell, only the Norse mythology articles completely lack infoboxes, most other religious deity articles have them for most articles within a series. a quick glance shows me they exist for Shiva, Rama, Hera, Osiris, Nabu, Asherah, though infobox use and which infoboxes are used is not completely consistent. Perhaps you could also consider something like a side navbox as with Astarte (though that one would be improved with a photo at the outset).   Montanabw (talk)  08:04, 19 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I refer you again to the Arbcom decision that infoboxes are neither required nor deprecated. As I say, the Norse pantheon resists the reductions inherent in having such a box. The facilitation of comparisons that you see as an advantage is in fact inaccuracy, and the "drive-by user" is going to derive inaccurate information as a result; the solution from an editorial point of view is to write an adequate introduction (and article). As to the insult, I am afraid I see that the other way round: your contention is that a deity whose characteristics and relationships have been debated by scholars for well over 100 years can be easily summed up by editors seeking consistency? I will remove it yet again. I'm sorry, since the article had been edited again, I thought you had reinstated it, but you had not. Yngvadottir (talk) 15:51, 19 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I was involved with the arbcom case, and am raising this here on a case by case basis, though part of my argument is that I think project-wide consistency also has much going for it. I find your argument that somehow Norse mythology is so much more complex than any other mythology to the point that an infobox would be of no help is kind of pretentious and rather ridiculous. (Infoboxes are, by their nature, simple)  But I also will not change your mind, so I'm not going to edit war over it any more than I would do so on some of the music articles where a similar attitude prevails.  Infoboxes add a consistent look to articles and really the only debate should be what goes into them, not whether to do them or not; they should be as integral as categories and such.  But whatever.    Montanabw (talk)  03:55, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Yes, whatever. The argument for consistency to me flies in the face of the Arbcom decision; and the simplicity is problematic when instead of providing a parking place for statistics and lists (as with Olympic athletes, ships, and species) it overrides the nuanced view the article provides - and which it is our job to provide. So I am afraid we have essentially divergent points of view. Yngvadottir (talk) 06:00, 20 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Of course, keep in mind this: 1)  Your consistency argument could equally be applied within Norse mythology, why not add an infobox for Loki or Freya even if not for Odin, eh? ;-)   but also 2) While;Arbcom essentially held that projects cannot dictate local policy in defiance of overall wikipedia guidelines, Arbcom did NOT hold that project guidelines on consistency and formatting were useless or to be discounted as good advice.  3)  I find your "nuance" argument unconvincing; we could say the same for Presidents of the United States, each of which has an infobox or (even moreso) Legal Cases of the US Supreme Court...  or ... I could go on.  At the end of the day, however, though I presume you have heard all the valid arguments in favor of infoboxes elsewhere, and I have heard those against a nauseaum,  so all we have here is an ILIKEIT versus an IDONTLIKEIT debate between two people, unlikely to be resolved. Given your strong interest in the topic compared to my minor interest (Which I admit can be summed up as "I'm part Scandanavian so Norse mythology is kind of interesting, plus it's also cool that Odin has a horse"), I'll defer to you on this particular article and topic,though perhaps there is room to consider an infobox for Sleipnir?   Montanabw (talk)  04:55, 21 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Please leave the info boxes out. They're not helpful for these types of articles, and if they exist on other similar articles, then they should probably be removed; most of our articles in the realm of mythology, folklore, and religion are very poorly developed (this one, unfortunately, included). A well-written introduction functions in all ways superior to an info box. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 19:09, 21 August 2014 (UTC)
 * Infoboxes and lead sections are two entirely different things with different purposes. The lead is a summary/overview.  An infobox is a standardized data set hat provides metadata, an image, and very basic data as well as being a suitable design element for a complex article.  I'm not going to fight about it here, as I have other fish to fry elsewhere, but you throw the baby out with the bathwater to reject use of infoboxes.  Some need improved design, but they are quite useful for what they do.   Montanabw (talk)  00:06, 22 August 2014 (UTC)
 * I feel that infoboxes can be useful in this context. A good point was brought up how political figures use infoboxes such as the President of the United States. That being said, are we talking about fictional and non-fictional or are we talking about the informational representation of a person? I lean towards the latter on this case. If we look at it like that, Odin is no different than any person, and yes, it is very cool that he had a horse. It's also important to note that when depicting a person and many people, we should try to keep consistent in all things. Consistency is the best way to access information. If it's somewhere different for each person, then Wikipedia's goal of making all information accessible just got a lot harder. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Chewbakadog (talk • contribs) 00:32, 22 August 2014

Again, I reopened this topic, when I created new infobox for the article, because of course in other articles about deities are placed infoboxes, but there is a mysterious person named Bloodofox, which evidently thinks, that he is boss here and he decided, that infobox is unhelpful and he completely removed it. Evidently he obviously believes that a much better solution for the beginning of the article is only a one simple picture of a romantic 19th century painter, it is really ridiculous, surely many articles like Krishna and Vishnu have placed helpful infoboxes with mythological data, very helpful. I thinks, that he is only troll vandalising the work of others and often sabotages the development of articles, because it is far easier for him to delete than to something create. I think I'm not the only one. Dragovit (talk) 17:15, 17 september 2017 (UTC)
 * No thank you, no infobox. It's reductive and misleading (particularly for such a complex deity, where scholars have disagreed), and articles do not have to be consistent in appearance. Yngvadottir (talk) 00:59, 16 September 2017 (UTC)
 * If the deity is so complicated, it can be mentioned in the infobox. I do not see any problem here. I do not see any difference if informations are written in an infobox or text, only it's hard to find them in the text. Dragovit (talk) 08:19, 22 September 2017 (UTC)

The origine of the name Odin ?
Один (Russian) = Eдин (Bulgarian) = Единствен бог = 1 = The Only God? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 78.90.230.235 (talk) 21:12, 27 October 2014 (UTC)


 * No, it is a Germanic name. As the article says, the first part is the same as the Old Norse word óðr, hence Adam of Bremen's statement about the name, "id est furor", "that is, fury". The attested Anglo-Saxon, Old High German, and Old Saxon versions of the name have the same bit in them. The -inn element is of uncertain meaning. But resemblance to Slavic words meaning "unique" is accidental. Yngvadottir (talk) 06:13, 28 October 2014 (UTC)

