sign in sign up
<<
Home , Albruna, Aun, Baltic mythology, Comparative mythology, Erna (mythology), Fantasian

The Retrospective Methods Network

Newsletter

Between Text and Practice

Mythology, and Research

A special issue of RMN Newsletter

Edited by Frog and Karina Lukin

№ 10

Summer 2015

RMN Newsletter is edited by Frog Helen F. Leslie-Jacobsen and S. Hopkins

Published by Studies / Dept. of , , and Art Studies University of , Helsinki

1

RMN Newsletter is a medium of contact and communication for members of the Retrospective Methods Network (RMN). The RMN is an open network which can include anyone who wishes to share in its focus. It is united by an interest in the problems, approaches, strategies and limitations related to considering some aspect of culture in one period through evidence from another, later period. Such comparisons range from investigating historical relationships to the utility of analogical parallels, and from comparisons across centuries to developing working models for the more immediate traditions behind limited sources. RMN Newsletter sets out to provide a venue and emergent discourse space in which individual scholars can discuss and engage in vital - disciplinary dialogue, present reports and announcements of their own current activities, and where about events, projects and institutions is made available.

RMN Newsletter is edited by Frog, Helen F. Leslie-Jacobsen and Joseph S. Hopkins, published by / Department of Philosophy, History, Culture and Art Studies PO Box 59 (Unioninkatu 38 A) 00014 University of Helsinki

The open-access electronic edition of this publication is available on-line at: http://www.helsinki.fi/folkloristiikka/English/RMN/

Between Text and Practice: Mythology, Religion and Research is a special thematic issue of the journal edited by Frog and Karina Lukin.

© 2015 RMN Newsletter; authors retain rights to reproduce their own works and to grant permissions for the reproductions of those works.

ISSN 2324-0636 (print)

ISSN 1799-4497 (electronic)

All scientific articles in this journal have been subject to peer review.

2

CONTENTS

Editor’s Note ...... 5

BETWEEN TEXT AND PRACTICE: MYTHOLOGY, RELIGION AND RESEARCH

Reflections on Texts and Practices in Mythology, Religion, and Research: An Introduction ...... 6 Frog & Karina Lukin Picturing the : Imagination in the Study of Oral Poetry ...... 17 Lotte Tarkka Mythology in Cultural Practice: A Methodological Framework for Historical Analysis ...... 33 Frog Folklore and Mythology Catalogue: Its Lay-Out and Potential for Research ...... 58 Yuri E. Berezkin Females as Cult Functionaries or Specialists in the Germanic Iron Age? ...... 71 A Retrospective for Using Landnámabók as a Source for the Religious History of ? – Some Questions ...... 78 Matthias Egeler Baptizing Soviet Children in Contemporary Rural Narratives ...... 92 Nadezhda Rychkova

REVIEW ARTICLES AND RESEARCH REPORTS

Meta-Mythology and Academic Discourse Heritage ...... 100 Frog The Blurry Lines among , , and Animals: The Snake in the Garden of Eden ...... 109 Robert A. Segal Social Movement and a Structural Distribution of Karelian Ritual Genres ...... 112 Eila Stepanova & Frog Lonely Riders of Nenets Mythology and ...... 118 Karina Lukin

CONFERENCES AND EVENTS

Austmarr IV: The Plurality of and Religious Change Around the , 500–1300: Methodological Challenges for Multidisciplinary Data ...... 128 Kimberly La Palm Interdisciplinary Student Symposium on and Medieval Scandinavian Subjects ...... 130 Seán D. Vrieland

3

Public Engagement with Research: A Viking TeaBreak ...... 131 Lisa Turberfield, Claire Organ & Blake Middleton

DISSERTATIONS AND THESES PhD Projects in : The Ludic Imagination in Contemporary Video Games (working ) ...... 133 Robert Guyker, Jr. Pre-Christian Sources on : The Significance of Text and Iconographic Evidence as well as Archaeological Finds (4th–11th Centuries AD) (working title) ...... 135 Tom Hellers Porous Bodies, Porous Minds: Emotions and the in the Íslendingasögur (ca. 1200–1400) ...... 140 Kirsi Kanerva

Master’s Projects On the -Semantic Group and the Case of Týr ...... 145 Petra Mikolić Appropriation and Originality: Hending and Alliterative Word as Tools for Skaldic Composition ...... 148 Cole Erik Nyquist

CALLS FOR PAPERS

Versification: Metrics in Practice ...... 149

The of Supernatural Encounters in Literature and Scandinavian Folklore: 4th Symposium of the Old Norse Folklorists Network ...... 150

Would You Like to Submit to RMN Newsletter? ...... 150

4

Editor’s Note

The volume of RMN Newsletter that you hold ”, as well as some connection with in your hands, or which shimmers on a screen the international, multilingual conference before you, is a thematic special issue Between “Laulu ja runo – Song and Emergent Poetics Text and Practice: Mythology, Religion and – Песня и видоизменяющаяся поэтика” Research. This collection of articles and held at the end of 2013 (Kuhmo, Finland). reports addresses a number of themes that Contributions developed from these events have proven of great interest to our readership are complemented by works by voices and presents a variety of discussions and familiar from RMN Newsletter’s discourse insights. Some contributions illustrate new space as well as additional articles that have methodological frameworks for research on been invited through our networks. The mythology and religion in earlier periods. outcome is a rich and stimulating volume. Others elucidate new types of resources and Between Text and Practice: Mythology, theoretical tools, and there are discussions of Religion and Research is organized as a main inclinations, prejudices and problems that body of scientific articles that are comple- have haunted earlier research, and which may mented by additional relevant review articles still impact us today. Together, the works and research reports. Several reports on the presented here offer a variety of perspectives research projects of junior scholars also from several disciplines and backgrounds of connect directly with the overarching theme. scholarship. Their diversity is complementary, As a whole, these various contributions form encouraging these works to converse with one an ensemble that is both diverse and opulent, another, to dialogic engagements that will with something of interest for all of our reach their fullest richness and potential in the readers. reflections of the reader. We have the hope Of course, this special issue is the product that they may also inspire, and that the reader of only one of many activities current in the may then carry these discussions further, RMN and its daughter networks. A report on along with the insights that they enable. the most recent Austmarr Network can be The special issue is the product of a found in these pages, and its next meeting will cooperation between RMN Newsletter and the be held already in October. The Old Norse Academy of Finland project, “Oral Poetry, Folklorists Network has been no less active: a Mythic Knowledge and Vernacular Imagination call for papers for its up-coming symposium (OMV): Interfaces of Individual Expression “The Ontology of Supernatural Encounters in and Traditions in Pre-Modern Old Norse Literature and Scandinavian Northeast ” of Folklore Studies, Folklore”, to be held in December 2015, can University of Helsinki, led by Professor Lotte be found at the back of this volume. RMN Tarkka. This cooperation has involved Newsletter is also already organizing another bringing together researchers linked to the special issue that centers on metrics and will Retrospective Methods Network (RMN) and appear already this winter. There is no doubt researchers involved in the events and that the RMN is vibrantly active and we at activities of OMV. More specifically, this RMN Newsletter are proud to be able to special issue has in its background the OMV’s participate, and to help by providing a panel of two sessions organized at the channel of communication and platform for American Folklore Society’s annual meeting discussion in to promote and support in 2014 (Santa Fe, New Mexico, U.S.A.), these activities. “Mythology as Cultural Knowing I: Texts, Beings, and Intersecting Categories; II: Frog Between Historical Experiences and Imaginal University of Helsinki

5

BETWEEN TEXT AND PRACTICE Mythology, Religion and Research

Reflections on Texts and Practices in Mythology, Religion, and Research: An Introduction Frog and Karina Lukin, University of Helsinki

Mythology and religion in through history, , literature studies, religious history have proven to have enduring interest studies, sociology and even and for research. This interest was sparked to life semiotics – just to mention a few. Within the under the of Romanticism, in the reflectivity of a Post-Modern environment, fascination of defining and affirming one’s modern reinventions of mythologies of the own culture through reflection on – and ‘other’ have come under scrutiny, from the sometimes the appropriation of – the ‘other’ use of mythology in the service of nationalism (e.g. Csapo 2004). The allure of both the to reworkings in popular culture. It also fantastic and horror has played its part, as became acknowledged that mythology was well as the intrigue held by the riddle of the not exclusive to the ‘other’: mythologies of other’s ‘’ that was somehow bound up current, scientific cultures also entered the with sometimes incomprehensible field of discussion. Indeed, it is possible to and perplexing practices. This endurance has view the empirical testing of ‘’ on the brought us two centuries rich with intense popular television program Myth Busters as investigations – works, theories and methods yet another form of research on mythology. upon which current research builds – and yet Amid such breadth and diversity, the scope the new perspectives across each of those and aims of the present volume remain quite many decades has carried with it new narrow and modest. challenges, toppling methodological frame- The works collected here present a range of works that are ever being built up anew. views from different disciplines and scholar- Between Text and Practice: Mythology, ships looking at mythology and religion in Religion and Research has been developed to different historical periods. Emphasis is on wrestle with some of these topics, especially pre-modern cultures and religions linked to where they connect with retrospective methods. Northeast Europe, although this frame is Of course, research on mythology and expanded considerably as the time-depth is religion is vast and has advanced in increased owing to the sources available and unnumbered directions. It sought to explore the range of material under comparison. historical others that belong to the heritage of Although research presented here connects the past and cultural others that belong to the with, for example, ethnographic fieldwork, peripheries of the present. entered archaeology and etymology, the contributions into the field of comparison as a frame of to Between Text and Practice: Mythology, reference for interpretation and gradually Religion and Research are generally united by blurred into an object of research, leading to working with written and oral textual the of a field of . evidence. Studies and discussions range from Rather than a discipline crystallizing around concentration on the analysis of empirical mythology, however, its research has data to concentration on theory, methods, and remained distributed across disciplines, tools and concepts applied in research. A addressed in , archaeology, number of these discussions elucidate issues, ethnography and ethnology, folklore studies, and trends of interpretation that have

6

evolved in the research discourse itself. by RUDOLF SIMEK (cf. also af Klintberg Together, these works can be seen as offering 2010), or linked to a concern that those tools that can be used and further developed lacking social, economic, martial or political in research on these and other cultures. power might have recourse to supernatural means (cf. Stark 2006; Tolley 2009). These Texts and Sources factors make it important to consider potential Sources and how we relate them to the past factors in the context of the mythic discourse present challenges that have been subject to that gave rise to the source (cf. FROGA). ongoing reassessment across the history of Caution is also needed regarding the research. The discipline of philology emerged verisimilitude of descriptions, as underlined around precisely this topic and its offspring, by MATTHIAS EGELER: verisimilitude may in folklore studies, sought to overcome the fact represent contemporary folklore, such as corresponding methodological problems first legends of historical ‘pagan’ religious of oral texts, and then of oral-derived texts practices attached to the heritage of the resulting from fieldwork. The challenges are landscape (cf. af Klintberg 2010: 350, legend- manifold, and increase as the sources become type T62) or legends of practices of the historically remote, sparse, and offer minimal cultural ‘other’, such as Sámi shamanism information. These present first the problem (ibid.: 264–265, types M151–160). Such of a source’s specific representation of a text- circulating plots and motifs may be applied script of performance or description of according to broad, intuitive that religious practice, and then a secondary issue will generalize it to a category that includes of how the context-specific representation diverse cultures and religions that we would relates to the cultural phenomenon that it distinguish in research (cf. Frog & Saarikivi (potentially) represents, reflects or refers to. 2014/2015; Frog 2014a: 442–443), and such Especially early sources for the vernacular circulating stories of the ‘other’ are religions and mythologies of transferred and adapted to new groups as tend to offer only brief glimpses from the historical circumstances and contact situations perspective of a culturally and religious change (Tanghlerlini 1995). The issues of ‘other’. In practice, this means that the relating such evidence to particular cultures producers of these sources were constructing are increased by the ontologies operative in images of their own culture and practices in a research (FROGB), which may also presume dialectic with those that they sought to abstract and ideal categories of culture in earlier represent, inevitably affecting the elements historical periods. For example, research and features that they chose to foreground and tends to operate on the assumption that Celtic how these were interpreted (cf. Lindow 1995; and Germanic religions were as distinct FROGA; TARKKA – references to articles in this during the Iron Age as their languages, yet volume are indicated by the author’s in SIMEK points out that the name or role SMALL CAPITALS). Such representations are designation of one purportedly Germanic almost inevitably ethnocentric, in the sense may be etymologically Celtic, which that the producers of the texts view their own in turn produces questions of the degree to culture as superior (Lévi-Strauss 1952; de which the early source in which she appears Castro 1998). Whether Christian or Roman, reflects ‘Germanic’ religion according to the these were often written within a context of ontologies we tend to assume. It thus becomes uneven power relations, in which the author very important to in mind the possibility represented the dominant group that was still that these sources are presenting different in the process of seeking to extend and types of ‘lore’, and to be cautious about the exercise power over the ‘other’. However, categories that we assume both for the such representations might also be structured sources, and for our own research. by social apprehension and fear (cf. Hiiemäe Additional issues are entailed in religious, 2004), for example linked to historical events ritual and mythological texts. Texts circulated and encounters that threaten or contest those in written form may fossilize mythological power relations, as in a case brought forward conceptions and from the period

7 when they were entextualized while the Genres and Registers corresponding models of religion evolve around Valuable tools in approaching mythology and them, as in the case of the Hebrew religion are the concepts ‘genre’ and ‘register’. addressed by ROBERT A. SEGAL. However, The term genre is especially associated with such formalized texts and their uses in folklore studies and literature studies, where it practice may become subject to variation is used to designate and distinguish text-type where a unifying administrative apparatus of categories or performance-type categories is not in place, as happened (e.g. Honko 1989). It is now normally used during the Soviet anti-religious campaigns with a distinction between etic genres, as discussed by NADEZHDA RYCHKOVA. Variation ideal constructs applied cross-culturally by a is still greater in wholly oral traditions, even researcher, and emic genres, as categories of where oral poems may be formally quite text type that are operative in a local stable in their social circulation. Particularly community and may be extensively inter- in medieval studies, there has been a long- penetrating (e.g. Ben Amos 1976; Tarkka standing tendency to conflate the isolated 2013). The term register has been developed transcription of such a text with tradition. through social linguistics and linguistic Especially in the evolving wake of Oral- anthropology, initially to refer to variation in Formulaic Theory (on which, see Foley 1988; language according to situation and Foley & Ramey 2012), perspectives on participant roles (esp. Halliday 1978). The variation have, however, been increasingly term’s use has gradually extended to the full penetrating into the discussion and into the range of resources for expressive behaviours ways scholars imagine such text-transcripts in that reciprocally function as models for those relation to what would certainly have been a behaviours (esp. Agha 2007). As each term multi-modal performance (e.g. Gunnell 1995). has extended its field of use, ‘genre’ and This does not mean that mythological stories ‘register’ have been inclined to converge and were not historically enduring – such endurance sometimes even become used more or less is unequivocally evident in the vast materials interchangeably. They nonetheless remain surveyed in the discussion of YURI E. complementary tools. Genre places emphasis BEREZKIN – but it does mean that caution is on textual products or performance wholes, needed when considering an isolated text- which in many cases entails informational artefact from the in relation to a content (e.g. a genre of epic cannot be defined tradition which it may (or may not) represent. independent of epic stories) or a performative In the present volume, discussions addressing enactment (e.g. a ritual performance as a such material tend to maintain a level of completed whole affects change in social, abstraction, looking at plots, motifs and images, physical or supernatural ). Register rites and that exhibit pattered recurrence places emphasis on expressive resources that across a corpus or corpora where they are may communicate the informational content or manifested in multiple context-specific accomplish an enactment but do not include entextualizations (e.g. LUKIN). However, these, and that may be used outside of the variation in those specific entextualizations context of producing generic products or even leads to another crux of analysis: the elements generically mixed products. (See also Frog of mythology and religious practice are 2015.) simultaneously polysemic (TARKKA) and The relevance of genre to studies of ambiguous (FROGA). This leads their particular mythology and religion has advanced semantics and meanings to be emergent in considerably especially across roughly the their specific relation to co-occurring signifiers past half-century. Although the term ‘myth’ is of the particular expression, performance or today quite flexibly applied to, for example, enactment (see further TARKKA). Thus, a text- ‘false beliefs’ (cf. Myth Busters), it was script of a mythological epic or ritual implemented as a term to talk about stories of performance provides challenges no less great non-Christian religions (FROGA). As such, it than texts that describe the religion and continues to be discussed and debated in beliefs of the ‘other’. terms of a genre of text type (see e.g. Briggs

8

& Bauman 1992). This, however, proves registers of mythology. However, it is problematic because cultural qualification as necessary to bear in mind that none of these ‘myth’ is centrally qualitative rather than formal registers form closed systems: as LOTTE (e.g. Doty 2000), which also problematizes TARKKA stresses, verbal art does not exist in viewing ‘myth’ strictly in terms of stories (cf. isolation from everyday speech, nor one genre Barthes 1972; FROGA). Nevertheless, genre in isolation from others, and the potential to remains an instrumental concept for discussing transpose generic strategies and their registers and distinguishing, for example, mythological provides a nexus of activity for the generation epics, incantations, , shamanic songs and negotiation of meanings. Register provides and so forth, which may each have distinct a tool for distinguishing and talking about uses, social functions and relations. KARINA certain of these resources in relation to others. LUKIN illustrates how even across a group of The concept is still relatively young: its closely related genres of Nenets epic and potential has only begun to be widely tapped shamanic singing, common images and motifs and explored across roughly the past quarter- may exhibit conventionalized functions century, while its utility for the analysis and producing distinctive meanings within the exploration of mythology and religion is only different genres as contexts. EILA STEPANOVA just beginning to open (e.g. Stepanova 2012). & FROG correspondingly outline a structural However, it provides a potentially powerful distribution of Karelian oral genres and the complementary tool to genre. groups using them in transition rituals for an individual’s movement from one community Practitioners and Specialists into another. The frameworks of conventions Of course, mythology does not simply exist that structure a genre are also relevant to ‘out there’ in the ether: people must talk about assessing information presented in generic it, tell stories, use it in or ritual, and texts, as EGELER points out regarding Old structure their behaviours in relation to the Norse literature. Genre proves an important understandings that it entails – otherwise it tool for considering, among other things, the stops being told, stops being remembered, and variation of different elements of tradition disappears or changes into something else. across contexts of use and the distribution of The same is no less true of religion, which has functional or communicative labour across no reality independent of people practicing it, genres within a cultural environment (cf. whether in the present or historically. Indeed, Honko 1981), as well as considering how a participants in a religion may define it in source of a particular type may shape the terms of the social practices around which information about mythology or religion that their group identity is constructed (Bell 1992). we seek to extract from it. Advancing from the perspective that a register Register provides a complementary tool for may be considered not only in terms of formal attending to how a system of representation resources for expressive behaviour but also shapes what it represents or communicates, reciprocally a model for behaviour, FROG whether this is the linguistic register of a form proposes that: of verbal art or a broad performance register. religion can be broadly considered as a type Just as equivalent narrative elements may of register of practice that has developed vary in use according to genre (Honko 1981; through inter-generational transmission, is LUKIN), mythology becomes interfaced with characterized by mythology, and entails an the speech register and performative register and (FROGA, p. 35). associated with a genre, practice or of This allows looking at, for example, practices. This interface has the outcome that and non-Christians that share a mythology may vary considerably across common environment as performing their different registers and the genres or practices different religions and religious alignments as associated with them (see also Stepanova broad registers of practice. Of course, this 2012; FROGA). In parallel to the linguistic or broad register of practice would also entail speech registers of verbal art, FROG has numerous genres and registers of verbal art proposed analysing such variation in terms of and performance. Within this frame, it

9 becomes useful to underline that not all the otherworld was necessarily linked to ‘cult’ individuals will be equally competent in all practice. genres and registers (cf. Agha 2007). The It may also be important to distinguish a more socially centralized a practice is, and the potentially exclusive social position of cult more distinguished from unmarked daily functionary from a specialist institution based behaviours, the more concentrated the on specialized competence in particular ritual practice is likely to be in a specialist role. In technologies. In Karelia, for example, activities such cases, the majority of participants in the that we might interpret as ‘cult’ would be practices would be passive rather than active orchestrated by a much broader category of tradition bearers (cf. von Sydow 1948: 11– specialist,1 who would use his power as an 12), whereas the specialists are positioned as intermediary with the otherworld in a variety authorities in the practices, knowledge and of capacities (Siikala 2002). In shamanic use or negotiations of power (e.g. with the cultures, shamans are also generally defined in otherworld) that the practice entails. In other terms of institutional roles linked to techno- words, mythology and religion are simply logies rather than to cult per se. If viewed as a social phenomena linked to different genres broad register of practice, religion may and registers of practice; many genres and include cults and larger publically orchestrated registers are linked to varying degrees with events, but it also includes a diversity of specialist roles, and those specialists – not the specialists and ritual activities that are better genres – become nexuses of competence and approached on their own terms. For example, authority in mythology and religious practice. Karelian lamenters were ritual specialists in Specialist roles are necessarily bound up socially central, public funerary rituals. They not only with the social practices themselves acted in order to ensure that the deceased but also with the structures of society in would be integrated into the community of the which they function, and different areas of ancestors, as well as maintaining reciprocal ritual activity may be associated with different communication with the otherworld thereafter, specialists. Specialist roles in ritualized working for the benefit of both individuals activities draw great interest and attention, but and of the community (STEPANOVA & FROG, caution is needed not only in source-critical and works there cited). These practices might scrutiny of information on a specific case (cf. be framed in terms of a ‘cult of the dead’, but EGELER), but also on the inferences made such a frame would conceal as much as it about what the significance is of someone reveals about living practice. Similarly, being identified with such a social role driving religious practice and its priests from (SIMEK). Within a cultural environment, there the public sphere effectively drives that may be a variety of roles that specialize in religion into the private sphere, which may engagements with beings and forces of the entail non-specialists assuming specialist roles – unseen world. Researchers often begin from a becoming specialists for the community, as in more or less modern, Christian set of the case discussed by RYCHKOVA – in order categories like ‘priest’, ‘’/‘sorcerer’, that the essential rituals of lived religion are perhaps ‘healer’, and more recently ‘shaman’. maintained. Beginning from general and Individuals performing ritual activities or simplistic categories may be a practical otherwise acting as intermediaries with the reality, but the dynamics of religion in social supernatural then get grouped into these practice only exceptionally reduce to simple simplistic categories, which can be hazardously black and white terms. misleading. A factor that is easily confused in this regard, as in the cases discussed by Knowledge and Imagination SIMEK, is whether or not the role is identified Mythology can be approached as a category with a formalized function in cult practice, of knowledge (cf. Doty 2000: 55–56). This orchestrating and/or mediating interactions with may be knowledge of the past and future a or gods at the center of the religious life beyond the present world, or knowledge of of a community. Not every intermediary with the social, empirical and supernatural worlds along with the paradigms whereby they are

10

organized and operate (FROGA; cf. LUKIN). in which he or she has competence and the Mythic knowledge is organized and structured areas in which he or she develops them through discourse, but not all views in a (Stepanova 2012; 2014). This means that community carry equal weight (Honko 1962: variation in mythic knowledge is not on a 126). It nests in genres and registers whereby simple spectrum, but rather that a single it is communicated, implemented and individual will have degrees of knowledge manipulated, and it centers in specialists relative to different genres and registers as authorities. Both poetic systems and the well as relative to the different fields of structures and paradigms of mythology can practice in which these are applied. Such also function as memory technologies, variation is also of considerable importance providing frameworks that can be capitalized for source-critical assessments, especially for on in order to crystallize mythic knowledge pre-modern sources. Just as such sources may both at the level of individuals and in social present legends of the ‘other’, the authors transmission (Lyle 2012: 9–20). In parallel may also have had no more than the most with these are also ritual technologies that basic rudiments of knowledge about traditions equally are a form of knowledge that requires they mention or describe. It is often doubtful refined competence, such as rite techniques whether a specialist would refer to the combined with singing or incantations to tradition with the same words, describe it in produce an ecstatic trance and to organize the the same way, or even draw attention to the ensuing experience with the supernatural same features. (Siikala 1978; Frog 2014b: 202–205; as TARKKA elaborates on the fact that ‘technology’, see Frog 2013). Mythic imagination is fundamental to the operation of knowledge and technologies interface in a mythic knowledge. The ‘imaginal’ is a quality cultural environment, forming links between that has received increasing attention in mythology, language-based technologies of research on myth (e.g. Doty 2000), but this verbal art and ritual technologies of practice has tended to blur into characterizing myth by that enable , , or other activity features of the fantastic or irreal. The role of to achieve its intended goal in contact with imagination has long been marginalized in the otherworld. Religion can be viewed as research and has remained under-theorized. organized around forms of knowledge. Imagination is the key to both the social Recognizing these as forms of knowledge construction of the unseen fields of existence, allows their spread across cultures, reflected in this world and beyond, and also for relating in vocabulary (Tadmor 2009), areal patterns the symbols of mythology to this world and in rite techniques (Siikala 1978) and narrative social life. Unseen worlds that exist in the traditions, to be addressed in terms of present, extending from the known, and also “information exchange” (BEREZKIN, pp. 68). those worlds that exist before or after present From that position, such information time, are constructed through discourse – exchange can then be considered in relation to through verbal and performative arts and networks of exchange of other types of through people talking about them. As information, such as seafaring and metal- TARKKA stresses, the image systems from working technologies (cf. Frog 2013: 68–72). which these are developed draw on the Mythic knowledge and knowledge of known, the seen, the familiar, which provides technologies are not evenly distributed in a a platform for the identification of features community: non-specialists will in general that set the ‘other’ apart, making it different, have a less sophisticated and less elaborate uncanny. The ‘other’ thus shares parallels in base of mythic knowledge (cf. Wright 1998: the structures of kinship relations, social esp. 72–73), which will normally be dependent organization, dwellings, transportation, tools on specialist authorities rather than repre- and dishware, conventions of hospitality, and senting a synthetic understanding (Converse so on, while at the same time, key features are 1964). Mythic knowledge is also not uniform, absent or inverted. LUKIN fore-grounds the and thus an individual’s mythic knowledge elementary role that the experiential intimacy will vary in relation to the genres and registers of these familiar images play in shaping the

11 meanings of mythic images of the otherworld symbols and practices rather than causing them and of the other, and how those mythic to disappear: socially significant tradition images reciprocally shape the meanings and elements that have become charged with significance of experiencing their empirical emotive power may instead be acculturated to counterparts. Meaning is construed through the new social (e.g. RYCHKOVA) and religious this dialectic relation between the imaginal and (e.g. Harvilahti 2013) environment, or adapted the empirical. This extends from convergences to new contexts, uses and social functions of experiential reality and its mythic-image (e.g. Fowler 1987; Frog 2011; cf. Dégh 1995: counterparts to symbolic correlations and 97, 125–127, 218–219). They become resources juxtapositions: in mythic discourse, where their meanings, otherworld imagery lays bare and simplifies interpretations and valuations become the structures, characteristics and values of contested and negotiated amid the fits and the reality that is familiar and observable, starts of cultural change, and in the of the reality that corresponds to our horizons accompanying tendency of groups to develop of expectation (TARKKA, p. 28). a new status quo (cf. FROGA). These processes are not abstract, even if they may be discussed This process cannot operate independent of abstractly: they are social and semiotic the capacity of imagination. phenomena that occur through interactions of Historical Change and Stratification embodied individuals under their particular Mythology exists in the present of its users, historical circumstances. Historical stratification and religion exists through the practices of is a condition fundamental to mythology and those who live it. The meaningful present of religion, but it must be stressed that stratifi- tradition emerges from the inherited symbols, cation is always a condition relative to a structures and practices of the past being present moment, and in that moment, “earlier adapted to current needs and circumstances, a historical layers of meaning are of no more process that transpires in dialectic with significance than later ones” (TARKKA, p. 22). internal innovations and external influences. Historical change and stratification are of That meaningful present is construed in pivotal concern for many investigations into research through the formal elements of the mythology and religion in earlier periods. A tradition – images, motifs, rites, plots, rituals – long-standing issue has simply been the and meta-discourse surrounding them. Evidence methodological obstacle of approaching of their use and representation, patterns information about vernacular traditions in indicative of as well as their post-conversion environments. As EGELER contestation, forms data on their collective emphasizes, the potential value of such sources significance, functions, social meanings and are themselves dependent on certain types of meaning potential (cf. Siikala 1990: 197). continuities or ongoing mythic discourse that These formal elements both provide shared functions as knowledge about the past in the frames of reference and are, at the same time, present of the sources – whether or not it is resources for expression, communication, and rooted in historical events that it purports to the exercise of power. Rather than being describe. The process of change and stratifi- static, they are in constant flux: internal cation may itself be the target of research, innovations and acculturated external models focusing on particular cases or mythic constantly increase the inherited resources discourse in such circumstances as a process available, while the same process affects the (FROGA). Attention may also turn to neglect and obsolescence of others, which continuities, which for oral cultures must rely gradually fall out of use. As a consequence, on comparative evidence. Working with a mythologies and religions are in perpetual database of astounding scope, BEREZKIN processes of historical stratification (cf. illustrates that mythological narratives and Siikala 2002). More radical changes of models for thinking about the world can reinvention or displacement may lead whole readily have continuity extending back to the genres and registers to break down and Stone Age. Situating the frame of comparison disappear. However, this may disperse stories, at a global scale, these comparisons present

12 evidence for the history of the spread of Research, Ahead and Behind knowledge, both carried in immigrations and Mythology and religion are addressed by through contact networks (as well as having countless disciplines and the number of the potential to yield negative evidence of approaches and the variety of phenomena that knowledge displacement or loss). Long-term can be addressed only seem to increase with continuities attest to continued social relevance time. However, it is imperative to remain of the knowledge or traditions, while wide- aware that, just as these phenomena exist in a spread connection with mythology suggests present rooted in and shaped by their past, so ongoing cultural significance. However, this too is the research on them, even if that does not indicate that continuities entailed the inherited past may vary considerably across same relevance: the meanings and meaning disciplines and across the cultures or religions potential of such traditional elements change under investigation. This rooting in the past more quickly than the elements themselves has played an instrumental role in the (Siikala 1990: 188). Care must be taken not to structuring of current research, its orientation, presume that continuity of form and relevance interpretations and relative valorizations of indicates a continuity of meaning. As SEGAL source materials, methods, theories, and so on illustrates, even a stable written text may (FROGB; cf. Kuhn 1970). This problem is fore- remain at the center of religious practice grounded in TARKKA’s discussion of while understandings change around it: this is imagination, that was simultaneously identified evident in the ontologies of beings operative as central to mythology and oral poetry while in the and linked to the era of being devalued, peripheralized and remaining its formalized entextualization, in contrast to under-theorized in the same research across the categories through which it is interpreted the 20th century. Inherited ways of looking at today. The same problem manifests in material also shape the way that we are comparing ritual roles (e.g. Dumézil 1988), or inclined to interpret source material, such as considering possible continuities between the interpreting vague early references to types of roles attested in sources scattered Germanic women connected to the super- hundreds of years apart (SIMEK). natural through a later (and no less obscure) Stratification also has more subtle relevance. institution, or presuming their connection to a The tension between continuity and change is cult, as in the material discussed by SIMEK. It ever in an ongoing process of resolution, is essential to return to these topics and whether this is a slowly changing process reassess them from a current perspective, lest within a more or less stable cultural environ- we become trapped, operating within our own ment,2 or under conditions of more rapid and mythology of the mythology and religion aggressive impacts of or being investigated – lost within a ‘meta- anti-religious campaigns. However, deeper mythology’ (FROGB). understanding of synchronic uses, variation The inheritance of earlier research includes and juxtapositions of mythology often a multitude of infrastructures, such as methods requires some perspective on backgrounds of and systems for organizing and analyzing the inherited or borrowed patterns of use. In materials, and the wealth of resources in addition, these processes are not uniform, but which material has been catalogued and rather transpire and are negotiated locally and analytically assessed as a platform facilitating in networks producing different dialects of further research. These infrastructures have mythology and religion (Siikala 2012). At the been subject to ongoing development and same time, they develop in connection with revision. Many of them took shape across the different practices and specialists so that first half of the 20th century, when the variation and change manifests differently in methods, aims and working theories of different genres and registers (FROGA), which research were quite different. Their basis may may be key to understanding variation in therefore be neither well-suited nor mythology between genres or their distribution methodologically viable for use with current of labour in the present of ritual practices research questions within current methodo- (STEPANOVA & FROG; cf. also Honko 1981). logical frameworks. Just as it may prove

13 necessary to reassess and theorize concepts structures as well as psychology, and more such as ‘imagination’ or the appropriateness recently to processes of change, variation and of identifying certain women mentioned in contextual meanings or significance. These early sources as ‘cult functionaries’, it may directions are continuously evolving, and also be methodologically relevant to reconsider although they may seem natural or even whole typological systems and to develop inevitable in retrospect, the clues anticipating alternatives. This is done here by BEREZKIN, them are notoriously difficult to read from who offers an alternative to tale-type (Uther within the discourse. 2004) and motif (Thompson 1955–1958) The present collection is too modest to indices, developing a system of categorization propose generalizations anticipating trends in that is better suited to the particular research the future, but it may be worth noting goals for which it is used. Of course, if explicitly the potential of ‘knowledge’ and advances in research are to influence the ‘imagination’ as new key concepts being scientific community, they must connect with applied in studies here (TARKKA; LUKIN; current models and understandings, whether FROGA; BEREZKIN; and cf. KANERVA). In through the internal innovation of what is addition, ‘mythic discourse’ has become a known or through its extension into new areas significant frame of reference (even if the and in new directions: new knowledge can term is not used), attending to practice and the only be accessed via a bridge from what is activity of people (FROGA; TARKKA; EGELER; known. Thus, reassessments and displacement STEPANOVA & FROG; RYCHKOVA; cf. GUYKER), of inherited models, perspectives and rather than projecting idealized images of interpretive frames must be situated in relation static and atemporal religions and mythologies. to those frames. An additional strategy for Such approaches also take broader views of advancement is capitalizing on the diversity mythology than simply ‘stories’, turning of disciplines and approaches to bring their attention to the ‘mythic’ (FROGA; LUKIN; multiple perspectives to bear on the target of TARKKA; cf. KANERVA). A variety of attention analysis. This is the strategy advocated by is also given to ontologies operating in EGELER: bringing together and triangulating vernacular cultures and texts which may not the methods and understandings available correspond to those familiar to researchers, or from different categories of data linked to to those that are inferred and assumed when different disciplines is a methodological approaching research materials (FROGB; SEGAL; strategy that is especially relevant where SIMEK; STEPANOVA & FROG; and also evidence under scrutiny is extremely limited. KANERVA; MIKOLIĆ). Corresponding attention Such triangulation is more likely to produce is given to typologies and categories used in findings that are sustainable across disciplinary research (BEREZKIN; FROGA; and also perspectives, and findings that are more TARKKA). This extends to the analysis of historically enduring. The dialectic between variation in the use of formal elements across current research and inherited disciplinary genres as categories of discourse (LUKIN), or resources presents a framework for innovation in the distributed use of genres in cultural and advancement in a variety of ways. practices (STEPANOVA & FROG). Another site The history of research discourse is receiving attention is the more general characterized by changes in broad paradigms dialectic construction of the unseen world in that provide general frameworks according to relation to experiential reality (TARKKA), and which more particular (e.g. the how the meanings of each are constructed in Historical-Geographic Method) are structured relation to the other (LUKIN). Of course, the and implemented.3 Investigations into the attention given to these topics is interfaced mythologies and religions of earlier cultures with, and complementary to, comparative were long dominated by emphasis on their studies of formal elements of folklore data (cf. formal elements – stories, rituals, cosmologies – BEREZKIN; FROGA), or focused reconstructive and their reconstruction into ideal forms. attention given to particular elements of Attention gradually shifted to their relation- mythology, such as a particular god (cf. ships to society, both in terms of social HELLERS; MIKOLIĆ). Such research is an

14 integrated part of studies that attend to the Bell, Catherine. 1992. Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice. topics and phenomena mentioned above and Oxford: Oxford University Press. Ben Amos, . 1976. “Analytical Categories and Ethnic do not marginalize them. Genres”. In Folklore Genres. Ed. Dan Ben Amos. We make no claim that some or any of Austin: University of Texas Press. Pp. 215–242. these points mark or anticipate future trends Briggs, Charles L., & Richard Bauman. 1992. “Genre, or trajectories of research. Perhaps, however, , and Social Power”. Journal of you may encounter thoughts and perspectives Linguistic Anthropology 2(2): 131–172. de Castro, Eduardo Viveiros. 1998. “Cosmological among these pages with which you are not Deixis and Amerindian Perspectivism”. Journal of already familiar, something with the potential the Royal Anthropological Institute 4(3): 469–488. to invite looking at familiar data or traditions Converse, Philip. 1964. “The Nature of Belief Systems in new and different ways, something that can in Mass Publics”. In Ideology and Discontent. Ed. carry your own research in unforeseen D. Apter. London: Free Press. Pp. 206–261. Csapo, Eric. 2004. Theories of Mythology. London: directions. Blackwell. Frog (mr.frog[at]helsinki.fi), PL 59 (Unioninkatu 38 A), Dégh, Linda. 1995. Narratives in Society: A 00014 University of Helsinki, Finland. Performer-Centered Study of Narration. FF Communications 255. Helsinki: Suomalainen Karina Lukin (karina.lukin[at]helsinki.fi), PL 59 Tiedeakatemia. (Unioninkatu 38 A), 00014 University of Helsinki, Doty, William G. 2000. Mythography: The Study of Finland. Myths and Rituals. 2nd edn. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press. Notes Dumézil, Georges. 1988. Mitra-Varuna. Trans. Derek 1. Such as the annual sacrificial festivals described by Coltman. New York: Zone Books. Stark (2002: 117–119), noting that the sources Foley, John Miles, & Peter Ramey 2012. “Oral Theory generally do not elucidate a connection between the and Medieval Studies”. In Medieval Oral Literature. person overseeing the ritual and the broader Ed. Karl Reichl. Berlin: de Gruyter. Pp. 71–102. category of specialist, even where this is clearly Foley, John Miles. 1988. The Theory of Oral known (e.g. Inha 1999 [1911]: 370–373). Composition: History and Methodology. 2. Jukka Korpela (2014) has, for example, argued that Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Iron Age cultural structures and worldview were Fowler, Loretta. 1987. Shared Symbols, Contested still maintained of in parts of Karelia into the 19th Meanings: Gros Ventre Culture and History, 1778– century. These conditions were essential for the 1984. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. maintenance of the mythology and practices rooted Frog. 2011. “ qua Fulcrum: in the or earlier were upheld in Perspectives on the Cultural Activity of Myth, conjunction with the associated ritual specialists Mythological Poetry and Narrative in Medieval until the traditions were documented in the 19th and Iceland”. Mirator 12: 1–29. 20th centuries (Siikala 2002; Frog 2013). Frog. 2013. “Shamans, Christians, and Things in 3. The view of the relationship between ‘’ and between: From Finnic–Germanic Contacts to the ‘methodology’ used here distinguishes a Conversion of Karelia”. In Conversions: Looking methodology as an ideological arena within which for Ideological Change in the Early Middle Ages. individual researchers operate, entailing views and Ed. Leszek Słupecki & Rudolf Simek. Studia valorizations of research materials and questions Mediaevalia Septentrionalia 23. Vienna: put to them, methods, theories, research tools, Fassbaender. Pp. 53–98. argumentation strategies, and so forth – Frog. 2014a. “Myth, Mythological Thinking and the methodology corresponds more or less to the Viking Age in Finland”. In , Fabula, Fact – proverbial ‘box’ in which we ‘think’; a paradigm is The Viking Age in Finland. Ed. Joonas Ahola & Frog here considered a broader structuring framework with Clive Tolley. Studia Fennica Historica 18. entailing core operating principles, implicit Helsinki: Society. Pp. 437–482. theories, valuations and priorities as a historical Frog. 2014b. “Parallelism, Mode, Medium and Orders pattern according to which contemporary of Representation”. In Parallelism in Verbal Art methodologies are organized – i.e. a paradigm and Performance: Pre-Print Papers of the Seminar- extends beyond and unites the (sometimes Workshop, 26th–27th May 2014. Ed. Frog. competing) ‘boxes’ within which groups of Folkloristiikan toimite 21. Helsinki: Folklore Studies, researchers ‘think’ and operate. University of Helsinki. Pp. 185–207. Frog. 2015 (in press). “Registers of Oral Poetry”. In Works Cited Registers of Communication. Ed. Asif Agha & Agha, Asif. 2007. Language and Social Relations. Frog. Studia Fennica Linguistica. Helsinki: Finnish Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Literature Society. Barthes, Roland. 1972 [1957]. Mythologies. New York: Frog & Janne Saarikivi. 2014/2015. “De situ linguarum Hill & Wang. fennicarum aetatis ferreae, Pars I”. RMN Newsletter 9: 64–115.

