At 10:03:57 PM on Thursday, March 27, 2008, Patrick Ryan wrote:
> From: "alexandru_mg3" <alexandru_mg3@...>
>> If you like the 'warrior'-semantism of Walhalla that I
>> like either (and for sure: this semantism is there)
>> welh2- 'to strike, to wound' contains it too...but please
>> remember also that we have there 'that ones that
>> gloriously have died in the battle and due to this have
>> arrived nearby their God'.
[...]
>> Remains to see now what nuance is preferable:
>> "that ones, [deadly] wounded [in a glorious
>> battle]..."
>> or
>> "that ones, the strongers, [that have died in a
>> glorious battle] ..."
>> and I think that the first ones sounds better...to define
>> the heroes...
[...]
> 'Death' qualifies no one to enter Valhalla; dying bravely
> is necessary, else why would the Valkyries bother to
> 'chose'?
ON <valr> 'the slain'; OE <wæl> 'slaughter, carnage; field
of battle; dead bodies'. ON <valkyrja>, OE <wælcyrie>
'chooser of the slain'. Nothing to do with strength: the
salient point is that they're the slain. ON <valgaldr>
'spell to raise the dead', <valgjarn> 'greedy for carrion',
<valblóð> 'blood of the slain', and OE <wælpi:l> 'deadly
arrow', <wælbenn> 'deadly wound', <wælfu:s> 'awaiting death'
and many others leave very little room for doubt.
Note that there's more than one way to interpret 'choosers
of the slain': it makes a nice story to have them choose the
most heroic, but they could equally be those who decide who
dies. Gylfaginning 36, which couples them closely with the
Norns, suggests as much:
Þessar heita valkyriur; þær sendir Óðinn til hverrar
orrosto, þær kiósa feigð á menn ok ráða sigri. Guðr ok
Rota ok norn en yngzta er Skuld heitir, ríða iaf[nan] at
kiósa val ok ráða vigum.
These are called valkyries; Odin sends them to every
battle, they allot death to men ['choose the approach of
death to men'] and govern victory. Guðr and Rota and the
youngest norn, who is called Skuld, always ride to choose
the slain and govern (the) killings.
Brian