"Oden" irrelevant?
I cannot understand why it would be irrelevant to add his Swedish name Oden to the top of the article. Wouldn't it be to withhold information from our readers to exclude a name used for many streets and squares and other public places in Sweden, the land of this character's probable origin? --SergeWoodzing (talk) 17:03, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * That modern Scandinavian version of his name is simply the result of sound changes. It's relevant in the section on places and things named for him, to make it clear that they are named for him and not someone with a similar name, but unless there are later texts about him using that name, comparable to the Anglo-Saxon, Old Saxon, and Old High German texts, I don't see any reason to cover it in the lede. Certainly not putative origins in any particular part of Scandinavia - his name back then was *Wodanaz and later Óðinn. Yngvadottir (talk) 17:11, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * What WP policy do you base those very authoritative opinions on, or are we all expected just to dansa efter din pipa as if you owned the article? I find the so-called "Old Norse" name forms much less relevant than a spelling widely used today in a country extremely relevant to this article. Sorry, but there is now an "Old Norse" cabal here on English WP, more and more noticeable all the time, and it has way way way to much say-so. After years of watching you guys go go go, I'm starting to put on my war paint. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 17:22, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * Wōdanaz is also the posited ancestor of Wōden (Anglo-Saxon) and Wodan (Old High German). Old Norse is simply the lingua franca of the field, and Wikipedia has articles on the different liguistic variants - which would argue against your accusation of a cabal, I would think. I'm afraid that I don't buy your argument that modern Scandinavian versions of the name of a pan-Germanic deity are important enough to be mentioned in the lede: what special association are you thinking of? In Gotland, where folks did have a special relationship to him, he was called Gautr. I've now supplied the missing statement about the posited pan-Germanic form in the body of the article. Yngvadottir (talk) 21:09, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * You cite "the lingua franca of the field", totally unknown to most readers here, and you argue what one Swedish province called him centuries and centuries ago. I want to add what he is called by millions of people of every nationality today, who travel via Odenplan & Odenplan metro station (soon to be one of Sweden's largest terminals) possiby on their way to Odensjö, or any of scores of other locations beginning with Oden--- in Denmark, Norway, Germany and other countries. WP search engine should be enough on that. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 21:32, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * As I said, that's relevant in the section on places and things named after him. My point about Gotland and Gautr was in response to your statement that Sweden is "the land of this character's probable origin", which continues to puzzle me. This is a pan-Germanic deity. And since we have articles on the different ancient local variants of his name (and possible regional variations in how he was regarded in those different places), this is in effect the article about the Scandinavian variant, for which the common factor is the material in Old Norse. So is there later material from after the sound changes had taken place that adds information about the god? Yngvadottir (talk) 21:57, 30 January 2015 (UTC)
 * You seem not to know about all the Scandinavian historians and authors through the ages who have claimed (some) and dealt with (many more, for and against) that Odin was a real historical person and that the Ynglings and subsequent Swedish kings all decended from Odin. They all also claim that tradition has it that said (possibly historical) Odin was from the Old Upsala area. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 22:13, 31 January 2015 (UTC)
 * I'd appreciate some citations, because this sounds like someone taking the Prologue to the Prose Edda too seriously, plus some confusion with Yngvi-Freyr. Also in getting you some citations to add to the article to establish that conventional form of the Proto-Germanic name, I was reminded that cognates of Odin/Woden/Wodan do not occur in Old East Norse; Dumézil is responding to that in his argument. (I note that Danish as well as Norwegian currently uses Odin.) So, citations please. Yngvadottir (talk) 05:50, 1 February 2015 (UTC)
 * My main point is this: with scores, possibly hundreds of place names in e.g. Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Germany, USA named for this character, and all beginning with Oden--- (not Odin---) it seems very weird to me that that alternative spelling should be excluded from the lede, and even completely ignored in this article. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 15:29, 1 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Not the same thing. Yes, one of the improvements this article needs is a thorough section on "Odin" placenames, ancient and modern. However, it's not true that Danish, Norwegian, and German placenames tend to use "Oden" rather than "Odin": the origins of the German placename Odenswald, for example, are debated precisely because that is not a usual form of the god's name in the Southern Germanic linguistic area. For Denmark and Norway, other than Odense, I can't find another example in a quick check, and both of those languages use "Odin" just like modern English. And returning to your earlier statement, even if it were true that there are lots of "Oden" placenames in countries other than Sweden, that would argue for that point being made in the placenames section of the article, not in the lede - you would have a stronger case for this linguistic variant being important to mention in the lede if there are indeed multiple scholars arguing that the deity can be traced to Sweden. I'm unfamiliar with such arguments, as you thought - so again, please tell us who they are. Yngvadottir (talk) 16:54, 1 February 2015 (UTC) (Edit to above: and US? like what?) Yngvadottir (talk) 16:56, 1 February 2015 (UTC)
 * "... it's not true that Danish, Norwegian, and German placenames tend to use 'Oden' rather than 'Odin'." ~ It's not possible to have a rational, constructive, worthwhile discussion with a person who twists things around like that. I've never claimed that "placenames tend to use Oden". I stated the fact that there are scores, possibly hundreds of place names in e.g. Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Germany, USA named for this character, and all of them begin with Oden---. I challenge anyone to show me that those places (not the ones named Odin---) have been otherwise named. Perhaps they are named for a Japanese meal? Please address only what I actually have written, and do not waste our time and interest with tactics that aren't getting us anywhere!
 * Re: Swedish connection, as only one example of hundreds, I quote Swedish WP on Njörðr: "Enligt Snorre var den nordiska guden Njord ursprungligen en verklig kung, sonson till Oden, son till Skjold, och far till Yngve-Frej. Uppfattningen om Njord som en historisk kung förekom ännu på 1800-talet." You may or may not be aware that many earlier writers of history have purported, without ever having been effectively refuted, that several of the Ynglings, decended from and named for Odin's great-grandson Yngvi, are buried in Old Upsala. I'm not saying that these are facts. The fact is that these stories have long been taken seriously, as I mentioned above. To my knowledge the possible actual whereabouts of a historical Odin and his decendants, have never been alleged to be anywhere else than eastcentral Sweden. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 18:16, 2 February 2015 (UTC)
 * I'm still waiting for actual citations - a reference to Swedish Wikipedia talking about the content of the Preface to the Prose Edda (or possibly about Heimskringla) - is not sufficient I'm afraid. And if you look above you will see that I already asked whether you might be thinking of Yngvi-Freyr. (Yes, I'm aware of Yngvi-Freyr and the Ynglingar. Have you noticed my user name?) I would also like to ask now for some examples of these placenames, since I failed to find the extensive use of the Swedish spelling to which you refer. As has stated, there are definitely things the article lacks, and one of them is a good placenames section, which would naturally include Oden placenames. But I don't see evidence to support your contention that that Swedish spelling rises to the level of importance to merit inclusion in the lede. Yngvadottir (talk) 18:29, 2 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Sorry! I thought you knew Swedish. Here are the facts related in Swedish Wikipedia's article about Njord: According to Snorri Sturluson the Nordic god Njord was a real king, grandson of Odin, son of Skjöldr, and father of Yngvi. The opinion of Njord as a historical king was still seen in the 19th century.
 * Re: place names, who needs Google? Here's what I did in English Wikipedia's own search field: Oden, Odena, Odenb, etc alphabetically all the way through to Odenw, looking at article names. Since we have the right to assume that there are not that many articles with falsified names on English Wikipedia, we also have the right to be convinced, unless we absolutely do not want to be convinced. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 18:47, 2 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Exactly. The Swedish article is referring either to the Prologue to the Prose Edda or to the Heimskringla. I see you've named one scholar in response to Bloodofox: Birger Nerman, who had a specific nationalistic focus concerning the Svear and the Ynglingar. It is of course by no means demonstrated that Freyr was descended from Odin: the preponderance of the texts say otherwise. Beware of accepting anything in the Prologue without at least comparing it to what is related in the other sections of the Prose Edda.


 * I made a similar search on Wikipedia itself (in Danish, Norwegian and German Wikipedia as well as English and Swedish), leading to my response above that cited Odenwald and Odense. However, I didn't find many Oden placenames, and as I said, despite Odense, modern Danish refers to him as Odin; and the etymology of Odenwald is much debated because it's in an area where one would linguistically expect an initial w if it refers to the god. In fact other than those two, the results I got were dominated by Odenplan in Stockholm. And I missed US examples entirely.


 * So, again, more names of scholars, please, and a sample list of the placenames outside Sweden to support your statement there are scores or hundreds. I have not found many. Yngvadottir (talk) 18:59, 2 February 2015 (UTC)
 * You're not even reading half of what I wrote - what's the use? - and now you're acting like I agree with Snorri and Nerman. In fact I wrote exactly the opposite, that I do not believe those stories to be facts. That's not the issue, the fact that those stories were believed for a very long time is. And the fact that nobody, as far as I know, has ever claimed that Odin and his decendants lived anywhere else but Upland.
 * But if you're going to continue to twist everything around, I'll have to find you hopeless to discuss this with and just stop replying.
 * In closing, since you're not interested, I have now counted the number of English WP articles about place names beginning with Oden-- which I claim have been alleged (note! alleged) to be named for Odin. There are 43, as per WP seach field. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 19:14, 2 February 2015 (UTC)
 * That's a higher number than I expected, but it and the name of one scholar are the only specifics I've seen you adduce. I'm afraid that rather than not reading, I'm simply not convinced that this spelling merits inclusion in the article outside a section on placenames. Yngvadottir (talk) 19:38, 2 February 2015 (UTC)
 * "Specifics" for what? Are you asking me to give you citable reliable sources here, and if so for what? Reliable sources are for article text, not at all required in talk page discussions. Anything, including WP:OR is admissible on talk pages in a constructive attempt to convince other reasonable editors and reach reasonable consensus. That's what we do on talk pages. I have done what I can to that end, but had no respect from you of any kind for that effort.
 * 1. All those place names beginning with Oden--- and named for Odin in the Swedish name form Oden, some of them in the United States, exist.
 * 2. Of the scholars and other writers who in times past have claimed or addressed very popular stories, known worldwide, that Odin was a historical person, not one has ever mentioned any other location than Old Upsala, Sweden, as the place where his descendants were buried.
 * 1. & 2. make the name form Oden much more important to this article than any of the "Old Norse" stuff only known to, and only appreciated by, "Old Norse" fan(atic)s and experts.
 * Nuff said. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 13:42, 3 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Your unsupported assertions do not serve to convince me, I am afraid; for one thing, my OR conflicts with yours, for another, the combativeness in your opposition to the citation of Old Norse - the language in which the vast majority of the material is preserved, and which readers need in order to look up and appreciate secondary sources, undercuts your argument. I can't speak for others, of course, and I do thank you for providing one name and outlining your method of arriving at the number of Oden placenames you assert. Yngvadottir (talk) 16:22, 3 February 2015 (UTC)

Third Opinion- *UPDATE*: It was brought to my attention that my views about "Oden" Specifically was unclear to at least one party. "(or any other names for that matter)" was meant to clarify my position on that. I'll make my position on that specific issue clear right here. I don't believe "Oden" should be included in the lead. While it has a place in the body of the article, per MOS:FORLANG it is a foreign spelling and I wouldn't say that it is closely related/associated enough or would help an English reader identify the entity in this article/topic. I would encourage info to be added about "Oden" to the body of the article. This is especially needed if the consensus ends up going the other way and it is included in the lead. Notification — Lightgodsy  (TALK CONT ) 06:24, 1 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Notification of WP:3O. — Lightgodsy (TALK CONT ) 05:36, 31 January 2015 (UTC)

Ongoing Article Rewrite
I would like to point out that this article has been flagged for a rewrite for a long time (since 2012) and it certainly still needs one. The ongoing rewrite handles matters of etymology and eponymy much more extensively.