15

Gunnell, Terry. 1995. The Origins of Scandinavian Siikala, Anna-Leena. 1990. Interpreting Oral Narrative. Drama. Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer. FF Communications 245. Helsinki: Academia Halliday, M.A.K. 1978. Language as Social Semiotic. Scientiarum Fennica. London: Edward Arnold. Siikala, Anna-Leena. 2002. Mythic Images and Harvilahti, Lauri. 2013. “Ethnocultural Knowledge and Shamanism: A Perspective on Poetry. FF Mythical Models: The Making of St Olaf, the God Communications 280. Helsinki: Academia of Thunder, and St during the First Centuries Scientiarum Fennica. of the Christian Era in the Scandinavian and Baltic Siikala, Anna-Leena. 2012. Itämerensuomalaisten Regions”. In The Performance of Christian and mytologia. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Pagan Storyworlds: Non-Canonical Chapters of the Seura. History of Nordic Medieval Literature. Ed. Lars Boje Stark, Laura. 2002. Peasants, Pilgrims, and Sacred Mortensen, Tuomas M, S. Lehtonen & Alexandra Promises: Ritual and the Supernatural in Orthodox Bergholm. Turnhout: Brepols. Pp. 199–219. Karelian . Helsinki: Finnish Literature Hiiemäe, Reet. 2004. “Handling Collective Fear in Society. Folklore”. Folklore (Tartu) 26: 65–80. Stark, Laura. 2006. The Magical Self: Body, Society Honko, Lauri. 1962. Geisterglaube in Ingermanland. and the Supernatural in Early Modern Rural FF Communications 185. Helsinki: Suomalainen Finland. FF Communications, 290. Helsinki: Tiedeakatemia. Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Honko, Lauri. 1981. “Traditionsekologi: Stepanova, Eila. 2012. “Mythic Elements of Karelian Introduktion”. In Tradition och Miljö: Ett Laments: The Case of syndyzet and spuassuzet”. In kulturekologiskt Perspektiv. Ed. Lauri Honko & Mythic Discourses: Studies in Uralic Traditions. Orvar Löfgren. NIF Publications 11. Lund: Liber Ed. Frog, Anna-Leena Siikala & Eila Stepanova. Läromedel. Pp. 9–63. Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society. Pp. 257–287. Honko, Lauri. 1989. “Folkloristic Theories of Genre”. Stepanova, Eila. 2014. Seesjärveläisten itkijöiden Studia Fennica 33: 13–28. rekisterit: Tutkimus äänellä itkemisen käytänteistä, Inha, I.K. 1999 [1911]. Kalevalan laulumailta. teemoista ja käsitteistä. Kultaneiro 14. Joensuu: Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Suomen Kansantietouden Tutkijain Seura. af Klintberg, Bengt. 2010. The Types of the Swedish Tadmor, Uri. 2009. “Loanwords and the World’s Folk Legend. FF Communications 300. Helsinki: Languages: Findings and Results”. In The Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Loanwords in the Worlds Languages: A Korpela, Jukka. 2014. “Reach and Supra-Local Comparative Handbook. Ed. Martin Haspelmath & Consciousness in the Medieval Nordic Periphery”. Uri Tadmor. New York: de Gruyter. Pp. 55–75. In Fibula, Fabula, Fact – The Viking Age in Tanghlerlini, Timothy R. 1995. “From to Turks: Finland. Ed. Joonas Ahola & Frog with Clive Continuity and Change in Danish Legend Tolley. Studia Fennica Historica 18. Helsinki: Tradition”. Scandinavian Studies 67(1): 32–62. Finnish Literature Society. Pp. 175–194. Tarkka, Lotte. 2013. Songs of the Border People: Kuhn, Thomas S. 1970. The Structure of Scientific Genre, Reflexivity, and Performance in Karelian Revolutions. 2nd edn. International Encyclopedia of Oral Poetry. FF Communications 305. Helsinki: Unified Science: Foundations of the of Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Science II.2. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Tolley, Clive 2009. Shamanism in Norse Myth and Lévi-Strauss, Claude. 1952. Race and History. : Magic I–II. FF Communications 296–297. UNESCO. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Lindow, John. 1995. “Supernatural Others and Ethnic von Sydow, C. W. 1948. “On the Spread of Traditions”. Others: A Millennium of World View”. Scandinavian In C. W. von Sydow. Selected Papers on Folklore Studies 67(1): 8–31. Published on the Occasion of his 70th Birthday. Lyle, Emily. 2012. Ten Gods: A New Approach to Copenhagen: Rosenkilde & Bagger. Pp. 11–43. Defining the Mythological Structures of the Indo- Wright, Robin M. 1998. Cosmos, Self, and History in Europeans. Newcastle upon Tyne: Cambridge Baniwa Religion: For Those Unborn. Austin: Scholars Publishing. University of Texas Press. Siikala, Anna-Leena. 1987 [1978]. The Rite Technique of the Siberian Shaman. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica.

16

Picturing the Otherworld: Imagination in the Study of Oral Poetry Lotte Tarkka, University of Helsinki

Abstract: This article advocates a reassessment of imagination in the study of oral poetry, theorizing imagination as a tool for research. It addresses imagination’s role in constructing unseen worlds through oral poetry, which dialogically structures understandings of the experiential world. It argues for a unified approach to imagination operating in mythic and other discourses. Kalevala-metre poetry provides an illustrative case. The otherworld is by definition beyond the The vitalization of imagination as a tool has scope of empirical experience. Knowledge nevertheless maintained a divide between the and understandings of the otherworld, its entertainment of and poetic meaning topography, inhabitants and significance are potential on the one hand, and understandings not random and purely spontaneous: they are of the mythic, unseen world on the other. The socially constructed and communicated through present article discusses this problem through discourse. Anchors of this knowledge are the case of research on Finno-Karelian forms of verbal art or oral poetry linked to traditions. It reviews the discussion of mythology, ritual and magic. In practice, of imagination through the history of scholarship, course, the deictic opposition between ‘us’ or where it has been under-theorized. It then sets ‘ours’ and ‘other’ leads to the symbolic out an approach to imagination, especially correlation between the remote, empirically following the work of Mark Johnson (1987), inaccessible and the environ- and illustrates its utility as a tool against mental or social spaces that are ‘other’, such empirical data. Finally, the article argues that as the forest or a neighbouring village. the divide between the mythic and the (Tarkka 2013: 327–428.) These ‘others’ may fantastic or poetic is a specious construct also be conceived through the lens of the rooted in the research history, and that better supernatural in dialectic with empirical theorizing of imagination makes it possible to experience, yet the supernatural qualities and observe a particular poetics operating in the attributes ascribed to them belong to the creation of meaning through imagery against sphere of the imaginal1 (see Frog 2015). In all a mythic sounding board. cases, imagination provides the essential bridge between discourse and knowledge or Imagination and Fantasy in Early Finnish understanding. Research Research has a long history of interest in The preliminary connotations of imagination mythology, the supernatural, and the traditions are already observable in the process of of oral poetry through which these realms of inventing the Finnish written language, where discourse and understanding have been it is called kuvatuslahja [‘the gift of picturing’], communicated. Like any other symbolic action, or kuvaisaisti [‘image-sense’], following the oral poetry works by creating new, otherwise terminology established by Elias Lönnrot in unimaginable couplings between language his pioneering Swedish–Finnish dictionary and the world. As these connections inter- from 1866–1880 (Lönnrot 1958a: 830; 1958b: twine, the unseen and inexplicable is clothed 76). Here, imagination or fantasy has to do with in concrete images and is thus rendered images, the senses and human dispositions. observable, conceivable, and understandable. According to a more recent dictionary At the same time, the everyday and that which definition, imagination is the “capacity to is manifest in the world are linked with form internal images or ideas of objects and images in such a way that their familiar situations not actually present to the senses” meanings become obscure and open to (Oxford English Dictionary, s.v. ‘imagination’), question, infusing them with new meaning but in philosophy, psychology, and art studies potential. A central position in the creation of the concept has been the subject of intense poetic meanings is the imagination. and long debate (see e.g. Johnson 1987: 141– In recent decades, imagination has received 166; Iser 1993; Petterson 2002). In the increased attention for understanding functions imagination, images and ideas may be of verbal art and how it operates in society. combined without being continuously subjected

17 to a reality-check; imagination is thus free up logical insights. These foregrounded the study to a certain point. A basic premise in the of poetry as a social phenomenon and as an study of verbal expressions, such as poems, is aesthetic and ideological resource for the the notion of the communicability of imagi- people who sang the poems. nation in a way that is conditioned by the In the study of Kalevala-metre poetry, translatability of the imaginative into language. imagination has been linked above all with Thus, the study of imagination has to take into three issues: a) the birth of poems and poetry account the boundaries set by language and its through individual or collective creativity; b) the conventions that are set by culture. Lönnrot origin of mythic concepts; and c) the figure- (1840: i) points out the imperfection of this ative nature of poetic language. Imagination conversion process: “in speaking of matters of and fantasy have, however, remained residual the mind and thought,” “figuration may only categories: no attempts have been made to take place through the voice and the word, analyze and theorize them, and the attempts to deficiently, like all other kinds of description envisage them have resorted to metaphor: in the world.” Lönnrot’s position can be imagination is pictured, for example, as ‘a looked on as a foundational view of how this borderless realm’ (ääretön valtakunta) which has been understood to take place within the ‘flies’ (lentää) (Setälä 1932: 606) or which field of Finnish folk-poetry research. ‘billows free and broad’ (vapaana ja laajana Finnish folklore studies took shape within lainehtii) (Hästesko 1910: 5). Traditions of the project of Romantic Nationalism. The interpretation of the poetry have long been collection, archiving, publication, and study bound up with nationalist ideology and a call of folklore focused on the oral poetic tradition for a nation to have a history (see e.g. Siikala that was still practiced in the peripheries of 2012: 22–23). The imaginative faculty or the Finno-Karelian culture area in the early fantasy received a dubious reputation: there 19th century. This tradition, namely poetry in was no national need for it, and it even the Kalevala-metre, provided the source became an obstacle to reconstructing the material for Lönnrot for his compilation of the history of the nation through the epic poems. Finnish , the Kalevala (1835; This , which Satu Apo (2015) identifies as 1849). The poems of this epic, indeed the romantic , has influenced particular mere existence of such a proof of civilization, genres in the history of research, favouring fuelled the national imagination, and its some, and rejecting others, particularly those influence ranged from art and education to characterised as fantasy-based entertainment. politics and commerce. The publication of the Most traditions of Finnish folk-poetry research epic resulted in extensive campaigns of were motivated by the quest for the real: folklore collection. Initially the study of this poems were supposed to tell of historical poetic tradition concentrated on the literary events, past ethnographic reality, or of myths epic, and, in line with the intellectual climate that in antiquity were believed to be true and of the time, the main question was whether therefore equally conceived of as represent- Lönnrot’s epic reflected ancient mythology or ations of an ethnographic reality. In the eyes ethnic, and thereby national, history. The of the researcher, these ‘ancient’ beliefs were scientific study of folklore only started to naturally ‘’ (kuvitelmat) (e.g. Harva prioritise Lönnrot’s sources and other oral 1948: 50, 53). Used in this way, the word poems as scholarly research material in the fantasy has a pejorative dimension which early 20th century. The study of Kalevala- points to a false or warped interpretation of metre poetry was dominated for decades by the reality, the superstition of ‘other’ people (cf. so-called Finnish or Historical-Geographic Frog 2014: 438–441). Method, which aimed at the reconstruction of Although imagination rarely functions as the poetic tradition through comparative study an analytical concept, the international (esp. Krohn K 1918; cf. Krohn K 1926; see groundbreaking text of Finnish folk-poetry Frog 2013). Starting from the 1960s, the research, Kaarle Krohn’s Die folkloristische historicising interest was increasingly Arbeitsmethode (1926), defines the research challenged with sociological and anthropo- object of folklore studies by means of

18 imagination: according to Krohn, folkloristics motifs with various materials, either learned investigates: or invented, calls for an exceptional ‘poetic das Volkwissen, soweit es: 1) traditionell, 2) gift, an open eye, which embraces nature, life and the human , and an imaginative power von der Phantasie bearbeitet und 3) echt 5 volkstümlich ist” (Krohn K 1926: 25, original which creates clear and beautiful images’ emphasis; cf. also Hautala 1957: 32–33.) (1885: 585, cf. also 587). Rather than being a characteristic of all people, creativity was a the lore of the folk, insofar as it is 1) traditional, 2) moulded by the imagination, talent of the few, the chosen of ancient bards, and 3) genuinely of the folk. or the collective of the Volk. This romantic gift was natural and unbound to subjects, or Krohn even calls the object of research essentially itseletön – ‘unconscious of self’ Volksphantasie [‘folk fantasy’] (1926: 21– and ‘selfless’– since individual performers of 22). It becomes clear from reading Krohn, folk poetry did not have ‘the slightest poetic however, that imagination mainly relates to gift of their own’ (vähintäkään oma the aesthetic or poetic form of texts: poetry is runolahja) (Krohn J 1885: 583). first and foremost the sphere of the In depicting the Karelian ‘creative linguistic imagination. Kalevala-metric epic poems instinct’ (luova kielivaisto) and ‘mind prone could be formed ‘within the native to dreaming’ (haaveilulle herkkä mieli), Kaarle imagination without any other basis in reality Krohn positively valued this tendency to than the singer’s own internal and external 2 produce variation: the eastern rune-singers vision,’ and poems could be developed and had not only preserved the poetry, but had linked ‘merely by means of the imagination’ ‘added to it with inexhaustible imagination, (pelkän mielikuvituksen avulla) (Krohn K and brightened it with the unquenchable 1932: 25–26). The more artistically-minded flame of feeling’6 (1914: 352). In his own folklorist Martti Haavio later advocated that it words, Krohn (1918: 132) clung to this was a researcher’s responsibility not only to ‘theory of free development’ (vapaan elucidate the materials and poetic patterns kehityksen teoria), especially as regards used by a poem’s composer, but also to attend Kalevala-metre poems, because he ‘believed in to this aesthetic and creative process: since he the special quality of the Karelian imagination.’7 is dealing with ‘the birth of a work of art, one Later, as the idea of gradual evolution gave should take note of the poet’s imagination and 3 way to the idea of devolution, and Krohn skill’ (Haavio 1952: 213). Although imagi- came to emphasize the poems’ western nation or ‘fantasy’ remained intuitively rather Finnish origin, the positive connotations of than analytically defined, its significance for imaginative creation were attached to the research was underlined already from the first th particular time and place of the poems’ origin: half of the 20 century. the subsequent changes were renderings of The association of imagination with poetry mechanical thought and the laws of poetic and creativity is a Romanticist notion. The metre (esp. in Krohn K 1926). ‘The time Greek word poiesis, from which it derives, when something new is created was past’8 and points to the ability of poetry to create imagination had withered into an ability to something new, and especially to create “new ‘select’ (valikoida), ‘assemble’ (kokoonpanna) kinds of worlds” (Oesch 2006: 87). Typically, and ‘ornament’ (koristella) (Krohn K 1918: 130). imagination has been seen as freedom of In addition to its position in the discussion expression and creation, and poetry thus of poetic quality and creation, imagination has becomes ‘the shoreless, borderless realm of served as an explanatory or interpretive the imagination, where the flight of imagi- 4 concept in the study of folk belief and nation is limitless and unbounded’ (Setälä mythology. As opposed to legends based on 1932: 606). Imagination is both the prime historical events, myths were ‘tales created by mover of poems and the impulse that makes the imagination’ (mielikuvituksen luomat them change and thus depart from their tarut) (Krohn K 1932: 22–24). Personi- original form and meaning. Already in the th fication, typical of folk belief, has in 19 century, Julius Krohn (1885) emphasized particular been seen as a product of the that amending Kalevala-metric poems or poetic 19 imagination (e.g. Krohn K 1914: 351). The imaginations to envision it through ‘images’ problem of ‘believing in’ religious ideas has (kuvat) that would capture its essential traits. also been elaborated upon in this light. F.A. These images always remained deficient, nor Hästesko (1910: 2–3, 5) argues that religious were they able to communicate logically the ideas ‘born [...] with the help of the idea of what they sought to represent (Setälä imagination, but based on belief,’9 do not 1932: 18, 26, 191). The of the rune- really belong to the sphere of the imagination singers was for Setälä a ‘fantasy’ (kuvitelma), in the true sense – the imagination does not whose meaning had become ‘obscure’ need ‘the support of make-believe’ (luulottelun (hämärtänyt), lending these images of the tuki). Especially interpretations of nature- sampo several different ‘Gestalts’ (hahmot). myths foregrounded the role of the Both rune-singers and researchers have imagination in the generation of religious ideas, attempted to analyse the multiplicity of these concepts and images. For example, E.N. Gestalts through ‘imagination and knowledge’ Setälä emphasised that myths of the world (mielikuvitus ja tieto). (ibid.: 25.) Setälä pillar as a pillar or axle at the centre of the emphasised that, unlike the rune-singers, world which supports the universe (mailman- researchers’ responsibilities lay in investi- pylväskuvitelma) are not ‘in essence matters gating the prototypical images, not the of belief’ (pohjaltaan uskomuksellinen). They fleeting reflections created by the imagination are based on ‘folk knowledge’ (kansantieto) (Setälä 1932: 20). and ‘“scientific” folk observations’ (‘tieteelliset’ In the discussion of the sampo, although kansanhavainnot) of the immovable North knowledge and rationality were favoured over Star, which ‘has set the folk imagination interpretative creativity, the question of going and simultaneously given cause for imagination is articulated. The suspicion religious imaginings.’10 (Setälä 1932: 596– expressed towards imagination and the 597.) For Uno Harva, the original core of the imaginative reflects two traditions of thought. nature-myth ideas was ‘the very mental image In the first, the meaning of a equates awakened by the phenomenon of nature’ (itse to its supposed original meaning, which luonnonilmiön herättämä mielikuva) together imaginative reworking obscures (e.g. Setälä with the vernacular explanation of the 1932: 25–26). In the second, imagination is phenomenon’s origin (Harva 1948: 72). These defined as the inclination of the human mind initial forms were mixed with ‘additional to grasp “objects through their images, traits from other stories and folk tales’11 shadows and reflections” (Johnson 1987: (ibid.). Imagination was therefore seen as both 142). As Mark Johnson (1987: 141–145) has the ability to mediate observations and mental noted, the latter approach derives from a images as well as the narrower capacity to misreading of Plato’s philosophy and sets generate ‘contaminations’ and ‘interpolations’ imagination in opposition to knowledge and in poems. Imagination was thus the creative rationality, confining it within the field of art. power of the poet who first composed a Early Finnish folklore research thus treated nature-myth poem, a power which no the ‘image sense’ operative in folk poetry successor could surpass even with boundless with ambiguity. Although imagination was imagination of his own (Setälä 1932: 583). acknowledged as an essential characteristic of The problem of imagination has been poetry, myth, and folklore – indeed, of all discussed by Finnish folklorists in the context discourse – its careful conceptualization was of the Sampo-Cycle and the sampo in not prioritised. The National Romanticist particular. The sampo is a mythic symbol of ideology foregrounded the unity of language, prosperity and growth that is produced by history, and art as the backbone of a national men and lost because of the inability to share culture and thus of a nation state. The its produce (e.g. Tarkka 2012). Setälä argued imagination, however, blurred any clear vision that rune-singers did not ‘know’ what the of the nation’s history and thus became sampo was: for them, the platonic idea or confined into the epiphenomenal sphere of ‘proto-image’ (perikuva) of the sampo was art. Imaginativeness as an aspect of language alien, but they tried through their was treated with similar negligence.

20

Imagination and the Figurative Nature of of images such as metaphors and similes in Language human thought: ‘People think through images. To be communicable and expressible in Images always arise in people’s minds: they language, imagination must link up with the are the surge of people’s thoughts.’14 conventions and poetics of the expressive (Relander 1894: 295.) culture in question. Our ability and inclination The emphasis on emotion is connected not to create mental images independently of any just with theories of folk-psychology and the direct sensual perceptions and to construct definition of lyric as a poetic genre of imaginal worlds from them is linked to culture, emotion, but also with Romanticism, in which language, and the generically determined means the connection of the imagination with of expression – even fantasy genres and emotions and irrationality formed a valued nonsense-verse have their own poetics and but also hazardous force (see Oesch 2006: hence their limitations of expression. Jouko 78–79). The relationship of imagination to the Hautala (1957: 33) places imagination within senses and its draw towards sensuality bring the competence of the performer to produce in their train the potential for vice and sin poetically structured and stylized texts: in the (Bendix 1997: 31). Assessments of figurative verse tradition, ‘form itself indicates the language often cast explicit aesthetic value influence of fantasy.’12 In this respect, judgements. Julius Krohn (1885: 572) argued imagination is thus a lingual phenomenon. that figurative language is undeveloped in Analyses and typologies of the figurative Finnish oral poetry, ‘since allegory is language within Finnish folk-poetry research impossible in folk poetry, where the intellect are as rare as conceptual analysis focusing on does not yet have the least influence.’15 For imagination. The most interesting attempt to his part, Haavio (1992: 290) emphasises that comprehend the figurative nature of folk ‘the verbal expression of ancient poets is not poetry is Oskar Relander’s thesis, shallow but [...] stratified,’16 and continues: Kuvakielestä vanhemmassa suomalaisessa In striving with limited means to bring lyyrillisessä kansanrunoudessa (1894) [‘On out precisely and comprehensibly Figurative Language in Older Finnish Lyric concepts and emotions which do not Folk Poetry’], which represents a folk- belong to everyday life, they [ancient psychology investigation seldom practiced in poets] do resort to the language of Finland. The work was not approved as an everyday life, but use the words and academic dissertation in folklore studies, and phrases with new meanings, as symbols it was only approved with difficulty in the for new states and activities.17 (Haavio discipline of aesthetics (Timonen 2004: 14– 1992: 290.) 15). Relander maps out the figurative expression of lyric folk poetry on the basis of Ideas that were ‘mysterious’ (salaperäinen), the laws of association between emotion and abstract or associated with the otherworld thought. The driving force is emotion, which were at odds with everyday experience and demands to be satisfied and expressed, and they were presented in graphically concrete ‘imagination brings forth images which keep forms by using metaphors or ‘translation’ emotion enlivened.’13 The imagination also (translaatio) into images (Haavio 1992: 289– sets in motion the recoupling of mental 290). Anna-Leena Siikala (2002: 48–49) images already in the consciousness that have emphasises particularly the concreteness of been activated in reaction to new images fed in mythic images. In them, the unknown and by the imagination. The imagination therefore inexplicable are rendered into visible and not only serves the emotions, but also promotes detailed graphic forms: both and the ‘the activity of thought’ (ajatustoiminta). sampo could be pictured as birds, the first as (Relander 1894: 2.) Although Relander’s one with iron wings (Siikala 2002: 50–52), analysis remains a relatively mechanical the latter as one with long claws (Tarkka attempt to create order and sense in the 2012: 145). By rendering one phenomenon imagery and poetic features of Kalevala-metre through another that represents a different poetry, he emphasises, albeit vaguely, the role conceptual category, metaphors enable

21 linguistic innovation and speech about things 40) or “considered and experienced as real” for the depiction of which the vocabulary or (Siikala 2002: 52). is lacking. These things may According to Mark Johnson’s (1987: 140) also be non-existent, for example things that broad definition, imagination is the human subsist only in the realm of the imagination. “capacity to organize mental representations Seppo Knuuttila uses the term visualisation (especially percepts, images and image (kuvantaminen): this indicates a conceptual schemata) into meaningful, coherent unities.” process ‘in which for example the non- Imagination is not confined to the field of art, existent is given meaning by linking it with nor does it relate only to the creation of various experiential and perceivable entities’18 images or the arrangement and comprehension (Knuuttila 2012: 140). This is especially clear of perceptions (Johnson 1987: 140–141). in mythic metaphor and images of the Johnson argues that imagination is part of otherworld. The of the mysterious human rationality: and abstract through images and shaping Imagination is a pervasive structuring these through oral poetry allows imagination activity by means of which we achieve to become communicable through language, coherent, patterned, unified represent- and this same process also develops the ations. It is indispensable for our ability expressive vocabulary of the poetry itself. An to make sense of our experience, to find oral poetry not only preserves archaisms and it meaningful. [...] Imagination is abso- flexes the semantics of vocabulary to conform lutely central to human rationality, that to its expressive needs, it also maintains the is, to our rational capacity to find systems of metaphors, images and symbols significant connections, to draw infer- that are fundamental to its functioning in ences, and to solve problems. (Johnson communication – communication that depends 1987: 168.) on imagination to be used and understood. In this light, Hautala’s (1957: 33) formulation of Johnson’s broad definition helps to outline the Kaarle Krohn’s (1926: 21–22) Volksphantasie analytical and methodological potential of the appears insightful for his time: the form of concept of imagination. In research on folk Kalevala-meter poetry (or any poetry) “is in poetry, this definition can be complemented itself an indication of the influence of by some additional points and observations. fantasy” (cf. Lakoff & Turner 1989). Imageries and figurative expressions in poetic language are not ornamentation, but point to Myths and Imagination the ways in which people create order and William G. Doty argues that the imaginal meaning in their world – they are traces of nature of myths connects them with other imaginal processes and they imply, at least “imaginal expressions and stories” and potentially, rational argumentation (see also “idiosyncratic imaginings” that provide a Lakoff & Turner 1989: 215). The interpre- model for the interpretation of experienced tations of images change over time, and reality (Doty 2000: 40). A feature earlier historical layers of meaning are of no distinguishing myths from other forms of more significance than later ones. Moreover, meaning formation is their interpretation as when examining the mythic imagery of something culturally important (Doty 2000: poems, it is not appropriate to limit oneself to 37–39). Mythology and mythic language mythic or ritual texts: the imagination has the produce the core metaphors of a society or a ability to link mythic and “believed-in community, by which “the apparent random- imaginings” (de Riviera & Sarbin 1998) with ness of the cosmos can be stabilized [....] everyday thought and the worlds of play. Myths provide the overarching conceptualities When taken altogether, representations of a society by structuring its symbolic arising from and organised within the sphere representations of reality.” (Doty 2000: 51.) of the mythic imagination do not necessarily Both Doty and Siikala argue that the products form a completely coherent mythological of the mythic imagination, such as mythic whole (cf. Siikala 2002: 55–56), although images, are “true experientially” (Doty 2000: variation and innovation are structured and

22 conventional in the context of the image At the risk of reproducing Romanticizing frames that govern the new couplings notions of folk poetry, there is also reason to between images and that structure the relative ask whether oral and literary poetries differ in freedom of imagination itself. The coherence relation to the cultural and linguistic channelling of images and image frames within a mythic of imagination, for example through traditional, corpus is context-specific: they make sense, crystallized imageries. In particular, a system but the relevant meanings within one context like Kalevala-metre poetry, in which several should not be extended to another. Although genres operate within the framework of one in the present survey the focus is upon the poetic language, is impossible to set apart verbal expression of the imagination, the from other forms of communication as a images could also be represented visually or completely separate artistic sphere. The poetic in action (cf. e.g. Siikala 2002: 52; Tarkka language was intertwined with spoken language 2012: 163–164). For example, in Karelian and other poetic systems (see Stepanova ritual praxis, the supranormal power that was 2012: 281; Tarkka, forthcoming a), and its believed to threaten a person was eliminated recognised genres occupied a concrete by means of the image of an iron and/or fiery position as social or magical tools (see Tarkka fence which surrounded him. The image was 2013: 109–115, 120–122, 286–287). Julius verbalised for example in the charm words Krohn (1885: 576) argued long ago that aijan rautasen rakennan [‘I will build an iron ‘[f]olk poetry is closely connected to life; the fence’] or tavos mulle tulinen miekka [‘Forge realm of the imagination has not been prised me a fiery sword!’] (circling the body with an from it as something separate from normal iron sword being symbolically equivalent to life, as with art poetry.’19 Nor for this folk the erection of an iron fence), while the image poetry does there exist ‘poetry as poetry’, was concretised with a fiery splinter, and with ‘poetry for poetry’s sake’, ‘pure poetry’ (cf. an or sword, and finally was activated by Setälä 1932: 592–593), or ‘mere poetic circling the person under threat with the expressions’ (cf. Siikala 2002: 52). In addition, splinter and axe (SKVR I4 1878, 1887). Within the intertextuality of folklore genres mediates the frame of an individual performance, the the genre-specific meanings attached to conventions for using and interpreting image imageries and image frames, thus allowing representations becomes active, and the the mythic meanings to affect the whole field pragmatic relations between linguistic and of expressive genres. para-linguistic expressions as well as objects and elements of the environment resolve Images of the Otherworld otherwise ambiguous and potentially Mythic worlds simultaneously shape and contradictory symbols into meaningful provide frames for people to understand the coherence. world of their everyday experience (cf. Frog, Mythic images and the poetic language by this volume; Lukin, this volume). This will be which they are expressed are shared, historically illustrated here through the ways in which the layered, and linked to the slowly changing singers of Kalevala-metre poetry constructed structures of mentality (cf. e.g. Siikala 2002: their mythic worlds. Descriptions of the 29–32; 2012: 64–71). The collective and otherworld provide a suitable empirical basis traditional dimension of imagination (Petterson for the analysis of how people picture and put 2002) may be emphasised by speaking of into words the unknown world beyond the 20 ‘popular’ or ‘vernacular’ imagination. In the senses. As a starting point, it may be area of vernacular imagination, mythic images asserted that the networks of meaning and form powerful loci of cultural memory, image systems rooted in the otherworld are emotion, and action. These are simultaneously mythic in their nature, but their range of uses made possible and moulded within tradition; also extends across the description and they influence the ways in which individuals evaluation of everyday life and of individual and communities act and reciprocally change life (see Siikala 2012: 64–65; Tarkka as they are shaped through this action. 2013: 237–258).

23

In 1871, Miihkali Perttunen performed The expressive strategies. In the face of this Song of Creation, in which the mythic challenge, the poem lingers and, through its Väinämöinen drifts across the primordial sea. repetitive structure, creates a cross-exposure The myth of the world’s creation depicts the of the undesired space. time before time and a landscape which had How did Miihkali depict what lay outside not yet been organised into the geography that the experience of observation, of everyday we recognise. This is despite the poem’s and rational thought? How did he relate and internal world being brought together from picture the unknown? For Miihkali, the other- landscape elements and social relations that, world was dark and ‘strict’ (tarkka), strangely already before the acts of creation, resemble coloured but still natural in its stone-like-ness the familiar world. The world is created from – it was a barren island surrounded by water, the eggs of the water bird that broods upon a village which consumed and drowned Väinämöinen’s knee and the sea bottom has heroes. The otherworld thus resembles what is taken on its shape from his movements, familiar and yet remains unknown. In taming whereafter the hero drifts to the shore of and familiarizing the unknown, Miihkali Northland (). To an audience familiar brought concrete and everyday landscape with the poetic corpus, Northland activates a features (such as islands), social organizations broad, spatio-temporal semantic framework (such as villages) and elements (such as rooted in the otherworld (Tarkka 2013: 383– water) into contact with perpetually new and 384): it is clear that the events of mythic surprising image frameworks. The familiar primordial time are situated on the border of meanings of the features and elements of this two worlds: ‘ours’, and that of the ‘other’. landscape receded and were brought into Miihkali gives the following account on question, but the unknown became filled with Väinämöinen’s journey: images and meanings. The colourful stone (1) Häntä tuuli tuuvittauve, was peculiar as a stone, but that unfamiliarity ilman lieto liikuttauve, compelled reflection on the categories and oalto rannalla ajauve characteristics of these phenomena in dialectic pimieh om Pohjoiĺahe, with their regularities and contrasts with tarkkahan Tapiolahe, empirical experience. miehien šyöjähän kylähe, Miihkali’s performance is the result of a urohon upottajahe, process of contextually relevant selection: the kiven kirjavan šivulla, singer combined elements from the pool of poajem pakšun lappiella, traditional expressions known to him and that šoarehe šelällisehe, also suited the context in order to form an mantereh on puuttomahe. aesthetically satisfying whole. The paradig- (SKVR I 58.82–92.) 1 matic set of usable expressions was based on A wind lulls him, the singer’s mastery over the mythic corpus a gentle breeze sweeps him, (Doty 2000: 33–34; Siikala 2012: 60–61), and a wave drives him to shore, the combination of these elements into a to dark Northland, syntagmatic whole presupposed competence to strict Tapiola, to the man-eating village, in the broader poetic idiom. Siikala (2012: the drowner of heroes, 465) notes that singers and performers of to the side of a colourful stone, incantations were able to form different to the slope of a thick crag, by continuously combining ‘new to an island of the open sea, features of the mythic world’.21 In the history to a land without trees. of research, the creation of a paradigmatic set Corresponding depictions are typical of of images and tropes, the selection of possible Kalevala-metre poetry, the narrative world of expressions, and the inclination to form which is built up through journeys conducted parallel depictions have all been connected between this world and the otherworld. The with the field of imagination. These patterns otherworld destination is too dark to see and are deeply cultural, and hence part of the too strange to picture by means of normal vernacular, poetic imagination.

