Nart stuff

Comment on Saga 28
'Wardana and Chwindizh Dwell in the White-Haired Forest' in
'Nart Sagas from the Caucasus'
"
This is a consolidation of two sagas, Hadaghatl'a 1970, vol. 7, no.
650,167-68, in Bzhedukh West Circassian (mislabeled as Shapsegh); and
no. 651, pp. 168-70, in Shapsegh.
() I discuss the full significance of these sagas elsewhere (see
1984b). These two sagas are an excellent example of the vital
importance of vestigial or marginal material. Only two short tales in
the entire seven-volume Circassian corpus refer to Nart Wardana or
Wadana. Nevertheless, these two fragments throw light on far-reaching
cultural relationships across ancient Eurasia. The "standard"
etymology for thie Germanic *Wo:ðanaz (Old English Wodan, Old High
German Wuotan, Noise Odin) is to derive it from the root *wo:ð-
'rage', cognate with Latin va:te:s ' rage, possession, fury' (Puhvel
1987, 193). As noted by Benveniste (1973, 247), all other forms
attested in Indo-European languages that show the suffix *-on- are of
the semantic form 'social unit-*on-', that is, "lord of a social
unit," with the sole exception of Proto-Germanic *wo:ðan-az; compare
Gothic kindins 'chief of the clan' <- *gent-i-n-os, basically, lord of
the race', Old Icelandic drottin-, Old English dryhten 'chief of the
troops' <- Proto-Germanic *druxti-n-az, Gothic þiudans 'lord of the
people, chief, Gaullish Toutonos, Illyrian Teutana <- PIE *tewt-on-os
(in historical times this used to denote the tribes themselves)
(ibid.: 245-48). Thus the use of a nonsocial term, *wo:ð-, in
*wo:ðan-az is anomalous.
On one hand, Wardana, in its Shapsegh form of Wadana (pronounced
"Wodéna"), offers a source for the late common Germanic god *Wo:ðanaz,
which has been reworked under Gothic influence from the Germanic
"Mercurius" noted by Tacitus in his Germania in the first century a.d.
Roman interpretation of the Germanic gods. On the other hand, the
Goths, with their steppe empire in the early centuries of the
Christian era, link up with the Ancient Pontic Iranians (Alans and
Sarmatians) and the ancestors of the Circassians, to borrow a
hypothetical Iranian *War-dana, which itself would have been cognate
with Indo-Aryan Vrddhana, "Giver of Booty," an epithet of the Hindu
god Shiva, whose name in turn is an epithet of the Vedic god Rudra.
Further, Wardana, like the Germanic Wodan, is fickle, killing all of
his nephews but one, and is responsible for raising tumuli over them.
In this latter function he assumes responsibility for dead heroes just
as Wodan does. His horse, too, like Wodan's (Norse Odin's) Yggdrasil,
is the fastest.
His blind brother in his disability not only recalls Wodan's loss of
an eye, but also has a name, Old Rook (/c´°and&´-z´/ 'rook-old'),
which recalls Wodan's brothers, the two ravens (in Norse) Villi and
Vé. Wodan cures battle wounds and Wardana cures Old Rook's blindness.
Wodan bestows wealth through raiding and looting, and this may lie
behind the alternative name of Old Rook, Giver of Old Oxen
(/c´°&-z´a-t´ / 'ox-old-give') (see Colarusso 1984b for further
parallels, and Dillmann 1979 for a study of Odin).
Thus, the two fragments from which this saga is compiled link some of
the furthest reaches of the Indo-European world into a religious and
historical web.
"

Vili and Vé are Odin's brothers, not his ravens, which were called
Hugin and Munin, or did I miss something?


Torsten