On the new article, there's certainly room for us to discuss sound change through the medieval period in regions where this occurred with the theonym, like Sweden. There are some interesting things that can be said about Oden being used as a synonym for 'the devil' during the medieval period, for example. However, I don't think every form of the name should be in the lead. I think it makes more sense to keep the names in the lead restricted to their earliest attested forms in the respected regions where the attestations appear, including Old Norse. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 04:22, 2 February 2015 (UTC)
 * So you feel it's absolutely necessary that the readers of English Wikipedia should not be informed in this article about the Swedish name form Oden for which so many place names there and elsewhere begin with Oden---? They should absolutely not be thus informed, even though, according to Snorri Sturluson and historians like Birger Nerman, both of whom were believed for centuries and decades, respectively, the only known actual decendants of Odin are buried in Old Upsala, Sweden? --SergeWoodzing (talk) 18:27, 2 February 2015 (UTC)
 * That's a lot of bold print and italics, and an unnecessary raising of the stakes. Drmies (talk) 22:09, 4 February 2015 (UTC)
 * And that comment is relevant how, in constructively trying to improve the article, which is what this page is for? --SergeWoodzing (talk) 21:44, 5 February 2015 (UTC)
 * You're not being constructive, and your behavior is deplorable. That's what. Play nice and be respectful and you won't see me again. Drmies (talk) 02:03, 6 February 2015 (UTC)
 * I'm surprised that you, as an admimistrator, do not know or care that a personal attack and threat like that belongs on my talk page, if anywhere. This page deals with an article, Odin, not with me. So police me elsewhere, if you please!
 * My use of bold print and italics, aside from being entirely within WP guidelines for such use, occurs only when what I've written without them is completely ignored, once or several times, by others discussing only what they please to discuss. Which doesn't make for much of a discussion, does it?. If you'd even read this discussion, you would probably have seen that and possibly not have attacked me. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 13:44, 7 February 2015 (UTC)

Óður
Óðin is a name from Óðreri, that is the first drink that he drank from Gunnlöð. The name Óður is not related to the word furry, but it is related to words on worship by resiting praise and such. see: http://asatru.is/troll-jotnar-hrimthursar-dvergar — Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.220.121.185 (talk) 16:22, 19 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Óður is the modern Icelandic spelling for the name Óðr. Adam of Bremen glossed óðr and hence Óðinn as furor (usually translated "fury" in English, but "frenzy" may be more accurate). Óðrerir is clearly related, but how is debated. (I'm not sure what you mean by "resiting", but I'm assuming you mean "fury" rather than "furry"). For more, see the references in the article - although we do need to say more about the etymology. Yngvadottir (talk) 20:21, 19 February 2015 (UTC)

Rewrite Launched
Hello! I have now launched the ongoing rewrite of the Odin article(s) into the live space. This talk page was getting a lot of traffic over issues that the new article either solves or can solve, and I therefore figured it was time to finally make where we're on the rewrite live. Like the rewrites that I produced for Thor, Freyja, valkyrie and many of the other Germanic mythology articles on Wikipedia, this new article is based on Good Article criteria and thus every claim is referenced to an academic source and presented in a neutral manner. This is a crucial article for understanding Germanic mythology and should continue to expand exponentially. The previous article was full of poorly referenced original research with unfortunate referencing practices (where references existed at all).

Strangely, there also existed two other articles covering the god that were nearly duplicates of one another, one consisting almost entirely of an extensively discussion regarding the etymology of the theonym. However, this situation is now resolved as those topics can be found here as well. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 16:19, 20 February 2015 (UTC)


 * Nice to see this editor is still wreaking havoc on Germanic topics.
 * Whenever you see articles divided into "Attestations" and "Theories" h2 sections, you'll know what happened.
 * Last time I checked, this division was not recommended for "good articles".
 * I have kind of given up hope this problem will go away on its own, so I suppose the occasional deep revert will be needed. --dab (𒁳) 17:12, 4 March 2015 (UTC)


 * So this guy is still around. And apparently still willing to resort to silly and impotent passive-aggressive comments. He's been doing this periodically for around ten years now. I guess there's just always going to be this guy and those like him lurking on Wikipedia with vague complaints.


 * Meanwhile I'm pleased to say that, despite those who exist here solely to obstruct or troll talk pages, we (myself and other editors that care about the quality of these articles) have rewritten nearly every Germanic deity article on Wikipedia over the past several years, bringing them up from poor speculation, random theory presented as fact, and blatant misinformation to entirely academically sourced summaries of their topics, including attestations separated from interpretation sections.


 * But I get it because I've heard it before; certain users would prefer to place personal, often ill-informed content like, say, etymological speculation, for many paragraphs without being called on it. It's hardly worth responding to at this point, but pet theories and pig-pen style of editing still result in incomprehensible piles of WP:SYNTH, and it doesn't help when a user—in this case Dbachmann—is consistently poorly read in this area (the resources are out there). I recommend a personal blog for these impulses. References and not half-baked opinions are the order of the day and anything to the contrary will be reverted. This is how articles progress, and this is how we've gotten beyond this article being tagged for a rewrite for around 3 years. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 20:36, 4 March 2015 (UTC)


 * Then why is most of the content about etymology that used to be in Wōdanaz missing here, even if it was sourced to impeccable academic citations? For example, Schaffner's article (while in German, but this shouldn't matter) is recent and specifically treats the etymology of the theonym, but no mention is made of it or the alternative reconstruction *Wōdunaz which he proposes. That's not a merger, that's willful deletion of good content and impoverishment of Wikipedia's coverage. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 19:51, 18 April 2015 (UTC)


 * It wasn't a merge, it was a total rewrite from scratch to remove all personal interjections and make sourcing clear. And that's because the material that was sourced was mixed in an entanglement of personal opinion and synthesis. Not good. As a result, it was simply rewritten with Orel, a standard work in the field. If you want to add content, you're welcome to. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 02:12, 19 April 2015 (UTC)


 * , rather than launching an edit war over half a year later, I recommend that you state your case here. As it stands, you're simply restoring the old poorly written (and poorly researched) pile of WP:OR and WP:SYNTH that this article was written to replace and, inexplicably, linking to it here at this article's better-sourced etymology sectioni. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 17:04, 7 January 2016 (UTC)


 * There is a ton of stuff over at Wōdanaz that's completely ignored here, including, but by far not limited to, Schaffner's take on the etymology, which I had added myself; this article does not even mention the competing reconstructions *wōdinaz and *wōdunaz and the forms they're based on; I considered adding at least a short summary of Schaffner's argument in this article, but then realised it (in order to be understandable) would have to go far too much into details that would overwhelm the general reader and this article, and are therefore better suited for a separate article (which addresses a more specialised audience, such as professional and hobby linguists, people more deeply interested in Germanic paganism, mythology and religion, etc.). Which, of course, already exists. If that separate article sucks because it contains unreliable material, just trim and improve it. --Florian Blaschke (talk) 17:20, 7 January 2016 (UTC)


 * Unfortunately, the reality of the situation is that most people have no clue about basic aspects of historical linguistics. In fact, I think most people simply have no idea that linguistics is a science at all (my own experience has been that people assume that it means one has simply studied a particular language). I wouldn't worry about what people can and cannot handle here—just add what needs to be added. As for the redirected article, its primary issue is that it was basically just a series of odd personal essays. It wasn't an article focused on etymology, rather it was an article left over from a series of strangely divided articles that the unified article replaced. A wouldn't object to a connected article dedicated solely to etymology on Wikipedia (which I recommend simply calling Odin (etymology) rather than using the conventional Proto-Germanic reconstruction), but to avoid the issues that plagued the previous article, I think that a new, etymology-focused article would really need to be rewritten from the ground up, without material from that redirected article. If you're up to the task, you have both my praise and my help. You're also welcome to just add to the etymology section here until it gets too big and we have to spin it off. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 19:33, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Too much bold in lede?
Is this article trying to set a WP record for the greatest amount of name varieties in bold type in it's lede? Look ridiculous to me. --SergeWoodzing (talk) 20:39, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Compare some of the cities in the Balkans and the Baltic states. It's a reflection of how many things redirect here. And actually no, it doesn't look excessive to me. There are six, and rather than being crammed together they all have explanations. Yngvadottir (talk) 21:40, 23 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Is anyone else interested in this article? --SergeWoodzing (talk) 11:52, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Note: I had to decline the WP:3O post due to lack of thorough discussion per the instructions. 3O is only for disputes between two editors where both sides have thoroughly discussed the issue first. Good day, Ugog Nizdast (talk) 14:11, 24 February 2015 (UTC)