24

On the level of the regional mythic corpus, generated in relation to this world, the the epithets of the otherworldly Northland situation in folk poetry is more complex: the depict a world permeated by strangeness. The depiction of the unknown otherworld helped to positive pole of meaning of otherworld define and valuate this world, and to emphasise settings is concerned with wealth: Northland this world’s essential characteristics in a was a ‘thick, fat’ (pakšu) and ‘strict, sharp’ dialectic process. The familiar world of the (tarkka) place, an otherworld home of wealth, living and the otherworld subsisted side by which could also be situated in real regions, side, or one inside the other. The boundary for example on the shores of the Arctic between them was a fundamental structuring Ocean, teeming with fish (Tarkka 2013: 222– principle of this world, and one of the central 223). As a place of wealth, the otherworld functions of ritual was to define, sanction and was, however, connected with Utopias: maintain that boundary (cf. Stepanova & boundless wealth was a dream of the hungry Frog, this volume). (Tarkka 2013: 423–424.) (Tarkka 2012: 165). The otherworld is defined both deictically, At its most typical, otherworldliness is from the definer’s own position –‘that over connected with life after death and its spatial there’ as opposed to ‘this here’ – and also in representation, and with hostile images contrast to self-definition – it is ‘other’. milling out moral concepts – the otherworld Although the terms are relational (the Northland is helvetti [‘hell’], paha paikka relationship of this to that), they nonetheless [‘the evil place’] and paha sarana [‘the evil point to spatial and bodily experience: to hinge’], where paha valta [‘evil power’] rules existence within a world, under a ‘sky’, the (SKVR I1 634, 58, 54a). The Northland of the this-worldly state of a lifespan. For an incantations is above all a place of sins and a individual, this condition begins at birth, realm of death described with negative when the child moves from the womb with its epithets, where evil has its origin and to otherworld associations tälle ilmalle [‘into which evil is returned. The afterlife was this air’], näitä maita marssimah, ilmoja depicted as a place that put an end to the ihanumah [‘to march these lands, to admire familiar, warm, and good life, and the images these airs (skies)’] (SKVR I4 985, 960). From of the realm of the afterlife in Kalevala-metric an individual’s point of view, the tämän poetry overlap with the imagery of the realm ilmanen [‘this-worldly’] is temporally limited of evil. Notions derived from folk medicine and at the end of life the departed leaves and incantations about the powerful death tuolla ilmalla [‘for that air/world’] (SKS substance called also support the KRA. Samuli Paulaharju b)16431. 1915). perceived overlap of these concepts: kalma (Tarkka 2013: 385–386.) In their deicticity, originated from the realm of the dead (or the spatial images of the otherworld and this katonehen kartanosta [‘from the yard of the world presuppose a subject position from fallen’]), or from the bodies of the dead (or which this and that are defined as spatial manalaisen maksan päästä [‘from the liver of entities. Hence they also construct the identity the departed’]), and thither it was also sent of the subject and position him or her in space back with the aid of an incantation (SKVR I4 and time, and in a social relationship. Spatiality 548; Tarkka 2013: 385, 395–396). and relationality also present the possibility of The otherworld is defined in relation to exchange and movement: travel between the difference: it is a relational term which relates otherworld and this world, and communi- at least implicitly to the notions of a boundary cation between them. Hence the conceptual and what is on this side of the boundary. construction of the otherworld creates a basis These dimensions of reality are pictured in the for the themes of journeying and incantation terms tuonilmanen [‘that world’, lit. ‘of that performance represented in Kalevala-metre air (sky)’] and tämänilmanen [‘this world’, lit. epic poetry. (Tarkka 2013: 386.) ‘of this air (sky)’]. (Tarkka 2013: 385.) Otherworld epithets combine with each Although the unknown nature of the other- other and may form extensive passages that world presupposes its being filled with give the narrative a rhythm, motivate the plot meanings which trace back to and are and describe the narrative universe – as in

25

Miihkali’s eight-line description of Northland The geography of the Kalevala-metre in example (1) above. At its briefest, the poetry’s otherworld is linked with Northland, otherworld may, however, be depicted with which, as its name indicates, was situated in just one compound word, such as ikiperä the north. As a northerly region, it was [‘eternal end’] (SKS KRA. Heikki Meriläinen compared with Lapland (e.g. SKVR I2 873) b)547. 1888). Also, landscape terms and place and was pushed to the periphery of a , in themselves neutral, may be linked community’s sphere of activity by means of with the matrix of otherworld localities in a derivatives of ‘north’ (pohja) pointing to narrative context or, for example, through distance, being at the back of beyond or parallel expression, leading their interpre- lowness: Northland (Pohjola) was pohja or tation and value to change. Thus pejorative pohjo [‘north; bottom’] (SKVR I2 1025; I1 epithets that emphasise distance or lowliness 683). The pohjainen [‘northerly’] was a cold like perä [‘back; end’], pohja [‘north; north wind (vilu viima [‘the cold breeze’]) bottom’] and syvä [‘deep’] (e.g. SKVR I1 60, with which the mistress of Northland blights 72) may be joined with value-free Väinämöinen’s sowing (SKVR I1 88). In a descriptions. The relationship between the geographicalised otherworld, the direction of otherworld and this world also may be north and ethnic foreignness (‘Lappishness’) emphasised by using kinship terms, by which are characterised by coldness and darkness, the people of Northland are described as which create an association with concepts of being kin to the heroes (e.g. SKVR I1 165). the world of the departed. Northland is an icy (Tarkka 2013: 386–387.) and slippery kymä kylä [‘cold village’] (SKVR In addition to spatial, topographical and I1 60, 81), the dark and stone-hard Pimettölä social definitions, the otherworld is [‘Darkland’] (SKVR I1 60, 81, 88, 54). In the characterised as differing from normal reality land hostile to life, even the heavenly bodies in its temporality or non-temporality, which is do not shine (SKVR I1 93). (Tarkka 2013: described with the iki [‘eternal’]. 388.) Northland is the ikikylä [‘eternal village’] and Through imagination, a person could ikiperä [‘eternal end’] (SKVR I1 93; SKS visualise and verbalise both the non-existent KRA. Heikki Meriläinen b)547. 1888). The and the unknown. One of the most typical eternal otherworld is the world of the dead, a epithets describing the otherworld points space-time outside the temporality of this precisely to this dimension: the otherworld was world. From this primary meaning, use of the strange. Because the unknown reality had to be epithet iki has spread. Mythic is a envisioned, however, and made perceptible, it characteristic of positive heroes, above all could be described as a region or a building: Väinämöinen, based on his age, which indexes Northland was the vieras maa [‘foreign land’], wisdom. Väinämöinen is the ikuinen [‘eternally the tuntematon tupa [‘unknown cottage’], the old’] ikiruno [‘eternal poet’] (SKVR I1 308, outo ovi [‘strange door’], the tietämätön tie 624). Timelessness also refers to the [‘unknown road’] and the salakansan kartano continuity of knowledge mediated from earlier [‘yard of the secret folk’] (SKVR I1 60, 64, generations or vanha kansa [‘the ancient 79a; I2 816, 1025). (Tarkka 2013: 390–391.) people’] (Tarkka 2013: 500): the temporal One of the dimensions of the unknown was reach of tradition exceeds an individual nimettömyys [‘namelessness’], which appears generation or the lifetime of one person. The in innumerable compounds when describing a epithet iki also gives form to a community’s reality which the main social epithets do not temporal depth, the chain linking the engage with. The otherworld was lahti generations to the primordial time of the nimetön, nimen tietämätön [‘a nameless bay, world-creation, along which the forefathers unknown by name’] (SKVR I1 58a). (Tarkka aid and counsel the living. Through the ritual 2013: 416–417.) The naming of phenomena and maintenance of this connection, eternity and agents belongs among the central functions of the present moment, this world and the mythic knowledge, since knowledge of a otherworld, fed and shaped each other. phenomenon’s name and origin gave power (Tarkka 2013: 387–388.) over it (Siikala 2002: 89–90). Naming not

26 only created categories and order in the Through them, that which is not – and that phenomenal universe, it also highlighted the which is not known – is given a linguistic name-giver’s power to define reality. A existence (Katajamäki 1997: 8; Tarkka 2013: cosmos-constructing name-giving power 389–390, 423). appears particularly clearly in origin incan- The most typical linguistic ways of tations. At the same time, calling something expressing negative epithets are the endings nameless and unchristened was an effective -ton/-tön [‘-less’] and the prefix epä- [‘un-, means of placing phenomena in the matrix of non-’] and the use of the words ei [‘not’] conceptual and social categories. (Tarkka (SKVR I1 93) or ilman [‘without’]. Toarie 2013: 417–420.) Epithets such as ‘nameless’, from Aajuolahti describes Väinämöinen’s being ‘strange’, ‘secret’, and ‘unknown’ not only driven to the otherworld thus: identified something as unknown; these all (2) […] kantopa vanhan Väinämöisen indexed danger, or potential threatening paikoilla papittomilla, power that one was not in a position to mailla ristimättömillä. control. Although this negative identification, Äij’ on sinne männehijä, an acknowledgement of knowing that vaan ei pois palannehia, something is ultimately unknown, already pirttih on ovettomah, eliminated (some of) that danger. ilman ikkunattomaha, Speaking of the otherworld fills the miesten syöpähä kylähä, unknown dimensions of reality with images, urosten uponnehese. giving them form and content. The source of (SKVR I1 78.37–46.) these images is naturally in the familiar reality [...] carries old Väinämöinen that can be observed and understood by the to priestless places, users of the poetry, because ‘nothingness’ to crossless / unchristened lands. cannot be depicted as such, as Kenneth Burke Many have gone there, (1966: 430) has expounded. One way to solve but have not returned, the problem of depicting the otherworld is the to the doorless cottage, without windows, use of negations: indicating the absence of to the man-eating village, features which characterise reality (or their to the drowner of heroes. inversion) (Tarkka 2013: 389–391, 423). Negation is a linguistic feature whereby a Like Miihkali, Toarie articulates her picture phenomenon is described according to what it of the otherworld according to the principles is not. As a phenomenon, negation is purely of parallelism: the verse pairs are internally linguistic: only in the linguistic universe may coherent and they are linked together in a something be set before us which does not meaningful way. Priestlessness and crossless- exist. (Burke 1966: 419–421.) Even tentative ness are typical epithets for the otherworld. understanding of the negative requires The familiar social cosmos was a land imagination. characterised by the priests and of Negations work like metaphors, uniting , and only those who had been different conceptual fields and features, baptised and named in the Christian comparing and distinguishing them: both were full members of society and thus fully broaden the circles of describable and verbali- human. A crossless land also indicated that sable reality. The structure of metaphor, the part of the graveyard where the problematic uniting of two conceptual spheres for the birth departed were buried, for example those who of a new meaning (e.g. Lakoff & Turner had died in a liminal state or those who did 1989), presents a direct way of talking about not belong to the community. The next epithet the otherworld: a phenomenon which lacks Toarie gives for the otherworld describes it as any immediate language to describe it is a place where many have gone but whence described through the features of the known few have returned. This is the place of the and familiar or their absence. Negations and departed, whose unknown character is metaphors may be viewed as the prerequisites emphasised: the living do not know the world for the verbalisation of the otherworld. of the departed, as eyewitness accounts or

27 messages are received thence, but only rarely, Imagination, Dreams, and Utopian Discourse in ritual settings and in dreams. Vernacular notions of the nature of the Images of a doorless and windowless cottage imagination may be found in areas other than point too to funeral rites and the otherworld as the symbolism of the otherworld, for example a place of the departed. The sphere of in words signifying imagination and fantasy, everyday human existence, the this-world and in concepts related to dreams and home, was often pictured metaphorically as a forebodings. In Karelian, what was conceived house. Correspondingly, the otherworld sphere as the opposite of the real and reality was was described as a building which lacked the mielenkoavailus, which is derived from the essential parts of a human dwelling – doors base word koavehus. Koavehus is ‘imagi- and windows. Otherworld dwelling places nation’, and koavailu, derived from it, were non-places: closed and airless spaces indicates description and narration, but also that it was impossible to get into, and which it make-believe and dreaming; the forms was impossible to exit. Ritual equivalents koavassellakseh, koavasteliutuo and koavehtie served as mediators between the house images or koavastoa indicate fantasy or a mirage in of this world and the otherworld. Ritual texts the mind and appearances in dreams. for funeral preparations emphasised that doors (Karjalan kielen sanakirja III: 311; II: 262– and windows were to be made, at least 263.) The last of these in particular is closely symbolically, on the kropnitsa, the covering related to the imaginative process, in which a built over a coffin and grave, so that dream is ‘seen’ (nähdään). The dream world communication between the living and the was the opposite of ilmi, or the visible world dead would be possible (Stepanova 2011: and wakefulness (SKS KRA. Iivo Marttinen 137). The lack of doors and windows pointed 8: III D.3.6, I, 16. 1911; Karjalan kielen to a bad death and the severing of communi- sanakirja I: 439), but was nonetheless seen: cation. (Tarkka 2013: 391.) what was seen in a prophetic dream might Otherworld epithets indirectly describe an move into the waking world; it was fulfilled. unobserved world outside everyday thought. The as yet non-existent future might also They make use of the imagination in projecting announce itself and become perceptible features of the known and familiar universe through hearing, vision or smell. Thus when, onto the unknown, indicating, however, the for example, something is heard from the lake absence of these characteristics. The same niinkuin huhuonta [‘like hollering’], it mental and linguistic images used to describe presaged a drowning. When muka niin kuin the otherworld aid our understanding of the välistä korvissa kuuluu itku eikä mitänä ole world we know: otherworld imagery lays bare [‘thus it is as though weeping is heard and and simplifies the structures, characteristics there isn’t anything there’], it forebodes and values of the reality that is familiar and something that will cause weeping for the observable, of the reality that corresponds to house (SKS KRA. Samuli Paulaharju our horizons of expectation. What belongs to b)14121–14122. 1916; see also b)4466. 1911). this world is figured through the otherworld, Forming images without sensory observation and the otherworld, eschewing definition, is and their traditional interpretation, the verbalised as a concrete opposite of this experiencing of sensations without stimulus world. Such dialectic differentiation works by as signs of a future event, and the dialogue selecting contextually meaningful character- between wakefulness and dreams are all istics of a phenomenon and creating epithets expressions of the vernacular imagination. on the basis of them. In depicting the These imaginations manipulated concepts of otherworld, many simultaneous or parallel time and almost invariably thematicised basic definitions were resorted to: the negative and essentials of human life: good fortune, wealth, inverted, the relational and deictic, the spatial and their distribution. and temporal, and the co-ordinates of real The overlap of wakefulness and the geography or of the fictive world of dreamworld and the imaginative working out traditional narratives. of the future in forebodings are linked with ritual activity in which possibilities were

28 given shape and their fulfilment was Siikala (2002: 49, 52, 55–56) – are not to be manipulated. In Kalevala-metre poetry, the equated with utopian images, although both exploration of possibility is coupled with operate with much the same concrete images. utopian images. Senni Timonen’s analysis of Utopian images cannot be reduced to the utopian intent is among the most powerful referential background of the tradition of interpretations of the poetics of the imagi- belief, which Siikala argues determines the nation and image-formation in Kalevala-metre meaning of mythic images. Whereas Siikala poetry. The utopian images distinguished by emphasises that mythic images and Timonen do not stop with commentary on the metaphors, regardless of their polyphony, are singer’s experience, typical for lyric, but “not just any images” (2002: 49, 55–56), ‘[w]hen turning away from what is present, Timonen positions utopian images differently: the mind set on a change begins to strive for 23 A utopian image may be almost ‘anything the imagined’ (Timonen 2004: 355). This at all’ in terms of content, nor is its project appears ‘in fantastic series of images’ meaning [...] exhausted within the refer- (fantastinen kuvasarja) (ibid.). The hoped-for, ential framework of folk belief – even if better situation of the future has to be it has a clear relationship to it. Whereas presented in images, because it is not, for the the concept of the ‘otherworld’ structures time being, in existence and hence cannot be folk belief – at least in theory – Utopia is captured in propositional expressions. Just as situated in the sphere of ‘this world’, the otherworld is a place of unknown reality, even if on its periphery. Utopia makes the ‘non-existence here’ (tässä-olemattomuus) the impossible into a reality; it extends of a localised Utopia creates new, alternative the real without completely crossing its universes, the depiction of which takes from a 25 borders. (Timonen 2004: 357.) couple of lines up to ten (see Timonen 2004: 355, 367). It is not a matter of ‘pseudo- Imagination operates in utopian discourse and worlds’ (pseudomaailmat) as defined by Leea lyric modes of expression according to the Virtanen (1991: 53), where a person retreats same parameters as in mythic discourse. To ‘to be happy’ (viihtyäkseen) or to sort out ‘the return to the words of Mark Johnson quoted hard world of reality’ (arjen kova maailma). above: Setälä (1932: 607) also conceived of the [It] is a pervasive structuring activity by imagination as a force by which people may means of which we achieve coherent, ‘create new worlds and new for patterned, unified representations [that] themselves, of which no-one may deprive 22 is indispensable for our ability to make them,’ a conception that equally assigns to sense of our experience, to find it these other realities merely the role of a meaningful. (Johnson 1987: 168.) safety-valve and neglects their subversive and world-creating force. Utopia is, for example, a It extends our reality by depiction and poetic means of moving beyond the reality verbalisation, by drawing out the wordless depicted in autobiographical songs to create and even subliminal from within the mind into unique and meaningful communications, an intersubjective dimension. The depiction or exploring the potentialities of existences that, figuration of the otherworld – in the form of like the supernatural otherworld, are inextri- mythic images, myths and rituals – “provides cably engaged in a dialectic assessment of the opportunities to ‘perform the world’” (Doty world of the singers. 2000: 41) in a performative sense: it extends the Unlike images of the otherworld, utopian field of what exists, actualizing and defining images relate to something better than this life the unseen. Utopian discourses manifest (Timonen 2004: 356). Like negations, they corresponding worlds in corresponding express the characteristically human ability or processes of performative articulation set into ‘inclination to turn from what is present a dialectic relation to our own. This dialectic towards what is absent’24 (ibid.). Timonen also shows the common-sense reality to be the notes, however, that the mythic metaphors of outcome of a laborious, multi-layered mental the otherworld – as defined by Anna-Leena and symbolic process of the dialogues created between it and various imaginal worlds. 29

The difference between mythic and foremost to imagination in the uses and Utopian discourses is not at the level of structuring of imageries across different imagination as a phenomenon, but at the level discourses – such as genres – and consequently of social perceptions of the signs and symbols produces a new perspective and more synthetic being engaged. Whereas in Utopian discourse understanding of the operation of imagination the semantic range of images used is in Kalevala-metric poetry. Folklore genres are remarkable (Timonen’s “almost ‘anything at differentiated yet interconnected spheres of all’ in terms of content”), the range of vernacular imagination: they offer the symbols in mythic discourse is more narrow. expressive means and set the expressive These constraints are not necessarily reducible constraints for imaginative processes and their to any assumptions about what people communication. As folklore genres are experienced or believed to be “true” (Doty increasingly defined as essentially dialogical 2000: 40) or “real” (Siikala 2002: 52) – after all, (e.g. Tarkka, forthcoming b) the domains of any analysis of these subjective experiences mythic imagination and other discourses remains speculative in the study of historical become conceptually intertwined. forms of discourse. Mythic imagination anchors If we accept Johnson’s broad definition of the imaginative associations to traditional imagination and bring it into primary focus, it mythic narratives and their authorization in becomes possible to demolish the assumed ritual practice. Yet also in these collective divide between mythic images and other displays of mythic meanings, the range of images. This definition becomes a tool where- interpretations varies greatly from individual by we can arrive at a more precise picture of to individual, and they also change over time. the imaginativeness of Kalevala-metric poetry and observe how meaning is created using Conclusions imagery against a mythic sounding board. In the history of Finnish folk-poetry research, Mythic images are emotionally, cognitively, imagination takes the form of an essential and morally compelling representations that characteristic of poetry, a dimension of are authorised both as tradition and in relation collective or individual creativity, an expla- to the intertextual universe of the oral poetry, nation of the origin of mythic notions and as well as in relation to the vernacular belief concepts, and a motivating force of the system. The boundary between these and figurative nature of poetic language. In spite other representations is, however, variable of being identified as central, it has been and often indistinct, since mythic symbols peripheralized and devalued through the have a polysemic quality, yielding a capacity majority of the history of research until to synthesise with co-occurring symbols in relatively recently. In this sense, the specific contexts of use: they are able to imagination has been treated with the same articulate not only the cosmogonic and bias as the notion of creativity: both have cosmographic frames and supranormal been at odds with the perception of tradition powers but also the values of the community, and traditionality, and closely linked to historical circumstances, and personal experi- individual subjects and the idiosyncratic. ences of individual singers (see Tarkka 1998: Anna-Leena Siikala’s and Senni Timonen’s 133). Although the present study has focused reinterpretations have significantly progressed on Kalevala-metric poetry, this case illustrates the analysis of the imaginal. Their work that it is in the field of vernacular imagination emphasises the connection of poetic language that mythic elements are charged by means of with the structures of worldview and emotions and current interests, personality conceptual categories. Even here, however, a and historicity, and thus gain an expressive divide has been maintained between mythic and world-altering power. By means of images and other images. This divide has imagination, possible worlds are created, developed owing to research emphasis on the which may have surprising consequences for genres and qualities, meanings, and uses of the intersubjective reality that we perceive as the image systems being analyzed. The present for us. present study attends instead first and

30

Lotte Tarkka (lotte.tarkka[at]helsinki.fi), PL 59 (Unionin- 15. “sillä vertauskuvallinen runous on mahdoton kansan- katu 38 A), 00014 University of Helsinki, Finland. runoudessa, missä ei äly vielä ollenkaan vaikutta” (Krohn 1885: 572). Acknowledgements: This survey article relates to the 16. “muinaisten runoilijain sanallinen ilmaus [ei] ole yksi- Finnish Academy-funded research project led by the kerrostumaista, vaan […] monikerrostumaista” author, “Oral Poetry, Mythic Knowledge and (Haavio 1992: 290). Vernacular Imagination: Interfaces of Individual 17. “Pyrkiessään puutteellisin välinein täsmällisesti ja ym- Expression and Collective Traditions in Pre-Modern märrettävästi tuomaan esiin käsitteitä ja tunnetiloja, Northeast Europe”. An earlier version of this paper jotka eivät kuulu arkiseen elämään, he tosin appeared in Finnish as “Mielikuvitus, kansanruno ja turvautuvat arkielämän kieleen, mutta käyttävät tuonpuoleisesta puhuminen” in Mytologia ja runous, a sanoja ja fraaseja uudessa merkityksessä, uusien special issue of Elore (22(1), 2015: 1–16), the text of tilojen ja toimintojen symboleina.” (Haavio 1992: which was translated by Clive Tolley and subsequently 290.) revised and expanded into its present form. The author 18. “jossa esimerkiksi ei-olevaa merkityksellistetään kyt- wishes to thank Frog for his profound comments and kemällä se erilaisiin kokemuksellisiin ja havain- suggestions in the revision of the original Finnish text. nonmukaisiin entiteetteihin” (Knuuttila 2012: 140). 19. “Kansanrunous on lähimmässä yhteydessä elämän Notes kanssa, ei ole siitä erotettu mielikuvituksen 1. The term ‘imaginal’ (cf. Doty 2000) is used here as a valtakunta tavallisen elämän ohessa, niinkuin neutral term referring to the involvement of taiderunous” (Krohn J 1885: 576). imagination while avoiding the term ‘imaginary’, 20. The empirical part of this survey summarizes my which has connotations of lacking reality and analysis of the otherworld imagery of the poetic falsehood, and thus both the ideas that the corpus of the village of Vuokkiniemi in Viena rotates around the and that the earth rotates Karelia (Tarkka 2013: 383–424). around the sun can be described as ‘imaginal’ 21. “jatkuvasti uusia myyttisen maailman piirteitä” understandings, whereas only one might be (Siikala 2012: 465). described as ‘imaginary’. 22. “luoda itselleen uudet maat ja uudet taivaat, joita 2. “kotimaisen mielikuvituksen piirissä ilman muuta kukaan ei voi häneltä riistää” (Setälä 1932: 607). todellisuuden pohjaa, kuin minkä laulajan oma 23. “Kääntyessään pois läsnäolevasta muutoshaluinen sisäinen ja ulkonainen näkemyspiiri tarjosi” (Krohn mieli alkaa tavoitella kuviteltua” (Timonen 2004: 355). K 1932: 25–26). 24. “taipumusta kääntyä läsnä olevasta kohti pois- 3. “on […], koska kysymyksessä on taideteoksen saolevaa” (Timonen 2004: 356). synty, huomattava runoilijan mielikuvituksen ja 25. “Utooppinen kuva taas voi olla sisällöltään miltei taidon osuus” (Haavio 1952: 213). ‘mikä tahansa’, eikä sen merkitys […] tyhjenny 4. “mielikuvituksen rannaton, ääretön valtakunta, missä kansanuskon viitekehyksellä – ei, vaikka sillä olisi mielikuvituksen lento on rajaton ja rajoittamaton” siihen selvä suhde. Kun kansanuskoa – ainakin (Setälä 1932: 606). teoriassa – strukturoi ‘tuonpuoleisuuden’ käsite, 5. “runolahjaa, avonaista silmää, joka luontoa, elämää utopia sijoittuu ‘tämänpuoleisuuden’ piiriin, vaikkakin ja ihmis-sielua käsittää, sekä selviä, kauniita kuvia sen äärireunoille. Utopia tekee mahdotonta luovaa kuvitusvoimaa” (Krohn J 1885: 585, cf. also reaaliseksi, laajentaa todellista ylittämättä kokonaan 587). sen rajoja.” (Timonen 2004: 357.) 6. “sitä ehtymättömällä mielikuvituksella kartuttaneet ja sammumattomalla tunteen tulella kirkastaneet” Works Cited (Krohn K 1914: 352). 7. “uskoi karjalaisen mielikuvituksen erikoiseen laatuun” Abbreviations (Krohn K 1918: 132). SKS = Suomalaisen Karjallisuuden Seura / Finnish 8. “Uutta luova aika oli ohi” (Krohn K 1918: 130). Literature Society. 9. “mielikuvituksen avulla, mutta kuitenkin todella vallin- neen uskon pohjalla […] syntyneet”. Sources 10. “on ollut omiaan panemaan kansojen mielikuvituksen SKS KRA = Manuscripts of the Folklore Archives of liikkeelle ja samalla antamaan aihetta uskomuk- the Finnish Literature Society. sellisiinkin kuvitelmiin” (Setälä 1932: 597). SKVR I1-4 = Suomen Kansan Vanhat Runot I: Vienan 11. “muunlaisista kertomuksista ja saduista saatuja läänin runot. 1908–1921. Ed. A. R. Niemi. lisäpiirteet” (Harva 1948: 72). Helsinki: SKS. 12. “muoto sinänsä on osoituksena fantasian vaikutuk- sesta” (Hautala 1957: 33). Literature 13. “mielikuvitus luo esiin kuvia, jotka pitävät tunnetta Apo, Satu. 2015. “Folkloristiikan synty, romantiikan vireillä” (Relander 1894: 2). perintö ja samporunojen tutkimuksen arvoitus”. 14. “Kuvien kautta ihminen ainakin ajattelee. Tämmöisiä Unpublished manuscript. Paper presented at the kuvia ihmisen mielessä aina syntyy, ne ovat Helsinki University Folkloristics Research Seminar, ihmisen ajatusten maininki.” (Relander 1894: 295.) 14th April 2015.

31

Bendix, Regina. 1997. In Search of Authenticity: The Lakoff, George, & Mark Turner. 1989. More than Cool Formation of Folklore Studies. Madison, Wis. / Reason: A Field Guide to Poetic Metaphor. London: University of Wisconsin Press. Chicago / London: University of Chicago Press. Burke, Kenneth. 1966. Language as Symbolic Action: Lönnrot, Elias. 1835. Kalewala, taikka wanhoja Essays on Life, Literature, and Method. Berkeley / Karjalan runoja Suomen kansan muinoista ajoista. Los Angeles: University of Press. Helsinki: SKS. Doty, William. 2000. Mythography. The Study of Lönnrot, Elias. 1840. Kanteletar. Helsinki: SKS. Myths and Rituals. 2nd edn. Tuscaloosa: University Lönnrot, Elias 1849. Kalevala. Helsinki: SKS. of Alabama Press. Lönnrot, Elias. 1958a [1866–1880]. Suomalais- Frog. 2013. “Revisiting the Historical-Geographic ruotsalainen sanakirja I. Porvoo & Helsinki: Method(s)”. RMN Newsletter 7: 18–34. Werner Söderström Osakeyhtiö. Frog. 2014. “Myth, Mythological Thinking and the Lönnrot, Elias. 1958b [1866–1880]. Suomalais- Viking Age in Finland”. In Fibula, Fabula, Fact – ruotsalainen sanakirja II: Lisävihko. Porvoo & The Viking Age in Finland. Ed. Joonas Ahola & Helsinki: Werner Söderström osakeyhtiö. Frog with Clive Tolley. Studia Fennica Historica Lukin, Karina. This volume (2015). “Lonely Riders of 18. Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society. Pp. 437–482. Nenets Mythology and Shamanism”. RMN Frog. 2015. “Are Trolls, and Sámis People too? – Newsletter 10. Considering the Mythic Ethnography of Old Norse Oxford English Dictionary [electronic edition]. Culture”. RMN Newsletter 9: 122–124. Available at: http://www.oed.com/ (last accessed Frog. This volume (2015). “Mythology in Cultural 20th April 2015). Practice: A Methodological Framework for Historical Oesch, . 2006. “J. G. Herder ja mielikuvitus”. In Analysis”. RMN Newsletter 10. Herder, Suomi, Eurooppa. Ed. Sakari Ollitervo & Haavio, Martti. 1952. Kirjokansi: Suomen kansan Kari Immonen. Helsinki: SKS. Pp. 70–89. kertomarunoutta. Porvoo / Helsinki: Werner Petterson, Bo. 2002. “On the Study of Imagination and Söderström Osakeyhtiö. Popular Imagination: A Historical Survey and a Haavio, Martti. 1992 [1957]. Runottaren vaunut: Esseitä Look Ahead”. In Popular Imagination: Essays on kansanrunoudesta. Helsinki: SKS. Pp. 275–292. Fantasy and Cultural Practice. Ed. Sven-Erik Harva, Uno. 1948. Suomalaisten muinaisusko. Porvoo / Klinkman. Turku: Nordic Network of Folklore. Pp. Helsinki: Werner Söderström Osakeyhtiö. 11–50. Hautala, Jouko. 1957. Johdatus kansanrunoustieteen Relander, Oskar. 1894. Kuvakielestä vanhemmassa peruskäsitteisiin I. Helsinki: SKS. suomalaisessa lyyrillisessä kansanrunoudessa. Hästesko, F.A. 1910. “Mielikuvitus ja todellisuus Helsinki: SKS. Kalevalassa”. In Kalevala Suomen kansan hengen de Riviera, Joseph, & Thedore Sarbin (ed.). 1998. tuotteena. Ed. F.A. Hästesko. Porvoo & Helsinki: Believed-In Imaginings: The Narrative Werner Söderström Osakeyhtiö. Pp. 1–16. Construction of Reality. Washington, D.C.: Iser, Wolfgang. 1993 [1991]. The Fictive and the American Psychological Association. Imaginary: Charting Literary Anthropology. Setälä, Emil N. 1932. Sammon arvoitus. Helsinki: Otava. Baltimore / London: Johns Hopkins University Press. Siikala, Anna-Leena. 2002. Mythic Images and Johnson, Mark. 1987. The Body in the Mind: The Shamanism: A Perspective on Kalevala Poetry. Bodily Basis of Meaning, Imagination, and Reason. Folklore ’ Communications 280. Helsinki: Chicago / London: University of Chicago Press. Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Karjalan kielen sanakirja I–III. 1968–1983. Helsinki: Siikala, Anna-Leena. 2012. Itämerensuomalaisten Suomalais-Ugrilainen Seura. mytologia. Helsinki: SKS. Katajamäki, Sakari. 1997. “Negaatiot Savon lyriikan Stepanova, Eila. 2011. “Reflections of Belief Systems yksinäisyyden, vierauden ja poikkeavuuden in Karelian and Lithuanian Laments: Shared kuvauksissa”. Unpublished MA thesis. Department Systems of Traditional Referentiality?”. Archaeologia of Folkloristics, University of Helsinki. Baltica 15: 128–143. Knuuttila, Seppo. 2012. “Ei-olevan kuvantaminen”. In Stepanova, Eila. 2012. “Mythic Elements of Karelian Tieteidenvälisyys ja rajanylitykset taidehistoriassa. Laments: The Case of syndyzet and spuassuzet”. In Annika Waenerbergin juhlakirja. Ed. Johanna Vakkari Mythic Discourses: Studies in Uralic Traditions. Ed. et al. Helsinki: Taidehistoriallinen seura. Pp. 139–147. Frog, Anna-Leena Siikala & Eila Stepanova. Studia Krohn, Julius. 1885. Suomalaisen kirjallisuuden Fennica Folkloristica 20. Helsinki: SKS. Pp. 257–287. historia I: Kalevala. Helsinki: Weilin & Göös. Stepanova, Eila, & Frog. This volume (2015). “Social Krohn, Kaarle. 1914. Suomalaisten runojen uskonto. Movement and a Structural Distribution of Karelian Helsinki: SKS. Ritual Genres”. RMN Newsletter 10. Krohn, Kaarle. 1918. Kalevalankysymyksiä. Helsinki: Tarkka, Lotte. 1998. “Sense of the Forest: Nature and Suomalais-Ugrilainen Seura. Gender in Karelian Oral Poetry”. In Gender and Krohn, Kaarle. 1926. Die Folkloristische Arbeits- Folklore: Perspectives on Finnish-Karelian methode. Oslo: H. Aschehoug & Co. Traditional Culture. Ed. Satu Apo, Aili Nenola & Krohn, Kaarle. 1932. Kalevalan kertomarunojen opas. Laura Stark. Helsinki: SKS. Pp. 92–142. Helsinki: SKS. Tarkka, Lotte. 2012. “The Sampo: Myth and Vernacular Imagination”. In Mythic Discourses: Studies in Uralic Tradition. Ed. Frog, Anna-Leena

32

Siikala, & Eila Stepanova. Studia Fennica Tarkka, Lotte. Forthcoming b. “The Field of Song and Folkloristica 20. Helsinki: SKS. Pp. 143–170. the Four-Legged Horse: On the Dialogue of Genres Tarkka, Lotte. 2013. Songs of the Border People: in Kalevala-Meter Poetry”. In Singers and Tales in Genre, Reflexivity, and Performance in Karelian the 21st Century. Ed. David Elmer & Peter McMurray. Oral Poetry. Folklore Fellows’ Communications Publications of the Milman Parry Collection of Oral 305. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Literature 3. Cambidge, Mass.: Milman Parry Col- Tarkka, Lotte. Forthcoming a. “The Poetics of Quotation: lection of Oral Literature & Harvard University Press. Proverbial Speech, Entextualization and the Emer- Timonen, Senni. 2004. Minä, tila, tunne: Näkökulmia gence of Oral Poems”. In Genre, Text, Interpretation. kalevalamittaiseen kansanlyriikkaan. Helsinki: SKS. Ed. Kaarina Koski & Frog with Ulla Savolainen. Virtanen, Leea. 1991. Naisten laulut ja todellisuus. Studia Fennica Folkloristica. Helsinki: SKS. Aikakirja 3. Valkeakoski: Valkeakosken kaupunki.

Mythology in Cultural Practice: A Methodological Framework for Historical Analysis Frog, University of Helsinki

Abstract: This paper presents a methodological framework for addressing variation and change in mythology within a cultural environment. Mythology is approached in terms of a ‘symbolic matrix’, which provides a semiotic context for mythic discourse. Different formal ‘integers’ of mythology are distinguished. ‘Dialects’ and ‘registers’ of mythology are introduced along with an approach to ‘positioning’ within the symbolic matrix. In recent decades, research on mythology has even where that variation is at the level of struggled increasingly with the problem of different religions. Equipping the approach to living variation in historical cultures and how be a functional tool in synchronic and this should be addressed. The present article diachronic investigations of either situation- sets out an approach to mythology that can be specific uses of mythology or broad social applied to any cultural arena and calibrated in developments has required theorizing both temporal and cultural-geographic scope mythology in a way that can move beyond according to the research questions asked and many of the limitations of earlier approaches. the material available. This is a usage-based This approach addresses mythology in approach to mythology as a special type of terms of what I call a symbolic matrix, a term semiotic phenomenon. It is designed to take which refers to the constitutive elements of a into consideration both synchronic and mythology or mythologies in a cultural diachronic local and regional variations in environment and conventions for their combi- mythology. The same social processes and nation (see also Frog 2014a; 2014d). Rather practices that enable continuities also than seeking to attend to ‘a mythology’ as a necessarily produce variation as an historical single, static , this approach attends to outcome. The equation of continuity and the symbolic resources through which variation is affected by different social and mythology is manifested and functions. As a historical factors including contacts and usage-based approach, it attends especially to conversions. It is necessary to bear in mind interfaces between mythology and social that these are processes that take place in practices or sets of practices. It acknowledges communities and networks of embodied the potential for mythology to vary between individuals, even where the specific processes different practices – types of variation that are are ambiguously remote in time and the customarily eclipsed by images of ‘a individuals have been rendered anonymous. A mythology’ as uniform, homogeneous and specific aim in the development of this atemporal. The scope of the symbolic matrix approach was to provide a methodological under consideration can be calibrated to a framework equipped to address these ‘cultural mythology’ or a ‘religion’, but processes and the active uses of mythology by attending to the matrix of resources helps agents operating in them. The approach is avoid the presumption that ‘a mythology’ is therefore equipped to address social variation exclusive of ‘other mythologies’. This is at the level of practices and group identities essential for considering diverse variations that may exist within a single community, related to contacts, such as those discussed

33 below. A focus here is on is the problem of should discuss ‘dialects’ of mythology as a how to take into account different perspec- means of talking about this sort of variation in tives that coexist within a community on the much the same way we talk about dialects of same elements of mythology. language. This type of analogy for considering The present discussion briefly outlines mythology provides a valuable tool for what is meant here by ‘mythology’ and what thinking about variation. is referred to as a symbolic matrix. A review Languages and dialects of language do not then follows of some formal differences evolve in isolation: they are affected by loans between certain types of ‘integers’ in that and other interference from contacts with matrix (i.e. unitary signifying elements such different languages and dialects. Mythologies as images, motifs, etc.). Distinguishing these are correspondingly affected by contacts with elements make it easier to observe and other mythologies and the practices with analyze what is happening in specific cases which those mythologies are interfaced. under discussion. Examples will be provided Viewing a mythology as a coherent, homo- of variation between perspectives on symbols geneous and exclusive system leads one to of mythology. Different perspectives will be imagine that Christianity encountered a more considered, both under conditions of or less coherent mythology – and thus religion – encounters between religions and also between when it arrived in Finland or Scandinavia. different social practices. Registers of The various consequences of such an encounter mythology is then introduced as a tool to that produce new combinations of mytho- account for both of these types of variation as logical material have been described with different forms of the same phenomenon. In terms like ‘syncretism’, ‘’ accord with interests of the readership of and ‘acculturation’. Such outcomes have been RMN Newsletter, emphasis is on pre-modern conceived of as something like a creolization environments rather than modern cultural of two idealized religions with their arenas.1 Examples are centrally drawn from associated mythologies. The researcher then Old Norse and Finnic cultures. seeks to untangle which elements derive from which religion or how they work together. The Problem However, this sort of approach easily Before turning to the problem of synchronic marginalizes and devalues the hybrids of this variation, it is useful to highlight mythology’s contact (or collision): they appear as aberrations capacity for long-term continuities, which is a between two ideal images. A particular necessary counterpoint for considering vari- concern that I want to address here is the ation. This historical endurance parallels that social perception of different mythologies – of language, which is why it becomes the perception that leads to the assimilation or reasonable to talk about ‘Indo-European manipulation of symbols associated with one mythology’ or ‘Uralic mythology’: just as the perspective on a mythology by people words and grammar of language have a viewing the same symbols from a different continuity spanning thousands of years, so too perspective. This perception may be from the 2 do symbols and structures of mythology. perspective of an entirely different religion, as Language and mythology have somehow been in an encounter between Christians and non- paired through the history of different cultures Christians, but it can also occur where until they were documented in the forms in different groups or specialists have different which they have become known. This does perspectives on (what we assume to be) the not mean that Hungarian and Finno-Karelian same mythology. mythologies are the same any more than the A distinction between ‘mythology’ and respective Uralic languages. It also does not ‘religion’ is also warranted here. These tend mean that Finno-Karelian mythology is any to get blurred in comparisons of ‘Christianity’ more homogeneous than the dialects of to the ‘mythology’ of a culture or community Finnish and Karelian languages. Building on in the North. Mythology and religion should the analogy of mythology to language, Anna- better be viewed as distinct but Leena Siikala (2012: 15) has proposed that we complementary categories. If we follow the

34 analogy of mythology to language, the elements continuities of mythology may be maintained like images, motifs and stories along with the through a radical change in religion (see e.g. structures and conventions for their use and Frog 2013c), while a change in religion may combination can be viewed as a parallel to the be accomplished on the platform of an lexicon and grammar of a language. In other established mythology (e.g. the Reformation). words, mythology is like another system for communication, representation, labelling and Mythic Discourse and a Symbolic Matrix interpretation; it is a system that functions The terms ‘myth’ and ‘mythology’ have been symbolically rather than linguistically.3 In defined in many ways. Generally speaking, contrast, religion can be broadly considered approaches tend to fall into three broad as a type of register of practice (cf. Agha categories, or some mixture between them. 2007) that has developed through inter- These broad groupings are considered generational transmission, is characterized by according to how they define or construe mythology, and entails an ideology and ‘myth’ and ‘mythology’ as formal categories worldview. This approach to religion views it rather than according to categories of as a metasemiotic entity – a system of analytical and interpretive approaches practices and behaviors (extending to social (, Myth-and-Ritual, literary groups with hierarchies and multiple roles) criticism, etc.; see Doty 2000), within which associated with mythology and that is socially implicit or explicit definitions of ‘myth’ and recognizable as a particular religion. Thus, ‘mythology’ may vary. A brief look at these individuals exhibiting certain behaviors, three categories is warranted as a frame of practices and associated symbols are viewed reference for the theoretical approach to as associated with a particular religion, and mythology outlined below. that identification associates the practitioner A classic approach is to define myth as a with the broader range of practices and type of story. This approach has a foundation behaviours, and the worldview of that in the origin of the modern term ‘myth’, religion, as well as associating them with which was borrowed from Classical Greek other practitioners of that religion as a register mythos during the era of Romanticism as a of practice. ‘Christianity’ is not simply a word for talking about stories associated with 5 mythology, but a religion that entails a non-Christian religions. Specific definitions socially recognizable religious identity. The of ‘myth’ as a type of story nevertheless 6 link established between a religion and a remain quite diverse. William G. Doty has mythology allows the metasemiotic entity of suggested that the continued emphasis on religion to be recognized through narrative is at its root “a way to stress the characteristic elements of that mythology, and humanistic values of imaginative storytelling, individuals identified with a religion become in contrast to bloodless scientific abstraction associated with its emblematic symbols of and arithmeticizing.” (Doty 2000: 41.) Defining practice and mythology. Although religion myth as a type of story normally leads to and religious identity are topics of discussion constructing a model of mythology as beyond the scope of the present paper, it is something like a coherent narrative world in important to emphasize that, according to the which gods and their adversaries have present approach, mythology remains a adventures according to narrative logic. This signification system, whereas religion is the sort of approach has difficulty with, for of practices and behaviors example, gods addressed in rituals but not interfaced with mythology that provide a narrated, such as Äkräs, the Karelian god of fundamental frame of reference for religious turnips and other root vegetables (e.g. Harva identity.4 In this respect, the conflation of 1948: 209–220): although he would seem to mythology with religion is comparable to be a god linked to the orchestration of growth conflating language with ethnicity. and sustenance, he remains beyond the scope Distinguishing mythology and religion of this type of mythology if there are not may not seem especially significant at first stories about him. The same is true of other glance, but it must be stressed that mythic images and motifs familiar only from

