Odin, Lodur, Hoenir skabe Ask og Embla by Frølich

Lóðurr (

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 ...

: ; also Lodurr) is a

god In monotheism, monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator deity, creator, and principal object of Faith#Religious views, faith.Richard Swinburne, Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Ted Honderich, Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Ox ...

Norse mythology Norse, Nordic, or Scandinavian mythology is the body of myths belonging to the North Germanic peoples, stemming from Old Norse religion and continuing after the Christianization of Scandinavia, and into the Nordic folklore of the modern period ...

. In the poem he is assigned a role in animating the first humans, but apart from that he is hardly ever mentioned, and remains obscure. Scholars have variously identified him with

Loki Loki is a god in Norse mythology. According to some sources, Loki is the son of Fárbauti (a jötunn) and Laufey (mentioned as a goddess), and the brother of Helblindi and Býleistr. Loki is married to Sigyn and they have two sons, Narfi or Na ...

, Vé, Vili and

Freyr Freyr (Old Norse: 'Lord'), sometimes anglicized as Frey, is a widely attested god in Norse mythology, associated with kingship, fertility, peace, and weather. Freyr, sometimes referred to as Yngvi-Freyr, was especially associated with Sweden an ...

, but consensus has not been reached on any one theory.

Name and etymology

The name's meaning is unknown. It has been speculatively linked to various

words, such as , "fruit, land", , "people" and , "to attract". The

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

words , "to grow" and , "shape", as well as the

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

word , "to blaze", have also been mentioned in this context. The metrical position of Lóðurr's name in the

skaldic poem A skald, or skáld (Old Norse: , later ; , meaning "poet"), is one of the often named poets who composed skaldic poetry, one of the two kinds of Old Norse poetry, the other being Eddic poetry, which is anonymous. Skaldic poems were traditionally ...

, composed in the strict

dróttkvætt In prosody, alliterative verse is a form of verse that uses alliteration as the principal ornamental device to help indicate the underlying metrical structure, as opposed to other devices such as rhyme. The most commonly studied traditions of a ...

metre, indicates that it contains the sound value /ó/ rather than /o/. This evidence, while strong, is not incontrovertible and some scholars have held out for a reading. (Lóðurr's name can also be represented or anglicized as , , , , , , , , , , , , , or .) Danish and Norwegian , Swedish , as well as Finnish may possibly derive from , meaning "Saturday", although more typically the etymology is proposed to originate from "washing day".

Attestations

Völuspá

In the

Poetic Edda The ''Poetic Edda'' is the modern name for an untitled collection of Old Norse anonymous narrative poems, which is distinct from the ''Prose Edda'' written by Snorri Sturluson. Several versions exist, all primarily of text from the Icelandic me ...

the name occurs only once; in , where the gods animate the first humans. The precise meaning of these strophes and their context in ''Völuspá'' is debated. Most relevant for the present discussion are Lóðurr's gifts of and . The word is obscure and the translations "film of flesh" and "blood" are just two of the many possibilities that have been suggested. The phrase "litu góða" is somewhat less difficult and traditionally interpreted as "good colours", "good shape" or even "good looks". The 19th-century Swedish scholar

Viktor Rydberg Abraham Viktor Rydberg (; 18 December 182821 September 1895) was a Swedish writer and a member of the Swedish Academy, 1877–1895. "Primarily a classical idealist", Viktor Rydberg has been described as "Sweden's last Romantic" and by 1859 was ...

proposed a reading of , meaning "shape of gods", and saw the line as indication that the gods created human beings in their own image. While the manuscripts do not distinguish between the

phoneme In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-west o ...

s /o/ and /ó/, most other scholars have preferred the /ó/ reading for metrical reasons. The metrical structure of 's

fornyrðislag In prosody, alliterative verse is a form of verse that uses alliteration as the principal ornamental device to help indicate the underlying metrical structure, as opposed to other devices such as rhyme. The most commonly studied traditions of ...

is, however, not very rigid and in 1983 Rydberg's theory was championed again by

Gro Steinsland Gro Steinsland (born 1945) is a Norwegian scholar of medieval studies and history of religion and since August 2009 has been the Scientific Director of the Centre for Advanced Study at the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters. Steinsland has m ...

. It remains debated.

Other attestations

Apart from the strophe in , Lóðurr's name occurs only twice in the original sources. The name is found in the

skaldic poems A skald, or skáld (Old Norse: , later ; , meaning "poet"), is one of the often named poets who composed skaldic poetry, one of the two kinds of Old Norse poetry, the other being Eddic poetry, which is anonymous. Skaldic poems were traditionally ...

and where "Lóðurr's friend" is used as a

kenning A kenning ( Icelandic: ) is a figure of speech in the type of circumlocution, a compound that employs figurative language in place of a more concrete single-word noun. Kennings are strongly associated with Old Norse-Icelandic and Old English po ...

for

Odin Odin (; from non, Óðinn, ) is a widely revered Æsir, god in Germanic paganism. Norse mythology, the source of most surviving information about him, associates him with wisdom, healing, death, royalty, the gallows, knowledge, war, battle, v ...

