The Haddingjar (

Old Norse Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic languages, North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and t ...

: ) refers on the one hand to

Germanic heroic legend Germanic heroic legend (german: germanische Heldensage) is the heroic literary tradition of the Germanic-speaking peoples, most of which originates or is set in the Migration Period (4th-6th centuries AD). Stories from this time period, to whic ...

s about two brothers by this name, and on the other hand to possibly related legends based on the

Hasdingi The Hasdingi were one of the Vandal peoples of the Roman era. The Vandals were Germanic peoples, who are believed to have spoken an East Germanic language, and were first reported during the first centuries of the Roman empire in the area which is n ...

, the royal dynasty of the

Vandals The Vandals were a Germanic peoples, Germanic people who first inhabited what is now southern Poland. They established Vandal Kingdom, Vandal kingdoms on the Iberian Peninsula, Mediterranean islands, and North Africa in the fifth century. The ...

. The accounts vary greatly.

Origins

It has been suggested that they were originally two

Proto-Germanic Proto-Germanic (abbreviated PGmc; also called Common Germanic) is the reconstructed proto-language of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages. Proto-Germanic eventually developed from pre-Proto-Germanic into three Germanic branc ...

legendary heroes by the name *''Hazdingōz'', meaning the "longhairs", and that they were identical to the '' Alci'' mentioned by

Tacitus Publius Cornelius Tacitus, known simply as Tacitus ( , ; – ), was a Roman historian and politician. Tacitus is widely regarded as one of the greatest Roman historiography, Roman historians by modern scholars. The surviving portions of his t ...

. According to Tacitus, the Alci were worshiped as gods by priests in female clothing: : ..''and the Nahanarvali. Among these last is shown a grove of immemorial sanctity. A priest in female attire has the charge of it. But the deities are described in Roman language as

Castor and Pollux Castor; grc, Κάστωρ, Kástōr, beaver. and Pollux. (or Polydeukes). are twin half-brothers in Greek and Roman mythology, known together as the Dioscuri.; grc, Διόσκουροι, Dióskouroi, sons of Zeus, links=no, from ''Dîos'' ('Z ...

. Such, indeed, are the attributes of the divinity, the name being Alcis. They have no images, or, indeed, any vestige of foreign superstition, but it is as brothers and as youths that the deities are worshipped''. ''Germania'' at Wikisource

Cassius Dio Lucius Cassius Dio (), also known as Dio Cassius ( ), was a Roman historian and senator of maternal Greek origin. He published 80 volumes of the history on ancient Rome, beginning with the arrival of Aeneas in Italy. The volumes documented the ...

mentioned c. 170 the '' Astingoi'' as a noble clan among the

, and the ''

Asdingi The Hasdingi were one of the Vandal peoples of the Roman era. The Vandals were Germanic peoples, who are believed to have spoken an East Germanic language, and were first reported during the first centuries of the Roman empire in the area which is ...

'' reappear, in the 6th century in

Jordanes Jordanes (), also written as Jordanis or Jornandes, was a 6th-century Eastern Roman bureaucrat widely believed to be of Goths, Gothic descent who became a historian later in life. Late in life he wrote two works, one on Roman history (''Romana ...

' work as the royal dynasty of the Vandals. The root appears in

Old Icelandic Old Norse, Old Nordic, or Old Scandinavian, is a stage of development of North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and their overseas settlement ...

as ''haddr'' meaning "woman's hair", and the motivation for the name ''Haddingjar''/''Astingoi''/''Asdingi'' was probably that men from Germanic royal dynasties sported long hair as a mark of dignity (cf. the "longhaired

Merovingians The Merovingian dynasty () was the ruling family of the Franks from the middle of the 5th century until 751. They first appear as "Kings of the Franks" in the Roman army of northern Gaul. By 509 they had united all the Franks and northern Gauli ...

").

In legend and mythology

#In the '' Hervarar saga'', ''

Gesta Danorum ''Gesta Danorum'' ("Deeds of the Danes") is a patriotic work of Danish history, by the 12th-century author Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Literate", literally "the Grammarian"). It is the most ambitious literary undertaking of medieval Denmark an ...

'', '' Orvar-Odd's saga'' and ''

Lay of Hyndla Lay may refer to: Places *Lay Range, a subrange of mountains in British Columbia, Canada *Lay, Loire, a French commune *Lay (river), France * Lay, Iran, a village *Lay, Kansas, United States, an unincorporated community People * Lay (surname) * ...

'', there are two Haddingjar among the twelve sons of the

berserker In the Old Norse written corpus, berserker were those who were said to have fought in a trance-like fury, a characteristic which later gave rise to the modern English word '' berserk'' (meaning "furiously violent or out of control"). Berserkers ...

Arngrim Arngrim was a berserker, who features in Hervarar saga, Gesta Danorum, Lay of Hyndla, a number of Faroese ballads and Orvar-Odd's saga in Norse mythology.Henrikson, Alf. (1998). ''Den stora mytologiska uppslagsboken''. Hervarar saga Accord ...

. #Oddly, in ''Orvar-Odd's saga'', after his friend Orvar-Odd had killed these two Haddingjar,

Hjalmar Hjalmar () and Ingeborg () were a legendary Swedish duo. The male protagonist Hjalmar and his duel for Ingeborg figures in the '' Hervarar saga'' and in '' Orvar-Odd's saga'', as well as in ''Gesta Danorum'', ''Lay of Hyndla'' and a number of Far ...

mentions in his death song two Haddingjar among his friends back in

Sigtuna Sigtuna () is a locality situated in Sigtuna Municipality, Stockholm County, Sweden with 8,444 inhabitants in 2010. It is the namesake of the municipality even though the seat is in Märsta. Sigtuna is for historical reasons often still referre ...

