[A GLANCE AT THE HISTORY AND LITERATURE OF SCANDINAVIA.]

By L. A. SHERMAN, Ph. D.

IV.—THE EDDAS: LATER SWEDISH HISTORY.

We have reserved to the last to speak of the religious books of the early Norsemen,—the Elder and the Younger Edda.

The Elder Edda, it has been often said, is the Old Testament of the Norseman’s faith. This is not because of its surpassing age, for the Younger Edda was compiled perhaps as early. The name was suggested because, in the first place, it is composed mostly in verse. It also tells the story of man’s creation, and the limit of his existence on the earth; it prophesies the final destruction of the universe and the genesis of a new heaven and a new earth. It is not a religious history of mankind in early ages; it is rather a biography of the gods, a register of their exploits and wisdom. In its present form it dates probably from the middle of the thirteenth century, but no one knows when its different parts were first composed. It consists of various distinct treatises, which were never united or considered together, until they had almost perished from the memory of the race. After the Scandinavians ceased to be idolaters, the old stories about Thor and Odin lost their charm, and were at length forgotten; only in the far off and dreary Iceland they were still told to enliven the winter evenings, and keep up the memory of life in the old Fatherland of Scandinavia. Even here they began to drop out of mind, when some quaint clerk put what he could remember of them together under the name of Edda (or “great-grandmother”). Some of the chapters are imperfect and fragmentary, showing they were caught and fixed in writing in the nick of time. There are many difficulties in the interpretation, and hints abound that the compiler took liberties with his materials and somewhat idealized his version. It was a Christian hand which copied out the legends, and here and there it wrote Christian sentiments and thought.

The oldest and most important chapter of the Elder Edda is the Völuspá, or Sibyl’s Prophecy. It is addressed to Odin, describing the meeting of the Æsir (or Northern deities), the origin of the human race, and the destruction of men and gods at Ragnarök.[C] We will here transcribe a couple of stanzas as specimens of the form of the old Norse or Icelandic original, and add a close translation:

STANZAS 66 AND 68.

Text.Translation.
66. Hittask Æsir66. The Asas meet
Á Ithavelli On the wold of Ida
Ok um moldwinur And of the earth engirdler
Mátkan dæma; Mightily judge;
Ok minnask war And call to mind
Á megindóma Their [bygone] greatness
Ok á Fimbultys And the ancient runes
Fornar runar. Of Fimbultyr.
68.Munu ósánir68. Then shall the acres
Akrarvaxa, Unsown bear harvest,
Böls mun alls batna, All ill is amended,
Mun Baldr koma; Balder is coming;
Búa weir Häthr ok Baldr Dwell Hader and Balder
Hropts sigtoptir In Hropt’s blessed dwellings
Vel valtívar. In friendship the wargods.
Vituth ér enn etha hvat? Know ye ought yet, or what?