35 ritual discourse, such as the staircase to the heals him of an ailment in so-called Super otherworld described in Karelian lament petram [‘On a Stone’] charms (e.g. Roper (Stepanova 2012: 262) or Kipuvuori [‘Pain 2005: 122–125), or how the River Jordan is Mountain’], ruled by a maiden who receives stopped so that and John can cross it in and tortures aches and illnesses in Karelian some so-called Flum Jordan [‘River Jordan’] incantations (Siikala 2002: 192). charms (e.g. Roper 2005: 104–109).9 When A more subtle problematic site in narrative- developing a coherent image of a mythology, based approaches is an inclination to narrative-based approaches have often (historically) reconstruct and fill out the included such historiolae. The case of the image of a mythology into a coherent whole. Second Merseburg Charm is famously contro- This inclination easily leads to the inference versial, because its first attestation is the most that in the Old Norse eddic poem important source for Hárbarðsljóð, for example, each mention of vernacular mythology, whereas the numerous an act or adventure of Þórr and Óðinn in their later examples are normally found with competitive dialogue either a) refers to a Christian actors like Jesus, Peter and Mary narrative that was known and circulated (e.g. Christiansen 1914; see also Beck 2003 independently as part of the broader mytho- and works there cited). For the present logy, or b) is an invention of the author of the discussion, it makes no difference whether a poem without relevance to the mythology. Christian narrative was translated into This can only be tested in cases where the vernacular or vice versa: story is independently attested or referenced in either case, a function-specific narrative elsewhere, which tends to be the exception appears to be transposed into a different because extant sources are so limited. The ‘mythology’ without clear integration into its difficulty here is that a presumption of broader narrative world. In fact, the agents in integration is not necessarily valid. Looking at such charms seem to be easily transposable the much richer data of kalevalaic poetry, the (Versnel 2002: 118) – i.e. such narrative mythic smith is attributed with elements can easily be transferred from the forging of the vault of in epic contexts mythology of one culture or religion to as an exemplar of his skill, and the motif is another – and it is not necessary for them to used in incantations as a symbol of mythic interface at all with the broader mythology for power. However, the event is never narrated users to see them as magically effective and it is never presented in poems of the (Frankfurter 1995: 475). These are just a few creation of the world – even where The Origin examples of sites where narrative-based of the World is performed as part of an epic approaches to mythology frequently appear cycle in which this act is attributed to Ilmarinen.7 ill-equipped to consider what might otherwise In redactions of The Singing Competition, the seem to belong to ‘mythology’. Väinämöinen similarly proclaims Another major type of approach begins certain motifs in the act of creating the world with an idea of mythology as a sort of that are not found in performances of The modelling system for understanding the Origin of the World by the same singers.8 social, empirical and unseen worlds, how they However the history of these variations is work and why they are the way that they are. interpreted, certain elements of the mythology This type of approach has developed from clearly exhibit context-specific functions even attention to the relationship of mythology to within the ‘textual universe’ (Tarkka 1993) of the way people think about reality (e.g. a single genre. This raises questions about Cassirer 1925), which led up to Branisław how to view motifs and themes that are Malinowski’s proposal that myth “is not referenced or narrated in ritual discourse but merely a story told but a reality lived” (1926: which otherwise seem at a remove from the 100). In its background is Émile Durkheim’s broader mythology. view of religion as “a system of ideas with This sort of autonomy is common for which the individuals represent to themselves charm historiolae, such as accounts of how the society of which they are members and Jesus meets Peter (sitting on a stone) and the obscure but intimate relations which they

36 have with it” (1912: 225). It has been influenced by , which considered structures and their systems through which culture and cultural expressions are organized and which exhibit a longue durée (cf. Lévi- Strauss 1967 [1958]: 202–228; Greimas 1987 [1962]). Semiotics has been most funda- mental in developing the modern approaches, among which Roland Barthes (1972 [1957]) is at the forefront. Although its implications extend to such a fundamental level that it can be challenging to unravel (esp. Lotman & Uspenskij 1976), this type of approach proves very useful for addressing myths in modern cultures owing to its emphasis on symbolic patterns and the indicators that make them recognizable in diverse forms, such as the ‘myths’ that good will triumph over evil or that soap bubbles help make things clean. Basically, myths become viewed in terms of symbolic models that provide frames of reference or that are more abstractly just recognized and understood as meaningful or significant (i.e. functioning paradigmatically rather than syntagmatically). Similar ideas are implicitly behind descriptions of mythology Figure 1. The so-called Gosforth Fishing Stone, 10th as constituted of things that are bonnes à (?) century, Cumbria, England. Þórr is on the left with his hammer, deeply carved eyes and a fishing line penser (Lévi-Strauss 1962: 128) [‘good(s) to with an ox-head for bait; his companion on the think with’] or mythology as “a form of adventure, the , is on the right with an axe knowing” (Doty 2000: 55–56, original emphasis). to cut the fishing line when the World is On the other hand, the semiotic approach is caught and raised to the surface; the face (?) of the not equipped to differentiate these types of World Serpent is in the lower right, with its tail in lower left (the knotwork pattern above the boat might patterns from a ‘myth’ of Þórr’s battle with speculatively be interpreted as the serpent’s body, the world serpent or a ‘myth’ that the world which encircles the world). (Illustration by the author.) was created from an egg. In other words, it and ‘myths’ that are distinct instantiations of slides towards structuralism’s pitfall of that paradigm, like Þórr’s battle with the identifying a meaning-bearing paradigm, and World Serpent (cf. Figure 1).11 then using that abstraction as a lens through Since around 1990, a third major approach which to view all of the paradigm’s instant- has developed that has been less concerned ations. Even when the abstraction is not with defining ‘myth’ or ‘mythology’ and artificially applied across contexts and focuses instead on mythic discourse, or people’s cultures10 and the indexical semantics of the use and manipulation of images, motifs and paradigm have been accurately assessed, using stories that have a mythic quality in order to that paradigm as a lens customarily levels mediate conceptual models, values, under- differences between those instantiations and standings and so forth. The term and concept marginalizes their potential for distinctive of mythic discourse emerged when ‘discourse’ meanings. The utility of this type of approach is became both a catchword and a new frame for compromised especially where the ‘mythology’ looking at different phenomena.12 The term of narrative-based approaches is brought into ‘mythic discourse’ is most often used without focus if no differentiation is made between seeking to define it, but it was quickly the ‘myth’ of an abstract paradigm, like the adapted into studies of mythology and monster-slayer’s victory over the monster, religion (e.g. Siikala 1992) and has been more

37 generally explored as a tool for addressing hand, the engagement with these models is how people interact with emotionally invested not dependent on a conscious understanding: symbols (e.g. Goodman 1993). The rise of just because one does not ‘believe’ in mythic discourse as an approach to mythology does not mean that s/he will not get nervous is linked to increased attention to meanings, or frightened by strange noises in the middle performance and viewing mythology in terms of the night in a house that is supposed to be of systems of symbols,13 which will here be haunted (cf. Kamppinen 1989: 18–19). On the considered the ‘integers’ of mythology. An other hand, the recognition of this emotionally integer of mythology is considered a invested quality is not dependent on personal meaningful, unitary element that can be alignment with the symbol: an atheist can distinguished from other elements. However easily respond to symbolism of martyrdom in simple or complex, insofar as anything linked literature. It is precisely the recognition that to mythology is presented, understood and certain symbols are emotionally invested that referred to as a single unit and can carry leads them to be used and manipulated. In meanings or associations as a unit, it can be addition, mythic symbols are generally considered a symbol: it is a type of sign that characterized by ambiguity: they can be can be recognized as signifying something. interpreted flexibly and in varying ways (cf. This may be the image of a god, a narrative Bell 1992: 182–187).16 motif or even a complex story. Different types In some contexts, it may be relevant to of these symbolic integers will be introduced discuss the symbolic matrix of ‘a mythology’ in the following section. For the moment, it is in the sense of a system of symbols along simply important to stress that mythology is with the constructions and conventions for here considered to be more than just stories; it their combination that are seen as belonging is made up of all sorts of symbolic integers together and associated with a particular and the conventions for their combination.14 language, culture or religion. When this is All of these together form a symbolic matrix. done, the symbolic matrix aligns with ‘a When approaching the symbolic matrix of mythology’ in an abstract sense comparable a particular environment, three factors should to a description of ‘a language’. This type of be stressed. First, discussing mythology and approach nevertheless differs from many its symbols should be distinguished from narrative-based approaches by extending to ‘belief’. ‘Belief’ is a subjective phenomenon include all elements in a mythology on the which happens at the level of individuals. one hand, while allowing that not all elements Owing to how this term is used with will be employed equally or function in the Christianity, ‘belief’ is normally imagined as same way in all discourses on the other – a conscious subscription of faith. Mythology much as certain archaisms and loan words are enables imaginal understandings of the world established in some varieties of language and experience. It extends beyond the empirical practice but not in others. However, a particular world to mental models that are related to the utility of the symbolic matrix is that it can be world through imagination (see Tarkka, this calibrated to a cultural environment where more volume). Mythology is distinguished from, than one such mythology is active and where, for example, poetic metaphor by the capitalizing on the ambiguity of mythic emotional investment of these models (Doty symbols, the elements of a mythology may be 2000: 55‒58). Thus mythology can be viewed manipulated and contested. When calibrated in terms of emotionally invested thinking in this way, a symbolic matrix is constituted models. When talking about mythology, its of the all of the relevant symbolic resources integers can be described as emotionally available, as will be illustrated below. invested symbols because they are socially recognized as being meaningful to people in Distinguishing Formal Types of Integer in powerful ways, whether they are so deeply Mythic Discourse established that they function as unconscious When approaching mythic discourse and a assumptions or they are actively contested symbolic matrix of mythology, it is helpful to within or across communities.15 On the one distinguish between the formal types of

38 symbolic integers. The terms ‘image’ and about thunder (cf. Uther 1997–1999: 763). ‘motif’ are often used rather loosely and to Vernacular images of THUNDER and DEVIL some degree interchangeably. I distinguish an could simply be transposed into the image as a static integer corresponding to the appropriate slots and the motif would ‘make grammatical category of a noun.17 In contrast, sense’ within the symbolic matrix of the local a motif incorporates a verb and involves mythology (Frog 2013b: 110). Modernization change or situates two or more images in a carried alternative images of many phenomena relationship.18 This distinction provides a based on scientific learning. These included framework for approaching different types of redefining thunder as caused, for example, by variation in mythic discourse. For example, a movements or collisions of air. These alter- motif common in the Baltic Sea region is native images divested THUNDER of agency, 19 THUNDER STRIKES DEVIL (cf. Uther 1997– which thus dissolved the central motif 1999: 763). (SMALL CAPITALS are used here to THUNDER STRIKES DEVIL. Although dissolving indicate symbols as semantic units; this is this central motif would seem to break down done especially at the level of images and the whole system surrounding it, this was not motifs and the symbolic equations formed by precisely the case, as recently illustrated by them.) Within this motif, THUNDER describes Ülo Valk (2012) in his discussion of Estonian a role for the local god like Þórr, Finno- traditions. Viewed in terms of the model Karelian , or Lithuanian Perkūnas, and outlined above, motifs such as THUNDER is filled by the corresponding symbolic image STRIKES HOUSE WITH OPEN WINDOW/DOOR (i.e. ÞÓRR, UKKO, PERKŪNAS). The slot of remained emotionally invested and vital: just DEVIL may be filled by the image of the because the understanding of thunder changed relevant adversary and does not require a did not mean one stopped taking precautions unique identity.20 This motif functions as a against being struck by lightning! Rather than core of many legends and is also linked to necessarily changing motifs that structured taboos and related traditions, such as what to behavior, the motif could also be reinter- do in order to avoid being struck by lightning. preted. The image of thunder was linked to In the latter contexts, THUNDER STRIKES DEVIL new motifs as basic principles for how can be viewed as an immanent motif – i.e. the thunder works, such as THUNDER IS ATTRACTED motif could manifest as reality or experience BY MOVEMENT OF AIR, through which an any time it thunders. This motif is also associated logic emerges for the motif interfaced with a number of other motifs, such THUNDER STRIKES HOUSE WITH OPEN WINDOW/ as DEVIL FLEES FROM THUNDER, which is in DOOR (← OPEN WINDOW/DOOR MOVES AIR IN turn associated with motifs like DEVIL ENTERS HOUSE) (cf. Valk 2012: 43, 53, 61, and also HOUSE TO HIDE. This last motif is in its turn 56, 59). This same process can be observed associated with preventative measures of for other immanent motifs (e.g. Frog 2014d: shutting windows and doors when it thunders 67). These examples illustrate mythic discourse in order to avoid the house being struck by in the negotiation of the relationship between lightning. Such actions reflect an immanent individual behavior and understanding how motif THUNDER STRIKES HOUSE WITH OPEN the world works. At the same time, this WINDOW/DOOR (← DEVIL ENTERS HOUSE TO example is illustrative of the utility of HIDE), which is connected to the system of distinguishing different types of minimal motifs surrounding THUNDER STRIKES DEVIL. integers in a mythology and their relation- The whole system surrounding the ships when approaching variation. THUNDER STRIKES DEVIL motif has developed Motifs are here addressed as minimal units on a principle that the images in the slots in narration, activity or experience. In research, THUNDER and DEVIL have agency. Individual the term ‘motif’ has sometimes also been used motifs linked to this system and the narratives for more complex integers of narration that built out of them could pass between cultures circulate socially, but it is often useful to in the Baltic Sea region with relative ease differentiate these from motifs as well. More because the different cultures shared the complex integers made up of conventionally general framework related to conceptions associated images, motifs and/or equivalent

39 sets of these can be distinguished as themes.21 generally symptomatic of the epics losing In the Finno-Karelian kalevalaic epic The their mythic status and the differentiation Song of Lemminkäinen, for example, the hero breaking down. encounters and overcomes a series of dangers A narrative pattern is a constellation of on his journey,22 each of which can be elements (images, motifs, themes and/or approached as a theme made up of a set of equivalence sets of these), their organisation motifs that comprise the encounter, resolution and interrelations, forming a coherent sequence, and continuation of the journey (cf. Frog although not necessarily constituting a plot 2013b: 106–108). The series of themes are forming a narrative whole; a conventional normally structurally similar, varying only in plot or plot type is a narrative pattern that equivalent images for the danger encountered characterises a complete narrative from 23 (e.g. FIERY EAGLE, BLACK WORM, WOLVES IN complication to resolution. For example, the IRON BRIDLES), each of which is linked to a tradition of the Theft of the Thunder- relevant motif for overcoming that danger (cf. Instrument, identified as tale-type ATU 1148b Frog 2014e: 196–198). Nevertheless, the image (Uther 2004 II: 48–50), is a complex plot type of the danger or motif of overcoming it may characterized by two interconnected narrative vary without disrupting the theme as a whole. patterns. The opening narrative pattern accounts Whole themes can also be manipulated in for the theft and concealment of the object mythic discourse. For example, The Song of with which the thunder-god produces thunder Lemminkäinen includes a theme of a duel of (an image of THUNDER); the second narrative magic in which the hero and his adversary pattern accounts for the god’s adventure(s) ‘sing’ an alternating series of helping-spirits whereby he recovers the stolen THUNDER and and the hero triumphs. In one exceptional case, defeats his adversary with it (THUNDER 24 a singer reversed the roles of Lemminkäinen STRIKES DEVIL). In the period when this plot and his adversary so that the hero is defeated type was recorded, the image of THUNDER as a (SKVR VIII1 839). This can potentially be musical object was inconsistent with current seen as asserting an alternative perspective on aetiologies of thunder in most of the cultures the image of the hero. Like images and concerned (Frog 2011: 80; cf. Frog 2014b: motifs, whole themes can also be transposed. 125–134). The plot was also generally falling This theme of a magical duel is found in a out of use or being adapted into something localized variation of the epic The Singing more currently relevant (Frog 2011: 81–91). Competition, where it has displaced the theme One example from Estonia presents the of the demiurge Väinämöinen’s dialogic opening narrative sequence in which the devil competition of knowledge with steals the god’s ‘instrument’ (pill), but then (SKVR II 33, 34a–b, 36). The case is interesting concludes abruptly as an origin of the devil’s because these contests are never otherwise association with bagpipes (torupill) without interchangeable. Keeping them separate connection to THUNDER (Loorits 1932: 63– appears historically rooted in a contrast 64). This adaptation may have been intended between identifying the socially disruptive humorously, but it can in any case be viewed Lemminkäinen with magic of a noita or as contesting the ATU 1148b tradition and the shaman while Väinämöinen, tietäjä iän image of thunder from an instrument (pill). It ikuinen [‘tietäjä of age eternal’], is identified illustrates the difference between adapting the with the type of power and magic relied on by narrative pattern of an episode as opposed to a the ritual specialist who commands the power whole plot type, as well as the potential for of incantations and associated rite techniques, variation between integers of different types a tietäjä [‘knower, one who knows’] (Frog (here adapting a narrative pattern into a 2010: 191–196; see also Frog 2013c). This complete plot; in other specific cases a motif local variation may not, however, reflect may vary with a theme or even with a whole contesting conceptions of mythology per se; it narrative pattern). When considering variation may instead be symptomatic of changes in the in mythic discourse, it can be quite important local significance of differentiating these types to distinguish integers of different scope and of magical knowledge, or it could be more complexity in order to assess the dynamics

40 and potential significance of the variation he assumed and in poetic discourse – 204 in observed. the list compiled by Neil Price (2002: 100– 107; cf. Falk 1924; Lassen 2011: esp. 183– Gods as Central Symbols 193, 230–233). All of these names present Images of gods are symbols that are often alternative ways of referring to the image seen as emblematic of a religion and the ÓÐINN. Óðinn’s penchant for disguises has mythology with which it is interfaced. This is equally led the image ÓÐINN to be recognizable unsurprising insofar as gods regularly appear through the image of MYSTERIOUS STRANGER, as agentive symbols of authority and power especially when predicated with only one eye. that function like proper nouns and are Equating name and image becomes more interfaced with networks of motifs, themes complex in interpretatio Romana. In various and other integers of mythology. These other parts of the Germanic-speaking world, the elements appear dependent on the agency of local image equivalent to ÞÓRR seems to have the image in the role of the god. This provides been commonly designated and the god as a symbol with the impression of equivalents to ÓÐINN as Mercurius, although especial centrality in the sense that if the such ‘translations’ were not entirely consistent symbol of the god is changed, all of these (e.g. de Vries 1956–1957 II: 27–32, 107–111). other elements of the mythology must change The name or label for the image was translated as well (Converse 1964: 208). In other words, into a word from another language. This other changing a god can have wide-ranging word might carry particular connotations for ramifications affecting stories, relationships to the image in a local environment but could other gods and possibly social order, ritual also simply affect a full translation of the practices and so forth. In contrast, changing a image (ÞÓRR → HERCULES) among, for example, motif that has an identity like a proper noun, the local elite in . At the same time, Old such as ÞÓRR FISHES FOR WORLD SERPENT, Norse texts present interpretationes Norroenae has ramifications of much more limited scope. whereby Old Norse names for vernacular gods A motif such as THUNDER STRIKES DEVIL, on were used to translate names (and thereby the other hand, may be manipulated in a images) of Roman gods (e.g. Lassen 2011: specific context to affect the image of a god 95–109). It is easy to conflate but, it is much more difficult even to perceive as and image, but there is in fact a great deal of targetable for manipulation as a symbol itself. potential for slippage and (re)interpretation It may have centrality within the symbolic between the word as a signifier and the matrix, but it functions more like a common symbolic image that it signifies. noun and its very pervasiveness leads the It is worth pointing out that images of gods symbol simply to be taken for granted. Gods could also be communicated, for example, thus manifest as central emblems of religions, non-verbally through iconography. An example whether engaged by subscribers to a religion of this is the representation on the so-called as a register of practice or perceived from Gosforth Fishing Stone (Figure 1, above). In outside as linked to a social identity for which this case, the image ÞÓRR becomes recog- the religion is inferred (and potentially nizable through a configuration of image fictionalized, e.g. from a Christian perspective). elements. These elements become interpretable Accordingly, gods become prime targets of in relation to one another as a distinct motif engagement in mythic discourse. ÞÓRR FISHES FOR WORLD SERPENT, the motif When addressing the images of gods, it is at the center of a theme of confronting the relevant to distinguish the mythic image from World Serpent at sea, which is in turn the the name of the god. Basically, the Old Norse center of a broader narrative pattern of Þórr’s name Þórr (as well as Modern English ) fishing adventure (images associated with is a word, a lexical integer designating the both being present in the representation). The image ÞÓRR. This distinction becomes more preservation of this stone in St. Mary’s pronounced in the case of the one-eyed god Church in Gosforth suggests a Christian Óðinn: a remarkable variety of names that are relevance. The incorporation of the Gosforth used to designate him in the various disguises Fishing Stone into the visual arena of a

41 church might be rooted in initially rendering vernacularly meaningful equivalents in the place of unfamiliar Christian mythic symbols – in this case the corresponding Christian motif JESUS FISHES FOR and the broader theme and narrative pattern of which it is iconic. This would be a type of mythic discourse as translation – an interpretatio Norroena – at the level of motifs and narrative sequences. Such translation has also been suggested for the representation of the vernacular -slayer Sigurðr in Christian contexts where the Christian St. George or Archangel would be expected (Rowe 2006: 169). The history of the Gosforth Fishing Stone is unclear, and its incorporation into the church may otherwise have involved mythic discourse at the level of reinterpreting the ambiguity of image elements as signifiers, Figure 2. Section of the Skog Church Tapestry allowing them to be seen as directly signi- presenting three figures customarily interpreted as the gods Óðinn (left, characterized by the emblem of fying the Christian motif JESUS FISHES FOR missing an eye), Þórr (center, characterized by the LEVIATHAN (a transition which presumably emblem of his hammer), and (right). occurred eventually among the local (Reproduced from Wikimedia Commons, “Three congregation). kings or three gods.jpg”.26) It is worth pointing out that the symbols in other gods on the Skog Church Tapestry, a mythology index one another as an outcome where each representation supports the inter- of their patterns of use – i.e. they form links pretation of the other two gods as forming the of association that develop potentially quite characteristic grouping of three, venerated complex networks. On the Gosforth Fishing gods (Figure 2). The lack of an eye has Stone, for example, ÞÓRR becomes recog- equally led to the interpretation of the Lindby nizable through the configuration of image figurine as a representation of ÓÐINN owing elements which we might say cumulatively to this emblematic feature (Figure 3). attain a sort of critical mass that activates Like any mutilation characterizing a god’s recognition of the symbol ÞÓRR FISHES FOR identity, this emblem is connected to a motif: WORLD SERPENT. This motif is iconic of a EYE SACRIFICED FOR MYTHIC KNOWLEDGE/ broader mythological narrative as a symbol, a POWER. The index of this motif to ÓÐINN symbol that is of broader scope than the motif leads a variety of artefacts to be interpreted as that indexes it. However, it is precisely the construing an identity with the motif ÓÐINN indexical network of elements comprising EYE FOR (MYTHIC KNOWLEDGE/ ÞÓRR FISHES FOR WORLD SERPENT that allows POWER?) where the artefact exhibits it to be recognizable, and once recognizable, contrastive differentiation of light and dark specific image elements on the stone are eyes or the post-production mutilation of one interpreted in relation to the motif and the eye, as well as cases of the deposition of a narrative sequence to which it belongs. This removed eye or associated part of a helmet process also holds for the image of ÞÓRR: representing the eye(brow) (see Price & once recognized, the pronouncedly carved Mortimer 2014). Some of these ritualized eyes become interpretable through Þórr’s behaviors are likely intended to produce a 25 fiery gaze as a characteristic predicate. In signifier for ÓÐINN, but this cannot be assumed other contexts, an attribute may prove for all cases. Leszek Gardeła identified a one- emblematic of the god, which has led one- eyed female head uncovered in the Viking eyed figures to be interpreted as signifying emporium of , Poland, with this pattern ÓÐINN. This appears in the context of two (Gardeła 2014: 81–83). If this head is related

42

Depositions of material eye-symbols suggest ritualized enactments of precisely this motif, with the implication that the significance of performance is informed by ÓÐINN SACRIFICES EYE enacted as personal experience (noting that the latter motif might have been altered or exchanged when the ritual was adapted cross-culturally). Some of the identified images may signify the EYE SACRIFICED FOR (MYTHIC KNOWLEDGE/ POWER?) motif performed by someone other than Óðinn. The significance of this motif can be inferred to derive from the motif ÓÐINN SACRIFICES EYE. That motif operates as a metonym for the power acquired by Óðinn’s act, which would in turn be identified with the power conferred on the individual filling the role of sacrificer. This highlights that the uses Figure 3. Bronze figurine from Lindby, Svenstorp, of ÓÐINN SACRIFICES EYE could be diverse. Skåne, SHM 13701 (7th century), generally Identifying this motif as a symbolic referent accepted to be a representation of the god Óðinn, as must therefore be distinguished from the the figurine only has one eye. (Photo © SHM (Swedish History Museum), reproduced with permission.) potential network of associations through which it is engaged in any one case. If the to the pattern of one-eyed symbolism, it is clearly not a signifier of ÓÐINN per se (Figure 4). Like so many symbolic elements of mythology, the motif EYE SACRIFICED FOR MYTHIC KNOWLEDGE/POWER seems to have circulated cross-culturally in the Baltic Sea region (Frog 2014a: 375–376). A common basis can be inferred for both Óðinn’s sacrifice of his eye at the spring of the giant Mímir and its parallel in a tradition in Lithuania of sacrificing an eye for mythic knowledge at a spring, where the practice is connected with the chthonic god Velnias (Gimbutas 1974: 89). Here VELNIAS equates to ÓÐINN just as Lithuanian PERKŪNAS will translate ÞÓRR (and vice versa) in relevant plot-types built on Figure 4. One-eyed female head from Truso (Janów the motif THUNDER STRIKES DEVIL. Even if the Pomorski). The right eye exhibits a clear eye with narrative describing the sacrifice of Óðinn’s pupil, while only a hollow area appears where the eye varied by dialect of mythology in time left eye should be. (Photo by Leszek Gardeła, and space, the integer ÓÐINN SACRIFICES EYE reproduced with permission.) FOR (MYTHIC KNOWLEDGE/POWER?) seems to one-eye modification to the so-called weapon- 27 have maintained continuity. The motif EYE dancer on one of the Torslunda matrices is not SACRIFICED FOR (MYTHIC KNOWLEDGE/ an ÓÐINN image (Price & Mortimer 2014: POWER?) also seems to have been mobilized 524), inferring the motif ÓÐINN SACRIFICES across languages and associated mythologies EYE does not reveal its significance, nor does in the dynamics of mythic discourse. This fact it reveal the significance of a woman highlights social perceptions of the motif’s represented this way in the Truso head (Frog significance and reinforces its validity as a 2014a: esp. 396–398).28 frame for interpretation.

43

matrix works. Today, we are accustomed to viewing mythology as distinct from science, and this makes it difficult to recognize ELECTRICITY and other mythic images, motifs and more complex integers associated with them in terms of mythology (see Frog 2014d). In this respect, historically and culturally remote contexts are much more easily viewed with greater objectivity. The historical remoteness of mythic discourse associated with medieval proves much more practical to illustrate effects of cultural change on a symbolic matrix. According to the present approach, the Figure 5. Þórr’s hammer ring. (Illustration by Amppi arrival of Christianity in the North was not a Darmark, © Ålands Museum, reproduced with process of one exclusive religion displacing permission.) another. Instead, the new religion richly Similarly, the so-called ‘Þórr’s hammer’ increased the available symbols in the matrix. amulets (cf. Figure 5) may potentially also Christians and non-Christians were not have activated the image ÞÓRR metonymically unaware of each other’s mythologies and they through the symbol of his power as the one could actively utilize each other’s symbols in who wields it. This would link the possessor mythic discourse as resources for the of the amulet (or its use) to that power and negotiation of their relationship (cf. McKinnell thereby to ÞÓRR. Here again the amulets as 2008). This sort of engagement has produced signifiers passed cross-culturally in a part of quite exceptional narratives that may seem to the world where the hammer or axe was the fall between the respective mythologies. For characteristic instrument of the thunder god. example, an Old Norse describes such a The ambiguous amulet-signifier may thus confrontation between a and a have metonymically activated different gods pagan priestess in which the priestess tells in different cultural contexts, much as the that the thunder-god Þórr once challenged Gosforth Fishing Stone could be interpreted Jesus to a duel, and Jesus was too cowardly to as a signifier of JESUS FISHES FOR LEVIATHAN. fight (Njáls saga 102). This can be viewed as These systems of indices are important because the emergence of a new plot (or at least the the connections between symbols reciprocally kernel of a plot) through the combination of construct those symbols, their significance different images (ÞÓRR, JESUS), and as a and valuation. The motif THUNDER STRIKES variation on the motif of confrontation which DEVIL and its patterns of use reciprocally normally leads to THUNDER STRIKES DEVIL in construct the image ÞÓRR as a protector of other mythological narratives about Þórr. social order from agents of . Disrupting Whereas the example of the Gosforth Fishing that index or altering the patterns of use of the Stone could be viewed in terms of translation motif would necessarily redefine the image across mythologies, in this case the manipu- ÞÓRR, which is constructed exclusively lation of the images ÞÓRR and JESUS situates through discourse (unlike e.g. images of other gods of two mythologies in a contrastive immediate ethnic groups, where discourse is relation to one another. The new plot asserts a in dialectic relation to empirical experiences relationship between them, and thus between of contacts with those groups). the and ways of life (which can be compared to the vernacular concept commonly Alternative and Changing Perspectives identified with ‘religion’)29 of which those Contexts of radical cultural change provide gods were emblematic. vital sites to observe mythic discourse. There is no evidence for the historical Modernization is extremely interesting in this endurance of a story about Þórr challenging respect, but it does not work well for Jesus, but it has long been thought that the illustrating a symbolic matrix and how such a 44

kalevalaic epic The Judgement of Väinämöinen, the form of Óðinn, whereby the image ÓÐINN in which Väinämöinen is banished by a Christ- itself becomes a signifier of the image DEVIL like baby, emerged and became established (see e.g. Kaplan 2011). Affecting the inter- out of precisely this type of process (e.g. pretation of motifs linked to Óðinn’s disguises Kuusi 1963: 320).30 Examples like this are and manipulations of fate established new important because they highlight that conventions as a process, and that process individuals can draw on all of the resources redefined the image ÓÐINN accordingly. Of available to them and that the particular course, such mythic discourse did not involve symbols are regarded from the perspectives of non-Christian agents only. In much the same those individuals. Such perspectives can be way that mythic discourse constructed the approached in terms of positioning in the image ÓÐINN in relation to, or to become a matrix. Religions, viewed as registers of signifier of, the image DEVIL, the images ST. practice, may correspondingly be viewed as OLAF and ST. ELIJAH were evolved in the characterized by socially established positioning cultures of Northern Europe in relation to and stance-taking – i.e. as generally character- vernacular images of the thunder god (Kaplan ized by alignments, interpretations and 2008; Harvilahti 2013). These strategies are valuations of the different sets, constellations, dependent on the expansion of the symbolic or systems of symbols in the matrix. It should matrix: this expansion made symbols of the also be noted that individuals will not have an vernacular religion available to the Christians even competence in all of the symbols for manipulation. Developments in patterns of available in the matrix. Such competence the use of mythic symbols, their inter- varies not only in relation to the positioning pretations and relative valorization are of different religions, but also between outcomes of mythic discourse. Just as the specialist and non-specialists associated with symbolic matrix is expanded by the intro- the same religion formation. This uneven duction of a new religion into the cultural distribution of competence also participates in environment, it inevitably contracts again as the relative ambiguity of the symbols. mythic discourse advances the social environ- Other strategies in mythic discourse may ment toward increasing degrees of hegemony target interpretations of specific symbols. Óðinn in the distribution of relationships of identities, seems to have been rather popular in this practices and mythic symbols. These develop- regard, at least in certain genres and discourses ments are important to understand as a social (Lassen 2011). He was characterized by process, but they also have implications for disguises and motifs of organizing and research and the significance of extant orchestrating the fates (and deaths) of heroes research materials. Research builds under- in the vernacular mythology. Although the standings of mythic symbols through the medieval oral culture of Scandinavia can only identification of the patterns in preserved, be guessed at, Christian authors took up these documented discourse, but the discourse that established motifs in certain saga genres and has been preserved may only enable a view steered their interpretations to foreground from one perspective in the community, deceit and manipulation as primary character- society or cultural environment. istics of Óðinn as a pagan god (e.g. Lassen Symbols of the relevant vernacular religion 2011: 152–177). In other cases, they could were not always available to medieval emphasize Óðinn’s ‘otherness’ by linking him Christians. In the Russian Primary Chronicle, to motifs of Sámi shamanism (Tolley 2009 I: for example, descriptions are also offered of 507–513). They could also employ a motif encounters with non-Christian sorcerers or familiar to Christian discourse, such as DEVIL priests. The Scandinavian accounts mentioned TEMPTS CHRISTIAN, situating the image above are historically removed from events, ÓÐINN in the role of DEVIL, which yet the authors are generally concerned with reciprocally informs the valuation and inter- the history of their own communities and pretation of ÓÐINN; the relationship between events in (more or less) familiar locations. The Óðinn and the Christian Devil could also be Russian Primary Chronicle recounts historically made explicit by stating that the Devil took remote events in geographically distant

45 locations such as Lake Beloye, where the and the adversary exhibits no fear either of non-Christians are presumably Uralic and this thunder or of the stolen object (Þórr’s therefore also culturally remote from the hammer), which he is willing to return in authors. Some of these pagan specialists are exchange for marrying the made to state explicitly in dialogue that their (hence the disguise).34 Þrymskviða appears to god is named ‘Antichrist’ and even to be a product of mythic discourse in which a describe their gods through Christian images mythological plot was adapted into a new as demons in Hell.31 It is therefore good to narrative that makes fun of the god Þórr (for consider whether such an example of mythic discussion, see further Frog 2014a). This discourse manipulates symbols of the culture example is also interesting because the adap- addressed (as in the case with ÓÐINN above), tation made the narrative sustainable in the new symbols only of the culture in which the environment of a Christian milieu: it eventually source was produced (as seems probable in spread throughout Scandinavia and was the account surrounding ‘Antichrist’ as a preserved as the only purportedly mythological pagan god), or even of an unrelated third narrative recorded from the Scandinavian culture with which some association has been ballad tradition (Liestøl 1970: 18). made.32 In addition, cultures construct images In the context of periods of religious of other groups, their mythologies and change, the negotiation of perspectives and religions, and these constructed images not positions of groups through mythic discourse only produce conventional interpretations but gives rise to diverse and fascinating products, also feed into the resources of the symbolic such as how Þórr challenged Jesus to a duel. matrix – e.g. developing a mythic image SÁMI Very few of these become established and as not just an ethnic other but also as a historically maintained as tradition beyond supernatural other (Lindow 1995).33 that transition period, if at all (see Frog In some cases, a whole plot type of a 2013b: 109–110). The transience of such mythological narrative may be manipulated in products can be associated with the transience mythic discourse. This seems to have of the period of transition itself: as occurred in medieval Iceland with the Theft Christianity became dominant, the interest of the Thunder-Instrument (ATU 1148b) and relevance of contesting the images of mentioned above. This narrative tradition is vernacular gods receded. They belong to the found in Baltic, Finnic, Germanic and Sámi process whereby the expansion of the symbolic cultures. It is generally interfaced especially matrix was followed by its contraction. The with the motif THUNDER STRIKES DEVIL and introduction of an alternative modelling also with conceptions of a relationship between system for the world (mythology) linked to thunder and fertility and/or life on earth that the new religion was followed by the are manifested through various motifs in the negotiation of mythic symbols. Such diversity different cultures. The 13th century eddic in the symbolic matrix was inevitably poem Þrymskviða presents a version of this resolved on local and regional levels as narrative that differs from the tradition people and their identities became united elsewhere in certain key respects. Most under the rubric of shared social practices to notably, a) Þórr is passive rather than which only certain ranges of mythic symbols orchestrating the action; b) the motif GOD were relevant. Cases like Þrymskviða – ASSUMES A DISGUISE associated with the attested relatively little changed across a recovery of the stolen THUNDER here takes a period ca. 650 years – are exceptional. In this unique variation, in which the god is pressed case, the plot’s long-term sustainability seems into dressing up as goddess in a wedding connected to the fact that the story of a burly, gown, that is explicitly identified with bearded man being disguised as a sexy bride humiliating the god through gender in order to recover his phallic hammer and transgression; and c) the story appears beat up the thief continued to be entertaining completely divorced from belief traditions – even when contesting the authority of Þórr the god’s chariot still produces thunder and was no longer topical. Reviewing these lightning as he travels (disguised as a bride) products of mythic discourse highlights that

46

integers of the symbolic matrix are not Väinämöinen and Väinämöinen’s companions in uniformly engaged: they are engaged from narratives. These gods appear quite differently different perspectives with different degrees across different genres although they are of competence as shared symbols through associated with the same type of specialist which identities and understandings may be and even linked to the same ritual practices, contested and negotiated. It also foregrounds such as healing (cf. also Honko 1981: 26). that the relevance of integers in the symbolic Although Ukko and Väinämöinen seem to matrix vary in relation to social and historical have different distributions in different contexts, which in at least some cases seem to genres, there do not necessarily appear to be exhibit alternating periods of pronounced gross inconsistencies in mythology across these change and stability. genres. The contrast increases if we compare these with Karelian lament traditions, which Generic Interfaces with the Symbolic Matrix were performed by different specialists in In general, the systems of symbols in the different contexts.35 Both Väinämöinen and matrix tend to center around particular social Ukko are completely absent from laments – as practices. Consequently, the symbols and is the Virgin Mary (Stepanova 2012: 276; perspectives on those symbols become inter- 2014: 215), who was prominent both in other faced with genres. Such interfaces become women’s traditions and incantations (e.g. particularly apparent when mythology is Timonen 1994; Siikala 2002: 195–203). compared across genres. Modern ideas about Laments are instead directed at specific Finno-Karelian mythology have been primarily deceased individuals, the remote community developed surrounding narratives in Kalevala- of ancestral dead, and a mysterious category meter epic and incantations. These genres are of divine powers (syndyzet) which may blur intimately connected. The most central agent into a Christian ‘Savior’ (spuassuzet = narrated in this poetry is Väinämöinen, who is spuassu.DIM.PL; Spuassu < Ru. Spas, Spasitel’ a demiurge and a founder of culture, who [‘Savior’]). The topography of the otherworld plays a significant role in establishing the also differs from that of genres mentioned present world order, and who is the tietäjä iän above. (See further Stepanova 2012; 2014: ikuinen [‘tietäjä of age eternal’], providing an 191–223.) Although certain features are found identity-model (cf. Honko 1998: 20–29) for across genres, such as the dog guarding the the ritual specialist known as a tietäjä. path to the otherworld, laments lack a river Narratives about him both offer origins of the separating the worlds of the living and the incantations used by the tietäjä as well as dead which is otherwise fundamental to exemplar models of magical events described Kalevala-meter epic and incantation (Stepanova in incantations themselves. However, 2012: 262; 2014: 198–199). Laments also Väinämöinen is not narrated in prose, he is refer to a copper staircase, which indicates rarely directly summoned for support in vertical movement between worlds rather than incantations, and he is not ‘worshipped’. the horizontal movement characteristic of epic (Frog 2013c: 75–83.) On the other hand, the (Stepanova 2012: 262; 2014: 196). In spite of thunder-god Ukko [‘Old Man’] (blurring into the fact that these genres had been evolving in the Christian God) is summoned by the tietäjä the same communities for centuries, they as the of his power, and Ukko appear to engage quite different parts of the is ‘worshipped’, associated with rituals, taboos symbolic matrix with only a rather limited and so forth. However, Ukko plays no role in number of shared symbols.36 Observing that the creation of the world nor in the lament, on the one hand, and epic and establishment of the world order and he is not incantations on the other, have assimilated a narrated as an agent active in Kalevala-meter variety of Christian symbols, they might be epic, even if he has a strong presence in described as exhibiting mythologies that are narrative prose. (Frog 2013c: 72–75.) Ukko is as different from or similar to one another as no less important for the tietäjä specialist than each is different from or similar to the Väinämöinen – albeit in different ways – yet mythology of Christianity. he does not play an active role with

47

The complementary distribution of Ukko commonly been conceived as an abstract and and Väinämöinen across different genres uniform whole, register developed in social underscores the fact that the image of ‘a linguistics as a term for variation in language mythology’ that will emerge in a study may according to situation or context and the vary considerably depending on the types of relationships of participants (esp. Halliday material subject to analysis. The comple- 1978; see further Agha 2001; 2007). The mentary significance of these mythic agents image of language as an ideal, uniform and to the same institution of ritual specialist homogeneous system was thereby replaced by equally emphasizes the need for caution in the a much more nuanced picture. The thing we emphasis given to different categories of data call a language appears as a set of potential when considering the relative significance of resources of vocabulary along with different gods in a cultural environment. The frameworks for grammar and pronunciation fact that Väinämöinen was not venerated in that form various constellations as registers. does not make him less socially However, no single register includes all of the significant than Ukko any more than the potential vocabulary of the language. The absence of Ukko from the world-creation and meanings of words may also not be the same narration of mythological epics would make or have the same connotations in different Ukko less socially significant than registers. Speech communication is not Väinämöinen. What is interesting to keep in limited to language only, and the term register mind is that the presence and absence of both has been progressively expanded from language appears to have been relatively stable on a to paralinguistic features and the broader genre by genre basis, and their comple- semiotics of expression. Register-based mentary significance to the tietäjä seems approaches have become common especially never to have produced narratives about in Finnish folklore research to refer to the Väinämöinen and Ukko as co-adventurers any linguistic and para-linguistic resources for more than it did about Väinämöinen and the expression associated with a particular genre Virgin Mary. This type of social and (see e.g. Koski 2011: 322–324). A comple- historical interfacing of mythology distributed mentary term mode was early on employed to across genres can be considered no less describe the mediating system through which present in the relative significance of the the signifiers of a register are communicated, Virgin Mary in traditions associated with whether these are signals, such as the sounds women (cf. Timonen 1994) and Mary’s of a voice singing, or another system of signs, absence from lament, which was a character- like alphabetical characters in a written text.37 istically women’s practice (Stepanova 2014: In the same way that speech registers are esp. 283). Still more striking is the fact that mediated through a mode of expression, the genres associated with different categories of symbols of mythology are mediated through a ritual specialists seem to have intersected and speech register. In this way, a speech register overlapped rather than to have aligned in a can be regarded as a mode of expression for a coherent and uniform mythology. Although register of symbols of mythology. mythology as engaged within a genre exhibits Viewed in this way, variation in mythology social stability, it becomes relevant to ask by genre or cultural practice becomes expected whose mythology and how that relates to, in parallel to variation in the linguistic reflects and reinforces the uses to which it is put register’s lexicon and its semantics, grammar by the people practicing the particular genre. and pronunciation. In other words, certain symbols like the turnip-god Äkräs have quite Registers of Mythology narrow and specialized contexts of use, The variation of mythology by genre can be whereas other symbols like Ukko or the approached in terms of ‘registers’. This Virgin Mary are used much more widely. At approach can then be applied back to variation the same time, this does not mean that Ukko in mythology according to positioning by and the Virgin Mary are uniformly integrated religion, as in mythic discourse related to into every register of mythology. This returns Christianization. Whereas language has us to the long-term persistence of mythology.