. This seems consistent with Lóðurr's role in . 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 ''

Prose Edda The ''Prose Edda'', also known as the ''Younger Edda'', ''Snorri's Edda'' ( is, Snorra Edda) or, historically, simply as ''Edda'', is an Old Norse textbook written in Iceland during the early 13th century. The work is often assumed to have been t ...

'', Lóðurr is conspicuously absent. Here the creation of humans is attributed to the sons of

Borr In Norse mythology, Borr or BurrThe ''Konungsbók'' or ''Codex Regius'' MS of the ''Völuspá'' reads ''Búrr''; the Hauksbók MS reads ''Borr''. Cf. Nordal (1980:31). The latter form alone was used by 13th-century historian and poet Snorri Sturlu ...

, whom Snorri names elsewhere as Odin, Vili and Vé. Snorri often quotes in his work, but in this case he does not. We cannot know whether he knew the strophes above or whether he was working entirely from other sources.

Nordendorf fibula

Another source sometimes brought into the discussion is the

Nordendorf fibula The Nordendorf fibulae are two mid 6th to early 7th century Alamannic fibulae found in Nordendorf near Augsburg, Bavaria, Germany. Both fibulae are from the same grave, a woman's grave from an Alemannic cemetery of 448 row graves. They are label ...

. This artifact, dating from about 600 CE, contains the

runic Runes are the letters in a set of related alphabets known as runic alphabets native to the Germanic peoples. Runes were used to write various Germanic languages (with some exceptions) before they adopted the Latin alphabet, and for specialised ...

inscription logaþorewodanwigiþonar. This is usually interpreted as ''Logaþore Wodan Wigiþonar'', where ''Wodan'' is

and ''Wigiþonar'' probably is

Thor Thor (; from non, Þórr ) is a prominent god in Germanic paganism. In Norse mythology, he is a hammer-wielding æsir, god associated with lightning, thunder, storms, sacred trees and groves in Germanic paganism and mythology, sacred groves ...

. It would be natural for ''logaþore'' to be the name of a third god, but there is no obvious identification in Norse mythology as we know it. Both Lóðurr and Loki have been proposed, but the etymological reasoning is tenuous, and firm conclusions cannot be reached.

Theories

Since the ''Prose Edda'' mentions the sons of Borr in the same context as ''Völuspá'' does Hœnir and Lóðurr, some scholars have reasoned that Lóðurr might be another name for either Vili or Vé.

was an early proponent of this theory, but recently it has received little attention. A more popular theory proposed by the scholar

Ursula Dronke __NOTOC__ Ursula Miriam Dronke (née Brown, 3 November 1920 – 8 March 2012Heather O'Donoghue"Ursula Dronke obituary: Inspirational teacher of Old Norse literature specialising in the sagas and poetry of medieval Iceland" ''The Guardian'' 25 M ...

is that ''Lóðurr'' is "a third name of Loki/Loptr". The main argument for this is that the gods Odin, Hœnir and Loki occur as a trio in ''

Haustlöng ''Haustlǫng'' (Old Norse: 'Autumn-long'; anglicized as ''Haustlöng'') is a skaldic poem composed around the beginning of the 10th century by the Norwegian skald Þjóðólfr of Hvinir. The poem has been preserved in the 13th-century ''Prose Ed ...

'', in the prose prologue to ''

Reginsmál ''Reginsmál'' (Old Norse: 'The Lay of Reginn') is an Eddic poem interspersed with prose found in the Codex Regius manuscript. It is closely associated with ''Fáfnismál'', the poem that immediately follows it in the Codex, and it is likely that ...

'' and also in the ''

Loka Táttur ''Loka Táttur'' or ''Lokka Táttur'' (tale, or ''þáttr'' of Loki) is a Faroese ballad (Corpus Carminum Færoensium 13D) which is a rare example of the occurrence of Norse gods in folklore. The ballad probably dates back to the late Middle Ages ...

'' a Faroese ballad which is a rare example of the occurrence of Norse gods in folklore. The Odin-kenning "Lóðurr's friend" furthermore appears to parallel the kenning "Loptr's friend" and Loki is similarly referred to as "Hœnir's friend" in Haustlöng, strengthening the trio connection. While many scholars agree with this identification, it is not universally accepted. One argument against it is that Loki appears as a malevolent being later in , seemingly conflicting with the image of Lóðurr as a "mighty and loving" figure. Many scholars, including Jan de Vries and

Georges Dumézil Georges Edmond Raoul Dumézil (4 March 189811 October 1986) was a French philologist, linguist, and religious studies scholar who specialized in comparative linguistics and mythology. He was a professor at Istanbul University, École pratique d ...

, have also identified Lóðurr as being the same deity as

. Recently, Haukur Þorgeirsson of the

University of Iceland The University of Iceland ( is, Háskóli Íslands ) is a public research university in Reykjavík, Iceland and the country's oldest and largest institution of higher education. Founded in 1911, it has grown steadily from a small civil servants' s ...

suggested that Loki and Lóðurr were different names of the same deity based on that Loki is referred to as Lóður in the rimur . Haukur argues that whether the rimur is based on Snorri's or a folksource the writer must have had the information about the identification from either a tradition or drawn the conclusion based on Eddic poems, since Snorri does not mention Lóðurr in his Edda. Since the contents of the Poetic Edda are assumed to have been forgotten around 1400 when the rimur was written Haukur argues for a traditional identification. Haukur also points to where the same identification is made with Loki and Lóðurr. Haukur Þorgeirsson says that unless the possible but unlikely idea that the 14th and 15th century poets possessed lost written sources unknown to us, the idea must have come from either an unlikely amount of sources from where the poets could have drawn a similar conclusion that Loki and Lóðurr are identical like some recent scholars or that there still were remnants of an oral tradition. Haukur concludes that if Lóðurr was historically considered an independent deity from Loki, then a discussion of when and why he became identified with Loki is appropriate. An identification with

has also been proposed. This theory emphasizes the possible fertility-related meanings of Lóðurr's name but otherwise has little direct evidence to support it.

References

Citations

Bibliography

* Ásgeir Blöndal Magnússon (1989). ''Íslensk orðsifjabók''. Reykjavík: Orðabók Háskólans. * Brodeur, Arthur Gilchrist (transl.) (1916). ''The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson''. New York:

The American-Scandinavian Foundation The American-Scandinavian Foundation (ASF) is an American non-profit foundation dedicated to promoting international understanding through educational and cultural exchange between the United States and Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway ...

. Available onlin
at Google Books
* Bugge, Sophus (1867). ''Norræn fornkvæði''. Christiania: Malling. Available online a
Sæmundar Edda
In particula
Völuspá
* Bæksted, Anders (1986). ''Goð og hetjur í heiðnum sið'', Eysteinn Þorvaldsson translated to Icelandic. Reykjavík: Örn og Örlygur. Pages 74 and 184. * Dronke, Ursula (1997). ''The Poetic Edda : Volume II : Mythological Poems''. Oxford: Clarendon Press. In particular p. 18 and pp. 124–5. * Eysteinn Björnsson (2001). ''Lexicon of Kennings : The Domain of Battle''
KENNINGS
* Eysteinn Björnsson (ed.). ''Snorra-Edda: Formáli & Gylfaginning : Textar fjögurra meginhandrita''. 2005
GYLFAGINNING
* Eysteinn Björnsson (ed.).

This editor prefers the reading. *

Finnur Jónsson Finnur Jónsson (May 29, 1858 – March 30, 1934) was an Icelandic-Danish philologist and Professor of Nordic Philology at the University of Copenhagen. He made extensive contributions to the study of Old Norse literature. Finnur Jónsson was b ...

(1913). ''Goðafræði Norðmanna og Íslendinga eftir heimildum''. Reykjavík: Hið íslenska bókmentafjelag. * Finnur Jónsson (1931). ''Lexicon Poeticum''. København: S. L. Møllers Bogtrykkeri. * Jón Helgason (1971). ''Eddadigte : Völuspá Hávamál'', 2. ændrede udg. København: Munksgaard. * Lindow, John (2001). Handbook of Norse mythology. Santa Barbara: ABC-Clio. . * Rydberg, Viktor (1886-1889). . Stockholm: Bonnier. * Simek, Rudolf. Dictionary of Northern Mythology. 1993. Trans. Angela Hall. Cambridge: D. S. Brewer. . New edition 2000, . *

Sigurður Nordal Sigurður Nordal (14 September 1886 – 21 September 1974) was an Icelandic scholar, writer, and ambassador. He was influential in forming the theory of the Icelandic sagas as works of literature composed by individual authors. Education Nor ...

(1952). . Reykjavík: Helgafell. * Steinsland, Gro (1983). "Antropogonimyten i Völuspá. En tekst- og tradisjonskritisk analyse." in , 1983, pp. 80 – 107. Lund. * Thorpe, Benjamin (tr.) (1866). ''Edda Sæmundar Hinns Froða : The Edda Of Sæmund The Learned''. (2 vols.) London: Trübner & Co. Norroena Society edition (1905) available onlin
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* Turville-Petre, E. O. G. (1964). ''Myth and Religion of the North : The Religion of Ancient Scandinavia''. London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson. In particular pages 143-4. {{DEFAULTSORT:Lodurr Æsir Creator gods Norse gods Loki Freyr