3O Response: As it cost me nothing to provide an opinion, I will respond. I see the bold in the lede as being used consistently, and thus it looks acceptable; however, to improve it a section of alternate names for Odin could be used. The only real issue I see in the lede is that it is far too large to be concise. Consider taking some of the detail out of the lede, and the bolding could be reduced without negative impact. ScrapIronIV (talk) 14:15, 24 February 2015 (UTC) ScrapIronIV (talk) 14:15, 24 February 2015 (UTC)
 * Thank you! --SergeWoodzing (talk) 11:12, 25 February 2015 (UTC)

Odin's Eye
There seems to be no mention of which eye Odin sacrifices to drink the Water of Wisdom. I was taught that it was his RIGHT eye. Can anybody shed some light on this? ÆsatruBard (talk) 14:40, 4 July 2015 (UTC)
 * Whether the eye was Odin's right eye or Odin's left eye isn't provided in source texts. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 17:00, 7 January 2016 (UTC)

Vanic deities
The article says:
 * "More radically, both the archeologist and comparative mythologist Marija Gimbutas and the Germanicist Karl Helm argued that the Æsir as a group were late introductions into northern Europe and that the indigenous religion of the region had been Vanic."

Does anyone know where to find more on this at Wikipedia? I found this website, bit I'd like to know more. Somebody can help me here? Joshua Jonathan  -  Let's talk!   08:08, 18 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Vanir, it is.  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   09:31, 18 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Joshua Jonathan I also found this: Sister-wife of Njörðr. – Corinne (talk) 23:55, 22 November 2016 (UTC)
 * You might take a look at Æsir–Vanir War, specifically the "Proto-Indo-European basis" subsection. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 00:18, 23 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks! And surprisingly; Gimbutas idea of traces of "Old Europe" makes sense intuitively; I read about Freya and Freyr for the first time only a couple of weeks ago, and was immediately reminded of the Earth Mother Goddess / Sky Father God death-and-resurrection myths, which fit with pre-IE mythology. Well, it's more complex then than intuition would say. Thanks!  Joshua Jonathan   -  Let's talk!   05:21, 23 November 2016 (UTC)

Vendel Era Plate Caption
The text body currently features the observation "Vendel era helmet plates (from the 6th or 7th century) found in grave in Sweden depict a helmeted figure holding a spear and a shield while riding a horse, flanked by two birds. The plate has been interpreted as Odin accompanied by two birds; his ravens." This is illustrated with an image of one such plate with a neutral description. However, this edit was recently made that positively identifies the image as Odin and his accompanying animal companions:. While some scholars have interpreted this object as Odin and his ravens, it's possible that depicts something else altogether. As a result, we need to keep the description completely neutral, as we do anything else. I've reverted this but it was reverted back by the same user:. I'll be reverting it once again after 24 hours (I maintain 1 RR restriction) without further discussion. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 02:41, 7 December 2016 (UTC)


 * If some scholars have identified it as Odin and some think it is "something else" then choosing not to identify it as Odin is weighing the "something else" more heavily than those who identify it as Odin. This is not remaining neutral. It seems to me that the thing to do is to present both cases. That would be remaining neutral. If we removed information because scholars could not agree there would be nothing in wikipedia at all. :) Morgan Leigh | Talk 23:45, 7 December 2016 (UTC)


 * The article contains information about how the object has been interpreted. The image simply describes the object. Stating a scholar's identification as fact is a problem. If you want to add additional information, please add it to the body next to the extant identifications. Thanks. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 04:13, 8 December 2016 (UTC)

Names in lead
Who decided that Orel should be the qualifier for what names to include in the lead? It was probably an attempt to keep the list from getting out of hand, but doing so at random isn't a solution. The Manual of Style is pretty clear about this anyhow:
 * MOS:FORLANG: If the subject of the article is closely associated with a non-English language, a single foreign language equivalent name can be included in the lead sentence, usually in parentheses. ... Do not include foreign equivalents in the lead sentence just to show etymology. Do not boldface foreign names not normally used in English.
 * The first half was followed well. The article is closely associated with Norse mythology and applicably starts with "Odin (from Old Norse Óðinn)". But that's when it goes wrong. Various other Germanic names (out of many) are shown only to conclude that they all stem from *wōđanaz (which is reconstructed and therefore not even an actual word). Whether or not this was done just to show etymology isn't the only issue; they're also not normally used in English and therefore shouldn't be included either way.


 * WP:LEADCLUTTER: ... if there are more than two alternative names, these names can be moved to and explained in a "Names" or "Etymology" section; it is recommended that this be done if there are at least three alternate names, or there is something notable about the names themselves. Once such a section or paragraph is created, the alternative English or foreign names should not be moved back to the first line.
 * And this is assuming that the words are "alternative names" in English, which they aren't. As there are currently 6 bold words in the lead that aren't "Odin", this would definitely apply.

"Óðinn" is the only bold alternative name that should be included in the lead. Bataaf van Oranje (Prinsgezinde) (talk) 10:29, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

Edith Hamilton
How is she supposed to be a "poor source"?Music314812813478 (talk) 05:44, 15 July 2017 (UTC)


 * The 1942 Edith Hamilton book you keep adding, Mythology, is a poor source. Despite its title, the book consists primarily of outdated discussion on Greek myths with  a small section (and somewhat inexplicable) chapter on Norse myth at its end. Hamilton was not a Germanicist but a Classicist. Germanicists, Indo-Europeanists, and other academics deeply versed in Germanic studies do not simply consider Odin a "sky father". Why? The situation is complex. There's a long history of academic debate over whether Odin developed under the influence of *tiwaz, the Germanic extension of the Proto-Indo-European 'sky father'. Yet Tyr, the Old Norse extension of *tiwaz, appears in the Old Norse record in a somewhat shadowy role. To flatly state that Odin is a "Germanic sky father" is inaccurate and misleading. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 17:07, 15 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Alright, Never mind then.Music314812813478 (talk) 08:03, 16 July 2017 (UTC)


 *  I'm interested in this topic, but have no opinion one way or the other on this issue. I'm wondering if you would be so kind as to clarify your second-to-last sentence, "Yet Tyr appears on recorded." Perhaps a typo, but I'd like to understand what you mean. Thanks. – Corinne (talk) 14:17, 16 July 2017 (UTC)


 * — Sorry, that was a typo. I've since corrected it. Hopefully it makes more sense now. :) &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 01:12, 17 July 2017 (UTC)

Not Encyclopedic
In the Archeological Record section, the following statement is not encyclopedic: " ...and it does not seem unreasonable to connect with Odin in..." It is not our place to give this opinion. I'm not sure, though, what we should say in its place. While we are at it the word used earlier in the section "modernly" is not really a word in English, but again I am not sure what to say.

IceDragon64 (talk) 14:44, 30 December 2017 (UTC)
 * After digging into this, I note that the sentence you mention ("...it does not seem unreasonable...") begins with "According to Davidson". The sentence seems reasonably unambiguous to me, but we can of course adjust the sentence further to eliminate the potential if needed. &#58;bloodofox: (talk)

WP:ENGVAR
I noticed that in this old version the article was first written in British English ("grey", "artefact"). Per MOS:RETAIN it ought to have been left in that version unless there was a good reason to change it. Was there? At the moment the article contains both versions, which is unsatisfactory. If there was no objection here I would standardise it on UK English. --John (talk) 20:18, 24 January 2018 (UTC)
 * Support the above. 104.169.39.45 (talk) 22:54, 24 January 2018 (UTC)

Recent edits
, what's with insisting on repeatedly inserting this this ungrammatical edit? And why are you holding up the German and French "versions" of this article as some kind of example? They're both terrible. Additionally, you bring up List of names of Odin, which is also horrible. It needs a total rewrite to bring it up to standard (compare the far superior list of valkyries and list of names of Freyja).

