From: Brian M. Scott
Message: 65335
Date: 2009-10-30
> -- In cybalist@yahoogroups.com, "Brian M. Scott"It says nothing about it at all. If you believe Snorri,
> <BMScott@...> wrote:
>> At 4:10:01 PM on Sunday, October 25, 2009, Torsten wrote:
>>> http://tinyurl.com/yjcsxkk
>>> Danish original
>>> http://www.verasir.dk/show.php?file=chap22-1-1.html
>> He writes:
>> I Kalevala har Ukko heitet "ylijumala", der i dag
>> oversættes til "God of Mercy/Lykkens Gud", men oprindeligt
>> må have haft betydningen "Julens Herre", jvf. julemandens
>> navn "Ýlir" i Norge/Island i 900 tallet e.Kr.
>> But <ylijumala> is 'high god' (<yli> 'over, above; more
>> than', <jumala> 'god'). In fact, Václav Blaz^ek thinks
>> that the name <Ukko> itself is an adaptation of Baltic
>> *uka- > Prussian <ucka-> 'prefix expressing the
>> superlative' (as in <ucka-kuslaisin> 'weakest'): the
>> first god of the Prussian pantheon is in record as
>> <Occopirmus> 'Saturnus' 1530, <Ockopirmus> 'der erste
>> Gott Himmels vnd Gestirnes' (16th cent.), and
>> <Occopirnum> 'deum coeli et terrae' 1563. He concludes:
>> 'It is generally accepted that the compound *Uka-pirmas
>> meant "most first"'.
> But where does that leave Öku-Þor then?
>> The interpretation of Þórsdrápa 12:5-8 is certainly a bitYes, it does. It reduces the Odin reference merely to part
>> idiosyncratic.
>> þá er funhristis fasta
>> flóðrifs Danir stóðu
>> knáttu Jólnis ættir
>> útvés fyrir lúta
>> Different editors have distributed the genitives
>> differently, but one reasonable prose rendering is indeed
>> the one that he used:
>> Danir flóðrifs útvés knáttu lúta fyrir [þeim], þá er ættir
>> funhristis Jólnis stóðu fasta.
>> Danes of the flood-rib of the outlying sanctuary could bow
>> down before (them), when (the) kinsmen of Jólnir's
>> flame-shaker stood fast.
>> <Flóð> is also 'high tide', and <flóðrif> 'flood-rib, rib of
>> the high tide' looks like a term for a skerry. <Útvé>
>> 'outlying sanctuary' looks like a parallel to <Útgarða-> in
>> <Útgarða-Loki>, referring to Jötunheimr; the 'Danes' of its
>> skerry would be giants.
>> <Jólnir> is one of Óðin's names, and <funi Jólnis> 'Óðin's
>> flame' is a kenning for 'sword', so <funhristir Jólnis>
>> 'Óðin's flame-shaker' = <hristir Jólnis funa> 'shaker of
>> Óðin's flame' = 'sword-shaker' = 'warrior'. Presumably
>> their kinsmen are also warriors. Thus:
>> Giants bowed down before them when (the) warriors stood
>> fast.
> Probably true, but doesn't affect his point.
>> He has a grammatical problem with the verse fromIt's certainly a possibility. But then Yule itself is the
>> Skáldskaparmál:
>> Jólna sumbl
>> enn vér gátum,
>> stillis lof,
>> sem steina brú.
>> Here <jólna> is clearly a genitive plural, not the gen.
>> sing. that he wants it to be.
>> (The) gods' banquet/drink [= poetry];
>> we yet fashioned,
>> (the) king's praise,
>> like a stone's bridge.
>> (It's possible that <enn> should be read as <en>
>> 'but/and', if the first line continues the preceding
>> strophe.)
> True, bungled, but...
> I don't think we can escape 'jól' on this one.
>> De tidligst kendte stednavne i Britannien, hvori indgårAs sure as one can be in such cases. If it were a folk
>> "Jól", er "Youlton" (Jól's tun) i North Yorkshire, og
>> "Youlthorpe" (Jól's thorp) i East Riding, Yorkshire.
>> Here's what Watts has to say about the place-names:
>> S.n. <Youlton>: 'Joli's estate'. <Loletun(e)> (for
>> <Iole-> 1086, <Yolton'> 1295-1508.
>> S.n. <Youlthorpe>: 'Eyjulfr's outlying farm', later
>> 'Yole's outlying farm', with spellings <Aiul(f)torp> 1086,
>> <Hiel-, Hioltorp> 12th c., <Yolt(h)orpe(e)> 12th-1359.
>> From the 12th cent. this name contains a different
>> pers.n., ME <Yole> from ON <Jól>, <Jóli>.
>> So this one apparently never did contain the Scandinavian
>> name as such and didn't acquire its ME borrowing until the
>> 12th century.
> Apparently Watts' Eyulfr hangs on the 1086 form alone.
> Are you sure that is not a folk normalization of an
> unusual name?