48

In this context, the long-term persistence of necessarily representative of oral genres mythology is linked to the corresponding handling mytho-heroic traditions with which persistence of particular genres and cultural written necessarily co-existed for some practices. The relationship of such practices to considerable period of time, even though little registers of mythology have been historically about those oral genres is known (cf. Lassen constructed and socially negotiated – they 2011: 308–383). function in the present as outcomes of the Shifting attention away from ideal and past. We tend to take it for granted that Mary uniform mythologies to a register-based model and Jesus do not go on adventures with also provides an approach to registers of Väinämöinen and Ilmarinen because we see mythology linked to different religions. In the them as belonging to Christian and vernacular same way that we discuss Finnish and English traditions, respectively. However, kalevalaic as separate languages, we can discuss Christian poems about both were sung by the same versus non-Christian or ‘scientific’ versus singers for centuries, and Väinämöinen, Mary vernacular mythologies. When Finnish and and Ukko can all have relevant places in a English are introduced into a single environ- single incantation. (Frog 2013c: 74.) How and ment, they increase the linguistic resources where these symbols appear, and how they available and the different languages can are or are not combined, are not a function of function as alternative registers: switching a contrast between ‘Christian’ and ‘non- between them may be contextually prescribed Christian’ in the present of the singers, but or a strategic choice.38 Particular resources rather an outcome of the long-term can been seen as centrally interfaced with the persistence of conventions for their use in genres and cultural practices through which different registers of mythology. they are asserted, communicated and socially On the same basis, the different registers of negotiated, whether those resources are mythology can be assumed to evolve in relation linguistic or symbolic. It is in the interactions to practice by individuals in conjunction with of such environments that symbols of the their interests and aims (which may be based matrix are adapted from one register to on or respond to needs in the community: cf. another just as words are borrowed from one Rychkova, this volume). This process means language to another, potentially changing in that the registers develop with varying meaning or use. With mythology, this process degrees of interconnection with and may involve reinterpretations or the independence from one another (cf. also conflation of symbols linked to different Honko 1985 on ‘tradition ecology’). When registers, such as the image ÓÐINN in Christian this is acknowledged, it underscores the discourse sometimes merging with DEVIL, the caution needed when developing perspectives image ST. OLAF merging with ÞÓRR, or on mythology in contexts where sources are reference to Spuassu [‘Savior, Christ’] in limited. For example, the sort of evaluative Karelian lament merging with the supernatural stance-taking in representations of Óðinn in powers that the register was historically certain written genres of Old Norse saga oriented to address. This same process led the literature addressed above seems to have Old Norse term þurs to be preserved in mytho- evolved a genre-based image ÓÐINN aligned logical eddic poetry referring to cosmological with the perspective of the sagas’ Christian in mythic time, in incantations referring authors. At the same time, the role of Óðinn to agents of illness in the present world, and as an active and present agent in the lives and in sagas used as a simple synonym for deaths of heroes in the mytho-heroic past ‘monster’ (Frog 2013a). These are all seems to be rooted in the vernacular mytho- engagements with the symbols of the matrix heroic traditions: the Christian construction of from the perspectives of users and uses of the ÓÐINN seems to have developed through the particular registers. That positioning constructs manipulation of traditional motifs and themes the interface between the genre or cultural that already indexed ÓÐINN. However, this practice and mythology. At the same time, register of mythology is linked to particular conventions of a genre and its use condition written genres of saga literature and is not the conservatism and social innovation of that

49 interface – i.e. how much it is inclined to mythology, such as the turnip-god Äkräs, that change or stay the same and in what ways – operate in quite narrow fields are of course which affect the long-term maintenance of particularly vulnerable in this regard. mythology within the particular register. However, the breakdown of a register that is In the long-term, each register of socially central to a broad area of the mythology may develop a different internal symbolic matrix could have wide-ranging historical stratification of both language and consequences. Here, it is again important to symbols. This stratification is an outcome of emphasize that registers of practice are the history of uses, contacts with other genres registers of those who practice them.39 As and relationships to them. In addition, social phenomena, such registers are linked to different registers of mythology may also social roles, relations and/or recurrent remain rooted in their formation in a particular situations. Where mythology is concerned, era with a particular perspective. This may be practices associated with authoritative roles when a particular genre, set of cultural and institutions can take on a key role in practices or religion was introduced into a historically shaping and structuring the cultural environment, or when historical positioning of social perspectives within the changes led to the (re)formation of a practices matrix, becoming conduits of authority for into their distinct form on the basis of earlier mythology (cf. Frog 2013c: 111). In terms of traditions. The register of Old Norse skaldic social semiotics, their registers become poetry, for example, evolved its system of centers in the historical maintenance of poetic circumlocutions interfaced pervasively mythology. Rather than a simple binary with the referents and patterns of association equation that registers either are or are not of the pre-Christian cultural milieu and linked to these conduits of authority, the especially the mythology and mytho-heroic networks of diverse registers and their traditions of that milieu. The adaptation of the relations can be regarded in center–periphery skaldic register to the Christian milieu relations to different conduits of authority evolved within that framework rather than (potentially several at any given time in displacing the pre-Christian elements and history). Thus, the richness of kalevalaic associations with a set of is associated with ritual and alternatives. (Clunies Ross 2005: 114–115, magical uses by tietäjäs with a continuity 134–138.) A corresponding phenomenon can extending back to the Iron Age, but as those be observed in the evolution of Finno- uses became obsolete in the wake of Karelian kalevalaic mythology, incantations modernization, the whole imaginal world and the tietäjä-institution, which emerged began to be forgotten. It first began shifting especially under Germanic influence during away from the center of the public life of the the Iron Age (Frog 2013c; cf. Siikala 2002; community, gradually displaced by public 2012). The formal continuities of mythic Christian practices and associated authorities. images, motifs, themes and narrative sequences As the institutionalized specialization of the in mytho-heroic sagas reconventionalized from tietäjä became marginalized, different a Christian evaluative stance may also warrant individuals began taking up the role to meet consideration in this light. For example, Old the needs of the community: a tradition that Norse saga literature emerged in a Christian seems to have been dominated by men was environment in conjunction with the Christian finally kept up almost exclusively by women technology of writing. It drew on the as the mythology collapsed and rapidly began resources of vernacular oral traditions for the to disappear (cf. Rychkova, this volume). inception of new, written genres that can be assumed to have developed distinctive Theory and Utility in Practice registers of both language and mythology The aim of the present discussion has been to within that special Christian milieu. introduce an approach to mythology through a Conversely, the obsolescence of a register ‘symbolic matrix’ that is capable of may lead to whole areas of the symbolic addressing variation and diversity in mythology matrix falling out of use. Integers of the within a culture or cultural environment, and

50 that can be calibrated according to the scope they are interfaced. The present model of investigation. This methodological model develops this as a framework within which it is based on an approach to mythology through is possible to address alignments and tensions systems of symbols that are used and even between individual choices or innovations and contested in mythic discourse. Viewing the social conventions of genres. At a broader mytho-logy in a social environment in terms social level, the alignments and tensions may of a matrix of symbolic resources allows it to be between those choices or innovations and be addressed simultaneously as a whole – even the competing valorizations of different if that whole is not internally systematized per symbols and positioning within the matrix. se – while acknowledging the diversity of per- Within such considerations, emphasis has spectives and uses that can be distinguished been placed on the historical durability of the and situated in relation to one another. flexible yet compelling symbols and Developing this approach with attention to structures or resources in the symbolic matrix. mythic discourse has had the result that it is Continuity and variation of these symbols and particularly suited to addressing mythology in structures highlight that the outcomes of situated practice. This has motivated the mythic discourse in any particular present development of a more formalized and moment in history participate in linking the systematic distinction of integers in the matrix past of the tradition to the future, or in (images, motifs, themes, narrative sequences, disrupting that link. plots) in order to have more sophisticated The model outlined here is not intended to tools for addressing variation at a structural be the ideal tool for all research questions level. The emphasis on mythology in situated concerned with mythology. It is centrally social activity has also highlighted the intended for studies concerned with mythology historical construction of the integers in the in cultural practice, especially where variation matrix and perspectives on them in relation to in mythology is a focus, issue or concern. historically structured social practices or When looking at specific examples and genres. It may also be noted that the basic historical situations, this approach has the framework for distinguishing types of formal advantage of acknowledging the synchronic integers and their use and variation in meanings of the integers of the tradition. discourse is not dependent on symbols having These may differ considerably from those of the quality of signification linked to emotional the cultural contexts from which they investment making them ‘mythic’: the basic ultimately derive (cf. Siikala 2002; Frog framework can be readily employed to address 2013b). The usage-based approach underlines the variation and historical stratification of functions and meanings of mythology in symbolic integers in any discourse. application, on which both continuity and Following the analogy with linguistics, this variation are dependent. This gives the frame- model complements the approach to local and work a utility for addressing the dynamics regional variation of mythology according to between continuity and innovation or change. ‘dialects’ with an approach to variation It is equally applicable to unique, situation- according to ‘registers’. Although the specific adaptations of mythology that may discussion and analysis of registers necessarily never become socially established, and to the abstracts these as semiotic resources from the investigation of an established tradition as the people who use them, it is extremely important social outcome of such an innovation or to recognize them as registers of practices that change. Such applications simply require the are in many cases socially constructed around calibration of the temporal and cultural or roles or even social institutions. These roles geographical scope and sensitivity of the and the individuals who fill them have been symbolic matrix that forms the frame of described in terms of ‘positioning’ in the reference. Although such a matrix is inevitably matrix. This positioning, anchored in a social both hypothetical and abstract, it can be much role or institution, then participates in the more sensitive and specific if the scope is historical construction of genres and in the narrowly defined in time and cultural space stratification of mythic symbols with which where thick data is available – for example, a

51 single parish in Karelia during a single study of the semantics of specific elements of century (cf. Tarkka 2013). Sensitivity decreases a mythology. Any of these investigations might and the matrix becomes increasingly abstract benefit from the present approach especially as its scope is extended across multiple when looking at specific examples and cases, dialects of mythology and a greater range of but they do not need it per se. On the other historical contexts. For example, it is possible hand, investigations into the meanings and to calibrate the framework to consider understandings mediated by mythic symbols Scandinavian–Christian contacts during the should take into consideration registral Late Iron Age, but the range and specificity of variation, and thus that these meanings and symbols and structures considered would even conceptual models may vary by register likely have to remain at quite a general and of mythology. The methodological framework abstract level that would be unavoidably presented here does have a wide range of removed from locally distinct contact events. applications, but it should be treated as a tool This would not invalidate such a model once among other tools, and like any tool, it is better it was developed, but it would affect its utility for addressing some problems than others. for addressing certain research questions. As a Research on mythologies has been tool, however, this methodological framework customarily done with mythologies associated nevertheless remains of central utility where with different language groups – Finno- variation is a relevant factor. Karelian mythology, Scandinavian mythology, Approaching mythology in terms of a Uralic mythology, Indo-European mythology symbolic matrix places emphasis on signifiers, and so forth. Here, variation has been their patterns of use and variations in those foregrounded, which problematizes viewing uses. Where an investigation or method mythology as a more or less uniform whole. moves away from the symbolic integers of the The distinction of registers of mythology mythology and their relations, so does the provides a new tool for approaching variation usefulness of this approach. For example, it between cultural practices, the historical would have little relevance to research development of that variation in relation to focusing on a mythology or religion as a uses and users, and also for looking at the metasemiotic entity without exploring its linkages and continuities of mythology across unitary integers as such. In other words, both diverse practices. However, attending to medieval Christians and players of modern variation does not mean that broad categories video games may recognize Þórr as meto- of mythology by culture or religion are nymically indexing vernacular Scandinavian invalid any more than addressing linguistic mythology and religion. However, there is no registers invalidates addressing languages as need to introduce a symbolic matrix or even categories of broad, inter-generationally trans- to discuss Þórr as a symbol if focus is on the mitted systems. Rather than being mutually meanings and associations of Scandinavian exclusive models, these are alternative and mythology and religion as an entity for complementary ways of looking at material. medieval Christians or modern players of They both become tools in the hands of a video games. Similarly, discussing a symbolic researcher for answering specific research matrix is focused on social phenomena and questions. For example, comparative studies social conventions that may only be of in Indo-European mythology and religion interest as a frame of reference if focus is on have a strong philological basis that seeks to mythology as used at the level of a specific identify and relate integers of mythology, individual or in a specific text. An investi- interfaces between mythology and ritual gation may also concentrate on conceptual language, connections to social roles and models mediated through symbols of social structures, and other paradigmatic mythology, much as symbols of mythology structures operating as organizing principles may be mediated through language. Conceptual with a longue durée. The methodology outlined models may be approached through symbolic here is no more necessary to studies on these integers, but such an investigation may simply topics than linguistic register theory is to target and survey those integers, as may a etymology and reconstructions of historical

52 phonology, grammar or metrics. However, it mythology of speakers of Proto-Indo-European becomes relevant when attention turns from (e.g. West 2007; Lyle 2012) and that of speakers of Proto-Uralic (e.g. Napolskikh 1992; Hoppál 2010: the question of whether certain motifs were 28–37) are quite different. Perspectives have more associated with the central Indo-European god recently been offered on elements and cycles of *Dyéus [‘Sky’] to why some of these seem to mythology that may have significantly earlier roots have been transferred to Óðinn (cf. West in the Stone Age (e.g. Meletinskij 1997; 2007: 173), why Indo-European structures do Napolskikh 2012; Witzel 2012; Berezkin, this volume). Alternately, attention may also be given to not seem to be filled by etymologically cognate ‘macro-regional complexes’ of mythology, which gods in Old (cf. Lyle 2012: are areal patterns and systems that develop in parts 75–86), or why the thunder-god’s battle with of the world where multiple cultures with different his serpent-adversary is, in the Scandinavian heritages of mythology have a long history of on- tradition, situated on a fishing trip and in a going interactions (Witzel 2012: 65–68; cf. Frog 2011; 2014a; also Berezkin in this volume). collective battle at the end of the world (cf. 3. Cf. Algirdas Julien Greimas’ (1987 [1962]) Watkins 1995: 414–428). The methodological description of mythology as a “metalanguage”. framework presented here can thus 4. It is possible to distinguish here between two broad complement certain aspects of these sorts of types of religious identity. One is an ‘official’, investigations. Most important in this regard ideally prescribed religious doctrine linked to scripture and an institutionalized social or remains the perspectives that it enables, which bureaucratic aparatus, such as the . extend beyond applying the framework The other is socially constructed through discourse directly. The variation that becomes evident and interaction at a local level. However, it should through this approach should be taken into be noted that the ideal model of religious practice consideration in any attempt to develop a and identity is centrally a frame of reference constructed by and for those participating in a broad image of a mythology at a cultural religious identity. Constructing images of the level: such broad cultural mythologies are religious identities of ‘other’ groups is built on unlikely to be as uniform and systematic as it social perceptions especially constructed through has long been popular to assume. discourse, whether this is a Norse or Finno-Karelian perception of Sámi religious identity, or the Frog (mr.frog[at]helsinki.fi), PL 59 (Unioninkatu 38 Church’s construction of images of ‘pagans’, A), 00014 University of Helsinki, Finland. ‘’ and ‘Jews’. Acknowledgements: This article is a revised and 5. E.g. Eliade 1968 [1963]: 1–2; Doty 2000: 4–30; see expanded version of “Myyttinen diskurssi ja mytologian also the discussion in Csapo 2004. symbolinen matriisi” in Mytologia ja runous, a special 6. E.g. Eliade 1968 [1963]: 5–6; Lévi-Strauss 1967 issue of Elore, vol. 22, no. 1 (2014; pp. 1–18). I would [1958]: 202–228; Barner-Barry & Hody 1994; see like to thank Joonas Ahola and Karina Lukin for their also discussions in Rowland 1990 and Briggs & valuable comments and suggestions that have Bauman 1992. strengthened and enriched this article, and also Maths 7. This occurs in the Sampo-Cycle, in which Bertell in its final polishing. The model presented here Väinämöinen is the only anthropomorphic agent in has been developed through research and findings of the world-creation, following which forging the the projects “The Song of Lemminkäinen”, funded by vault of heaven may be attributed to Ilmarinen as an the Kalevala Society, “The Generation of Myth in a indicator that he has the skill to create the Confluence of Cultures”, funded by the Kone mysterious object called a sampo (see further Frog Foundation and Finnish Cultural Foundation, and the 2012; 2013c: 69–73). Academy of Finland project “Oral Poetry, Mythic 8. For example ‘heaping together mountains’ (e.g. Knowledge, and Vernacular Imagination” of Folklore SKVR I1 185.23, 30), whereas The Song of Creation Studies, University of Helsinki. attributes him only with the creation of the celestial bodies from a world-egg, which may include Notes forming heaven and earth from its upper and lower parts (notably distinct from the fabrication of the 1. On applications of this approach to mythologies in vault of heaven from iron), and shaping the modern culture, see Frog 2014d. contours of the seabed but not of the land (for a 2. Addressing mythologies in this way groups them variant from the same singer, Ontrei Malinen, see according to linguistic heritage and will then SKVR I 79.19–26, 50–61). highlight the relatedness of those groups, which 1 9. Discussing the coherence of a mythology must be does not necessarily entail seeking to reconstruct an kept distinct from arguments about the ‘origin’ of a earlier form of the mythology. Any long-term particular narrative element or historiola. For continuity is of course linked to the history of the example, linking the Flum Jordan motif to an mythology and what that mythology was in earlier account of the of Jesus found in the 7th- periods. Consequently, what can be said about the century Chronicon Paschale (Davies 1996: 21)

53

does not mean that users of the motif in charms also Arend 1933; 1960: 68–98; Frye 1968; Foley included it in local accounts of Jesus’s baptism. 1990: esp. 240–245, 279–284, 329–335). 10. Particularly controversial in structuralist approaches 22. For a review, see Frog 2010: 377–395; for was the attempt to advance structural patterns and examples of this epic in English, see FFPE 34–38. paradigms to universals (e.g. Lévi-Strauss 1967 23. This distinction is not clearly made in the Aarne– [1958]) or to otherwise presume a pattern whereby Thompson–Uther (ATU) tale-type index of it became an artificial lens through which evidence international folktales (Uther 2004 or its earlier was interpreted, and then to treat the interpretation editions), which is ostensibly concerned with plots, as demonstrating the validity of the pattern (e.g. even if these might be combined. However, certain Germanic mythology and religion in Dumézil 1988 types listed seem normally to have appeared only as [1948]). episodes within complex narratives without a 11. In order to resolve this issue, I have elsewhere distinctive complication and/or resolution to form a outlined a differentiation between centralized complete plot according to the definition here (e.g. symbols and decentralized symbols (Frog 2014a; ATU 1087). On this topic, see also Berezkin, this 2014d), and between a surface mythology and deep volume. mythology (Frog 2014c). 24. For a survey of the sources for this tradition and its 12. It was used, for example, to describe how variations, see Frog 2011; for a more detailed references to apocalyptic visions were handled and review of the problematic Scandinavian evidence, manipulated in political speeches and the media see Frog 2014b. (e.g. O’Leary 1989). 25. If I am not mistaken, I was introduced to the 13. This is found even among scholars who defined potential significance of this feature in a myths in terms of stories (e.g. Witzel 2012: 17; cf. presentation given by Merrill Kaplan at the also Doty 2000: 49). University of Uppsala in 2006. 14. Certain abstract structural patterns can also be 26. Available at: https://commons.wikimedia.org/ viewed as types of signs in that they have wiki/File:Three_kings_or_three_gods.jpg. diagrammatic iconicity: recognizing the pattern 27. On the one hand, this means that the accuracy of equates to the recognition of its meaningfulness. Snorri Sturluson’s account of this event in his even if the images and motifs with which it is is not relevant to this discussion except insofar as completed may be open to considerable variation. the loss of the eye is correlated with sacrifice and 15. This type of variation has been discussed by Doty the acquisition of supernatural power. On the other in terms of the degree of the vitality of a myth hand, this means that caution is needed when (2000: 137–140). employing Snorri’s account as a frame of reference 16. Cf. also Claude Lévi-Strauss’ argument that because the same details that make it accessible to “symbols are more real than what they symbolise; us as narrative may deviate from the local tradition the signifier precedes the signified” (1987: 37). of ÓÐINN SACRIFICES EYE in relation to which a 17. On mental images and image schemata, see e.g. particular artefact was made or ritual performed. Lakoff 1987: passim.; on mythic images, see 28. For example, the one-eye modification could have Siikala 1992: 42–50. been only symbolic, emblematic of a role, just as 18. I have developed this definition of ‘motif’ as a modifications to helmets were emblematic to their practical tool for analysis. The term ‘motif’ was wearers rather than a literal blinding per se (cf. Price originally intuitively defined and its use has been & Mortimer 2014: 519–525). It might be appealing extremely inconsistent. Stith Thompson’s Motif- to infer that the one-eyed Truso head represents Index of Folk-Literature (1955–1958) did not serve some type of sorceress, but this would only be to clarify this, owing to his own approach: “Certain speculation. For all we know, the modification of items in narrative keep on being used by story- an image making it one-eyed like the Truso head or tellers; they are the stuff out of which tales are the one-eyed buckle tongue from Elsfleth near made. It makes no difference exactly what they are Bremen (Price & Mortimer 2014: 525) may have like; if they are actually useful in the construction been part of a ritual act for the creation of a of tales, they are considered to be motifs.” supernatural helping agent that could act on behalf (Thompson 1955: 7, my emphasis; cf. Berezkin, of the user (in later Scandinavian folklore this is this volume.) most familiar in the form of a milk-stealer created 19. Thompson’s motif type A62.2 “Thunder and by witches). The question seems irresolvable. Lightning Slay Devils”. 29. The vernacular language was not equipped with 20. I.e. the image filling the slot DEVIL may be a equivalents to the modern terminology for decentralized symbol – a symbol that functions as a discussing religion, religious conflict and religious common noun (‘devil’) as opposed to a proper noun change. Instead, it used expressions like inn forni (‘’) (on decentralized symbols, see further siðr [‘the old way of life’] as opposed to inn nýi Frog 2014a; 2014d). siðr [‘the new way of life’] or Kristinn siðr 21. Like the term ‘motif’, the term ‘theme’ has been [‘Christian way of life (religion)’] (Cleasby & used in a variety of ways and most often without Vigfússon 1896: 526; on the interplay of vernacular clear formal criteria to distinguish it from other and Christian religion in the conversion context, see structural units (cf. Propp 1968 [1928]: 12–13; further e.g. Aðalsteinsson 1978; Miller 1991; Sanmark 2004; Gunnell 2009).

54

30. This interpretation was a structuring principle of Ahola, Joonas, Frog & Ville Laakso. 2016 Elias Lönnrot’s Kalevala, where The Judgement of (forthcoming). “The Roles and Perceptions of Väinämöinen is represented at the end of the epic to Raptors in Iron Age and Medieval Finno-Karelian mark the end of the pagan past and beginning of the Cultures through c. AD 1500”. In The Origin and Christian era. Importance of Falconry until 1500 AD with an 31. This is found in the entry under year 6579 (AD Emphasis on Northern Europe. Ed. Oliver Grimm. 1071); a Christian’s assertion that a pagan god is in Wachholz: Neumünster. fact the Antichrist is also found under the entry for Arend, Walter. 1933. Die typischen Scenen bei Homer. 6582 (AD 1074). Berlin: Weidmannsche Buchhandlung. 32. This last case seems likely, for example, in the case Barner-Barry, Carol, & Cynthia Hody. 1994. “Soviet of Old Norse sagas mentioning Jómali (from Finnic Marxism-Leninism as Mythology”. Political ) as a god of the Bjarmar [‘Bjarmians’] on Psychology 15(4): 609–630. the White Sea: it is highly improbable that the Barthes, Roland. 1972 [1957]. Mythologies. New York: theonym of such a remote and infrequently Hill & Wang. contacted foreign group was maintained in oral Beck, Wolfgang. 2003. Die Merseburger discourse for perhaps two centuries when other Zaubersprüche. Wiesbaden: Reichert. personal names were not (see Frog 2014c: 466–467). Bell, Catherine. 1992. Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice. 33. Cf. motifs in legends related to Sámi shamanism Oxford: Oxford University Press. (Christiansen 1958: 54–56, type 3080; Jauhainen Briggs, Charles L., & Richard Bauman. 1992. “Genre, 1998: 167–168, types D1031–1040; af Klintberg Intertextuality, and Social Power”. Journal of 2010: 264–265, types M151–160). Such motifs Linguistic Anthropology 2(2): 131–172. construct the image SÁMI through discourse. Cassirer, Ernst. 1925. Sprache und Mythos. : 34. For a full discussion, see Frog 2014b: 142–154. B.G. Teubner. 35. On Karelian lament, see further Stepanova 2014; Christiansen, Reidar Th. 1914. Die finnischen und for works in English, see Stepanova 2011; 2012, nordischen Varianten des zweiten Merseburger- and also Stepanova & Frog, this volume. spruches: Eine vergleichende Studie. FF 36. These differences extend to quite a fundamental Communications 18. Hamina: Suomalaisen level, as discussed regarding raptor symbolism in Tiedeakatemian Kustantama. Ahola et al. 2016. Christiansen, Reidar Th. 1958. The Migratory Legends. 37. Although ‘mode’ was introduced with a prominent FF Communications 175. Helsinki: Academia position by M.K.A. Halliday (1978), it was not as Scientiarum Fennica. concisely defined as his other terms and was not Cleasby, Richard, & Gudbrand Vigfússon. 1896. An devoid of ambiguity (see Shore 2015). On the use Icelandic English Dictionary. Oxford: Clarendon Press. of ‘mode’ here, see Frog 2014e: 198–202. Converse, Philip. 1964. “The Nature of Belief Systems 38. This phenomenon has been referred to as in Mass Publics”. In Ideology and Discontent. Ed. D. ‘languaging’; see e.g. Jørgensen et al. 2011. Apter. London: Free Press. Pp. 206–261. 39. This has recently been highlighted by Eila Stepanova, Cross, Hazzard, & Olgerd P. Sherbowitz-Wetzor who has characterized the lament register as a (eds. & trans.). 1953. The Russian Primary register of lamenters rather than as a register of a Chronicle: Laurentian Text. Cambridge: Mediaeval genre of folklore an sich (2014). Academy of America. Csapo, Eric. 2004. Theories of Mythology. London: Works Cited Blackwell. Sources Davies, Owen. 1996. “Healing Charms in Use in England and Wales 1700–1950”. Folklore 107: 19– Eddic poems cited following Neckel & Kuhn 1963. 32. FFPE = Kuusi et. al. 1977. Doty, William G. 2000. Mythography: The Study of Njáls Saga – Sveinsson, Ól. (ed.). 1952. Brennu- Myths and Rituals. 2nd edn. Tuscaloosa: University Njáls saga. Íslenzk Fornrit 12. Reykjav k: Hið of Alabama Press. slenzka Fornritaf lag. Dumézil, Georges. 1988 [1948]. Mitra–Varuna. New Russian Primary Chronicle – Text: Ostrowski 2003; York: Zone Books. Translation: Cross & Sherbowitz-Wetzor 1953. Durkheim, Emile. 1915 [1912]. The Elementary Forms SKVR = Suomen Kansan Vanhat Runot I–XV. Helsinki: of Religious Life. London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd. Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura, 1908–1997. Eliade, Mircea. 1968 [1963]. Myth and Reality. Harper Torchbooks. New York: Harper & Row. Literature Ellis Davidson, H.R. 1964. Gods and Myths if Northern Aðalsteinsson, Jón Hnefill. 1978. Under the Cloak: A Europe. Baltimore: Penguin Books. Pagan Ritual Turning Point in the Conversion of Falk, Hjalmar. 1924. Odensheiti. Kristiania: Brøggers. Iceland. Uppsala: Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis. Foley, John Miles. 1990. Traditional Oral Epic. Los Agha, Asif. 2001. “Registers of Language”. In A Angeles: University of California Press. Companion to Linguistic Anthropology. Ed. Frankfurter, David. 1995. “Narrating Power: The Theory Alessandro Duranti. Malden: Blackwell. Pp. 23–45. and Practice of the Magical Historiola in Ritual Agha, Asif. 2007. Language and Social Relations. Spells”. In Ancient Magic and Ritual Power. Ed. M. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Meyer & P. Mirecki. Leiden: Brill. Pp. 457–476.

55

Frog. 2010. and Lemminkäinen. UCL Eprints. Gunnell, Terry. 2009. “Ansgar’s Conversion of Iceland”. London: University College London. Scripta Islandica 60: 105–118. Frog. 2011. “Circum-? – The Strange Halliday, M.A.K. 1978. Language as Social Semiotic. Case of the Theft of the Thunder-Instrument (ATU London: Edward Arnold. 1148b)”. Archaeologia Baltica 15: 78–98. Harva, Uno. 1948. Suomalaisten muinaisusko. Porvoo: Frog. 2012. “Confluence, Continuity and Change in the WSOY. Evolution of Myth: Cultural Activity and the Finno- Harvilahti, Lauri. 2013. “Ethnocultural Knowledge and Karelian Sampo-Cycle”. In Frog et al. 2012: 205–254. Mythical Models”. In The Performance of Christian Frog. 2013a. “The (De)Construction of Mythic and Pagan Storyworlds. Ed. Lars Boje Mortensen, Ethnography I: Is Every þurs in Verse a þurs?”. Tuomas M, S. Lehtonen & Alexandra Bergholm. RMN Newsletter 6: 52–72. Turnhout: Brepols. Pp. 199–219. Frog. 2013b. “The Parallax Approach: Situating Honko, Lauri. 1981. “Four Forms of Adaptation of Traditions in Long-Term Perspective”. In Tradition”. In Adaptation, Change, and Decline in Approaching Methodology. 2nd edn. Ed. Frog & Oral Literature. Ed. Lauri Honko & Vilmos Voigt. Pauliina Latvala with Helen F. Leslie. Helsinki: Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society. Pp. 19–33. Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Pp. 101–131. Honko, Lauri. 1985. “Rethinking Tradition Ecology”. Frog. 2013c. “Shamans, Christians, and Things in Temenos 21: 55–82. between: From Finnic–Germanic Contacts to the Honko, Lauri. 1998. Textualising the Siri Epic. Helsinki: Conversion of Karelia”. In Conversions. Ed. L. Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Słupecki & R. Simek. Vienna: Fassbaender. Pp. 53–98. Hoppál, Mihály. 2010. Uralic Mythologies and Frog. 2014a. “From Mythology to Identity and Imaginal Shamans. : Hungarian Academy of Experience: An Exploratory Approach to the Sciences. Symbolic Matrix in Viking Age Åland”. In The Viking Jauhiainen, Marjatta. 1998. The Type and Motif Index of Age in Åland. Ed. J. Ahola, Frog & J. Lucenius. Finnish Belief Legends and Memorates. Helsinki: Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Pp. 349–414. Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Frog. 2014b. “Germanic Traditions of the Theft of the Jørgensen, J.N., M.S. Madsen, L.M. Karrebæk & J.S. Thunder-Instrument (ATU 1148b)”. In New Focus Møller. 2011. “Polylanguaging and Superdiversity”. on Retrospective Methods. Ed. Eldar Heide & Karen Diversities 13(2): 23–37. Bek-Petersen. FF Communications 307. Helsinki: Kamppinen, Matti. 1989. Cognitive Systems and Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Pp. 120–162. Cultural Models of Illness. FF Communications 244. Frog. 2014c. “Myth, Mythological Thinking and the Helsinki; Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Viking Age in Finland”. In Fibula, Fabula, Fact – Kaplan, Merrill. 2008. “Out-Thoring Thor in the The Viking Age in Finland. Ed. Joonas Ahola & Frog Longest Saga of Óláfr Tryggvason”. Journal of with Clive Tolley. Helsinki: Finnish Literature English and 107(4): 472–489. Society. Pp. 437–482. Kaplan, Merrill. 2011. Thou Fearful Guest: Addressing Frog. 2014d. “Mytologia on katsojan silmässä”. In the Past in Four Tales in Flateyjarbók. Helsinki: Ympäristömytologia. Ed. Seppo Knuuttila & Ulla Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Piela. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. af Klintberg, Bengt. 2010. The Types of the Swedish Folk Pp. 59–73. Legend. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Frog. 2014e. “Parallelism, Mode, Medium and Orders of Koski, Kaarina. 2011. Kuoleman voimat. Helsinki: Representation”. In Parallelism in Verbal Art and Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Performance. Pre-Print Papers of the Seminar- Kuusi, Matti. 1963. “Keskiajan kalevalainen runous”. Workshop, 26th–27th May 2014. Ed. Frog. Helsinki: Suomen Kirjallisuus 1. Ed. Matti Kuusi. Helsinki: Folklore Studies, University of Helsinki. Pp. 185–207. Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Pp. 273–397. Frog, Anna-Leena Siikala & Eila Stepanova (eds.). Kuusi, Matti, Keith Bosley & Michael Branch (ed. & 2012. Mythic Discourses: Studies in Uralic trans.). 1977. Finnish Folk Poetry: Epic. Helsinki: Traditions. Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society. Finnish Literature Society. Frye, Donald K. 1968. “ Formulaic Themes Lakoff, George. 1987. Women, Fire, and Dangerous and Type-Scenes”. Neophilologus 52(1): 48–54. Things. Chicago: Chicago University Press. Gardeła, Leszek. 2014. Scandinavian Amulets in Viking Lassen, Annette. 2011. Oden på kristent pergament. Age Poland. Rzeszów: Fundacja Rzeszowskiego København: Museum Tusculanums Forlag. Ośrodka Archeologicznego / Instytut Archeologii Lévi-Strauss, Claude. 1962. Le totemisme aujourd’hui. Uniwersytetu Rzeszowskiego. Paris: PUF. Gimbutas, Marija. 1974. “The Lithuanian God Velnias”. Lévi-Strauss, Claude. 1967 [1958]. Structural In Myth in Indo-European Antiquity. Ed. Gerald Anthropology. Doubleday: Garden City. James Larson, C. Scott Littleton & Jaan Puhvel. Lévi-Strauss, Claude. 1987. Introduction to the Work of Berkeley: University of California Press. Pp. 87–92. Marcel Mauss. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul. Goodman, Lenn E. 1993. “Mythic Discourse”. In Myths Liestøl, Knut. 1970. Den norrøne arven. Oslo: and Fictions. Ed. Shlomo Biderman & Ben-Ami Universitetsforlaget. Scharfstein. Leiden: Brill. Pp. 51–112. Lindow, John. 1995. “Supernatural Others and Ethnic Greimas, Algirdas Julien. 1987 [1962]. “Comparative Others”. Scandinavian Studies 67(1): 8–31. Mythology”. In On Meaning. Trans. Paul J. Perron. London: Frances Printer. Pp. 3–16.

