Teutonic Mythology: Gods and Goddesses of the Northland, Vol. 3

by Viktor Rydberg

The position of Slagfin-Gelderus to the two contending divine brothers, his brothership-in-arms with Balder, the respect and devotion he receives from his opponent Hoder, can only be explained by the fact that he had very intimate relations with the two brothers and with the mythical persons who play a part in the Balder-myth. According to Saxo, Hoder was fostered by Gevarr, the moon-god, Nanna's father. As Nanna's foster-brother, he falls in love with her who becomes the wife of his brother, Balder. Now the mythology actually mentions an individual who was adopted by the moon-god, and accordingly was Hoder's foster-brother, but does not in fact belong to the number of the real gods. This foster-son inherits in the old Norse records one of the names with which the moon-god is designated in the Anglo-Saxon poems—that is, Hoce, a name identical with the Norse Hjúke. Hnaf (Hnæfr, Næfr, Nanna's father) is also, as already shown, called Hoce in the Beowulf poem (see Nos. 90, 91). From the story about Bil and Hjuke, belonging to the myth about the mead and preserved in the Younger Edda, we know that the moon-god took these children to himself, when they were to carry to their father Vidfinnr, the precious burden which they had dipped out of the mead-fountain, Byrger (see Nos. 90, 91).

That this taking up was equivalent to an adoption of these children by the moon-god is manifest from the position Bil afterwards got in the circle of gods. She becomes an asynje (Younger Edda, i. 118, 556) and distributes the Teutonic mythological soma, the creative sap of nature and inspiration, the same liquid as she carried when she was taken up by the moon-god. The skalds of earth pray to her (ef unna itr vildi Bil skáldi!) and Asgard's skald-god, Brage, refreshes himself with her in Gevarr-Nokver's silver-ship (see Sonatorrek; cp. Nos. 90, 91). Odin came to her every day and got a drink from the mead of the moon-ship, when the latter was sinking toward the horizon in the west. The ship is in Grimnersmal called Sökkvabekkr, "the setting or sinking ship," in which Odin and Saga "daily drink from golden goblets," while "cool billows in soughing sound flow over" the place where they sit. The cool billows that roar over Sokvabek are the waves of the atmospheric sea, in which Nokver's ship sails, and they are the waves of the ocean when the silver-ship sinks into the sea. The epithet Saga is used in the same manner as Bil, and it probably has the same reason for its origin as that which led the skalds to call the bucket which Bil and Hjuke carried Sægr. Bil, again, is merely a synonym of Idun. In Haustlaung, Idun is called Byrgis ár-Gefn, "Byrger's harvest-giving dis;" Thjasse is called Byrgis ár-Gefnar bjarga-Tyr, "Byrger's harvest-giving dis, mountain-Tyr." Idun is thus named partly after the fountain from which Bil and Hjuke fetched the mead, partly after the bucket in which it was carried.

That Hjuke, like Bil-Idun, was regarded by the moon-god as a foster-child, should not be doubted, the less so as we have already seen that he, in the Norse sources, bears his foster-father's name. As an adopted son of the moon-god, he is a foster-brother of Hoder and Nanna. Hjuke must therefore have occupied a position in the mythology similar to that in which we find Gelderus as a brother-in-arms of Nanna's husband, and as one who was held in friendship even by his opponent, Hoder. As a brother of the Ivalde daughter, Bil-Idun, he too must be an Ivalde son, and consequently one of the three brothers, either Slagfin, or Orvandel-Egil, or Volund. The mythic context does not permit his identification with Volund or Egil. Consequently he must be Slagfin. That Gelderus is Slagfin has already been shown.

This also explains how, in Christian times, when the myths were told as history, the Niflungs-Gjukungs were said to be descended from Næfr, Nefir, (Nefir er Niflunger eru frá komnir—Younger Edda, i. 520.) It is connected with the fact that Slagfin, like his brothers, is a Niflung (see No. 118) and an adopted son of the moon-god, whose name he bore.

Bil's and Hjuke's father is called Vidfinnr. We have already seen that Slagfin's and his brothers' father, Ivalde, is called Finnr, Finnakonungr (Introduction to Volundarkvida), and that he is identical with Sumbl Finnakonungr, and Finnálfr. In fact the name Finnr never occurs in the mythic records, either alone or in compounds or in paraphrases, except where it alludes to Ivalde or his son, Slagfin. Thus, for instance, the byrnie, Finnzleif, in Ynglingasaga, is borne by a historified mythic person, by whose name Saxo called a foster-son of Gevarr, the moon-god. The reason why Ivalde got the name Finnr shall be given below (see No. 123). And as Ivalde (Sumbl Finnakonungr—Olvalde) plays an important part in the mead-myth, and as the same is true of Vidfin, who is robbed of Byrger's liquid, then there is every reason for the conclusion that Vidfin's, Hjuke's, and Bil-Idun's father is identical with Finnakonungr, the father of Slagfin and of his sister.

Gjuke and Hjuke are therefore names borne by one and the same person—by Slagfin, the Niflung, who is the progenitor of the Gjukungs. They also look like analogous formations from different roots.

This also gives us the explanation of the name of the Asgard bridge, Bilröst, "Bil's way." The Milky Way is Bil-Idun's way, just as it is her brother Hjuke's; for we have already seen that the Milky Way is called Irung's way, and that Irung is a synonym of Slagfin-Gjuke. Bil travelled the shining way when she was taken up to Asgard as an asynje. Slagfin travelled it as Balder's and Hoder's foster-brother. If we now add that the same way was travelled by Svipdag when he sought and found Freyja in Asgard, and by Thjasse-Volund's daughter, Skade, when she demanded from the gods a ransom for the slaying of her father, then we find here no less than four descendants of Ivalde who have travelled over the Milky Way to Asgard; and as Volund's father among his numerous names also bore that of Vate, Vade (see Vilkinasaga), then this explains how the Milky Way came to be called Watling Street in the Old English literature.[15]

In the mythology there was a circle of a few individuals who were celebrated players on stringed instruments. They are Balder, Hoder, Slagfin, and Brage. In the heroic poems the group is increased with Slagfin-Gjuke's son, Gunnar, and with Hjarrandi, the Horund of the German poem "Gudrun," to whom I shall recur in my treatise on the heroic sagas. Balder's playing is remembered by Galfrid of Monmouth. Hoder's is mentioned in Saxo, and perhaps also in the Edda's Hadarlag, a special kind of metre or manner of singing. Slagfin's quality as a musician is apparent from his name, and is inherited by his son, Gunnar. Hjarrandi-Horund appears in the Gudrun epic by the side of Vate (Ivalde), and there is reason for identifying him with Gevarr himself. All these names and persons are connected with the myth concerning the soma preserved in the moon. While the first drink of the liquid of inspiration and of creative force is handed to Odin by Mimer, we afterwards find a supply of the liquid preserved by the moon-god; and those mythic persons who are connected with him are the very ones who appear as the great harp-players. Balder is the son-in-law of the moon-god, Hoder and Slagfin are his foster-sons, Gunnar is Slagfin's son, Brage becomes the husband of Bil-Idun, and Hjarrandi is no doubt the moon-god himself, who sings so that the birds in the woods, the beasts on the ground, and the fishes in the sea listen and are charmed ("Gudrun," 1415-1418, 1523-1525, 1555-1558).

Both in Saxo and in Galfrid Hoder meets Slagfin with the bow in his conflict with him (Cheldricus in Galfrid; Gelderus in Saxo). The bow plays a chief part in the relation between the gods and the sons of Ivalde. Hoder also met Egil in conflict with the bow (see No. 112), and was then defeated, but Egil's noble-mindedness forbade his harming Slagfin's foster-brother. Hoder, as an archer, gets satisfaction for the defeat in Saxo, when with his favourite weapon he conquers Egil's brother, Slagfin (Gelderus), who also is an archer. And finally, with an arrow treacherously laid on Hoder's bow, Volund, in demoniac thirst for revenge and at Loke's instigation, takes the life of Balder, Hoder's brother.