. #In ''

Hversu Noregr byggðist ''Hversu Noregr byggðist'' ( non, How Norway was inhabited) is an account of the origin of various legendary Norwegian lineages, which survives only in the ''Flateyjarbók''. It traces the descendants of the primeval Fornjót, a king of ''"Gotlan ...

'', there is a Hadding Raumsson who was the king of Haddingdalen in

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

. He is succeeded by a son and a grandson by the same name. After his great-grandson Högni, there is a succession of three more generations named Hadding, making six Haddingjar in the same line. #The prose section following ''

Helgakviða Hundingsbana II "Völsungakviða in forna" or "Helgakviða Hundingsbana II" ("The Second Lay of Helgi Hundingsbane") is an Old Norse poem found in the ''Poetic Edda''. It constitutes one of the Helgi lays together with ''Helgakviða Hundingsbana I'' and ''Helgakv ...

'', there is a

Helgi Haddingjaskati Helgi Haddingjaskati (Old Norse: , meaning "Helgi the lord of the Haddingjar") was a legendary Norse hero of whom only fragmentary accounts survive. It is said in the end section of ''Helgakviða Hundingsbana II'', a poem of the ''Poetic Edda'', th ...

(Helgi the prince of the Haddingjar, i.e. the Hasdingi of the Vandals) referring to a now lost poem named '' Káruljóð'', which was named after Helgi's beloved, the

Valkyrie In Norse mythology, a valkyrie ("chooser of the slain") is one of a host of female figures who guide souls of the dead to the god Odin's hall Valhalla. There, the deceased warriors become (Old Norse "single (or once) fighters"Orchard (1997:36) ...

Kára. This poem survives in an altered form as ''

Hrómundar saga Gripssonar ''Hrómundar saga Gripssonar'' or ''The Saga of Hromund Gripsson'' is a legendary saga from Iceland. The original version has been lost, but its content has been preserved in the ''rímur'' of ''Hrómundr Gripsson'', known as ''Griplur'', which were ...

'', where Helgi fights in the service of two Swedish kings by the name ''Haldingr''. #In the oldest one of the

Gudrun Gudrun ( ; non, Guðrún) or Kriemhild ( ; gmh, Kriemhilt) is the wife of Sigurd/Siegfried and a major figure in Germanic heroic legend and literature. She is believed to have her origins in Ildico, last wife of Attila the Hun, and two que ...

lays, the ''

Guðrúnarkviða II ''Guðrúnarkviða II'', ''The Second Lay of Gudrún'', or ''Guðrúnarkviða hin forna'', ''The Old Lay of Gudrún'' is probably the oldest poem of the Sigurd cycle, according to Henry Adams Bellows. The poem was composed before the year 1000 a ...

'',

says that the potion of oblivion that her mother had given her contained several runes, and among them the "unshorn corn ear of Haddingland", possibly a magic Vandal rune. #In ''

Kálfsvísa The ''Kálfsvísa'' ("Kálfr's '' vísa''", Kálfr being maybe the name of its author) is a poem partially preserved in Snorri Sturluson’s ''Skáldskaparmál''. Its three stanzas in ''fornyrðislag'' mostly consist of a þula of horses and thei ...

'', in

Snorri Sturluson Snorri Sturluson ( ; ; 1179 – 22 September 1241) was an Icelandic historian, poet, and politician. He was elected twice as lawspeaker of the Icelandic parliament, the Althing. He is commonly thought to have authored or compiled portions of the ...

's ''

Skáldskaparmál ''Skáldskaparmál'' (Old Norse: 'The Language of Poetry'; c. 50,000 words; ; ) is the second part of the ''Prose Edda''. The section consists of a dialogue between Ægir, the divine personification of the sea, and Bragi, the god of poetry, in ...

'', it is said that the king of the Haddingjar (the Vandals) rode a horse named Skævað. #In ''

'' there is a

Haddingus Hadingus was one of the earliest List of legendary kings of Denmark, legendary Danish kings according to Saxo Grammaticus' ''Gesta Danorum'', where he has a detailed biography. Georges Dumézil and others have argued that Hadingus was partially mo ...

about whom

Saxo Grammaticus Saxo Grammaticus (c. 1150 – c. 1220), also known as Saxo cognomine Longus, was a Danish historian, theologian and author. He is thought to have been a clerk or secretary to Absalon, Archbishop of Lund, the main advisor to Valdemar I of Denmark. ...

has many things to tell. He is possibly a memory of the

, the royal clan of the Vandals. #The original name of the Norwegian valley

Hallingdal Hallingdal ( en, Halling Valley) is a valley as well as a traditional district located in the traditional and electoral district Buskerud in Viken county in Norway. It consists of six municipalities: Flå, Nes, Gol, Hemsedal, Ål and Hol. Hal ...

was ''Haddingjadalr''. Local legends state that Hadding was a king of this valley, and that it was named after him. After him, his sons, the two Haddings, fought over control of the valley. One of them was killed, and was buried in a mound in Gol, still known for sightings of huldufolk.

Notes

Sources

* Ohlmarks, Åke. (1982). ''Fornnordiskt lexikon''. Tiden.
The article ''Hadding'' in ''Nordisk familjebok'' (1909)
{{Norse mythology Legendary Norsemen Vandals Germanic warriors Germanic heroic legends