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2. I remember giants,
born early on,
who long ago
had nutured me;
Nine homes
I remember,
nine wood-ogresses,
the famous Measure-Tree
down beneath the earth. |
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2/2 ár um borna, "born at
the beginning of existence". These age-old giants fostered the
sibyl, who says nothing of her ancestry. This fostering explains
how she could possess true stories of the world from the
earliest times. [Sigurd Nordal, Völuspá, p. 9].
2/5 Níu heima, has
its analogue in Vafþrúdnismál 43: níu kom ek heima
fyr Niflhel neðan; hinig deyja ór helju halir, "I have come
to nine worlds, down below Niflhel; into those worlds men die
from Hel." Although the geography here is unclear, the 'nine
homes' must be the realms of the dead. [Ursula Dronke, P.E. II,
p. 9]. Germanic cosmology divides the universal structure into
nine 'homes' or 'worlds' (níu heimar), but the separate
regions cannot be named with certainty. It would seem as if only
the number nine itself was fixed. While Völuspá 2
speaks of nine worlds in its all-inclusive sense, the old giant
in Vafþrúðnismál 43 speaks of nine heimar down
below Niflhel, these being regions of punishment. Conversely,
nine heavens are mentioned and called by name in
Skáldskaparmál 75, [Anthony Faulkes tr.]. The concept of
nine heavens is preserved in a list of their names in a þula
of Himins heiti, Níu eru heimar/á hæð talðir,
'Nine are the heavens counted on high." A recurrent pattern
observed in early religious literature of a number of
Indo-European stocks, Greece and India in particular, suggests a
physical triparition of the universe. [J.P. Mallory and D.Q.
Adams, Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture, p. 131].
Remnants of a system of nine layers above heaven and nine below
can be seen in Hesiod's Theogony 722-8, where the
'layers' have become distances measured by time; a nine days
drop from heaven to earth, another nine days from earth to
Tartarus. [Dronke, Poetic Edda Vol. II, p. 109-110]. Compare Hermod's nine day ride to Hel to
get news of
Baldur in Gylfaginning 49 and return with the ring
Draupnir, also referenced in Skírnismál 21.
Likewise, Vedic cosmology divides the universe into nine, or
three times three, world-regions, but its subdivisions never
seem to be the same. Usually three earths, three atmospheres,
and three heavens are spoken of and the three earths are
represented as lying one beneath the other. See Rigveda
IV, 53, 5 which reads: "Savitar thrice surrounding with his
mightiness mid-air, three regions, and the triple sphere of
light, sets the three heavens in motion and the threefold earth,
and willingly protects us with his triple law." [Griffith tr.].
See also Rigv. I, 34, 8; I, 108, 9; II, 27, 8; III, 56, 8; V,
60, 6; VII, 87, 5; IX, 113, 9, among others.
2/6: íviðjur, plural of íviðja, a rare
word meaning "troll-wife" also recorded in Hyndluljóð 48, and in a þula
of heiti for troll-women,
where it may have originally meant "she who dwells is the
woods" or "malicious creature" (cp. íviðgjarn,
'wicked, evil' and OE
inwidde, adj. 'malicious'), [Sigurd Nordal,
Völuspa, p. 9]. In Hrafnagaldur Óðins 1:
elr íviðja, íviðja bears offspring. Likewise, in
aldna í Járnviði, 'the old one in the Ironwood',
who is identified as a giantess by its location
"in the east", breeds
Fenris kindir, 'Fenrir's progeny' in Völuspá 39.
Compare this to the numerous offspring of járnviðja,
a term applied to Skadi in Háleygjatal 3/4 by Eyvindr
Finnsson (c. 980), who bears many sons to Odin. [Dronke, P.E.
Vol. II, p. 142].
In the 1970s, x-ray analysis of the Codex Regius manuscript
proved that the reading íviði, "in the wood",
is erroneous.
níu íviðjur: This has been interpreted in various ways, but
there is little hope of it ever being fully explained, (Sigurd
Nordal, Völuspa, p. 9). Sophus Bugge suggests that the
níu íviðjur are Heimdall's nine mothers named in
Hyndluljóð 35, said to turn the world mill as eylúðrs
níu brúðir, 'the nine brides of the island-mill',
in a lausavísa attributed to a certain Snæbjörn .
Although the nine names attributed to the giant maidens in
Hyndluljóð 35 contain no elements relating to trees or
roots, Ursula Dronke concludes, "as Heimdall is the
world-tree", his mothers "must be the roots (well
expressed as 'sisters)." [P.E. II, p. 109]. The
physical image of a tree growing out of a giantess' body is
preserved in a curse in Helgakviða Hjörvardsson 16. The
giantess Hrímgerðr is cursed into the earth, Nío röstom/ er
þú skyldir neðarr vera,/ ok vaxi þér á baðmi barr! "Nine
miles deeper down you should be, and may a tree (lit. a pine
needle) grow on your bosom!"
The poem places a fair amount of emphasis on trees.
This strophe is the first of three sections of Völuspá
that chart the origin and life of this specific Norse tree, and
ultimately herald its death. [Lars Schlereth, British
Theories of Mythology and Old Norse Poetry, p. 157].
2/7 mjötvið, "measuring tree" , see also mjötuðr,
v. 45.
2/8 fyr mold neðan: Ursula Dronke takes this to mean
that the völva first knew the world-tree only as its roots
before it broke out into the light, but acknowledges the
reference might more generally include the subterranean world (nío
heima...) she remembers [P.E. II, p. 110]. |
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