56

Loorits, Oskar. 1932. Das Märchen vom gestohlenen Siikala, Anna-Leena. 1992. Suomalainen šamanismi. Donner-instrument bei den Esten. Tartu: Gelehrte Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Estnische Gesellschaft. Siikala, Anna-Leena. 2002. Mythic Images and Lord, Albert B. 1960. The Singer of Tales. Cambridge: Shamanism: A Perspective on Kalevala Poetry. Harvard University Press. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Lotman, Iu. M., & B.A. Uspenskii 1976. “Myth – Name Siikala, Anna-Leena. 2012. Itämerensuomalisten myto- – Culture”. In Semiotics and Structuralism: Readings logia. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. from the Soviet Union. Ed. Henryk Baran. White Stepanova, Eila. 2012. “Mythic Elements of Karelian Planes: International Arts & Sciences Press. Pp. 3–32. Laments: The Case of syndyzet and spuassuzet”. In Lyle, Emily. 2012. Ten Gods. Newcastle upon Tyne: Froget al. 2012: 257–287. Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Stepanova, Eila. 2014. Seesjärveläisten itkijöiden Malinowski, Bronislaw. 1948 [1926]. Myth in Primitive rekisterit: Tutkimus äänellä itkemisen käytänteistä, Psychology. In Magic, Science and Religion. By teemoista ja käsitteistä. Kultaneiro 14. Joensuu: Bronislaw Malinowski. Garden City: Doubleday Suomen Kansantietouden Tutkijain Seura. Anchor. Pp. 93–148. Tarkka, Lotte. 1993. “Intertextuality, Rhetorics and the McKinnell, John. 2008. “Vǫluspá and the Feast of Interpretation of Oral Poetry: The Case of Archived ”. Alvíssmál 12: 3–28. Orality”. In Nordic Frontiers. Ed Pertti Anttonen & Meletinskij, Eleazar Moiseevich. 1997. Das Reimund Kvideland. Turku: Nordic Institute of paläoasiatische mythologische Epos: Der Zyklus des Folklore. Pp. 165–193. Raben. Berlin: Reinhold Schletzer. Tarkka, Lotte. 2013. Songs of the Border People: Genre, Miller, William Ian. 1991. “Of Outlaws, Christians, Reflexivity, and Performance in Karelian Oral Horsemeat, and Writing: Uniform Laws and Saga Poetry. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Iceland”. Michigan Law Review 89(8): 2081–2095. Thompson, Stith. 1955. Narrative Motif-Analysis as a Napolskikh, Vladimir. 1992. “Proto-Uralic World Folklore Method. FF Communications 161. Helsinki: Picture: A Reconstruction”. In Shamanism and Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Northern Ecology. Ed. Juha Pentikäinen. Berlin: Thompson, Stith. 1955–1958. Motif-Index of Folk- Mouton de Gruyter. Pp. 3–20. Literature I–VI. FF Communications 106–109, 116– Napolskikh, Vladimir. 2012. “The Earth-Diver Myth 117. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. (А812) in Northern Eurasia and : Timonen, Senni. 1994. “The Mary of Women’s Epic”. Twenty Years Later”. In Frog et al. 2012: 120–140. In Songs Beyond the Kalevala: Transformations of th Neckel, G. & H. Kuhn (eds.). 1963. Edda. 4 edn. Oral Poetry. Ed. Anna-Leena Siikala & Sinikka Heidelberg: Carl Winters Universitäts-buchhandlung. Vakimo. Studia Fennica Folkloristica 2. Helsinki: O’Leary, Stephen. 1989. “The Political use of Mythic Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Pp. 301–329. Discourse”. Quarterly Journal of Speech 75: 433–452. Tolley, Clive 2009. Shamanism in Norse Myth and Ostrowski, Donald (ed.). 2003. The Povest’ vremennykh Magic I–II. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. let I–III. Cambridge: Harvard Ukrainian Research Uther, Hans-Jörg. 1997–1999. “Donner”. Enzyklopädie Institute. Electronic edition: http://hudce7.harvard des Märchens III. Ed. Kurt Ranke et al. Berlin: de .edu/~ostrowski/pvl/index.html. Gruyter. Pp. 762–766. Price, Neil S. 2002. The Viking Way. Uppsala: Uther, Hans-Jörg. 2004. The Types of International Department of Archaeology and Ancient History. Folktales I–III. FF Communications 284–286. Price, Neil, & Paul Mortimer. 2014. “An Eye for Odin? Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. – Divine Role-Playing in the Age of ”. Valk, Ülo. 2012. “Thunder and Lightning in Estonian European Journal of Archaeology 17(3): 517–538. Folklore in the Light of Vernacular Theories”. In Propp, V. 1968 [1928]. Morphology of the Folktale. Mythic Discourses: Studies in Uralic Traditions. Ed. Austin: University of Texas Press. Frog, Anna-Leena Siikala & Eila Stepanova. Studia Roper, Jonathan. 2005. English Verbal Charms. Fennica Folkloristica 20. Helsinki: Finnish Literature Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Society. Pp. 40–67. Rowe, Elizabeth Ashman. 2006. “Quid Sigardus cum Versnel, H.S. 2002. “The Poetics of the Magical Charm: Christo? – Moral Interpretations of Sigurðr An Essay on the Power of Words”. In Magic and Fáfnisbani in Old Norse Literature”. Viking and Ritual in the Ancient World. Ed. Paul Mirecki & Medieval Scandinavia 2: 167–200. Marvin Meyer. Religions in the Graeco-Roman Rowland, Robert C. 1990. “On Mythic Criticism”. World 141. Leiden: Brill. Pp. 105–158. Communication Studies 41(2): 101–116. de Vries, Jan 1956–1957. Altgermanische Religions- Sanmark, Alexandra. 2004. Power and Conversion. geschichte I–II. 2nd edn. Berlin: de Gruyter. Uppsala: Department of Archaeology and Ancient Watkins, Calvert. 1995. How to Kill a Dragon. Oxford: History, . Oxford University Press. Shore, Susanna. 2015 (in press). “Register in Systemic- West, M.L. 2007. Indo-European Poetry and Myth. Functional Linguistics”. In Registers of Oxford: Oxford University Press. Communication. Ed. Asif Agha & Frog. Helsinki: Witzel, E.J. Michael. 2012. The Origins of the World’s Finnish Literature Society. Mythologies. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

57

Folklore and Mythology Catalogue: Its Lay-Out and Potential for Research Yuri E. Berezkin, Museum of Anthropology & Ethnography (Kunstkamera) / European University at Petersburg

Abstract: The catalogue of folklore and mythology contains ca. 50,000 abstracts of oral texts from all over the world. The distribution of 2,000 cosmological and etiological motifs, adventure and trickster episodes is systematically checked across almost 1,000 traditions. The database was developed as a tool for the research of prehistoric migrations and cultural interactions. The present article introduces and illustrates its potential for research. “The Thematic Classification and Areal point on the way towards the systematization Distribution of Folklore-Mythological Motifs. of all the New World and later also of the Old The Analytical Catalogue” (www.ruthenia.ru/ World materials was an encouraging folklore/berezkin) with a set of accompanying conversation with Johannes Wilbert in Los files not placed on the web is a resource Angeles in 1993. My first computer was created for the study of the human past. bought the same year thanks to a George Folklore texts from more than 6000 books and Soros’ grant, and my first attempts to apply papers as well as some unpublished materials statistical methods to the data took place in have already been processed. The textual part the year following. These attempts would of this database is in Russian and therefore have failed without the friendly help of inaccessible for most users. Since the mid- anthropologist Alexander Kozintsev. 1990s, the work was supported by Russian funds that assigned money, not for the The Replication of Narratives creation of the database itself, but for The database has been developed through the receiving new information on prehistory. To etic interpretation of ‘myths and tales’ as find time for the preparation of abstracts in cultural elements subject to replication. This English for the items catalogued was approach is complementary to their study as practically impossible. This sad fact has its emic phenomena that have a particular positive side too. Before being widely meaning for the people who use these cultural opened, a system of such scale had to be elements. However, it warrants stressing that properly adjusted. With the of these approaches to cultural data do not computer technology and ever easier access to compete or interfere with one another. Any publications, many gaps and flaws that the cultural feature can be both interpreted and database initially contained have been filled unconsciously reproduced (Durkheim 1911; and corrected. A complete translation of Geertz 1993: 92–93). I use the expressions textual material into English has hardly been ‘folklore’, ‘mythology’ and ‘folklore and manageable, but some means to diminish this mythology’ indiscriminately to refer to all disadvantage will hopefully be found. kinds of traditional stories and tales, long and The database had a long formative period short, sacred and profane. The focus of of development. Graduating as an archaeologist research is placed on the replication of forms and initially having in mind a search for that can be borrowed from culture to culture potential clues to understanding the mytholo- and not emic interpretations that are culturally gical scenes on Moche vases and murals (ca. specific. Borrowing between cultures and A.D. 100–800; Berezkin 1981), I began to historical processes of cultural change can systematize South American Indian folklore both potentially change the emic category to data in my own way. Only later, since the which a story or tale belongs, which makes it mid-1990s when the processing of the North essential to treat the material inclusively in American materials began, did I become more the type of research for which the database intimately engaged in problems of method has been developed. and theory, being influenced more by Franz Certain elements of culture are related to Boas and his students (Boas 1995: 329–363; the physical survival of people, but narratives 2002: 635–674; Kroeber 1908; Lowie 1908; and mythological images are not counted Wilbert & Simoneau 1992: 41–45) than by among these. You cannot make flat roofs after the mainstream folklore studies. A crucial coming to live in a rain forest, even if you

58 made them when living in a desert. However, the folklore is more like the evolution of nothing prevents you from reproducing the prokaryota than that of eukaryota. Therefore same stories in the new environment. Social applying the same procedures to the study of events that include a public retelling of myths a particular folklore plot as to the study of a are important, but there is not a necessary gene (Tehrani 2013) does not seem to be dependence between the public event and the methodologically correct. content of the story or stories told The ultimate purpose of the research based (Malinowski 1926). Thus, sets of folklore on the analysis of the areal patterns of the elements can be preserved even if the spread of the folklore elements is to reveal not landscapes, climates and social configurations functional dependences between folklore and in which they are told change. A deep and other spheres of culture (and nature) but the abrupt cultural or environmental change particular and to some degree chance would probably trigger modifications in the peculiarities of such processes as migrations folklore-mythological sphere too, but not and cultural contacts and interactions. because of a direct dependence between mythology and environment. More important The Problem of Multigenesis would be a general cultural imbalance that The database is a tool for the study of human facilitates the loss of some cultural elements past. Such a tool would be useless if elements and the adoption of other, new ones. All other of folklore tales were ephemeral units subject conditions being equal, folklore and to easy emergence and disappearance. mythology change in proportion to number of Therefore it was desirable to assess the times it undergoes interpersonal transmission probability that multiple similar elements in in the chain of its historical communication. folklore could emerge independently of one In practice, that transmission has long been another. The reality is that we can hardly recognized as a social process rather than measure such a probability and that the being limited to a chain of single individuals independent emergence of even complex (Frog 2013: 21). For this reason, it can be cultural forms cannot be completely excluded. practically discussed in terms of generations However, though every particular cultural and inter-generational transmission. Any element could probably emerge more than culture is based on the copying of its elements once, trends in the areal distribution of a great from generation to generation, and any number of elements (many dozens and even replication is ultimately subject to variation. hundreds of them) must depend on some Unlike genes, cultural elements can be social, natural or historical factors. Otherwise acquired both from other members of the the areal distribution of elements would be same group of peoples and from outside that chaotic. The hypothesis of the ephemeral group, i.e. they can move from people to nature of elements of folklore was rejected, people without the need for those peoples to not because of some theoretical considerations, be genetically related. Thus the distribution of but under the pressure of factual evidence. cultural elements and genetic markers will not This or that element is found in one region necessarily co-occur across different popu- and absent from others. Those elements that lations. The study of tales according to are truly found universally have simply been biological metaphors has a long history, and ignored because their study is useless for our this has more recently advanced to purposes. comparisons using models and software from Initially, the factors responsible for the genetics. The different kinds of transmission patterns in the areal distribution of folklore of the folklore elements can be described as elements were thought to lie in social and vertical when transmitted from generation to natural spheres. It was thought that cultures generation within a population, and horizontal with particular types of economy and social when transmitted between peoples of different organization that existed in particular climates origins. Both kinds of transmission could take and landscapes produced similar stories and place in any period of history. If parallels with worldview images. However, such correlations biology are appropriate, the development of have proven to be weak at best. The data from

59

Figure 1. Myths with circum-Pacific distribution that explain Figure 2. The earth-diver cosmological myth. Persons or the origin of plants on the principle of ‘many from one’. creatures acquire from the bottom of the ocean or from the Many different fruits and tubers grow on the branches of one lower world small amount of solid substance which turns into tree; bodily members of a person (Avesta: a bull) turn into the earth. The outlined routes of the spread of the motif are different plants. Grey circles = traditions for cultivated highly hypothetical. plants. Black circles = traditions for wild edible plants.

Figure 3. The task-giver is a king or a chief. The person who Figure 4. Obstacle flight. Running away from a dangerous gives difficult tasks to the hero is a prominent figure in the being, a person throws objects that turn into mighty obstacles social hierarchy, i.e. a head of the political unit of a in the way of the pursuer. 1. A whetstone and a comb are community or higher level and not a mythical being. thrown, and they turn into a mountain and into a thicket, forest, etc. 2. Either a whetstone or a comb but not the both. African cultures processed during the last 3. A comb is thrown but it turns into another kind of obstacle, eight years was the last straw in breaking this not into a thicket. 4. A thrown comb in the American Indian hypothesis. This led me to determine that the tales (probably a Spanish borrowing). potential influence of social-ecological Pacific, and these stories have much in conditions on the distribution of folklore common (Figure 1). Even if I missed some elements is insignificant. Sub-Saharan African African texts of this category, they must be agriculture, based on root-crops and trees and extremely rare, whereas corresponding texts not only on grain-crops, is of the same type as can be found in almost every publication on the Southeast Asian, Oceanic and tropical the folklore of the circum-Pacific region. American agriculture. However, no etiological It is easy to offer additional examples. The stories related to the origin of cultivated ‘earth-diver’ stories are found mostly in the species (nor to the origin of practically any continental areas far from any large body of plants at all) were found in Africa, while a lot water (Figure 2). The person who suggests of stories related to the origin of edible plants impossible tasks for a hero is a prominent are known to people on the both sides of the figure in the social hierarchy (and not just a

60 mythological character like Thunder, the Sun, rabbit’. The terms ‘motif-episode’ and ‘motif- a wizard, etc.) in stories recorded in those image’ are used when it is relevant to make parts of North America where social certain distinctions. stratification was weak. Such a figure is I define motifs as any episodes or images practically absent from Nuclear America with retold or described in narratives that are its state- and chiefdom-level societies, the few registered in at least two (although normally Andean cases could well have emerged under in many more) different traditions. Some of Spanish influence (Figure 3). A whetstone my motifs find correspondences in standard and a comb as objects thrown behind the hero indexes used by folklorists. For motif-images, to become a mountain and a thicket blocking the corresponding index is S. Thompson’s the way of the pursuer are not registered (1955–1958) index of elementary motifs, and everywhere where combs and whetstones for motif-episodes the index is the A. Aarne – were used, but across a wide but restricted S. Thompson – H.-J. Uther’s (ATU) index of zone of Northern Eurasia and North America the types of international folklore (Aarne (Figure 4). 1910; Thompson 1961; Uther 2004). As long as the population was sparse and However, neither of these systems can be contacts between small groups were episodic, regularly used for our purposes. Neither of vertical transmission has in general probably them was ever contemplated to serve as a tool prevailed. During the initial colonization of as in historical research as such, and both are yet unpopulated parts of the globe, it can be Eurocentric. assumed that the transference of folklore S. Thompson’s index was created with the elements was exclusively vertical as people declared aim to hold it aloof from any spread into the new territories. Within densely problematics of historical research (Thompson populated areas where contacts between the 1932: 2). The aim was to reduce any text to a people were continuously ongoing and intense, kind of standard combination of ‘characters’ the horizontal transmission of folklore likely or ‘units’. It is symptomatic, however, that an became dominant and also shaped vertical expert can easily extract a set of registered transmission. Therefore the formation of the motifs from a given text, but it is normally trans-Eurasian information network since impossible to reconstitute the content of any about Hellenistic/Han period had to have real text on the basis of the set of motifs important consequences for the development extracted. Descriptions of the root motifs on of the Old World folklore (and culture in which clusters of more particular motifs are general). When patterns such as those based were intentionally deprived of details in illustrated above are observed in such a large Thompson’s index, wordings like ‘Origin of body of data, a historical explanation for the Frog’ (A2162), ‘Dwarfs in Other World’ areal distribution of the folklore elements (F167.2) and ‘Self-Mutilation’ (S160.1) being seems the most plausible. typical. Particular motifs are, on the contrary, too specific and often created based on one Motifs as Analytical Units unique text (cf. A1730: Creation of Animals Up to this point, I have tried to refer to the as Punishment and A1731 Creation of replicated units of texts ‘elements’, just as F. Animals as Punishment for Beating Forbidden Boas did more than a century ago. This term Drum). As a result, Thompson’s index is too vague, however, so the term ‘motif’ presents both a combination of units that are was chosen as a more practical and specific. It universal and can be found anywhere and might be better to coin a totally new term units that have a restricted local distribution. more appropriate for the study, but all When all of these units are taken together suggested alternatives have been rejected for without differentiation, the statistical various reasons. For example, the term processing of regional sets of ‘motifs’ is ‘episode’ is perhaps the best for the senseless. The application of Thompson’s description of narratives but it is not well index to South American materials (Wilbert suited to cosmological ideas like ‘rainbow as & Simoneau 1992) demonstrated that, if a serpent’ or ‘shadows on the moon as a necessary, the system itself can be upgraded

61 to fit the non-European cultural and different combinations inside one text but can environmental peculiarities. However, the also be used in stories for which the ATU world-wide processing of units selected on the index gives other numbers. In Uther 2004 (I: base of Thompson’s index would reflect the 176–179), the selection of episodes described similarity/dissimilarity between environments in the context of particular tale-types is and (material) cultures, and not between oral fortuitous. In the case of ATU 301, the motifs traditions themselves. listed below as 1, 2 and 6 in Figure 5 are The tale-type was originally understood as described, whereas those listed as 3, 4 and 5 a narrative plot with a more or less precise are omitted. The six example motif-episodes origin in space and time. This idea has been are here described according to the wordings severely criticized (e.g. Jason 1970) and now in our catalogue and numbered according to the ATU tale-types are primarily used as the distribution maps in Figure 5. The reference points for finding parallels for example motif-episodes may be described as particular texts. There are several reasons why follows: the ATU index is impossible to use for the 1. Hero, His Companions and a . The sort of historical studies discussed here, i.e. for hero and his companion, or companions, assessing a degree of similarity/dissimilarity live together. Every morning one stays at between folklore traditions on a global scale. home while another or others go to hunt, Being Eurocentric, ATU’s power to classify etc. A demonic person comes, eats up all the the folklore of Sub-Saharan Africa, , food and beats the cook. Or, the man who and is restricted, remains at home comes to the demon himself while and America are completely in search of fire and is maltreated by him. beyond its scope. The ethnic attribution of The hero kills or neutralizes the demon. texts is systematically provided only for Europe. Besides Nuclear Eurasia, this episode is popular in the Southeast Asia and rather well For other areas, it is absent or practically represented in Sub-Saharan Africa. absent not only in the reference index itself (Uther 2004), but also even in some regional 2. Hero Marooned in the . A man indexes that use the ATU system (e.g. descends down into a well, over a precipice, Thompson & Roberts 1960; Ting 1978; - etc. Saving a girl or girls, getting treasure, Shamy 2004). A still more significant etc. he sends them up. After receiving the girls and/or treasure, his companions cut the problem is related to how ATU tale-types are rope and the hero remains below. The defined. In many cases, sets of episodes found episode is better represented in and in in particular variants of the same tale-type are than the previous one, but is totally so different that it is impossible to assess the absent from insular Southeast Asia. degree of similarity between particular texts 3. Snake Threatens Nestlings. A serpent or of the same tale-type without consulting the water monster regularly devours or injures original sources or publications. Finally, the children of a powerful being, usually mistakes in the index are relatively numerous, nestlings of a giant bird. The bird has no which is of course inevitable if the texts power over the serpent but the hero kills the themselves are not available but only monster. This episode, unlike others, is of texts. found in the ; one of the Kazakh One of the best-known tale-types, ATU versions is especially similar to the 301 The Three Stolen Princesses can be used Amerindian ones (Berezkin 2014b, fig. 1). to illustrate what really stands behind some of In the Iranian index, the episode is selected the types in the index. The description as a distinct tale-type 301E (Marzolph includes about a dozen and a half of the 1984). episodes that are often incorporated into the 4. White and Black Rams. Going to the stories identified with this tale-type. Six of underworld, the hero should take a white these have been chosen for the present ram (horse) with him, which would carry illustration, considering their areal spread him back to earth. By chance, he takes a using original publications. As in any other black one, which carries him even deeper to the lower level of the underworld. This ATU type, these episodes can be found in episode is popular in the Eastern

62

Figure 5. Patterns of distribution of six motif-episodes that are used in the context of ATU tale-type 301. 1. Hero, His Companions and a Dwarf. 2. Hero Marooned in the Underworld. 3. Snake Threatens Nestlings. 4. White and Black Rams. 5. The Packed Kingdom. 6. Man Feeds His Own Flesh to His Animal Helper. Mediterranean but not known beyond the found in Eastern Europe. Some examples of Maghreb, the Middle Volga area and Pamir. this episode may potentially have remained unnoticed by me because the motif has only 5. The Packed Kingdom. Returning from the recently been included in the catalogue. underworld, an abducted princess puts objects that she used there (clothes, house, 6. Man Feeds His Own Flesh to His Animal ‘kingdom’) into a small container (an egg, a Helper. The hero has to feed a powerful ball, etc.) and brings them with her. This creature (usually a giant bird) by regularly episode is more rare than others and mostly giving it pieces of meat. When the meat 63

supply is exhausted, he cuts off a piece of his regions or cultural groups to be handled as own flesh. The pattern of areal distribution separate but intersecting parameters. of this episode is reminiscent of the Ideally one tradition should correspond to distribution of episode 2, with the important one ‘ethnic’ group, but such groups, as is well exception that it is absent from . known, are different. We can provisionally The presence or absence of particular episodes accept a hypothesis that cultural differences in Atlantic Europe, South Asia or Africa is depend on a) geographical distance between important for research on the prehistoric people and on b) the existence or nonexistence exchange of information or movements of of language barriers between them. people. However, it is impossible to retrieve Accordingly, linguistically homogeneous such data from the available folklore indexes. traditions that occupy very wide geographical It was therefore necessary to create a database areas were split and those whose carriers of our own and not use the systems created spoke closely related languages and occupied for other purposes. small territories were merged together. Such Eurasian traditions as Ukrainian, Kazakh, and The Database Lay-Out and Usage especially Russian and Chinese, occupy huge The database exists as a set of Word files and areas, even considering the traditional ethnic as a correlation table in *sav format. The territories before ca. AD 1500. These should textual version contains abstracts of ca. be split into smaller units in the future. The 50,000 texts from all over the world. The main reason that it has not been done yet is precise number is difficult to assess: one text because of the lack of information concerning can contain several motifs and is therefore the exact provenience of part of the texts. reproduced several times in different parts of For poorly known regions (especially the catalogue, but one motif can be illustrated Melanesia, including New Guinea, and by several texts. Texts are arranged according Australia), where the number of languages is to the motifs that they contain. Motifs large and the amount of folklore data for each included in the first half of the catalogue and individual language is relatively small, ethnic denoted with letters from A to I are mostly traditions were united into clusters rather related to cosmology and etiology. Motifs in mechanically differentiated. the second half, denoted with letters from J to The textual database available on the M, are related to adventures and tricks. This internet is upgraded once a year. In 2014, an dichotomy is not rigorous but that is interactive version with English wordings of unimportant because the database’s search motifs and maps of the areal distribution of function allows any motif to be easily found motifs was created. The automatic transfer of regardless of its place in the general list of the data from the *sav format produced motifs or grouping with other motifs of the chance mistakes, some of which potentially same kind (e.g. motifs related to the have not yet been identified. Because of this, explanation for death or trickster episodes; the site has not yet been opened to the public, motifs found only in Eurasia or only in the but I hope that it will be in the near future. Sub-Saharan Africa, etc.). Using the database, we can either check For every motif, abstracts of texts are the areal distribution of particular motifs or arranged by regions, beginning with South apply statistical programs to assess the degree Africa and ending with Tierra del Fuego. The of similarity/dissimilarity between traditions. relative size of the regions distinguished in Examples of the spread of particular motifs the database varies significantly and depends have been shown above (Figures 1–5). on the problematics of the research at the time Another example is shown in Figure 6, which when a particular set of regions was defined. represents the spread of tales reproduced by Within each region, several traditions (from later groups of Asian migrants on their way to one to several dozen) are selected, and just the New World. these units (the traditions) together with the Initially, when only data on the American motifs form the basic structure of the system. traditions was included in the catalogue, the This structure allows individual motifs and distribution of all the motifs according to all

64

Figure 6. The Leg-Bridge. A person stretches his or her leg or Figure 7. Computed data on the distribution of 548 folklore neck (Dafla of northeast India: hand) as a bridge across body motifs related to adventures and tricks according to 309 of water. The fugitives or those who walk ahead cross the ethnic traditions of the Old World. Second principal bridge; the persecutor or those who are behind usually fall component (2nd PC). Traditions located between the Caucasus because the person takes his bridge away. and Mongolia with adjacent Siberia form one group, while traditions of Western Europe and the Mediterranean with the traditions was analyzed. When the data on adjacent Africa form another group. This evidence suggests the Old World traditions was included, the that information exchange inside two spheres of system became too heterogeneous to be communication was slightly more intensive than between processed as a whole. It contains, on the one those two spheres. Traditions with mathematic indexes from +0,24 to -0,24 are neutral with respect to the Western and hand, motifs that can be extremely old, which Eastern complexes and are not shown on the map. potentially spread already in the early Holocene or Late Pleistocene Periods, and on the variants of the factor analysis uses the so- the other hand, motifs that spread across called principle components (PC) as factors, Nuclear Eurasia during the last millennia or which are formally related to a completely even in recent centuries. Consequently, any use different task, which is to find a linear of the database to address a particular research combination of features for which the question requires preliminary analytical work dispersal is maximal. The number of such concerning which motifs in particular should maximums coincides with the number of be selected for processing. dimensions of a particular task. The greatest st Expressed in figures, the world folklore maximum corresponds to the 1 PC, the next nd and mythology database is a binary table (i.e. one to the 2 PC, and so on. With the consisting of zeros and ones) with lines for processing of such a large and diverse dataset traditions and columns for motifs. In this way, as ours, the first three or four components every tradition is characterized by long strings undertake less (sometimes much less) than of zeroes and ones that contain information on 20% of the total variability. However, it is the degree of similarity/dissimilarity between enough for a convincing differentiation of the traditions. This information can be extracted traditions according to a huge number of in different ways. One way is based on the features. principle of factor analysis. Within this As an example of the statistical processing framework, features (i.e. the motifs) are of data, the results of computing the represented as sums of a small number of information on distribution of adventure and concealed variables (factors). Factor analysis trickster motifs typical for the tales recorded algorithms promote, as far as possible, the in Nuclear Eurasia are presented in Figure 7. preservation of initial correlation between the This scheme was first published in Berezkin features (the motifs). As a result of such a 2015 (as Fig. 2) and here is slightly modified presentation, every tradition is characterized after including data on ca. 500 additional by values of a small number of factors texts. (usually two or three), so the number of variables is fundamentally reduced. One of

65

Advantages of the Database: Folklore folklore traditions to the north and to the Parallels between the Caucasus and the south of the steppe zone helps to reconstruct North Eurasian Forest Zone the stories that were probably known to the A new approach to the material is justified as pre-Turkic and pre-Mongolian inhabitants of far as one gets access to new information the steppe. Comparing southern and northern hitherto unavailable. One of the advantages is Eurasian versions, the anthropogenic myth in the possibility to apply statistical analysis to a which a dog and a horse participate was vast and diverse aggregation of data and to provisionally reconstructed (Berezkin 2014a). reveal tendencies that otherwise would remain Here is another example of the same unnoticed. Our database in *sav format approach. inevitably contains chance mistakes and mis- Two persons engaged in dialogue describe prints. However, the information was a series of objects and creatures as being accumulated during such a long time in the simultaneously giant and small: context of such diverse research projects that Abkhazians (Shakryl 1975, no. 89: 395– a systematic bias is hardly possible. And all 396). A dialogue between a devil and a ‘1’s and ‘0’s of the correlation table can be man. – What news? – Eight dogs cannot eat easily checked against the data of the textual up a thigh of a mosquito. – Dogs are small. – catalogue. They devoured eagles that flew into the yard Another innovation is the global rather of a prince. – Eagles are small. – When they than regional approach to the material. The sat on a roof of the palace, their wings database began to grow from an original touched the ground. – The palace is small. – concentration on South America. As its scope Every room is spacious enough for eight was expanded, the Western Eurasian folklore, camels. – Camels are small. – They were eating the upper branches of pines. – Pines which has been the focus of attention of are small. –When my brother was looking at traditional folkloristics, was looked into from their tops, he had to crane his neck and his the outside. Thanks to this, it was possible to cap fell down. – Your brother is small. – He observe transcontinental parallels that had could take stones from the bottom of a well remained beyond the horizon of earlier by putting his hand into it. – The bottom was researchers. Besides regularities in the near. – If you throw a stone in the morning, distribution of motifs that are related to the it will not reach the bottom until evening. – problems of the peopling of the Americas, the The was short. – A cow that conceived Austronesian dispersal, early maritime contacts in the morning returned with a big calf in the between Africa and South and Southeast Asia, evening. and other broad themes that need not be Similar texts are recorded among the Abazins, a groups of Abkhazians that reviewed here, the previously unnoticed migrated to the northern slope of the main parallels between texts recorded in Western Caucasian range, and the Kabardin, who are Eurasia itself were also found. more distantly related to the Abkhazians and Of special interest are those that concern live to the north of the Abazins (Alieva and parallels between traditions of the Caucasus Kardangushev 1977: 121-123; Tugov 1985, and the much more northern areas of the no. 120: 335–336). forest belt. Because a direct contact between Ossetians. A dialogue between a man and a the two regions is impossible, the motifs in giant. – How did you cross Terek River? – I question had to be known earlier in the steppe caught a donkey, used my cap for a saddle, zone, from where they probably disseminated legging bands for saddle-girths. – It was not in both directions. The steppe zone is an area Terek but a stream? – The donkey’s cry was where ever new groups of people were almost not heard on the opposite bank. – The constantly moving from West to East (in the donkey was small? – From its hide, a coat Chalcolithic Period and the Bronze Age) and and a cap for Uryzmag were made. – then mainly from East to West (since the Iron Uryzmag was small? – He could not hear a Age). Because of population replacement, the cock crying at his feet. – He was deaf? – He early motifs had little chance of being heard how ants ploughed in the underworld. – The ants were not far away? – Herdsmen preserved. However, information found in the reached them in a year. – Herdsmen were

66 bad? – During this year, wolves could not The northern Khanty version is not take a single ear of a kid. – Wolves were expected in company of the Caucasian ones bad? – They immediately devoured but stories about the Sun and a demon who buffaloes in the steppe. – Buffaloes were compete for the hero have a similar areal bad? – They spent an iron yoke almost distribution (Figure 8). A man pursued by a immediately after being harnessed. (Britayev demonic person seeks protection from & Kaloev 1959: 380–382.) another person who is related to the upper world (the Sun, the Moon, ). The Georgians (Imeretia). A dialogue between a protector, the pursuer or both are female. wolf and an angel in the guise of a beggar. – They pull the man in the opposite directions How did I cross the sea? – On the back of a and usually tear him in half or the man’s leg fly. – The sea is small? – An eagle tried to is torn off. Stories about two females, the fly over it but was exhausted and drowned. – Sun and a demon, who tear the male Moon It was an eagle nestling? – When he moved, apart, are known both in Siberia and in the his wings they covered three towns. – Caucasus. Owing to constraints of space, I Towns were small? – A horseman could provide only two abstracts. hardly ride across them during three months. – He had a colt, not a horse? – When this Abkhazians. A girl who was really a were- horse died, its master made three coats and wolf was born into the of a prince. three caps of its hide. – The master was Her younger brother ran away, met the small of stature? – When a cock cried, he Moon woman and married her. After some could hardly hear it. – He was deaf? – When time, he decided to visit his former home ants were arguing under the earth, he could and found it in ruins. His cannibal sister hear them. (Kagan 1898, no. 22: 64–66.) pursues him and the youth ascends to the Moon. His sister, however, could catch his . A dialogue between a monster foot and tore it off. That is why a one-legged and a beggar who is really a fish saved by person is seen in the Moon (Bgazhba 1983: the man and had now arrived to help him. – 33–35). Where are you from? – From the other side of the sea. – How did you come? – I rode a Khanty (Vakh River). A cannibal daughter lame flea. – The sea was small? – An eagle was born to an old couple. Their son decides cannot fly across it. – The eagle is a to run away and marries a daughter of the nestling? – The shadow of its wings would Sun. He decides to visit his home, but it is cover a town. – The town is small? – A hare empty and his cannibal sister attacks him. cannot run across it. – The hare is tiny? – Its He escapes but reaches his wife at the hide is enough to make a coat, a cap and a moment when his sister manages to catch couple of mittens. – For a dwarf? – If you him. His body is torn apart by the two put a cock to his knee, he will not women. His wife gets the part without a hear it. – He is deaf? – He hears how a deer heart and cures him, but he continues to die eats grass in a forest (Tumanyan 1984: 101– and to be revived. He is the Moon (Lukina 106.) 1990, no. 5: 65). Northern Khanty. A dialogue between two In Western Siberia the plot is registered persons. – Why are your legs crooked? – I among Tundra Nenets, different groups of the crossed seven seas in a boat without oars. – Khanty, Sel’kups and Kets (Osharov 1936: The seas were small? – Who knows, but a 11–115, 142–144; Dul’son 1966: 13–115; Pelikh blue, a bird was flying across but fell 1972: 368, 369; 1998: 42, 63; Alekseenko into the water. – The bird was small. – Who 1976: 83, 83–84; Prokofieva 1976: 107; could see it, but seven men used its wing as a house roof. – The men were small. – Who Kulemzin & Lukina 1977: 122; Sangi 1989: knows. People say that each one was as big 42–44; Lukina 1990, no. 5, 6: 65, 66–67; as a net on the Ob River. – So the nets were Golovnev 1995: 303–304; Nikolaeva 2006: small. – Small or big, but put at a depth of 123–126; Tuchkova 2006: 126, 241, 305) and seven sazhen (a sazhen is 7 feet) and the in the Caucasus among the Abkhazians, upper edges were seen. – It means the water Abazins, Ossetians and Ingush (Miller 1882: was shallow. – Shallow or deep, but when 297–299; Chursin 1956: 149–150, 150, 150– the blue, the green fish is swimming, its 151; Bgazhba 1983: 31–33, 33–35; Malsagov head, its tail are not seen (Nikolaeva 1999, 1983, no. 138: 297–299; Tugov 1985, no. 36: no. 11: 156). 67

related to this complex. But that is a theme for another paper.

Perspectives and Future Prospects As was mentioned above, the database contains ca. 50,000 abstracts of texts while the number of texts, published or preserved in the archives, is at least ten and possibly a hundred times larger. The more texts that are processed, the greater the analytical power of the database as a tool, so its field of application is practically unlimited. The database was designed to yield results that are Figure 8. Moon Torn in Half. 1. A man pursued by a demonic of potential interest mostly for archaeologists, person seeks protection from another person who is related to linguists engaged in historical comparative the upper world (the Sun, the Moon, Venus). The protector, linguistics, and geneticists, i.e. for those the pursuer or both are female. They pull the man in opposite scholars who study history, and especially the directions and usually tear him in half or the man’s leg is torn off. 2. Two male persons compete for a girl, one pulls her up deep history of human culture. On the other into the sky and another down to earth. She gets to the Moon. hand, the resource can be used to reveal information linked to processes in much more 91–93). They are registered also among the recent history. For example, the statistics in Hungarians, Romanians and Ukrainians Figure 7 may reflect information exchange (Afanasiev 1994: 271–272; Botezatu 1981: resulting from the Osman intrusion into the 27–37; Hidas 1953: 24–32). Such areal Balkans and central Mediterranean (a distribution fits the hypothesis about the southern Balkan - Sicilian wedge between circulation of similar narratives among the Central Europe, Arabian and the Near inhabitants of the steppe region very well. East, which leaves the as the only In tales of the Sami of the Kola Peninsula, ‘Eastern’ tradition in the ‘West’). It is yet to it is a girl who is an object of competition and be seen what sort of uses and utility the now is seen in the Moon (Charnoluski 1962: database may have for other researchers with 50–79; Kharuzin 1890: 348–350). The Eastern different types of research questions and Sami folklore tradition has a strong Western research aims. In addition to offering an Siberian component (Berezkin 2008) and had alternative model for indexing folklore hardly any links with the steppe region. material, the database may prove of interest as Stories about a cannibal sister (ATU 315A) a resource for typological studies, for helping are known across half of Eurasia, but the contextualize research on a particular local motif of the Moon being torn apart is more tradition, or it could simply be used as a specific and peculiar to the traditions mentioned complementary resource for considering the above. traditions of a particular culture or region. A It is interesting that a rather similar episode multiply indexed database of ca. 50,000 exists in the folklore of the Makka Indians of abstracts of traditional texts from cultures Paraguayan Chaco (Wilbert & Simoneau around the world holds tremendous potential, 1991, no. 84, 85: 179–186, 187–191). This even if the selection of material has been can be taken as an example of the independent limited by the aims for which it has been emergence of a comparable narrative scheme. designed. A very early transfer of the motif from Asia to There is nevertheless a point of concern the New World is not completely excluded that the future prospects of the database but cannot be proven, of course. project as presented here are rather uncertain. Motifs which are typical for Scandinavia, It has been developed as a tool for analysing Baltic and northern Russians, on the folklore, especially by scholars concerned one hand, and the Caucasus, on the other with the deep history of human cultures. hand, also exist. A “Big (or long) bull” (Iso Scholars who command the historical data, härkä, Suur härg) is one of a series of motifs

68 such as archaeologists or geneticists, do not Berezkin, Yuri. 1981. “An Identification of themselves work with folklore materials, Anthropomorphic Mythological Personages in Moche Representations”. Ñawpa Pacha 18: 1–26. while folklorists today are usually indifferent Berezkin, Yuri. 2008. “Sibirsko-saamskie paralleli v to historical problems and rarely have a oblasti mifologii na fone siuzheta ATU 480” sufficient knowledge of the human past for [‘Siberian–Sámi Parallels in Mythology against the such long-term perspectives. This leaves the Background of ATU Tale-Type 480’]. Natales database rather betwixt and between different Grate numeras? Sbornik statei k 60-letiiu Georgiia Akhillovicha Levintona. Saint Petersburg: European types of specialists. During the last 25 years University at Saint Petersburg. Pp. 119–143. or more, dozens or perhaps hundreds of Berezkin, Yuri. 2014a. “The Dog, the Horse and the people from many countries helped me by Creation of Man”. Folklore (Tartu) 56: 25–46. providing necessary literature, inviting me to Berezkin, Yuri. 2014b. “Serpent that Closed Sources of conferences, teaching me computer programs Water and Serpent that Devours Nestlings of Giant Bird: Assessment of the Age of the Dragon- or helping to provide grant support. However, Fighting Myths in Eurasia”. Aramazd: Armenian the preparation of the abstracts of texts and Journal of Near Eastern Studies 8 (1–2): 186–193. the selection of traditions and motifs has Berezkin, Yuri. 2015. “Spread of Folklore Motifs as a remained almost exclusively up to me. With Proxy for Information Exchange: Contact Zones the possible exception of my younger friend and Borderlines in Eurasia”. Trames. Journal of and Social Sciences 19(1): 3–13. and colleague Yevgeni Duvakin, who at the Bgazhba, Khukhut. 1983. Abkhazskie skazki [‘Abkhaz moment does not even have a permanent Folktales’]. Sukhumi: Alashara. position in despite his excellent Boas, Franz. 1895. Indianische Sagen von der historical and linguistic education, no one Nordpazifischen Küste Amerikas. Berlin: Asher. knows enough about the database to be able Boas, Franz. 2002. Indian Myths and Legends from the North Pacific Coast of America. Trans. D. Bertz. to modify and develop it further. It is Vancouver: Talonbooks. therefore difficult to say for how long this Botezatu, Grigore. 1981. Moldavskie narodnye skazki project will outlive me. [‘Moldavian Folktales’]. Kishinev: Literatura Artistike. Yuri E. Berezkin (berezkin1[at]gmail.com) Museum of Britayev, Sozyryko, & G. Kaloev. 1959. Osetinskie Anthropology & Ethnography (Kunstkamera), narodnye skazki [‘Ossetian Folktales’]. Moscow: Universitetskaya emb., 3, Saint Petersburg 199034, Gosudarstvennoe Izdatel’stvo Khudozhestvennoi Russia; European University at Saint Petersburg, Leteratury. Gagarinskaya 3, Saint Petersburg 191187, Russia. Charnoluski, Vladimir. 1962. Saamskie skazki [‘Sámi Acknowledgements: The work presented here has been Folktales’]. Moscow: Gosudarstvennoe Izdatel’stvo supported by the Russian Fund for Basic Research, Khudozhestvennoi Literatury. grant no. 14-06-00247. I would like to thank Frog, not Chursin, Grigori. 1956. Materialy po etnografii only for correcting my English, but also for making Abkhazii [‘Materials on the Ethnography of many valuable and wise additions and corrections that Abkhazia’]. Sukhumi: Abkhazskoe concern the content of this article. gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo. Dul’son, Andrei. 1966. Ketskie skazki [‘Ket Works Cited Folktales’]. Tomsk: Izdatel’stvo Tomskogo Aarne, Antti & Stith Thompson. 1961. The Types of the Universiteta. Folklore: A Classification and Bibliography. FF Durkheim, Émile. 2011. “Jugements de valeur et Communications 184. Helsinki: Suomalainen jugements de r alit ”. Revue de Metaphisique et du Tiedeakatemia. Morale. Available at: http://kieranhealy.org/files/ Aarne, Antti. 1910. Verzeichnis der Märchentypen. FF misc/durkheim-jugements-text.pdf. Communications 3. Helsinki: Suomalainen El-Shamy, Hasan. 2004. Types of the Folktale in the Tiedeakatemia. Arab World: A Demographically Oriented Tale- Afanasiev, Aleksander. 1994 [1869]. Poeticheskie Type Index. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. vozzrenia slavian na prirodu [‘Poetic Views of the Frog. 2013. “Revisiting the Historical-Geographic Slavs Regarding Nature’]. Vol. 3. Moscow: Indrik. Method(s)”. RMN Newsletter 7: 18–34. Alekseenko, Yevgenia. 1976. “Predstavlenia ketov o Golovnev, Andrey. 1995. Govoriaschie kultury: mire” [‘The Worldview of the Kets’]. In Priroda i Traditsii samodiitsev i ugrov [‘Speaking Cultures: Chelovek v Religioznyh Predstavleniyah Narodov Traditions of Samoyedic and Ugric Peoples’]. Sibiri i Severa. Ed. I.S. Vdovin. Leningrad: Nauka. Yekaterinburg: UrO RAN, Institut Istorii i Pp. 67–105. Arkheologii. Alieva, Alla and Zaramuk Kardangushev. Hidas, Antal [Anatol Gidash]. 1953. Vengerskie 1977. Kabardinskie narodnye skazki [Kabarda narodnye skazki [‘Hungarian Folktales’]. Moscow: Folktales]. Moscow: Detskaya literatura. Gosudarstvennoe izdatel’stvo khudozhestvennoi literatury.

69

Jason, Heda. 1970. “The Russian Criticism of the Prokofieva, Yekaterina. 1976. “Starye predstavlenia ‘Finnish School’ in Folktale Scholarship”. Norweg sel’kupov o mire” [‘Old Ideas of the Sel’kup about 14: 285–294. the World]. In Priroda i Chelovek v Religioznyh Kagan, Mikhail. 1898. “Imeretinskie skazki i predania” Predstavleniyah Narodov Sibiri i Severa. Ed. I.S. [‘Imeretia Folktales and Traditions’]. Sbornik Vdovin. Leningrad: Nauka. Pp. 106–128. materialov dlia opisania mestnostei i plemen Sangi, Vladimir. 1989. Antologia fol’klora narodov Kavkaza 24(2): 53–71. Sibiri, Severa i Dal’nego Vostoka [Anthology of the Kharuzin, Nikolai. 1890. Russkie lopari [‘Russian Folklore of the People of Siberia, the North and the Lapps’]. Izvestia imperatorskogo obschestva ]. Krasnoyarsk: Krasnoyarskoe knizhnoe liubitelei yestestvoznania, antropologii i etnografii. izdatel’stvo. Т. 66. Trudy etnograficheskogo otdela. Т. 10. Shakryl, Konstantin. 1974. Abkhazskie narodnye skazki Moskva: Tovarishestvo skoropechatni A.A. [Abkhazian Folktales]. Moscow: Nauka. Levenson. Tehrani, Jamshid. 2013. “The Phylogeny of Little Red Kroeber, Alfred. 1908. “Catch-Words in American Riding Hood”. PLoS ONE 8(11): e78871. Available Mythology”. Journal of American Folklore 21(81– at: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/ 82): 222–227. journal.pone.0078871. Kulemzin, Vladislav, & Nadezhda Lukina. 1977. Thompson, Stith, & Warren Roberts. 1960. Types of Vasiugano-vahovskie hanty v kontse XIX – nachale Indic Oral Tales. FF Communications 180. XX vv. [‘The Vasiugan and Vakh Khanty in the Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia. Late XIX – early XX Century’]. Tomsk: Izdanie Thompson, Stith. 1932. Motif-index of Folk-literature Tomskogo Universiteta. I. FF Communications 106. Helsinki: Suomalainen Lowie, Robert. 1908. “Catch-Words for Mythological Tiedeakatemia. Motifs”. Journal of American Folklore 21(80): 24– Thompson, Stith. 1955–1958. Motif-index of Folk- 27. Literature I–VI. Bloomington: Indiana University Lukina, Nadezhda. 1990. Mify, predania, skazki Press. khantov i mansi [‘Myths, Legends, Tales of the Ting, Nai-Tung. 1978. A Type Index of Chinese Khanty and Mansi’]. Moscow: Nauka. Folktales in the Oral Traditions and Major Works Malinowski, Bronislaw. 1926. Myth in Primitive of Non-Religious Classical Literature. FF Psychology. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner Communications 223. Helsinki: Suomalainen & Co. Tiedeakatemia. Malsagov, Akhmet. 1983. Skazki i legendy ingushei i Tuchkova, Natalia. 2004. Mifologia sel’kupov chechentsev [‘Ingush and Chechen Folktales and [‘Sel’kup Mythology’]. Tomsk: Izdatel’stvo Legends’]. Moscow: Nauka. Tomskogo Universiteta. Marzolph, Ulrich. 1984. Typologie des persischen Tumanyan, Hovhannes. 1984. Skazki [‘Folktales’]. Volksmärchens. Beirut: Orient-Institut der Yerevan: Luis. Deutschen Morgenländischen Gesellschaft. Tugov, Vladimir B. 1985. Abazinskie narodnye skazki Miller, Vsevolod. 1882. Osetinskie etudy [‘The [‘Abazin Folktales’]. Moscow: Nauka. Ossetian Essays’]. Part 2. Uchenye zapiski Uther, Hans-Jörg. 2004. The Types of International Moskovskogo universiteta. Otdel istoriko- Folktales I–III. FF Communications 284–286. filologicheski 2. Moscow. Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia. Nikolaeva, Galina. 2006. Ketskie narodnye skazki [‘Ket Wilbert, Johannes & Karin Simoneau. 1991. Folk Foktales’]. Krasnoyarsk: Polikor. Literature of the Makka Indians. Los Angeles: Nikolaeva, Irina. 1999. Ostyak Texts in the Obdorsk UCLA American Center Publications. Dialect. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag. Wilbert, Johannes, & Karin Simoneau. 1992. Folk Osharov, Mikhail. 1936. Severnye skazki [‘Northern Literature of South American Indians. General Folktales’]. Moscow: s.e. Index. Los Angeles: UCLA Latin American Center Pelikh, Galina. 1972. Proiskhozhdenie sel’kupov [‘The Publications. Origins of Sel’kup’]. Tomsk: Izdatel’stvo Tomskogo Universiteta. Internet Sites Pelikh, Galina. 1998. Sel’kupskaya mifologia [‘Sel’kup The Thematic Classification and Areal Distribution of Mythology’]. Tomsk: Izdatel’stvo Tomskogo Folklore-Mythological Motifs. The Analytical Universiteta Catalogue. Avialable at: www.ruthenia.ru/ folklore/berezkin)

70

Females as Cult Functionaries or Ritual Specialists in the Germanic Iron Age? Rudolf Simek,

Abstract: This article reviews women of Germanic tribes mentioned in early Greek and Latin sources that have , in the past, been interpreted as cult functionaries or even ‘priestesses’. Each case is presented and it is shown that although these women may have connections with the supernatural, with and even had political influence, there is no reason to presume they are associated with a particular cult or a formal role in any cult. In recent years, it has become fashionable to haunted the Roman writers, and not only interpret deviant burials of women in the them. The Greek geographer Strabo (ca. 63 Germanic Iron Age as burials of sorceresses, BC to ca. AD 23) does not mention the defeat, witches, priestesses, vǫlur (sg. vǫlva), or, but, talking about the , who according more cautiously, as ‘ritual specialists’, ‘cult to him lived beyond the Elbe, he mentions a specialists’ or ‘cult functionaries’. This would custom which must reflect the traumatic presuppose that we know anything about such experiences of the Roman armies some 100 functions of women for the period from ca. years earlier: 400 BC to AD 1000, i.e. for a period during About the Cimbri, the following custom is which Germanic was slowly told: the women in the train of the army retreating towards the North of Europe, were accompanied by grey-haired, finally being replaced by Christianity even in prophesying women in white shirts and long , Iceland, and Sweden during the 11th dresses, fastened on with a brooch, with and 12th centuries. But in fact, before the high bronze belts and bare feet. These approached medieval Christian pseudo-historical novels the prisoners in the camp with drawn preserved as the Icelandic sagas, we have no swords, put wreaths on their heads and led indication of female cult functions beyond them to a large sacrificial cauldron, occasional occurrences of the term vǫlva in a measuring about 20 amphorae [about 524 litres]. One of them ascended some steps, single skaldic and in several eddic stanzas, bent over the cauldron and cut the throat of none of which are dateable to before ca. AD every one [of the prisoners] held up to her. 1050, and not a single rune stone mentions From the blood streaming into the kettle, she any female cult functionaries. However, as far prophesied the future. Others cut open the as the etymology can tell us anything, it bodies and, reading the entrails, promised appears that the Old Norse term vǫlva is victory to their own. In battle, they beat the cognate to the term vǫlr [‘staff’], which is the hides stretched over the wickerwork of their only connection between such prophetesses wagons, creating an enormous din. and staffs, although findings of potential (Geographika VII.2, 3, my translation; cf. staffs among grave goods have led to The Geography of Strabo, vol. 3, p. 170.) speculation about them as being connected These bloodthirsty priestesses in long white with vǫlur (or rather, to their graves). On the dresses cutting the throats of the Roman other hand, we do have a number of texts prisoners to collect their blood in iron referring to Germanic prophetesses/seeresses cauldrons in order to predict the future from from the Roman Iron Age, however these it, have in turn haunted the imaginations of 1 may be interpreted in each case. Because this scholars delving into the religion of the information on early Germanic sibyls is not ancient ever since. readily available in English, the following However, the source value of this detailed article sets out to offer an overview of the description for our understanding of Greek and Latin sources for such roles of Germanic cult functionaries is greatly females in the pre-Christian period. diminished as it is a conflation of different elements. Strabo, his informant or possibly Strabo’s Prophesying Women of the Cimbri th even written source, seems to have combined On 5 October 105 BC, the Roman armies three elements regarding religious habits: suffered a disastrous defeat at the hands of the Germanic Cimbri at Arausio, deep in southern 1. Seeresses were employed among the Germanic tribes to predict the future (see . Thereafter, the Germanic threat below).

71

2. The Germanic tribes (among others) were Ger. Alb [‘spirit’]; ON rún [‘secret (magical) known to occasionally slaughter their knowledge; charm’]). The version Aurinia, prisoners after a battle as part of a votive however, places the name in the etymological sacrifice. vicinity of matron names such as Aufaniae, 3. The Roman practice of predicting the future Aumenhenae or the name of a goddess Aueha from the entrails of animals. (all on 2nd century AD votive stones). However, Strabo here uses two terms to denote these the uncertainty of the form of the name leads grey-haired, prophesying women. Both Greek its reconstruction to be motivated by other hiéreia [‘priestess’] and prómantis information about Germanic priestesses and [‘prophetess’] (cf. also Gr. mantis, profétis seeresses rather than the name yielding [‘prophetess’]) are used, not the more formal independent information about the function or term sibyl (Gr. síbylla), but neither of these significance of seeresses. terms is ever found in other classical or later provides us with significantly more authors to denote Germanic seeresses. information both on ’s state and her function in his Historiae, and it is from this Tacitus’s Veleda and description in particular that we can learn a Around a century later, Tacitus (AD 56‒116) great deal about the political role of a seeress describes the role of Germanic women in war in the 1st century AD. in his ethnographic account. In AD 98, he Veleda was a member of the tribe of the writes: who lived in the area between the Inesse quin etiam sanctum aliquid et Ems and the Lippe rivers. According to this providum putant, nec aut consilia earum account, she played a vital political role in the aspernantur aut responsa neglegunt. Vidimus Batavian revolt. In AD 69, the Germanic sub divo Vespasiano Veledam diu apud from the area on the Lower rose plerosque numinis loco habitam; sed et olim against the Roman occupation under which Albrunam et compluris alias venerati sunt, they were living. Their leader, Julius Civilis, non adulatione nec tamquam facerent deas. sent Munius Lupercus, the commander of the ( 8.) conquered legion Castra Vetera, as a gift to They even believe that there is something Veleda. Tacitus reports this as follows: sacred and prophetic inherent to [women], Ea virgo nationis Bructerae late imperitabat: and neither disregard their council nor vetere apud Germanos more, quo plerasque ignore their answers. At the time of the feminarum fatidicas et, augescente divine , we have seen how Veleda superstitione, arbitrantur Deas. Tuncque was long held by most to be a deity (numinis Veledae auctoritas adolevit. Nam prosperas loco), but even Albruna and others were Germanis res et excidium legionum venerated, albeit neither out of adulation nor praedixerat. Sed Lupercus in itinere as if they were (deas). interfectus. (Historiae IV, 61.) These comments are more guarded and yet This maiden of the tribe of the Bructeri also more precise than those of Strabo, seeing enjoyed extensive authority, according to the that he gives us the names of two of the ancient Germanic custom, which regards seeresses, namely Veleda and Albruna. The many women as endowed with prophetic former, he says, was active during the reign of powers (fatidicas) and, as the superstition Vespasian (AD 69‒79), the latter olim [‘once grows, attributes divinity to them upon a time’ or ‘a long time ago’], thus (arbitrantur deas). At this time Veleda’s probably before Veleda. influence was at its height, since she had There is no other information on Albruna. foretold the Germanic success and the Even the name is by no means certain: destruction of the legions. But Lupercus was ‘Albruna’ is actually an emendation for killed on the road. Aurinia and Albrinia. If either Albrinia or The death of the commander did not lessen Albruna is correct, then these names would the honour given to Veleda and, when the suggest an interpretation as ‘the trusted friend Germanic peoples on the western banks of the of the ’ or else ‘the one gifted with the Rhine later threatened the town of , secret knowledge of the elves’ (cf. ON álfr, 72 the citizens of Cologne called upon Civilis marble from this town is aimed at someone and Veleda as arbitrators: called Veleda and refers to her as “the tall, arrogant virgin whom the Rhine-water drinkers Arbitrum habebimus Civilem et Veledam, 2 apud quos pacta sancientur.’ Sic lenitis worship.” Tencteris, legati ad Civilem et Veledam From the words of Tacitus “At the time of missi cum donis, cuncta ex voluntate the divine Vespasian we have seen ...” one Agrippinensium perpetravere. Sed coram might deduce that Tacitus had indeed seen adire adloquique Veledam negatum. Veleda when she was brought to Rome, as he Arcebantur aspectu, quo venerationis plus was born in AD 60 and Vespasian only died inesset. Ipsa edita in turre: delectus e in 79. This possibility might explain the propinquis consulta responsaque, ut historian’s special interest in Veleda, whom internuntius numinis, portabat. (Tacitus, he mentions five times altogether. Historiae IV, 65.) Despite the tempting phonetic similarity, the ‘We will have as arbiters Civilis and Veleda, name Veleda is most likely not etymologically before whom all our agreements shall be related to ON vǫlva [‘seeress’], but is ratified.’ With these proposals they [the connected with Celtic fili(d) [‘poet, scholar’] citizens of Cologne] first calmed the (cf. Krahe 1961; Guyonvarch 1961; Meid 1964; and then sent a delegation to Civilis cf. also Cymr. gweled [‘to see’]: Birkhan and Veleda with gifts which obtained from them everything that the people of Cologne 1997: 295). It is quite possible that Veleda desired; yet the embassy was not allowed to was originally not a name, but rather a term for approach Veleda herself and address her ‘seeress’, in which case the term could indeed directly: they were kept from seeing her to be of Celtic origin. If *veleda is an originally inspire them with more respect. She herself Celtic term for a variety of female cult lived in a tower (in turre); one of her specialist, it is possible that the corresponding relatives, chosen for the purpose, carried to role has also been assimilated from or at least her the questions and brought back her heavily influenced by Celtic models. answers, as if he were the messenger of a Syncretistic interaction between Germanic and god (internuntius numinis). Celtic religions are found in most sources Soon after this, in AD 70, the Germanic (mainly inscriptions) along the Lower Rhine. fighters seized the flag ship of the Roman It is therefore at least possible that Tacitus’s Rhine fleet, a Trireme, in a night-time attack account of the *veleda/Veleda is more strongly and dragged it as a gift for Veleda up as far as reflective of Celtic traditions on the continent the river Lippe. The commander, Petilius than the role of Germanic cult functionaries in Cerialis (who had escaped solely because he Scandinavia at that time or later. had spent the night with a Germanic mistress on land), correctly assessed the power of Dio Cassius’s Ganna and Waluburg st Veleda and asked her in secret messages to Two more seeresses from the 1 century AD allow the fate of war to take another direction are known to us through Roman sources, both upon which he promised a pardon for both mentioned by name by Dio Cassius (AD 163 – rd Civilis and the Batavi (Tacitus, Historiae V, ca. 229), writing (in Greek) in the early 3 24). Unfortunately, we do not know how century AD. These are quite apart from an Veleda reacted to this attempt at bribery to unnamed, gigantic or at least supernatural ‒ change her predictions, but we do hear about woman of similar function. This last woman her later fate from other sources: a poem purportedly confronted the Roman commander written by Papinius Statius (Silvae I, 4, 89) Drusus in 10 BC, when his army was mentions Veleda as a prisoner in the year AD approaching the Elbe near to (what is today) 77, and a little later she was apparently Magdeburg, i.e. in the tribal lands of the deported to Italy. It is not unlikely that she . According to Dio Cassius (Roman lived out the remainder of her days as a Histories 54, 35), this person predicted Drusus’s temple servant in a temple in the town of approaching death (Abramenko 1994). Despite Ardea in Latium (South Italy), since a Greek the fact that the appearance of this woman has satirical poem found on a small fragment of served as the main evidence for beliefs that

73 women among Germanic tribes could be The seeress Waluburg, on the other hand, powerful agents with the ability to prophesy, is expressly called a sibyl (sibylla). This is it nevertheless has an extremely legendary found of all places on a Greek ostrakon from character and will not be considered here as the island Elephantine opposite Assuan in presenting valid ethnographic information. Southern Egypt, and dated to the 2nd century The two named seeresses mentioned by Dio AD. Here she is referred to as “Waluburg Cassius are Waluburg and Ganna. Se[m]noni Sibylla”, quite clearly her name, Ganna was a seeress from the tribe of the origin and profession. This description is , settled east of the Elbe, and seems found in the penultimate line of a list of to have been active towards the end of the 1st Roman and Graeco-Egyptian soldiers, century AD. She was brought to Rome with possibly a pay-roll. Walu- probably derives the king of the Semnones, Masyos: from Germanic *walus [‘stave, wand’],4 thus Masyos, king (basileus) of the Semnones, the wand, the symbol of a seeress. and the virgin Ganna, who had appeared as a How the Germanic seeress came to be in seeress in Celtica3 after Veleda, came to Egypt, where she was obviously in service to , were treated honourably and were the Romans, is an open question. If she did returned. (Cassius Dio, Roman History 67, not go there as a slave, then perhaps it was in 5; Historiarvm romanarvm, vol. 3, p. 180). some form of service to a Roman officer, Domitian was emperor from AD 81‒96, and a which would also explain her lowly rank on treaty with the Cheruski (who lived between the salary list. Possibly she had been deported the Weser and the Elbe) seems to have occurred by the Romans for political reasons, like during the year after his final war against the Veleda, which would underline the significant , namely AD 86, which is thus a likely political influence which the seeresses had date for the appearance of Ganna in Rome. As upon the Germanic peoples. such, she was active in the decade after Tacitus and Dio Cassius obviously Veleda had been captured and deported. considered the seeresses of Germanic tribes to On the basis of phonetic similarity, the be virgins, that is to say, unmarried, youngish name Ganna is either connected to gin- (as an women. However, it must remain and open ablaut variant of *gan-; de Vries 1970: §572) question whether the Roman authors or else interpreted as being connected with interpreted the Germanic female cult ON gandr [‘magic wand’]. However, the functionaries in terms of the only group of etymology of gandr is uncertain although it is Roman female cult functionaries they were clearly connected to magical practices (cf. acquainted with, namely the Vestal Virgins. Heide 2006: 65‒69; Tolley 2009 I: 246–247). Gambara of the Longobards In Old Norse, it appears to refer to magical A rather questionable case of a female cult implements which may be variously interpreted functionary is the Langobardian queen-mother as a ‘staff’ or ‘wand’ or a magical spirit being Gambara, whose sons Ybor and Ajo led the manipulated in magic. If the word meant Langobards to victory over the after ‘staff, magic wand’, the name would be their mother had prayed to Frea. The only directly related to the emblem of her calling, indications of a cult function for Gambara are just as in the case of the seeress Waluburg her – obviously public – prayer, and her name, (addressed below). This presents the possibility which has been interpreted as deriving from that Ganna might not be a personal name but *Gand-bera [‘wand bearer’]. However, could reflect a term denoting her office, as neither the Langobard texts (Origo gentis was discussed for Veleda above. The Greek Langobardorum; Paulus Diaconus I, 3 and 7) text is ambiguous here, explaining various nor the version in Saxo Grammaticus (Gesta matters in a secondary clause: that she was a Danorum VIII, 284: the form he gives is virgin, active after Veleda in Celtic lands, and Gambaruc) hint at an official religious role, that she was a seeress. It is noteworthy that although prophesy is not mentioned and she is not called by the usual term sibylla, but nothing indicates an institutionalized position rather theiázousa [‘someone making in a cult. prophesies’].

74

Seeresses in the Early Roman Iron Age correct, Veleda must then have served as the Apart from the etymology of names such as representative of a deity. Ganna, Gambara, Veleda and Waluburg, and In the other passage quoted above, the various references to their political roles, however, Tacitus distinctly says that Veleda the only details we have about these seeresses and other seeresses were venerated “neither come from the descriptions of Strabo and out of adulation nor as if they were Tacitus. Strabo, as discussed above, seems to goddesses.” So what exactly was Veleda’s have combined various notions into one role? It can be deduced from the fact that no picture, namely that of old women as cult hint is made at a sacrifice or any other cult functionaries and legendary accounts of the act, at which she may have officiated, that she ritual slaughter of prisoners after a battle. was not a priestess. Tacitus expressly states Although not altogether impossible, his that she was not a goddess, and anyway he account is totally isolated and should be would have used the word fanum rather than considered to have little reliability. He does turris for her abode if he had wanted to imply not even use the word priestesses for these anything of that kind. The votive gifts, on the women, although that is what his description other hand, might seem to assign to her a may imply. Tacitus, on the other hand, may divine role, but her human nature is stressed have personally seen Veleda and goes into by her function as a mediator and by the some detail when talking about her role in attempt of a Roman official to sway her two different works. decisions with political promises. It seems We hear about three physical facts, namely natural, therefore, to assume that Veleda was that (like Ganna) she is considered to be a a politically active seeress, potentially involved virgin, secondly that she lives in a tower, and more in politics than in religion. thirdly that she receives presents, including, But what does all this tell us about the role no less, a large Roman battleship. It may be of women in the Germanic cults of the Roman considered surprising that Tacitus mentions a Iron Age? The detailed information about tower, but in the usage of his time Latin turris Veleda seems to point to a not insignificant has two meanings: on the one hand, it is a public political role of the seeresses. However, siege tower (and as such is frequently used by this function appears limited to the prediction Caesar in his De bello Gallico, e.g. Lib. II, 12, of the future, seeing that Veleda’s role as a 30, 33), on the other hand it is used as a mediator seems rather atypical and also not in synonym for burgus and denotes a very small keeping with her secluded place of abode.5 fort, usually with a lookout tower. Thus, And despite the fact that not even hints can Tacitus may imply that she lived in some be found in the Roman Iron Age of the small, native fortified settlement, not just in a supposed magic wands that have been village, implying that she lived apart from unearthed in some Viking Age women’s ordinary people. This would also explain why graves (Dommasnes 1978; 1982; Petré 1993; servants had to act as go-betweens between Gräslund 2001), the staff must have been a her and those who came to see her. The gifts sign of their trade, even to the point where it are more difficult to explain: from Tacitus’ was reflected in their names or terms of their description, it seems that both the Romans function: Ganna, Gambara/Gambaruc, Veleda and the natives tried to influence her and Walu-burg might all be functional terms predictions by sending her presents. However, rather than personal names, in most cases as the ship was sent to her after a victory over referring to their sign of office. the Romans that she had predicted, it would Apart from the ritual slaughter of prisoners thus appear to have to be equated with the mentioned by Strabo (and this in their votive gifts common in Iron Age Germanic prophetic function!), the evidence from this societies (cf. the ship offerings of Hjortspring, period offers no indication whatsoever of a Nydam, and Thorsberg). However, votive cultic function of women beyond prophecy, gifts can only be dedicated to a deity as a and certainly no solid grounding for seeing token of gratitude for prayers granted. If this them as priestesses in public cultic functions. interpretation of the ship as a votive gift is

75

From the Iron Age to the Vǫlur completely speculative and unfitting for The Veledas and Gannas of Iron Age Central Germanic areas. Europe may well be reflected to a certain The sibyls of heathen antiquity – the degree in the late poetic and other literary Erithraean, the Cumean, the Delphic and the records referring to vǫlur in the North. These Libyan sibyls – had become acceptable to would supposedly declaim the history and Christians of the Early Middle Ages, as the future of the world (as in Vǫluspá) or make Erithrean sibyl in the texts of the Sibylline guesses at the future of the local inhabitants Oracles who had supposedly uttered a verse (as in the case of Thorbjörg litilvǫlva in Eiríks about the coming of Christ and the end of the saga, Thordís spákona in Vatnsdœla saga, or world, which was taken up in the writings of Heimlaug vǫlva in Gull-Thóris saga). The St Augustine and Isidor of Seville and thus latter, whose literary existence only starts in became widely known, to the extent that it the High Middle Ages in some rather fanciful was even integrated into the Easter : sagas, are not depicted by their literary Dies irae, dies illa, creators to have the same social standing as solvet saeclum in favilla, their counterparts a millennium earlier, and teste David cum Sibylla their supposed practices own more to the (Version by Thomas of Celano, ca. 1190– authors’ knowledge of Sami than 1260.) to Norse customs – as far as these are Day of wrath, that day, described 300 years after the advent of an age dissolves in ashes, Christianity. Where the importance of their according to David and the Sibyl function is emphasised (as in Vǫluspá), this is done in descriptions which owe more to the The fact that the literary topos of the vǫlva in four classical sibyls of early medieval eddic poetry owes elements to both the literature than to the spádísir and spákonir literary Latin description of classical sibyls who may have practised their craft on farms and to the actual practises of famous seeresses in pre-Christian times does, of course, not in Iceland and Greenland in pre-Christian th times. The reality of vǫlur in the Viking Age presuppose that Tacitus was known in 13 and their living practices – if they indeed century Iceland (as has been claimed: existed at all – are in fact far less clear than Tausend 2009: 173), but may well reflect a contemporary accounts of such women from common Germanic reminiscence of such the Roman Iron Age, leaving the direct important women in a distant past. connections and continuities between them Nevertheless, despite these literary tenuous. interferences of Late Antiquity and the Early But even for the late literary manifestations Middle Ages, it would be dangerous to draw a of (minor) prophetesses in Scandinavia in direct line between the literary medieval saga literature, terms such as ‘cult specialist’ descriptions of the vǫlur with the seeresses of (e.g. Tausend 2009: 155), ‘cult functionary’6 Germanic antiquity – even if the role of the or ‘ritual specialist’7 (Gardeła 2012: 89ff.) latter was also surprisingly close to that of the seem strangely out of place, and even more so classical Mediterranean sibyls. But this again for the seeresses of antiquity. We hear may be due to the interpretatio Romana nothing about their role in a public cult, and tacitly inherent in the descriptions of the to assume a (formalized? transregional? Germanic seeresses and given voice by our traditional?) ritual of prognostics beyond the classical sources. wild phantasies of Strabo is pure guesswork. Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Rudolf Simek (simek[at]uni- We may certainly call them ‘prognostic bonn.de), Institut für Germanistik, Vergleichende specialists’ with an important role in politics, Literatur- und Kulturwissenschaften Abteilung für but to assign their role to religious cults is Skandinavistik Universität Bonn Am Hof 1d D-53113 based exclusively on Roman concepts of Bonn , prognostics in and popular Romantic ideas of the past. Such ideas remain

76

Notes Kaiserzeit und Völkerwanderungszeit in 1. On seeresses generally, see Schröder 1933: 133–137; Skandinavien: Studie zur zeitlichen Ordnung Hultgård 2005; Simek 2006: 367–369, 463f., 477f.; anhand der norwegischen Funde”. Berichte der Tausend 2009: 155–174. Römisch-Germanischen Kommission 75: 283–640. 2. On the fate of Veleda, see Guarducci 1945–1946; Birkhan, Helmut. 1997. Die Kelten. Wien: Keil 1947; Wilhelm 1948; Volkmann 1964. Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften. 3. Despite what (1938: 113) says, Dommasnes, Liv Helga. 1978. “Et gravmateriale fra namely “in Germania”, the manuscripts and yngre jemalder brukt til å belyse kvinners stilling”. editions all read “in Celtica”. Viking 42: 95–114. (=Dommasnes 1982.) 4. The name Waluburg has nothing whatsoever to do Dommasnes, Liv Helga. 1982. “Late Iron Age in with the Walpurga (from Wald-burga). Western Norway: Female Roles and Ranks as 5. To assume, as Tausend (2009: 166f.) seems to Deduced from an Analysis of Burial Customs”. imply, that Veleda and/or Ganna had something to Norwegian Archaeological Review 15: 70–84.) do with the sacrificial feast of the Semonones, Schröder, Franz Rolf. 1933. Quellenbuch zur described in Tacitus, Germania 39, is pure Germanischen Religionsgeschichte. Berlin/Leipzig: speculation. De Gruyter. 6. “Kultfunktionärin” is the term preferred by Olof Gardeła, Leszek. 2012. “Entangled Worlds: Sundqvist (2003: 425). Archaeologies of Ambivalence in the Viking Age”. 7. The term ‘ritual specialist’ is understood here as Unpublished PhD thesis. University of Aberdeen. having specific association with cult. Gräslund, Anne-Sofie. 2001. “The Position of Iron Age Scandinavian Women”. In Gender and the Works Cited Archaeology of Death. Ed. Bettina Arnold & Nancy L. Wicker. Gender and Archaeology 2. New York: Sources Altamira. Pp. 81–102. Caesar, De bello Gallico = Dv Pontet, Renatvs (ed.). Guarducci, Margherita. 1945–1946. “Veleda”. 1900. C. Iuli Caesaris Commentariorum: Libri VII Rendiconti della Pontificia Accademia Romana di De bello Gallico cvm A. Hirti Svpplemento. Oxonii: Archaeologia 21: 163–176. E Typographeo Clarendoniano. Guyonvarch, Christian-J. 1961. “Notes d’etymologie et Dio Dassius, Roman Histories: Cassii Dionis de lexicographie celtiques et gauloises 9”. Ogam Cocceiani Historiarvm romanarvm qvae svpersvnt 13: 321–325. edidit Vrsvlvs Philippvs Boissevain. Berlin: Heide, Eldar. 2006. Gand, seid og åndevind. Bergen: Weidmann, 1901. University of Bergen. Origo gentis Langobardorum = Waitz, G. (ed.). 1878. Hultgård, Anders 2005. “Seherinnen”. In Reallexikon Scriptores rerum Langobardicarum et Italicarum. der Germanischen Altertumskunde XXVIII. Berlin / Hannoverae: Impensis Bibliopolii Hahniani. New York: De Gruyter. Pp. 113–121. Paulus Diaconus = Waitz, G. (ed.). 1878. Pauli Keil, Josef. 1947. “Ein Spottgedicht auf die gefangene Historia Longobardorum. Hannoverae: Impensis Seherin Veleda”, Anzeiger der österreichischen Bibliopolii Hahniani. Akademie der Wissenschaften, Phil.-hist. Klasse Saxo Grammaticus, = Olrik, J., & 84(19): 185–190. Ræder, H. (eds.). 1931. Saxonis Gesta Danorum. Krahe, Hans. 1961. “Altgermanische Kleinigkeiten 4: Hauniæ: Levin & Munksgaard. Veleda”. Indogermanische Forschungen 66: 35–43. Strabo, Geographika = Jones, Horace Leonard (ed.). Meid, Wolfgang. 1964. “Der germanische 1924 (reprint 1954). The Geography of Strabo III. Personenname Veleda”. Indogermanische With an English translation. London: Heinemann. Forschungen 69: 256–258. Tacitus, Germania = Much, Rudolf (ed.). 1967. Die rd Petr , Bo. 1993. “Male and Female Finds and Symbols Germania des Tacius 3 edn. Ed. Wolfgang Lange in Germanic Iron Age Graves”. Current Swedish in cooperation with Herbert Jankuhn & Hans Archaeology 1: 149–154. Fromm. Heidelberg: Winter. Simek, Rudolf. 2006. Lexikon der germanischen Tacitus, Historiae = Simcox, William Henry (ed.). Mythologie. 3rd edn. Stuttgart: Kröner. Cornelii Taciti Historiae – The History of Tacitus Spickermann, Wolfgang. 1994. “Mulieres ex voto”: According to the Text of Orelli I–II. London: Untersuchungen zur Götterverehrung von Frauen Rivingtons, n.d. im römischen Gallien, Germanien und Rätien (1.–3. Jahrhundert n. Chr.). Bochum: Brockmeyer. Literature Sundqvist, Olof. 2003. “Priester und Priesterinnen”. In Abramenko, Andrik. 1994. “Drusus’ Umkehr an der Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde Elbe und die angebliche Opposition gegen seine XXIII. Berlin/New York: De Gruyter. Pp. 424–435. germanischen Feldzüge: Zum literarischen Vorbild Tausend, Sabine. 2009. “Germanische Seherinnen”. In für Cass. Dio 55, 1, 1-4 und Suet. Claud. 1, 2”. Klaus Tausend. Im Inneren Germaniens – Athenaeum 82: 371–383. Beziehungen zwischen den germanischen Stämmen Baetke, Walter. 1938. Die Religion der Germanen in vom 1. Jh. v. Chr. bis zum 2. Jh. n. Chr. Quellenzeugnissen. 2nd edn. Frankfurt: Diesterweg. Geographica Historica 25. Stuttgart: Franz Steiner. Bemmann, Jan, & Güde Hahne. 1994. “Waffen- Pp. 155–174. führende Grabinventare der jüngeren römischen

77

Tolley, Clive. 2009. Shamanism in Norse Myth and Walser, Gerold. 1955. “Veleda”. In Paulys Magic I–II. FF Communications 296–297. Realencyklopädie der classischen Altertums- Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. wissenschaften VIII A,1. Stuttgart: Metzler. Pp. Volkmann, Hans. 1964. Germanische Seherinnen in 617–621. römischen Diensten. Krefeld: Scherpe. Wilhelm, Adolf. 1948. “Das Gedicht auf Veleda”. de Vries, Jan. 1970. Altgermanische Religions- Anzeiger der österreichischen Akademie der geschichte I–II. Leiden: Brill. Wissenschaften, Phil.-hist. Klasse 85: 151–154.

A Retrospective Methodology for Using Landnámabók as a Source for the Religious History of Iceland? – Some Questions Matthias Egeler, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München

Abstract: This paper describes and discusses nine different categories of ‘indicators’ that can be taken into consideration when assessing the historicity of accounts in Landnámabók. This presentation is specifically targeted at references to religion and religious practices in Iceland prior to the Christianization of the country. The methodological tools can be adapted to analyse other types of information, other texts, and other traditions. If one approaches the Icelandic Landnámabók are not two but four centuries removed from or ‘Book of Settlements’ as a historian of the Settlement Period. Norse religion, one faces a dilemma. On the This temporal distance is the more one hand, this text contains an extremely rich significant as the different extant recensions assemblage of religious motifs: funerary of Landnámabók differ markedly from each rituals, temple buildings, sorcery, supernatural other, and furthermore stand in complex inter- beings, , shape-shifting, and textual relationships to the corpus of the Sagas miracle-working all play a role in this text; of Icelanders (Íslendingasögur): Landnámabók religion and the supernatural are indeed so and the Sagas of Icelanders share a consider- prominent in Landnámabók that they appear able amount of material, and more often than to have formed a key interest of its author(s) not the exact nature of the relationships and/or redactor(s) (cf. the overview in Map 1 between these two corpora is problematic or below). This suggests that Landnámabók just simply unclear (Böldl 2011: 230; might have tremendous relevance as a source Sveinbjörn Rafnsson 2001: 616). Yet even if for the religious history of Iceland. Yet, it is hardly possible to disentangle the details Landnámabók is anything but a contemporary of the interrelationships between Landnámabók witness to the happenings it claims to record. and the Sagas of Icelanders with any degree The first, ‘original’ version of Landnámabók of certainty, it is abundantly clear that both in has frequently been ascribed to Ari the the choice and in the treatment of the motifs Learned and Kolskeggr Asbjarnsson in the contained in Landnámabók, the different early 12th century. If this dating of the recensions of this text are very much part of ‘original’ Landnámabók is correct, this first the literary discourses of their time of version of the text was already written down creation. Thus, they are anything but a some two centuries after the events it monolithic pillar rooted in the Settlement describes, but this version is not extant. What Period in any straightforward way. we have are a number of later recensions All this is of course well known (cf. Gísli dating from the late 13th/early 14th century Sigurðsson 2014: 177; Jakob Benediktsson onwards: the Sturlubók recension (ca. AD 1966–1969), and the purpose of reiterating 1275–1280), the Hauksbók recension (probably these fundamental problems of Landnámabók AD 1306–1308), the Melabók recension as a source for the religious history of the (early 14th century, but extant only as a small Settlement Period is merely to highlight the fragment), and two recensions from the 17th dilemma that a historian of religion faces century (cf. Simek & Hermann Pálsson 2007: concerning Landnámabók: on the one hand, 241f.; Sveinbjörn Rafnsson 2001: 614f.; this text contains such a wealth of religious Hermann Pálsson & Edwards 1972: 3–5). This motifs that it seems impossible not to turn to means that the extant texts of Landnámabók it as a source for the study of Old Norse

78

Map 1. The ‘geographical’ distribution of religious/supernatural motifs in Iceland according to Landnámabók (Sturlubók recension). Not marked are mere mentioning of ‘priests’ (goði) or of genealogical relationships to holders of ecclesiastical offices. (The map of Iceland on which locations have been marked is © Landmælingar Íslands, http://www.lmi.is/en/okeypis-kort/, 14.08.2014, used with permission.) vernacular religion, but, on the other hand, the that it is historically reliable. It might even be problems of source criticism inherent in this that occasionally a detailed unhistorical text are so overwhelming that it is anything account is more telling than a stark historical but clear how, and even if, it can be used to one, providing more information about study the pre-Christian religion of Iceland. Landnámabók’s time of writing than we The present article aims at contributing ‘lose’ about the Settlement Period. towards the methodological discussion of how ‘authentically pagan’ elements in Landnáma- Some Preliminary Distinctions bók – i.e. elements which have a ‘factual’ If one enquires into the ‘truth’ of the accounts source value for the study of the Icelandic given in Landnámabók, one has to vernacular religion of the Settlement Period – differentiate a number of different layers of can be identified. For this purpose, it will authenticity. ‘Truth’ in the sense of a factually propose a catalogue of methodological correct description of Viking Age conditions guidelines which might be applied for is not the only kind of ‘truth’ found (or not assessing the value of individual anecdotes in found) in Landnámabók; another kind of Landnámabók as historical sources. It goes ‘truth’ is the bona fide recording of traditions without saying that this catalogue is not which one of the authors/redactors working intended to be an apodictic formulation of on Landnámabók thought to be authentic, ‘the truth’, but rather an unassuming list of even if they were not. Terminologically, one questions intended to be further discussed, possible way of framing the difference amended, and supplemented. Equally, the between these different categories of ‘truth’ is intention of posing the question of historicity to speak of ‘folkloric truth’ vs. ‘historical to Landnámabók cannot be about proving, but truth’. must indeed always be about assessing the Truth-Type A: Folkloric Truth. A ‘folkloric historicity of this material: in many cases, truth’ is defined as a statement constituting a showing that accounts of Landnámabók are bona fide representation of opinions current unhistorical is just as illuminating as showing during the time of their recording.

79

The acts of writing by the authors and/or redactors of Landnámabók and its different versions may have recorded a contemporary understanding, thus reflecting what the ‘truth’ was as it was known to the author/redactor, or they may record an invention dating to the time in which the text was created (written/redacted). In the former case, i.e. if the text reflects a contemporary understanding, it can be termed a ‘folkloric truth’. Strictly speaking, there may be one such layer of ‘truth’ for each writer and redactor involved in the creation of the extant recensions of Landnámabók. Since more often than not it is, however, impossible to differentiate these different authorial layers conclusively, no Figure 1. The relationship between ‘folkloric truth’ and attempt will be made in the present article to ‘historical truth’ vs. ‘specific truth’ and ‘general truth’. pin down possible indicators for, say, an ‘folkloric’ understanding a ‘folkloric truth’. In assessment of a 12th century ‘folkloric truth’ th contrast to this, the term ‘historical truth’ tries of the original Landnámabók vs. a 14 to grasp the factual relationship between the century ‘folkloric truth’ of the Hauksbók extant literary account and the historical redaction. Another problem which has to be circumstances of the Settlement Period beyond acknowledged, but can be solved only very ‘mere’ high medieval understandings. Of rarely (if ever), is that the oral culture could course these two ‘truths’ are not mutually have developed several competing views on exclusive; in fact, in order to be ‘historically one and the same question. This implies that true’, an account will normally also have to be even in the case of blatant contradictions ‘folklorically true’, as it is only a continuous between different medieval Icelandic folkloric chain of transmission which gives traditions, more than one version could be the author/redactor of the extant text access to bona fide true (= a ‘folkloric truth’) even if it 1 an aspect of Settlement Period history. is not factually so. Another distinction which is necessary to Truth-Type B: Historical Truth. A ‘historical draw is the distinction between a ‘general’ truth’ is defined as a statement constituting and a ‘specific’ truth: an accurate representation of actual historical circumstances. Truth Quality A: General. A motif, image or concept can be described as ‘true in a Even if an entry in Landnámabók is a bona fide general way’ if the author/redactor has taken recording of the ‘truth’ insofar as it constituted it from the pool of contemporary social the contemporary understanding of the time in understandings available to him, but has put which the extant text was created, this does it into a context of his own devising. not necessarily imply that this high medieval One hypothetical instance would be the idea ‘folkloric truth’ is identical with the factual that settler X built a temple: such a claim conditions of the Settlement Period, i.e. the reflects a ‘general truth’ if the author/redactor ‘historical truth’. The factual accuracy – the of the text shared a contemporary bona fide ‘historical truth’ value – of such information belief that the early settlers built temples, but, is, however, a possibility to be enquired into. for reasons of his own, ascribed this motif to a Arguably, the narratives recorded in settler for whose temple-building he had no Landnámabók – unless they are a conscious authority. literary invention by one of its writers/ redactors – are recordings of what is essentially Truth Quality B: Specific. ‘Specifically true’ is a motif which is a bona fide reflection of folklore (understood as contemporary social 2 ‘the truth’ both in terms of its own content understandings). This is the basis for terming and in terms of its context. the faithful recording of this contemporary

80

To continue the example of the temple-building purports to speak about. One obvious settler: a claim that settler X built a temple is restriction of this tool is that the types of a ‘specific truth’ if the author of Landnámabók information provided by Landnámabók are based this account on the contemporary state only rarely open to archaeological verification of knowledge both in terms on the general or falsification. There are, however, some makeup of the motif and in terms of the notable exceptions. Perhaps the most obvious specific person he associated it with. is Landnámabók’s frequent mention of mound It goes without saying that the categories burials (S39, 40, 42, etc.), whose historicity is of ‘folkloric’ vs. ‘historical’ and ‘specific’ vs. amply confirmed by the archaeological ‘general’ truth are not dependent on each evidence (Adolf Friðriksson & Kristján Eldjárn other, but rather lie perpendicular to each 2000). More specific is the archaeological other: a ‘folkloric truth’ in Landnámabók can evidence for Landnámabók’s claim that some be both ‘specific’ and ‘general’, and so can a settlers received boat burials (S72, 115): ‘historical truth’, as illustrated in Figure 1. while the historicity of the specific boat Even using all the indicators proposed below, burials mentioned in Landnámabók cannot be it will almost never be possible to determine confirmed by the archaeological evidence, the exact location of a claim made by there is good evidence illustrating that the Landnámabók on this grid. This is especially general idea of Settlement Period boat burials the case when we attempt to distinguish is historically accurate (cf. Figure 1). This between a ‘specific’ and a ‘general’ truth, archaeological confirmation of the literary which is only possible where there is external accounts possibly includes the detail that the evidence relating to a specific claim made main burial could be accompanied by human about a specific settler – and such evidence is sacrifice (S72); corresponding evidence may almost never available. To be sure about the recently have come to light in the course of ‘specific historical truth’ represented by the excavation of the Litlu-Núpar boat burial square IV in Figure 1 is thus virtually in Northern Iceland (Roberts 2008/2009). The impossible. But even though – or perhaps inverse case – i.e. an archaeological falsification rather especially because – this problem cannot of claims made by the Book of Settlement – is be solved, it is necessary to bear it in mind. illustrated by its claim that the early Icelandic After these preliminary remarks, it is now settlers built ‘temples’ (hof: S41, 85, 233, time to turn to the question of what indicators 234, etc.): unambiguous evidence for are available to assess the trustworthiness of substantial Settlement Period cult buildings is accounts given in Landnámabók. In the notable only by its complete absence, strongly following, such indicators will be presented suggesting that the ‘temples’ of Landnámabók individually. As a matter of course, however, are a retrojection of high medieval churches this is merely a question of presentation, not into an imaginary pagan past.3 of their actual use. In actual use, the indicators proposed below should always be correlated Indicator 2. Toponyms with each other and used cumulatively to the Toponyms form another important type of greatest possible extent (cf. Ahola & Frog evidence for the study of religious history; 2014: 11–13 on ‘relevant indicators’). they are as important for Iceland as they are Obliquely, this point will be reflected in the for other parts of the Germanic-speaking recurrent use of some of the same world (cf. Brink 2007; Laur 2001; de Vries Landnámabók narratives to illustrate a 1956–1957: passim). What makes place names number of different indicators. (including the place names in Landnámabók) particularly interesting as sources for the Indicator 1. Archaeological Evidence religious history of Iceland is the conservatism Where possible, accounts of Landnámabók created by their specific social context: a should be compared with the archaeological place once named, and generally known by its data, which constitute the most tangible of the name, is much less likely to be renamed than very few categories of evidence that actually a local story is to be retold. This makes stem from the time that Landnámabók toponyms found in Landnámabók like Hǫrgá

81

(S222) [‘Altar-River’ or ‘Temple-River’], ‘folkloric truth’ (Figure 1, squares I and II), Hǫrgárdalr (S223, 224) [‘Altar-River-Dale’] but it precludes that it reflects a ‘historical or Þórsmǫrk (S343) [‘Thor’s Forest’] highly truth’ (Figure 1, squares III and IV).4 Thus, the valuable as historical sources. The disadvantage use of independent historical accounts suggests of such toponyms is, of course, that, while that (at the very least) a number of central semantically clear toponyms are a narrative in elements of the story of the reputed early a nutshell, this nutshell is a very small one Christian settler Ørlygr are not historical. indeed: their ‘narrative’ content is restricted to the composition of two or perhaps three Indicator 4. Non-Icelandic Literary Sources terms, which encapsulate and hint at the Further indications of the historicity – or the circumstances which brought about the lack thereof – of an anecdote in Landnámabók acquisition of a certain name by a certain can sometimes be provided by comparing its place, but they do not at all elaborate on it. account to non-Icelandic literary sources Place names and their semantics contain as (predominantly sources from the British little elaboration as anything narrative Isles): if an anecdote in Icelandic literature so possibly could. This extreme restriction of closely parallels a non-Norse narrative from their narrative content implies an equally other parts of Atlantic Europe that there limited information content. But even so, seems to be a historical connection between sacral toponyms can raise interesting the two tales, then the Landnámabók story is questions. Why, for instance, is the river more likely to be a borrowed literary fiction flowing through Þórsmörk [‘Thor’s Forest’] than a historical account. One instance of this called ‘Cross River’ (Krossá: S343)? is provided again by the settlement narrative of Ørlygr Hrappsson. In this narrative, Indicator 3. Historical Accounts ‘bishop Patrick’ presents Ørlygr with essential Where possible, accounts of Landnámabók objects for building and equipping a church. should be reviewed in the light of Among the bishop’s gifts is a church bell. The independent, contemporary historical sources. Hauksbók version of the story contains the One restriction of this tool is that such a detail that this bell falls overboard before review is generally only possible with respect Ørlygr reaches the place where he is to settle, to elements of Landnámabók which are not but is then found lying on the shore when directly related to Iceland. This is because Ørlygr lands after having identified his virtually no independent, contemporary settlement site (H15). Curiously, the motif historical sources from the Viking Age exist that a church bell drifts over the sea and lands for Iceland. But even so, historical evidence on the place where a Christian settlement is to can be of relevance for assessing some of the be established also recurs in Irish hagiography, religious elements in Landnámabók. One case which suggests that the occurrence of this in point is the claim that the settler Ørlygr motif in the settlement story of Ørlygr Hrappsson – reputedly one of the first Hrappsson is a borrowing from Irish Christian settlers in Iceland – was the foster- ecclesiastical sources (Young 1937: 120; son of a certain bishop Patrick. Allegedly, this Wellendorf 2010: 15f.). This serves to further bishop had his see on the Hebrides, his advice emphasise the fundamentally fictional character formed the basis for Ørlygr’s settlement on of the settlement narrative of Ørlygr the Kjalarnes peninsula, and the Patreksfjǫrður Hrappsson as a whole, which seems to be in the West Fjords was named after him cobbled together from a broad range of (S15). Interestingly, however, no such bishop diverse sources, some of which are demon- Patrick lived during the time in question strably unhistorical (reinterpreted toponyms, (Jakob Benediktsson 1968: 52n.2; Wellendorf hagiographical stock motifs), while for the 2010: 14); more likely than not, this figure rest a historical background cannot be proven was merely extrapolated from the toponym and is made implausible by the strong Patreksfjǫrður, whether at the time of writing unhistorical elements of the narrative. or in oral history. This situation allows for the Non-Norse roots of a settlement narrative possibility that the account could reflect a do not necessarily, however, also imply that

82 the narrative in question is late. An example attributes to the Settlement Period, and well- of a non-Norse, but possibly early, mytho- known early medieval Irish narratives logical motif in Landnámabók is provided by suggests that Landnámabók might be correct the story of Auðun the Stutterer (S83; Egeler to claim that this story indeed dates as early as 2014; cf. af Klintberg 2010, legend types the Settlement Period. If this is so, then it F101–106). This Auðun was a settler who attests to a mythologization of the Icelandic took land on the Snæfellsnes peninsula. landscape that was executed on the basis of an According to Landnámabók, he had kinship Irish narrative pattern and that dated as far connections to Ireland: Auðun was married to back as the time of the first settlement.5 a certain Mýrún, the daughter of “Maddaðr, king of the Irish” (S83). One autumn, Indicator 5. Landscape Landnámabók tells, Auðun saw a dapple-grey The anecdotes which Landnámabók ties to stallion run down from Lake Hjarðarvatn and particular landscapes and landscape features to his stud-horses, and the horse subdued his should be compared with these landscapes or breeding-stallion. Then, Auðun went over, landscape features if these are still extant. The took hold of the grey stallion, yoked him potential significance of such a comparison is before a two-ox sledge, and carted all the hay illustrated by the Landnámabók account of from his home-field. The stallion was easy to the settlement of Þórsnes (S85; cf. Eyrbyggja manage through the middle of the day, but as saga 10). In the course of a colourful discussion time went on, he trampled into the ground up of the pagan religious sites on Þórsnes, this to the hoof-tufts, and after sunset he broke the passage of Landnámabók comes to speak of entire harness and ran to the lake. After that the assembly site on the eastern part of the he was never seen again. peninsula. There, the text claims, was a large Kinship connections to Irish kings – or boulder sacred to Thor on which those were rather: the Irish king – are a topos of Icelandic killed who were sacrificed to the god. literature. In the case of Auðun the Stutterer, To locate an assembly site on Þórsnes seems however, these claims have an unusual ring of to be based on authentic local knowledge: in authenticity conveyed upon them by the the eastern part of the peninsula, where names of Auðun’s wife and reputed father-in- Landnámabók (and Eyrbyggja saga) locate an law: both of these seem to be reflections of assembly site, lies a farm which to this day real Irish names current during the Viking bears the name Þingvellir [‘Assembly Age (Muirenn and Matudán; the latter name Fields’]. Such local knowledge also appears happens to be attested as the name of several to have influenced the picture of the sacred Irish kings of the Viking Age). This makes it landscape that is painted by the literary interesting that the strange horse which account in an additional way. In the emerges out of a mountain lake over Auðun’s homefield of Þingvellir farm, where the farm has close parallels in early medieval Irish literary account locates the boulder which was literature: the most prominent heroic mount of reputedly used for , lies to this Irish story-telling during the Viking Age was day a large boulder. This boulder is coloured the ‘Grey of Macha’, the horse of the hero Cú by reddish inclusions of iron, giving it a Chulainn. If one analyses its representation in pattern recalling dried blood (Collingwood & Viking Age texts like Fled Bricrenn and Jón Stefánsson 1899: 95f. with fig. 82). Jón Brislech mór Maige Muirthemni, this heroic Hnefill Aðalsteinsson (2005: 500f.) assumes horse shared the following traits with Auðun’s that the account of Landnámabók (and water-horse: both horses are a) stallions of Eyrbyggja saga) is based on historical fact grey colour, b) which are supernaturally and that this boulder was indeed used for strong, c) very difficult to tame, d) emerge human sacrifice. What argues against this, from a mountain lake, and e) ultimately however, is that reliable evidence for human disappear into the same mountain lake. Given sacrifice to gods is otherwise notable only by Auðun’s marital connections to Ireland, the its absence from early Iceland. Therefore, and exact parallelism between the story of the given the existence of a prominent, iron- Snæfellsnes water-horse, which Landnámabók coloured boulder in Þingvellir, it seems likely

83 that the account of human sacrifices on of Auðr which is, however, significantly Þórsnes is a high medieval fiction, whether it different from that in Landnámabók: while is a literary fiction or an oral, ‘folkloric’ one. Landnámabók describes Auðr as a noble This fiction was not conjured up out of thin Christian, Laxdœla saga describes her as a air, but was based on an in-depth familiarity noble pagan. This is particularly striking in with the local landscape and the ‘blood’- the respective accounts of her death spattered boulder to be found there. Here, a (Landnámabók S110; Laxdœla saga 7): both medieval fantasy of a murderous texts give closely parallel accounts of the was developed out of the real-world features feast which Auðr organises immediately of the landscape and gained a status as before her death, but while Landnámabók ‘history’, which led to its inclusion in the concludes its report with Auðr’s burial on the purportedly historical fabric of Landnámabók. shore, the Laxdœla saga account ends with a Recalling the different kinds of ‘truth’ magnificent pagan boat burial. summarised in Figure 1, it might very well be Sveinbjörn Rafnsson (2001: 615) argues that the Landnámabók redactor who inserted that the older of these two narratives is the this episode did consider it to be a bona fide one represented by the saga: he hypothesizes accurate tradition. Thus, the tale of Thor’s that the saga account could have been taken sacrificial stone might still very well reflect a from an older, now lost version of Landnáma- post-conversion ‘folkloric truth’; yet it clearly bók, while the extant version of Landnámabók does not reflect a Viking Age ‘historical turned some of the first settlers into Christians truth’. in order to make Iceland part of the Christian history of salvation. What perhaps might Indicator 6. Stereotypification argue against this conclusion, however, is the As a methodological point, the question of almost stereotypical simplicity of the ‘stereotypification’ concerns the problem of historical account given by Laxdœla saga. In whether the picture drawn by Landnámabók the saga, there is a very simple and very or other medieval Icelandic sources seems to straightforward dichotomy between a pagan reflect a medieval Christian cliché. A motif past and a Christian present: what came which appears to display traits of stereotypi- before the official conversion of Iceland in the fication according to Christian medieval year 999/1000 was pagan, and what came patterns should be considered to be of limited after is Christian. Landnámabók, in contrast, validity for use in a retrospective recon- presents a much more nuanced picture free of struction of pagan beliefs or practices. such a clichéd, straightforward division One example of a passage in Landnámabók between pagan and Christian: in this account, to which the question of ‘stereotypification’ the settlement is partially Christian, then this might be applied is its account of the Christianity is lost, and finally it is re- settlement of Auðr the Deep-Minded (S95, established a few generations later. This 97, 110, 399). Landnámabók claims that Auðr picture of an oscillation between Christianity had, before moving to Iceland, lived in the and paganism is much more complex and British Isles and was a Christian. When she distinct, and because of this very distinctiveness died, she ordered that she should be buried on it also seems much more plausible than the the shore at the high water mark, because she saga’s simple black-and-white dichotomy did not want to lie in ground that was not between a pagan Settlement Period and a later consecrated. After her death, her family lost Christianisation. This is particularly so since the Christian faith. They began to worship the the idea that Norse settlers coming from the ‘Cross Hills’ (Krosshólar), where Auðr British Isles might follow a Christian faith, as previously had had her place of (Christian) it is exemplified by Auðr, is historically prayer, built a temple (or altar: hǫrgr) there, eminently plausible. Since the British Isles and believed that these hills would be the had been Christian long before the beginning place where they would go after their death. of the Viking Age, they would indeed have A parallel to this account is provided by constituted a plausible background for the Laxdœla saga. Laxdœla saga paints a picture acceptance of Christianity by Norse settlers.6

84

In fact, it should be emphasised that this arguably with connotations of particular historical context is a crucial indicator pointing lavishness and wealth, given the scarcity of towards the historicity of the Landámabók timber suitable for shipbuilding in Iceland. On account (and, by implication, towards the the basis of these considerations, the most validity of ‘stereotypification’ as a pheno- likely reconstruction of the history of the menon, arguably observable in the version of traditions about Auðr might be that the the events told by Laxdœla saga). In account in Landnámabók, with its oscillation principle, the astereotypical character of the between Christianity and paganism, has Landnámabók account could, rather than historical priority over the stereotypically being a consequence of historical accuracy, pagan Auðr of Laxdœla saga. There might also be a narrative device. This interpretation even be a hint in the text of Laxdœla saga is argued for by Sveinbjörn Rafnsson when he itself that the author of the saga knew this suggests that the purported Christian faith of other tradition, but consciously chose to some of the earliest settlers merely served to simplify the stratigraphy of Icelandic religious tie the Icelandic settlement into the history of history by substituting the complex historical salvation (2001: 615). For such an approach, intermingling of paganism and Christianity the Christianity of figures like Auðr the Deep- with a simple dichotomy: that he chose to Minded could be a literary anticipation of the ascribe a boat burial to Auðr could be later conversion.7 Hypothetically, such a recon- interpreted as a conscious literary nod struction of the genesis of the Landnámabók towards the tradition according to which Auðr account is just as possible as assuming that its was buried on the shore at the high water astereotypical character gives it historical mark. precedence. Seen in the wider historical This being said, it should be stressed that context of the Settlement Period, however, it this reasoning obviously does not mean that seems highly significant that the the account in Landnámabók presents us with Landnámabók account with its oscillation ‘the specific historical truth’ (Figure 1, square between Christianity and paganism exactly IV) about Auðr. It merely indicates a mirrors the actual historical situation of early probability that the Landnámabók account medieval Atlantic Europe, which was a may have historical precedence over the complex and multicultural one in which account presented by Laxdœla saga; and this Christianity and paganism recurrently did ‘historical precedence’ is nothing more than a indeed live side by side. location on a relative scale of probability, not To some extent, the archaeological record a clear distinction between ‘true’ and ‘false’. also reinforces the impression that the account Neither the account of Landnámabók nor the in Laxdœla saga presents not a recording but account of Laxdœla saga can be taken to be rather a stereotypification of history. To date, necessarily true (be it ‘historically’ or there are only five certain boat burials known ‘folklorically’), and even less so since they from the whole of Iceland (Roberts 2008/2009: are complex assemblages of broad narrative 38). This is a surprisingly low number, given patterns and individual motifs which may that there are several hundred known from the have different origins and individually carry Scandinavian continent (cf. Müller-Wille different degrees of weight. 1968/1969). This might indicate that boat burials were only rarely performed in Iceland, Indicator 7. Narratological Integration? which further undermines the plausibility of Another indicator that could be useful for the saga account which claims that Auðr assessing the value of Landnámabók passages received a boat burial. In addition, high as sources for Icelandic religious history has medieval Icelandic literature contains a to do with what I call ‘narratological surprisingly large number of descriptions of integration’. This point, however, is too boat burials (the relevant passages are insecure to propose as a thesis. It should collected in Müller-Wille 1968/1969): the better be formulated as a question to be medieval literature seems to use them as a discussed: is it possible to argue that the less kind of antiquarian pagan stereotype, easily an element can be explained

85 narratologically within its given context in discontinuity between the narrative motif and Landnámabók, the more likely is it to be a its contexts: they look at how a motif seems reflection of traditions whose roots run deeper not to be fully integrated into its wider than the composition of Landnámabók as a surroundings and treat this lack of integration high medieval text? Or, to put it differently: as a consequence or indicator of its status as a are statements of Landnámabók which appear relict with roots outside of its current textual to follow the intrinsic logic of a straight- home. forward narrative likely to do so because they One element of Landnámabók which raises have been invented for this purpose? And, the question of whether a lack of conversely, is something which does not ‘narratological integration’ might be a hint at make a ‘good story’ (gradually) more likely to historical plausibility is the settler Helgi bjóla. reflect a historical tradition than an element Landnámabók claims that Helgi, who took which follows the intrinsic logic of the plot of land on the Kjalarnes peninsula and was a narrative? These questions suggest themselves counted among the outstanding settlers in the especially in those cases where material South Quarter, was a Christian (S14, 397, treated by Landnámabók is also treated by 399). In contrast to this, Kjalnesinga saga one of the Sagas of Icelanders, but in a (mid-14th century) claims that Helgi was a different way. In such cases, one is tempted to follower of the old religion, though he wonder whether an element is particularly sacrificed only rarely (ch. 1). Kjalnesinga plausible if it contradicts the accounts given saga then further tells that Helgi allowed a in the Sagas of Icelanders, since this Christian Irishman and his retinue to settle on contradiction means that it is not only a part of his land claim. demonstrably independent from, but also less Sveinbjörn Rafnsson (2001: 615) suggests dependent on, the framework of the plot of an that Kjalnesinga saga here reflects an older extended narrative than the version given by tradition than Landnámabók: in his opinion, the saga. To some extent, this point the historical Helgi bjóla was a pagan, and not corresponds to the phenomenon for which a Christian as claimed by Landnámabók. If, Frog (2014: 128f., n.12) has coined the term however, one compares the appearances of ‘suspension’. Frog defines ‘suspension’ in the the Christian Helgi in Landnámabók and the following way: pagan Helgi in Kjalnesinga saga, it is striking that Helgi’s Christian faith plays no narrative Conceptual models or motifs can be 8 considered ‘suspended’ in a traditional role within Landnámabók whatsoever, narrative when they are not reconciled with whereas the purported paganism of Helgi and the broader or belief his family in Kjalnesinga saga is crucial for traditions, or when they are otherwise the saga plot. The plot of Kjalnesinga saga maintained although their significance has revolves around the religious tensions that become obscure or completely opaque [...]. increasingly develop between Helgi’s pagan (Frog 2014: 128n.12.) family and the Christian Irish settlers whom Frog’s term has a different thrust than my he has allowed to settle on his land claim. In question of ‘narratological integration’: the order for this plot to work, Helgi and his phenomena for which he uses his category of family have to be pagan; if he were a ‘suspension’ generally seem to have preserved Christian, Helgi would undermine the very their ‘suspended’ features because these basis of the further development of the saga features are structurally important for their plot. On the other hand, the Christian faith of respective narrative contexts, making them Helgi in Landnámabók is merely mentioned ‘suspended’ within the context of the world- without having any further consequences view of the society in which they are used as within the text; the narrative of Landnámabók elements of a story, whereas ‘narratological gains nothing by this detail, and this implies integration’ approaches the historical validity that, had this detail been a late invention by of motifs from the angle of their narrative an author/redactor of Landnámabók, it would context (or lack thereof). Both terms, not only have taken a considerable liberty however, share the attention to a certain with the historical tradition, but would have

86 done so in a way which was utterly functionless pagan who was already drifting away from for the new narrative. In this sense, its paganism. Both these details, again, make one position lacks narratological integration: it wonder whether they should perhaps be can hardly be explained by its narrative understood as literary references rather than context. This raises the question of whether, as historical reality. And could this perhaps historically, the account of Landnámabók further strengthen the suspicion that, in these might perhaps be more plausible than the cases, the accounts of Landnámabók, with account of Kjalnesinga saga: did the author of their lack of stereotypification and their (the later) Kjalnesinga saga base his plot limited narratological integration, might be loosely on historical persons, but subordinate closer to ‘historical’ reality than the (historical and/or folkloric) ‘fact’ to the stereotypical and narratologically well- requirements of developing a working integrated accounts of the sagas? fictional plot? While I do not think it applies in the case Indicator 8. Lack of Elaboration? of the Christian Helgi of Kjalnesinga saga, a Strictly speaking, the potential indicator ‘lack qualifying point should be noted as an aside: of elaboration’ constitutes a special case of we may not only imagine that a good fit Indicator 7 (‘narratological integration’). Yet between an anecdote and a wider narrative it can be applied to Landnámabók so framework is due to a conscious adaptation of frequently that it deserves to be mentioned as the anecdotal material to its wider narrative an individual point. Methodologically, this frame, but we may also imagine that there potential indicator prompts inquiry into the may be cases in which anecdotal material was degree to which a motif is elaborated on: can preserved because it fitted well within a wider one suspect that, the less an element is narrative frame. This implies a methodlogical elaborated, the more likely it is to be based on aporia, which illustrates how important it is to an extra-textual tradition? see the different indicators proposed in the The background of this question is an present paper cumulatively and to correlate as inference: an element which has been many of them as possible in order to reach a invented by the author or a redactor of convincing assessment of the material. Landnámabók needs a certain amount of It may also be noted that the question of explanation to be understood by the reader; if narratological integration in Kjalnesinga saga no such explanation is given, then this could exactly parallels a question asked earlier suggest that the author/redactor was drawing about Laxdœla saga. In both cases, the on a pre-existing narrative tradition and could differences between the descriptions of the assume that the information necessary to same happenings in Landnámabók and in the understand this element was available even sagas make one wonder whether the authors of without being included in Landnámabók: it the sagas prioritised the artistic requirements was part of the ‘assumed knowledge’ of the of their narratives over the historicity of their intended audience. This does of course not tales. And both saga authors might also share mean that this tradition goes back all the way yet another trait in their treatment of the to the Viking Age and is ‘historically true’ material: if their versions are indeed (cf. Figure 1); nobody would argue that secondary, fictionalised versions of what we Quasimodo or the Count of Monte Christo are told in Landnámabók, then both authors were historical figures just because they do built a nod towards the ‘historical’ account not need to be explained to a modern into their fictional version. In the case of audience. But, it does imply that such a Laxdœla saga, this means that Auðr’s tradition was established at the time of Christian burial on the shore is mirrored by Landnámabók in its extant form, which in the burial of the paganised Auðr in a boat. turn implies that the tradition is older than this Similarly, the Christian faith of the Helgi of source. One possible example for this is the Landnámabók reverberates in the statement of Christian faith of Helgi bjóla: this motif is Kjalnesinga saga that Helgi was a pagan, but never elaborated on and remains without any a pagan who sacrificed only rarely – i.e. a narrative function throughout Landnámabók.

87

This lack of elaboration might be taken to the barest outlines of a story may be suggest that his Christian faith was not intrinsically suspicious. invented by a Landnámabók author, but constitutes a passing reference to a tradition Indicator 9. Folkloristic Comparisons that already existed outside of this text (just as In spite of the huge problems posed by the it had already been suggested by the above late date of folkloric material, comparisons comparison of the Helgi of Landnámabók with the evidence of folklore might also help 9 with the Helgi of Kjalnesinga saga). Another to indicate tendencies of probability. One example is found in half a sentence of the example is offered by Eyvindr’s boulder- settlement account of the valley Flateyjardalr worship in Flateyjardalr: folkloric reports th th in Northern Iceland (S241). There, Eyvindr from 18 and 19 century North-Western Loðinsson nam Flateyjardal upp til Gunnsteina Iceland mention that certain boulders called ok blótaði þá [‘took the Flatey-valley up to landdísasteinar were the objects of a certain the Gunn-boulders and made sacrifices to amount of worship and of certain them’]. The text makes so little – indeed prohibitions, such as not to cut grass in their nothing at all – of Eyvindr’s habit of immediate vicinity (Simek 2003: 126; Simek sacrificing to the boulders called Gunnsteinar 1995: 234; Turville-Petre 1963; de Vries that there is no obvious reason why the author 1956–1957: §528). Similarly, other kinds of of this passage of Landnámabók should have non-human beings were also thought to invented it. This does of course not prove inhabit rocks and boulders (cf. Simek 1995: anything (after all, this detail could just be a 234; Turville-Petre 1963); dwarfs, for instance, fiction meant to add local colour), but it might are associated with the cliffs Dverghamrar indicate a tendency of probability. The boulders [‘Dwarf-Cliffs’] near the waterfall Foss á worshipped by Eyvindr in Flateyjardalr might Síðu in Southern Iceland and the boulder be a case in point that lack of elaboration Dvergasteinn [‘Dwarf-Stone’] on the northern could be due to an implied reference to a pre- shore of the Seyðisfjörður in Eastern Iceland. existing tradition – be it a tradition about Such modern parallels to Eyvindr’s cult of the Eyvindr specifically (which would give the Gunnsteinar boulders could be taken to account ‘specific truth’ in the sense of the suggest (though they do not prove) that this classification proposed in Figure 1) or about tradition could be historically correct (Figure pre-conversion pagans more generally (which 1, squares III and IV). Or, if it is not would put the account into the slot of ‘general historically correct, that it does at least seem truth’). to have been invented in accordance with To conclude, it might furthermore be current folk belief (Figure 1, squares I and II). mentioned that ‘lack of elaboration’ as an Another example of the possible applications indicator could also be inverted. Thus, one of comparisons with modern folklore is could argue that the more elaborate an provided by the floating church bell of Ørlygr account becomes, the more questionable its Hrappsson, already discussed above apropos individual details may be. As a case in point, Indicator 4 (‘non-Icelandic literary sources’). one could quote the ‘blood’-spattered In this story, during the settler’s voyage to sacrificial boulder on Þórsnes that has been Iceland, a church bell is transported in the discussed above in the context of Indicator 5, settler’s ship. Before the settler reaches his the landscape context: this boulder is a destined place of settlement, this bell falls colourful element of a very detailed account overboard, but instead of being lost, it is – and almost certainly does not reflect any against all probability – found lying on the ‘historical truth’, be it general or specific (cf. shore by the settler’s final place of settlement. Figure 1). This makes one wonder whether What is noteworthy about this account from one should in general be wary of any account the perspective of the folkloric record is that which is too good at putting flesh on its sunken church bells are a rather well-attested narrative bones: after more than two centuries motif in Swedish folk legends – but in none of of (probably predominantly oral) transmission, these folk legends do such church bells float, anything which presents us with more than and in fact most of these legends emphasise

88 the impossibility of bringing the sunken bell conclusions which are substantially back to the surface (af Klintberg 2010, legend strengthened by the combination of several types U71–77, 81–90). This negative evidence such indicators of probability. might be taken to indicate that the motif of the Retrospective questions are certainly not floating church bell might not be an the only ones which can and should be established Norse one – an idea which applied to Landnámabók; one might, to pick correlates very well with the above-mentioned just one example, perhaps think of the fact that it has direct parallels in Irish geocritical approaches of Robert T. Tally and hagiography. In this way, the negative Bertrand Westphal as alternative ways of evidence of Scandinavian folklore further approaching this work, ways which do not supports the conclusion that the motif of the primarily focus on the question of its ‘truth’ floating church bell in Ørlygr Hrappsson’s (Westphal 2011; Tally 2011; Tally 2013; settlement account indicates that it does not Egeler 2015). Given that the extant recensions represent a ‘historical truth’ (Figure 1, squares of Landnámabók are separated from the III and IV). Settlement Period by some four centuries, a In sum, it can thus be postulated that retrospective approach might arguably not folkloric comparisons can be applied to even be the approach most appropriate to its Landnámabók anecdotes in two ways: specific character as a high medieval work of positively, as indicators of the (at least literature. Yet if one wants to appreciate folkloric) accuracy of Landnámabók material, Landnámabók fully, then retrospective and negatively as indicators of a lack of questions – whatever their place may be in the historical value (cf. Frog 2013: 113). overall picture – should not be discounted entirely. The claim to relay a (historical? Concluding Remarks folkloric?) ‘truth’ about the Settlement Period I hope that others will be able to add to this is at the core of Landnámabók. If one wants provisional list of methodological questions, to do justice to this text, one has to take this the aim of which is to help in assessing the claim seriously – not in the sense that one historical reliability of religious motifs in would necessarily have to believe in the Landnámabók. Any such additions would be factual truth of Landnámabók, but in the particularly valuable given that indicators sense that one should weigh and confront its such as the ones proposed here for the most claim to truth, whatever the result of this part provide nothing more than tendencies of confrontation may be. From a certain point of probability and therefore should, as far as view, it is just as interesting when it can be possible, always be used cumulatively – and plausibly shown that Landnámabók is the more indicators that can be accumulated, historically inaccurate as when it can be the better. That such a cumulative use is both plausibly shown that it is historically, or at possible and meaningful is, for instance, least folklorically, truthful. On one level, it illustrated by the settlement account of Ørlygr may, admittedly, seem more illuminating that Hrappsson just mentioned above. In the Eyvindr’s cult of boulders is likely to be preceding pages, this account has been ‘true’ (at least when taken with a folkloric discussed under the headings of three grain of salt) than that Landnámabók’s claims indicators: Indicators 3 (‘historical accounts’), about the existence of pagan temple buildings 4 (‘non-Icelandic literary sources’), and 9 appear to be blatantly historically untrue. But (‘folkloristic comparisons’). This illustrates on another level, the latter point contains just the possibility to correlate different indicators as much insight as the former; it is, after all, and to use them cumulatively; and it should neither trivial nor can it be taken for granted be noted in particular that all three indicators that Icelandic cultural memory (at least as it is suggest essentially the same (negative) represented in Landnámabók) assimilated assessment for the historical authenticity of pagan cult practice to the practice of the the settlement story of Ørlygr Hrappsson. This Christian church rather than stylising it as suggests that these indicators consistently something completely alien and condemning point towards the same conclusions – it as devil-worship. Therefore, negative

89 answers to the retrospective question of the Iceland, have been far beyond the reach of both the ‘truth’ of an account also further our control and the expertise of the Church hierarchy. Their religious life might therefore easily have been understanding of Icelandic religious history, far removed from what a trained priest in the and not necessarily just in a negative way. British Isles might have considered good Christian Matthias Egeler (Matthias.Egeler[at]daad-alumni.de), practice, be it in terms of liturgy or of cosmological Institut für Nordische Philologie, Ludwig- ideas. Or to put it differently: it is one thing if a Maximilians-Universität München, Geschwister- settler decided to call himself or herself a Scholl-Platz 1, 80539 München, Germany. ‘Christian’, but it might have been a different thing entirely whether this self-proclaimed and un- Acknowledgements: This research was supported by a supervised Christianity would have been accepted th Marie Curie Intra European Fellowship within the 7 as ‘properly Christian’ by a Church representative European Community Framework Programme. outside of Iceland. Thinking along these lines, one Furthermore, it is a pleasant obligation to acknowledge might even wonder whether the later paganization Frog’s patient support and rich advice, which has of Auðr’s Christian place of prayer at Krosshólar greatly improved this article. could not have been a direct continuation of tendencies already inherent in whatever exactly was Notes Auðr’s practice of worship at this site. (Though, of 1. Cf. Egeler 2014: 54–56 with n. 8 on the different course, this is pure speculation.) versions of the identification of Auðun the 7. Cf. Sayers (1994: 132f., 138, 145f., 149), who Stutterer’s father-in-law in S81 and H71. interprets the reference to papar [‘(Christian) 2. Cf. Jón Hnefill Aðalsteinsson (1999: 146): priests’] at the beginning of Landnámabók as well “Landnámabók is by nature largely a folkloristic as later references to Christian settlers in this way work.” as typological antecedent and precedent of the later 3. Cf. however the recent interpretation of a pit house Christianisation of Iceland. in South-Eastern Iceland as a cult building (Bjarni 8. Sveinbjörn Rafnsson (2001: 615) argues that Helgi’s F. Einarsson 2008; rejected by Milek 2012: 92f.). ‘Christianisation’ does have a function within the Of course Landnámabók’s mentions of ‘temples’ broader Christian framework of Landnámabók, could reflect real memories of the establishment of forming part of an attempt to integrate the history cult sites which have been recast on the basis of of Iceland into the wider framework of the medieval Christian understandings of what a cult Christian history of salvation. If this is so, however, site should look like (i.e. equivalent to a church-like it is striking indeed just how little effort the building). This, however, can not be verified, nor passages about Helgi put into highlighting such an would such an inference have an appreciable agenda. I would argue that Helgi’s Christian faith is information content, since it can be assumed as a mentioned so much in passing that it does not even matter of course that there were cult sites of some make a noteworthy contribution to such a salvific description scattered across the whole of Iceland. agenda. 4. As an aside it might be mentioned that this example 9. Recently cf. on the use of folkloristic sources more also illustrates both the value and the limitations of generally Heide & Bek-Pedersen 2014; Sävborg & sacral toponyms as sources for religious history Bek-Pedersen 2014. (Indicator 2). 5. It might be worth mentioning that instances of a Works Cited mythologization of the Icelandic landscape are very Sources common in Landnámabók (as well as in other Eyrbyggja saga = Einar Ól. Sveinsson & Matthías genres of Icelandic literature). The best-known Þórðarson 1935. instances probably are the cliffs and mountains that, Kjalnesinga saga = Jóhannes Halldórsson 1959. like Helgafell on Snæfellsnes, are conceptualized as Landnámabók = Jakob Benediktsson 1968; English dwelling-places of the dead (Landnámabók S68, 85, translation = Hermann Pálsson & Edwards 1972. 97, 197; cf. Mayburd 2014; Heizmann 2007). Thus, Laxdœla saga = Einar Ól. Sveinsson 1934. the tale of Auðun and his lake-horse is of interest both as an instance of a narrative based on an Irish prototype and as an example of a broader pattern in Literature Adolf Friðriksson & Kristján Eldjárn. 2000. Kuml og the Icelandic treatment of the relationship between nd the supernatural and the landscape in which the haugfé úr heiðnum sið á Íslandi. 2 edn., rev. by former is ