Re: Nerthus of Germania (was: Odin the Immigrant?)

From: tgpedersen@...
Message: 10841
Date: 2001-11-01

--- In cybalist@..., "William P. Reaves" <beowulf@...> wrote:
> Hej Torsten,
>
>
>
>
> Although the Voluspa poet clearly uses Hlin as an alternate
designation for
> the goddess Frigg, a technique common in Eddic and skaldic poetry,
and
> Snorri clearly knew Voluspa, as he quotes and paraphrases it
throughout his
> work, Snorri portrays Frigg, Hlin, and Jord as seperate
personalities. One
> must ask if this is the way the ancient Germanic tribes really saw
it? An
> examination of Eddic poetry suggests otherwise.
>
> And while we are on this passage, note the name of Frigg's hall. It
is
> Fensalir, "the halls of the fen or marsh". One might ask what the
> significance of the sky-god's wife having "marsh-halls" is, unless
of course
> she were viewed as the Earth mother? Isn't this itself consistant
with the
> pattern of heiro gamos in other IE mythologies?
>
> Perhaps we can discuss this further. If so I can bring other Eddic
and
> skaldic examples to bear.
>
>
> Wassail, William
>
As far as I can tell, your reasoning makes sense. Yet another trinity.

I had something else I might add about Nerthus.

Skadi (the one in Skadin-auia > Skaney ?), the daughter of Tjasse the
giant (with Saami relations?), married Njord because he had beautiful
feet. Obviously a sex change has taken place here. This means that
Skadi was once a man (and my Old Norse grammar book, which I can't
find now, says there is something fishy about the gender of "skadi").
If he is connected to Skaane (Scandia), we could assume that Tacitus'
(and Nerthus') "island in the ocean" was Sjælland (if the "Odin"
story is right, and he was already on Fyn by Tacitus' time, it can't
have been Fyn, that wuzzy Scandinavian cult wouldn't have fit in),
and that the gender switch had to do with a reversal in the political
relations between the two areas between Tacitus' and Snorri's time
(long time span, but anyway). You might recall all the negotiations
that surrounded the first docking of an American and Russian
spacecraft; necessarily one of them had to stick something into the
other, but who should it be? And would the team that eventually did
it please refrain from comments at the docking (they didn't, of
course)?

Torsten