This article's lead is already plenty long, and adding discussion about the scholastic discourse around sources referring to Odin as all father only draws it other further. Eventually, we'll need a section in the body discussing why difference sources describe Odin as they do, but in the mean time these edits are the opposite of helpful. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 22:45, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

Construction of Homosexuality
Searching this title, it appears to be cited 54 times on Wikipedia right now. This widespread usage made me initially assume it would be a reliable source, but I came across something in this 2008 book which raises strange claims about Odin which are not reflected in this article. From https://books.google.ca/books?id=2pw-CgAAQBAJ&pg=PA248
 * It stands for the essence of the male individual. Special powers are ingested by acquiring the semen of someone who already has these powers.
 * Because Odin was heterosexually active, he was in danger of depleting his semen, the source of his powers, and therefore he had to replenish his supply from time to time. The myths tell us that he did this by visiting corpses hanging from gallows. On these visits Odin drank the semen ejaculated by the hanged men.
 * As an Aesir who could change his shape (usually into that of an animal),” and who gained arcane knowledge by swallowing semen, there was only a small step to changing sex and playing a female role in homosexual encounters. Moreover though Odin was a war god he fought with magic rather than physical prowess and thus had nothing to lose from feminization. His followers, who fought with muscle and magic, did.

Have any publications espoused views like this prior to David F. Greenberg? I hadn't heard of them until now. Has anyone published criticisms of these assertions? Or agreements? I'm wondering if it is a controversy of any notability. I have no idea what "myths" Greenberg is referring to here. Are there any disputes about how to translate the meanings of certain phrases related to this? The claim about "corpses hanging from the gallows" and what Odin did in relation to them seems like something which might not be accepted by certain Odinists. ScratchMarshall (talk) 06:59, 26 June 2018 (UTC)


 * As far as I'm aware no, the claims seem to be utter bogus. The Poetic and Prose Eddas along with other sources of information from the period when the Norse pagan faith was still practiced does not have any information on this. Nikolai Gennadievich Nazarov (talk) 03:29, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

Wōdanaz, Woden, Oðin, and nuance
I don't think every manifestation of Wōdanaz should be lumped together under the name "Odin". There's a huge misconception in the public mind that Norse mythology is a standalone thing, rather than a branch of a larger Germanic mythology. This misconception is so prevalent that often when people encounter instances of non-Norse Germanic paganism, they immediately assume it must somehow trace back to the Norse. One example of this is how so many websites out there claim the English days of the week are named after "Viking gods". Wikipedia should help fight this ignorance, not perpetuate it. An encyclopedia should not trade accuracy and informativeness for a tiny bit of convenience.

The solution is simple: whenever this article strays from the Norse version of Wōdanaz, it should use culture-appropriate names, and let the reader know the article has temporarily left the realm of Norse mythology and stepped into a sister mythology. It's a little bit of work, but goes a long way towards untangling a persistent misconception. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Blodcyning (talk • contribs) 23:48, 4 December 2018 (UTC)
 * The primary issue here is that in the Anglosphere, including in academia, Odin refers to the entire complex. Additionally, referring to branch-specific can also be misleading, particularly when we're talking about interpretatio. If we need to be more specific, let's do it, but we need to keep the aforementioned in mind. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 00:13, 5 December 2018 (UTC)
 * It might be traditional and commonplace to conflate Norse mythology with Germanic mythology, but it's still inaccurate. Scholarship should move towards more accuracy. What's there to lose? I don't really get your interpretatio objection. Like, if we want to talk about Tacitus referring to Wōdanaz as Mercury, we can simply say Wōdanaz like I just did. I don't see how that's misleading. Blodcyning (talk) 16:57, 8 December 2018 (UTC)


 * It rather depends which part of "academia" you're coming from, as to whether anybody would sanction the idea that "Odin" refers to the entire complex. A scholar considering the Woden concept in the early Anglo-Saxon period would more likely use the term "Odin" to refer broadly to the "Oðinn" of later Viking-age conceptualizations. They would be differentiating between divergent (though ontologically related) mythologies which had evolved in different ways, and had accrued distinct stratifications of meaning, in different horizons of time and place. The scholarly question would be how to identify the attributes likely to have been understood in a given context, stripping away the nuances and accretions which did not belong to that time or place, rather than lumping them all together - and especially avoiding or unpicking the contamination of ideas based on later reinventions or recapitulations. In my opinion Blodcyning is right, but doesn't go far enough. The danger is not merely of slipping into a false confusion of cultural horizons, but of going the whole James Frazer and "rediscovering" (in fact, newly imagining) a primal and eternally recurrent Odin agglomerated and justified, in an unscholarly way, out of the fragments of diverse ancient systems of thought and experience. Really there should be separate articles in Wikipedia for Wodanaz, Woden and Odin. And, for that matter, Wotan. It is not merely that the subject is large and important enough to warrant it: it is necessary, in order to escape from a false synthesis. Eebahgum (talk) 09:30, 17 February 2019 (UTC)
 * All major academic sources on this topic, such as Lindow and Simek's handbooks, refer to the deity as "Odin" when referring to the complex as a whole. This response (and the response above) appear to be rooted in some kind of criticism of academic works, but this isn't the place for it. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 11:45, 17 February 2019 (UTC)

Infobox (redux)
I fail to understand your problems with adding the deity infobox. I think they're pretty useful and I don't agree with your reasoning that they're misleading or inadequate to Norse mythology articles. They provide a quick and concise review of the main information that's sometimes hard to find within the article. That's a problem specially with the Norse mythology articles, that are some of the hardest mythology articles to read (I'm an historian, I know what I'm talking about) and often fail to mention information. For example, not all of Odin's children are mentioned in the article, which is good data to help people investigate further. Also the reductionism argument doesn't hold. The "complexity" of Norse deities can be applied to any mythological deity of some importance, at least within the European/Mediterranean world. It's not an unique feature of Norse gods.

Infoboxes are an useful tool. They are not the article and they don't reduce its quality. On the contrary, they provide basic useful information in an standardized manner. They don't prevent people from reading the article. They help people to see if the article is useful for them to read or not. There is a reason mythology pages use them, apart from creating consistency. I think the issue should be reconsidered. Flordeneu (talk) 16:22, 2 June 2020 (UTC)
 * If you were familiar with these topics and the subject of folklore studies more broadly, you'd be well aware that folklore changes over time and narratives and other details in the Germanic corpus often vary by source. That includes topics like Odin's sexual partners or progeny. Most of Wikipedia's entries on myth-related topics are unfortunately very poor, but it happens that our coverage of Germanic mythology is in a much better state than much of what the site offers to date. Infoboxes are great for, say, car models, but they are not great for describing the development and questions surrounding a deity and its extensions over thousands of years. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 19:31, 2 June 2020 (UTC)


 * I'm familiar with them. Like I said, I'm an historian and mythology and folklore are also a source of information. However, none of the arguments you list holds up.


 * 1) The changes in narrative and details according to sources is not an unique trait of Germanic mythology. They happen in any mythology with a corpus of sources big enough. They're even worse is mythologies with bigger corpus than Germanic mythology has.
 * Yes, there are myth articles in Wikipedia of questionable quality, but I disagree with your affirmation that all the Germanic mythology articles are better. Some are, yes. Many are very well sourced, that's true. Sources are explained extensively and in detail. However, they're also often difficult to read, while not mentioning or explaining important facts about the subject. For example, here most of Odin's children are not mentioned, not even to explain those changes or differences by sources you pointed out. The valkyries are just mentioned twice. Valhalla once.
 * 1) The fact that a subject is complex doesn't mean some basic information couldn't be distilled for non-experts. Like I said, infoboxes are a tool. They provide a basic review about the subject. It's not their job to explain the history or development of the subject. That's what the article is for. It is their job to give a quick overview and help people decide if its a topic they want/need to read. They do not detract the article of its quality, on the contrary, they add value to it.


 * Flordeneu (talk) 22:34, 2 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Then you'd do well to spend more time with some introductory texts on the topic of folklore studies. Again, deities aren't car models, comic book charaters, or cereal brands with readibly list-able "stats" or straightforward "archs" or whatever. These articles—easily the finest mythology articles on the site—are written about topics unfamiliar to most readers, and we can expect they'll be tough for many to engage with.


 * That doesn't mean we can't work to package this material in a more friendly manner. That said, a baseball card-like infobox is not going to help readers, but only confuse them further. There are fundamental concepts that readers must understand to make sense of these topics, just like in any other field, and misleading or misinforming readers doesn't help. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 00:16, 3 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Lose the patronizing tone. It only makes you sound arrogant and conceited. Worse, you're making it sound like nobody could understand Germanic mythology without a doctorate in Folklore studies.


 * That said, that a topic is unfamiliar doesn't means it has to be tough to engage with. There are a lot of articles about difficult topics that are quite approachable without losing any quality. And, once again, I disagree with the usefulness of the infobox. A correctly-crafted infobox would not me misleading or misinforming, but very useful for a quick basic review of the topic. And note that I'm saying "basic" and "correctly-crafted". That's the purpose of an infobox. Nobody is going to take an infobox like a Holy Grail. Something is too complicated for the infobox? Don't add it, but that doesn't mean that other useful information couldn't go into it. Flordeneu (talk) 03:04, 3 June 2020 (UTC)


 * The "I'm a historian" credential mongering requires a response, and that response is: Myth is a genre of folklore, and folklore specialists are folklorists. An infobox that repeats the first few sentences of the lead paragraph doesn't sound helpful. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 04:06, 3 June 2020 (UTC)


 * 1) Mongering???? I was just explaining that I wasn't assessing the article's difficulty to read as someone who doesn't understand the difficulty of the field and was expecting the easy entry of a mainstream book. I know it's a complicated field, but the article is still hard to read. That's all. I don't know whatever else you understood.


 * 2) Folklorists may be folklore specialists but they don't hold an exclusivity on mythology. Mythology is a genre used by other fields of humanities whose specialists may need to know about it almost as much as a folklorist does. You can't explain the history of a civilization without understanding their beliefs, the way they were expressed and how they shaped their society. Or explain their art, their literature or their philosophy. Their/our knowledge may be limited to a few cultures instead of the broader field a folklorist may study, and our way to approach it may be different, but that doesn't mean we don't know what we're talking about. Ever heard about interdisciplinary studies?


 * 3) If you think an infobox just repeats a few sentences, you don't understand infoboxes at all. Flordeneu (talk) 17:49, 3 June 2020 (UTC)


 * One issue, shared with other articles on Old Norse mythology, is that the article bears the name of the ON god Óðinn but encompasses other Germanic reflexes of *Wōđanaz. The argument against infoboxes then becomes self-circular as you cannot encompass several different gods, even stemming from a common proto-type, within a single infobox. I would argue for the creation of an article *Wōđanaz, serving the same purpose as the article *Frijjō or *Fraujaz. Alcaios (talk) 18:00, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Scholars discuss these topics in context of the broader body—none of them exist(ed) in a vacuum. It sounds like you're aiming to build articles around infoboxes.


 * Both of those articles should really just redirect to Frigg and Freyr rather than an arbitrary reconstruction. There's nothing to say about them that can't be said in the etymology sections of said articles. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 18:40, 3 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Then Jupiter, Zeus and Dyaus should be merged into a single article, and Dyeus should not exist at all if we follow your reasoning. Alcaios (talk) 18:46, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
 * As you know, Greek, Latin, and Vedic are separate Indo-European branches. Were those articles more developed, they'd discuss the development of said entity within each branch rather than presenting some kind of notion of stasis. Unfortunately, they're currently a mess. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 18:52, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Then take Auseklis and Aušrinė as a better example, two Baltic deities stemming from Proto-Baltic *Aušra. Or merge Jove, Diūs (Fidius) Diāna and Dīs Pater, since those are all Latin deities stemming from PIE *dyeu ('sky'). You could also merge Aurvandil and Ēostre since both are Germanic deities stemming from PIE *hₐ(e)wes-. And YES, the articles Fraujaz and Frijjō are a mess, like most WP articles on historical linguistics, which is a field naturally attracting mess from both defenders and opponents of the comparative method. Alcaios (talk) 19:05, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
 * PS: there are even better examples among the Baltic and Slavic deities since Baltic and Slavic languages belong to the same Balto-Slavic branch. The provided Latin and Germanic examples are not that conclusive since they most likely do not stem from the same Italic/Germanic deity. The Auseklis–Aušrinė example still holds though. Alcaios (talk) 19:12, 3 June 2020 (UTC)
 * A separate article for Wōđanaz could be notable if there is material about the reconstruction of a proto-Germanic god with that name, like there is for reconstructed proto-Indo-European gods, but if it's really just a name it belongs in the etymology section. Ffranc (talk) 08:59, 6 June 2020 (UTC)


 * That was a thin, short conversation to get consensus. I’d have waited for more voices. Not opposing or supporting the result myself. I just want to recommend more time next time. —¿philoserf? (talk) 12:28, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * I was expecting more voices and opinions myself too, and a more constructive debate. I don't think we reached any consensus at all. Flordeneu (talk) 14:15, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

I put the infobox back. I was responding to the lack of consensus. The box should not be removed until consensus is reached. That is the expected behavior. I came to the conversation as a disinterested editor. That was my judgement. Hash it out then edit. Instead my revert was reverted. That is not the expected behavior. —¿philoserf? (talk) 21:41, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * While attempts have been made by users to add infoboxes to the article over the years, they've always been rejected. This is another example: If you want previous debates, you can find them in the history of this talk page. The problem remains the same: The infobox misleads the reader and contains misinformation, and an accurate infobox would turn into a paragraph. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 21:43, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Additionally, this push for an inofbox is coming the same editor who is pushing nonsense like this on to other articles: "Trickster god, the father of lies and deceit Personification of fire" — What is this, the 19th century? This is not improving these articles., , you might want to take a look at these. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 21:49, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * , Thank you for context. I will review history. Here is the order I saw:
 * An infobox was there
 * A short conversation that didn't look like consensus occurred
 * the infobox was removed —¿philoserf? (talk) 21:52, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * , There were no conversations about an infobox in the archives. There are this one and the one above from 2014/2017.
 * Consensus across Time appears to be no inobox. —¿philoserf? (talk) 21:58, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Adding just a little context to this for new raders trying to make sense of the discussion: The editor pushing for the addition of this infobox has been on a spree of adding infoboxes to these articles, often containing odd references to theoretical 19th century stuff or adding random facts", like descendents from whatever source. In reality, the record is not consistent—Tyr, for example, is listed as Odin's son in one source, but as descending from a jötunn in another, and we know from comparative data that, for example, *Tiwaz (predecessor to Old Norse Tyr) was in a very different conceptual place in the Proto-Germanic period or sometime before. Infoboxes on complex figures like these misinform and mislead the reader, which is why they get so much pushback. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 22:01, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Adding just a little context to this for new raders trying to make sense of the discussion: The editor pushing for the addition of this infobox has been on a spree of adding infoboxes to these articles, often containing odd references to theoretical 19th century stuff or adding random facts", like descendents from whatever source. In reality, the record is not consistent—Tyr, for example, is listed as Odin's son in one source, but as descending from a jötunn in another, and we know from comparative data that, for example, *Tiwaz (predecessor to Old Norse Tyr) was in a very different conceptual place in the Proto-Germanic period or sometime before. Infoboxes on complex figures like these misinform and mislead the reader, which is why they get so much pushback. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 22:01, 5 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Since I was pinged, I'll leave a note approving the removal of the infobox, and noting that a similar one was added at Thor right after the most recent talk page discussion on that article, which also did not endorse addition of an infobox. Infoboxes do not assist the reader in the cases of complex deities, they mislead by oversimplification at best and misstatement at worse, and I;m afraid these most recent ones, with their curiously assembled "god of X, Y, Z, a, b, c, and 1, 2, 3" are particularly misleading. A well crafted intro is a better guide. That's what we have the intro for: to summarize the article. Yngvadottir (talk) 00:18, 6 June 2020 (UTC)


 * The infobox provides some good links to related articles, but I think the navigational box at the bottom, Odin, does a better job at that. The big problem is that all these names and attributes come from a bunch of different literary works, and they clearly aren't meant to be read together as a grand, consistent family tree or inventory. An infobox that just lists everything creates the impression of some kind of logical-mathematical consistency, which is very unmythological. For the details to be meaningful, it must be clear where they are attested and in what context, and an infobox isn't a good place for that. (The navigational box doesn't have the same problem because it doesn't have any pretense of providing info - only navigation). Ffranc (talk) 08:55, 6 June 2020 (UTC)


 * , now you're resorting to personal snubs? Wow, your arguments are improving! Congratulations! Just one thing that it seems you're confused about: I'm not an infobox. What you may think of my edits it's one thing. The infobox is another. And as I said before, if don't like the content of the infobox, simply improve it. That doesn't mean the infobox by itself is not useful. Flordeneu (talk) 01:20, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
 * and, please take the personality out of the conversation. I would ask you to treat the conversation like debate on the floor of the US Senate, where they, by rule, do not refer to each other by name.
 * Let’s discuss the subject or wait and watch as others do. —¿philoserf? (talk) 04:16, 7 June 2020 (UTC)
 * Let’s discuss the subject or wait and watch as others do. —¿philoserf? (talk) 04:16, 7 June 2020 (UTC)


 * Discussing the issue is the only thing I've wanted to do from the start, but I only found a condescending attitude and personal attacks on his part. I'd be very happy to have a civilized discussion. Flordeneu (talk) 04:33, 7 June 2020 (UTC)

So, I see the way of reaching consensus here is saying nothing? Great strategy. Flordeneu (talk) 03:23, 12 June 2020 (UTC)

References/Sources
Is there a consensus here to cleanup the mixed reference style? We are very close to a clean short-footnote and source style. There are a few full inline citations mixed in. There is also one source that is not the target of a short-footnote.

What say you all? What is the style for this article? —¿philoserf? (talk) 12:32, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * The article has generally maintained a style of an endnote with an accompanying reference listed at the end. This was once unified and consistent, but it seems that editors who have since added to the article have here and there simply dumped references without acknowleding the established style. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 21:42, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * , That is nice. If that holds up as the consensus I am happy to do the work. It’d be a break from the citation error/warning fix work that brought me here initially. —¿philoserf? (talk) 21:48, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * I appreciate that, . I know it's a pain to keep these styles consistent and to deal with the formatting, etc. Whatever we end up with, I am personally happy as long as it is consistent. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 22:02, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * I would prefer that we use the sfn style for a quicker access to the source (and its url) while reading the article, if you don't see any inconvenient. Alcaios (talk) 22:05, 5 June 2020 (UTC)
 * PS: you can copy some of the citations from here. Alcaios (talk) 22:07, 5 June 2020 (UTC)

"Supreme god" or "king of the gods" (and the educational level of this article)
Why is there no discussion of Odin's status in the article?

Granted that in ancient Germanic religion it is debatable whether Wuodan was seen as some kind of leader of the gods, he does seem to be presented as such in the Icelandic Eddas, and he is inarguably, invariably presented as such in modern adaptations. When non-scholars read the name "Odin", I would bet most of them think "king of the gods" before they think "ravens" or "eight-legged horse" or "self-sacrifice" or even "one-eyed".

If this is not, in fact, accurate, not mentioning it in this article will do nothing to correct the error. This article (like many mythology-themed articles, I'm sorry to say) is a deluge of minute detail that swamps the non-scholarly reader's comprehension of the main points.

As a general rule, Wikipedia articles are supposed to be aimed at audiences one educational level below the audience that would be learning about them in class. Thus, Wikipedia articles on doctorate-level subjects should be aimed at postgraduates; Wikipedia articles on undergraduate-level subjects should be aimed at high school students.

I'm sure there are many fine points of Odin scholarship that go up to doctorate level and beyond. However, Odin as a mythological figure is, at highest, introduced to students at undergraduate level.

—VeryRarelyStable 05:00, 10 March 2021 (UTC)
 * Thanks for taking this to the talk page, . There's been a lot of discussion about Odin's role as 'head of pantheon' in sources like the Prose Edda as opposed to other sources, such as Adam von Bremen. We should have a section on this. &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 17:54, 10 March 2021 (UTC)

Odin/Wotan is Satan
I have done my own research among all pantheons of all religions, which is simmilar to the effort done in the Proto-Indo-European mythology page. And judging by common relationships across all pantheons and cultures (encompassing far more than just proto-indo-european) I safely conclude that Odin/Wotan is Satan, the god commonly associated with Saturn, who killed/castrated his father Uranus. This explains why Wotan is one-eyed, because Saturn has only one eye, in the huge vortex that dwells in its South Pole. Unfortunately, whereas Wikipedia has an article about Saturn's hexagon, it still lacks one about the Eye of Saturn, so I'll leave a link to NASA. 88.5.104.157 (talk) 18:56, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * Please take a moment to look at WP:OR. Content of this nature needs to be supported by reliable sources; our own research and analysis cannot be used to support content. Girth Summit  (blether)  19:00, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * That's why I wrote it in the talk page instead of the article. My only intent is to confirm the portions of the article that connect Odin with Saturn. 88.5.104.157 (talk) 21:11, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * First of all, insofar as Odin is identified with a planet, that planet is Mercury, not Saturn. Wednesday is mercredi, Mercury's day; Saturn's day is Saturday. Second, no-one on earth knew any of the features of Saturn until people started pointing telescopes at it. By that time, Christianity had already ousted both Germanic and Graeco-Roman religion across most of their original territories, so those features cannot have inspired any elements of the earlier mythologies. And Saturn's polar vortices were unknown until Cassini visited it within our lifetime.
 * More to the point, however, "I have done my own research and I safely conclude X" is the sort of thing people say who don't know what research is and how it works. If you were a researcher, you would have results, you would have measurements, you would have comparisons, you would have discussions of competing hypotheses and how you settled on which one was correct. You still wouldn't be able to put them in an article until you had published them somewhere else first, but you would have discussed them here.
 * —VeryRarelyStable 22:26, 22 July 2021 (UTC)
 * I made that article. Immanuelle ❤️💚💙 (talk to the cutest Wikipedian) 16:04, 30 April 2023 (UTC)

"Wotan" listed at Redirects for discussion
A discussion is taking place to address the redirect Wotan. The discussion will occur at Redirects for discussion/Log/2021 August 8 until a consensus is reached, and readers of this page are welcome to contribute to the discussion. Thespündragon 05:59, 8 August 2021 (UTC)

Shaw Odin/Wotan non-cognate and eighth-century conflation theory: establishing its sufficient notability for inclusion
(Note: Shaw's ideas and whether to cover them have had previous discussion at Talk:Germanic peoples. Yngvadottir (talk) 03:46, 23 January 2022 (UTC))

As per :'s request that I establish WP:Note for Philip A. Shaw's arguments in Uses of Wodan to justify discussion of them, here, and thereby justify restoration of my proposed edits to the article drawing upon this work. The hypothesis has been used, engaged with, and discussed in the following WP:RS, from peer-reviewed academic specialists across a range of disciplines:

Doyle White 2014, an explicit taking up and extension of Shaw's arguments to the goddess Frigg.

Harland 2019, who uses Shaw's hypothesis as part of his argument to dispute 'Germanic' interpretations of early medieval material culture and to dispute the identification of early medieval bracteates as representing Odin.

Harland 2021, p. 185, which uses Shaw's hypothesis to state, It is extremely unlikely that Wodan/Oðinn can be reliably associated with one another, or that such a deity was worshipped by cults in Anglo-Saxon England before the eighth century, as part of a broader argument rejecting that we should assume Germanic myths took the same form in late antiquity as in later early medieval high medieval evidence. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 134.2.88.124 (talk) 23:50, 22 January 2022 (UTC)

Neidorf 2022, who regarded the argument's separation of Wodan from Odinn as sufficiently scholarly and potentially challenging to his analysis of the appearance of Woden in Widsith as to require immediately addressing in the article.

Borri 2018, who describes Shaw's thesis as the 'best survey on the topic' of Woden's earliest appearance in narrative sources (p. 1), and then proceeds to explicitly use and build upon Shaw's hypothesis to consider how this extremely early appearance of Woden in a late antique literary context functioned.

Traves 2022, who much like Borri treats Shaw as the best available survey on Woden's appearance in Anglo-Saxon England

Broome 2020 makes an assessment of Borri 2018's use of Shaw's hypothesis, and the presence of Woden in Jonas of Bobbio's Vita Columbani more generally, Says (drawing on Shaw's work):

Borri hints that he believes the Alamanni actually did worship a deity called Woden, which was Shaw's assessment: Woden/Wodan was originally an Alamannic and Lombard got later adopted as an ancestor by various Anglo-Saxon royal families, and later still conflated with the Norse Oðinn. While Jonas's may be our first reference... ...what he almost certainly was not referring to was the one-eyed All-Father accompanied by two ravens and riding an eight-legged horse of later medieval mythology

Though this theory is hardly deployed or accepted by every Germanic philologist, there thus seems to be sufficient peer-reviewed uptake of, engagement with, and consideration of it from scholars of late antique and early medieval history, philology, and archaeology, and their uses of it seem by and large to involve a positive assessment of its quality, this being the case even in the one instance where the work was not agreed with.78.43.197.76 (talk) 09:01, 23 January 2022 (UTC)


 * IP, please append 4 tildes ( ~ ) to your posts on talk pages, to prevent edit conflicts with either a bot or an editor identifying who made them and when.)
 * I've noted in parentheses at the top of this section that there is previous discussion at Talk:Germanic peoples. I see there that others have noted that Shaw's etymological theory—casting doubt on Wōden/Wôdan being cognate with Óðinn—has not found scholarly acceptance. That's a relief to me. I think we should in any case make a distinction between that and Shaw's argument that the cult of Óðinn was distinct from the cults of Wōden/Wodan and that one or more forms of the god were introduced through cultural contact after Christianisation (do I have that right?) That seems to me to be the flip side of the quite old argument that the god known as Óðinn was a relative latecomer to Scandinavian heathenism, adopted from elsewhere (opinions varying between an introduction via Gothic trade, ultimately from Mediterranean or Thracian influence IIRC, I am not an Óðinn specialist) or from the western German area, where he was thought to have originally been a death figure. (The Einwanderer theory is covered in the first paragraph of our Origin, theories, and reception section. It is opposed not only by Dumézil's trifunctional theory, until recently generally accepted, but implicitly by the theory of a "bracteate religion" that gives Odin and Baldr major roles in Migration Age Germanic religion, and which I fear Wikipedia needs to cover, although it is in my view very much a minority theory.) In recent decades this has re-established itself as a widely propounded view in the modified form of regarding Óðinn as becoming increasingly prominent in Scandinavia as a correlate of increasing class stratification, with his cult being dominant among the chieftain class and this dominance being reflected in skaldic poetry produced under court sponsorship (and this relates to the presentation of Óðinn in the Prose Edda as a stand-in for the Christian deity; Terry Gunnell, "From One High One to Another: The Acceptance of Óðinn as Preparation for God", 2013). IMO this is the context in which Shaw's argument about the deity/deities might usefully be mentioned in our article. But we decided on good grounds of academic coverage as well as etymology not to have separate articles on Wōden and/or Wôdan. I don't believe any academic argues that the full panoply of attributes of Óðinn were shared identically in Anglo-Saxon England and among all the continental Germanic peoples, in fact the emphasis on chieftains and their power centres, educated and to some extent both polemicised and syncretic religion at Scandinavian heathen courts, popular religion focusing on local deities and spirits, and regional differences within Scandinavia, would make such an assertion quite remarkable. But a fundamental fact that makes many of the theories tenable is the relative lack of non-Scandinavian evidence, or even evidence concerning popular religion. (I'll shut up now.) Yngvadottir (talk) 03:46, 23 January 2022 (UTC)
 * You're in luck, Shaw's work begins with an in-depth consideration of the pre eighth-century Scandinavian evidence, including a focus upon the late antique/late Roman Iron Age bracteate material. His criticism that these bracteates can be seen as indicative of a 'bracteate religion' (iirc this is Hauck and Hauck's students) are criticisms more widely shared by opponents of culture-historical interpretations of late antique archaeology who strenuously dispute the verifiability and legitimacy of such claims, for whom I might mention Guy Halsall, Philipp von Rummel, Sebastian Brather, James Harland, Svante Fischer, Nancy L. Wicker, who are just a few I could name, who point out that the evidence for this putative religious belief is lacking, and relies upon circular and not empirically-demonstrated argumentation. In this respect Shaw fits within a long-standing and increasingly accepted scholarly tradition, whilst also making an effort to consider the limited pre-eighth-century non-Scandinavian material which exists, including what seems to be regarded by the scholars I've cited above as the best scholarly overview of our limited textual evidence for mentions of Wodan in, say, Merovingian Gaul or Lombard Italy. In this respect whilst it's certainly currently a minority theory I think I've made a case for it being one, that scholars are paying attention to and taking on board (and therefore sufficiently notable for inclusion), precisely because it uses that lack of non-Scandinavian material or absence of evidence for popular religion as important underpinnings to its premises.78.43.197.76 (talk) 09:01, 23 January 2022 (UTC)
 * The figure of Odin is probably the most widely studied (and commented upon deity) in the ancient Germanic corpus, drawing monographs and theories from the earliest layers of antiquarianism surrounding the topic. Shaw's PhD saw publication in 2002, 20 years ago. The impact of Shaw's proposal, like some of his other sweeping proposals, has been very limited, and it is one of very many other proposals about the deity's origins and diffusion that have appeared through the years. Sure, we should mention it somewhere in a history of scholarship, but we need to be wary of undue emphasis, and particularly if it's not even receiving mention in surveys like that of Schjødt ("Óðinn", 2020). &#58;bloodofox: (talk) 09:41, 25 January 2022 (UTC)
 * An striking coincidence: Shaw's theory that Odin was of Alemanic origin is being promoted by someone living in old Alemanic territory, as you can see when you check Geolocate.--Berig (talk) 09:59, 25 January 2022 (UTC)
 * The only person making assumptions about nationalism as an underlying motivation for suggesting the inclusion of scholarship is you. The allegation is especially absurd given that at no point have I attempted to suggest a singular origin for Odin (quite the opposite) and have at no point mentioned the Alemanni, Baden-Wuertemmberg, or Swabians. Bloodfox's point that it should not have undue emphasis, but at the very least deserves a mention in the history of scholarship, seems a reasonable compromise consensus to me. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2A02:908:618:CC60:9192:5CD:6ADB:72CF (talk) 11:20, 25 January 2022 (UTC)
 * The Old English weekday Wōdnesdæg (first mentioned by Byrhtferth) is a calque of Latin Mercurii dies. OHG Wōdanstag, MLG Wōdensdach, ON Óðinsdagr, OFris. Wērnisdei, and MDu. Woensdach all prove that speakers of those languages associated the very same deity (or at least local variations of this deity) to the Roman god Mercurius. Whether this god is of Proto-Germanic origin or a later import that came to be spread among early medieval Germanic peoples is another story. What can be said with certainty is that ON óðr ('mad, frantic, furious') and OE wōd ('insane, frenzied') are cognates, as attested by the earlier Goth. woþs and Proto-Norse -wōdz < PGmc wōđaz (cf. also Gaulish wāteis & Latin vātēs) Alcaios (talk) 20:20, 27 January 2022 (UTC)
 * The Old English weekday Wōdnesdæg (first mentioned by Byrhtferth) is a calque of Latin Mercurii dies. OHG Wōdanstag, MLG Wōdensdach, ON Óðinsdagr, OFris. Wērnisdei, and MDu. Woensdach all prove that speakers of those languages associated the very same deity (or at least local variations of this deity) to the Roman god Mercurius. Whether this god is of Proto-Germanic origin or a later import that came to be spread among early medieval Germanic peoples is another story. What can be said with certainty is that ON óðr ('mad, frantic, furious') and OE wōd ('insane, frenzied') are cognates, as attested by the earlier Goth. woþs and Proto-Norse -wōdz < PGmc wōđaz (cf. also Gaulish wāteis & Latin vātēs) Alcaios (talk) 20:20, 27 January 2022 (UTC)

Peter Vang Petersen
There is a reference to Peter Vang Petersen in the text, but there is no source title in the footnote. How can we fix this? Creedweber (talk) 03:48, 10 January 2023 (UTC)

the translation of Odin
is the translation of Odin really "the lord of madness"? I think it only means "the mad one". Where does "lord" come from? Carlberyeur (talk) 23:48, 12 March 2023 (UTC)


 * In Western (Possibly wider) Indo-European languages, an infix *-n- seems to have denoted mastery or lordship of something. For instance, the lord of thunder is reconstructed as being called *Perkwunos. In Proto-Germanic, the reconstructed form *Wōðanaz seems to be made out of the term for rage/frenzy/madness *wōðaz with the *-n- element added in, meaning something like the "lord of madness" 82.15.232.23 (talk) 20:44, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 2 October 2023
There is no mention in this article that Odin/Wednesday is a main character in “American Gods”, a book by Neil Gaiman and a tv series Ebond750 (talk) 19:02, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done: please provide reliable sources that support the change you want to be made. TylerBurden (talk) 20:39, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

American Gods
There is no mention in this article that Odin/Wednesday is a main character in American Gods, a book by Neil Gaiman and a tv Ebond750 (talk) 19:02, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

Semi-protected edit request on 21 October 2023
I suggest adding mention of earliest written attestation of Odin as Wōthnaz, which in the genitive form is Woðnas from Vindelev bracteate X13. Monroecodex (talk) 07:40, 21 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Red information icon with gradient background.svg Not done for now: Please provide reliable sources for your desired edit, the exact prose, and where you would like it. — Sirdog (talk) 08:09, 21 October 2023 (UTC)

"W.O.T.A.N." listed at Redirects for discussion
The redirect [//en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=W.O.T.A.N.&redirect=no W.O.T.A.N.] has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at  until a consensus is reached. TNstingray (talk) 22:35, 12 November 2023 (UTC)

Adam of Bremen Wotan
Odin is referred to as "Wotan" in the Adam of Bremen section of this article. Even the latin text has been changed to reflect this, saying "Wotan id est furor" But in the original work Adam states: "Alter Wodan, id est furor". I think the use of "Wotan" is inappropriate here and should be changed to "Wodan" at least in the latin part and Wodan/Odin in the english one. Ediable (talk) 13:03, 9 February 2024 (UTC)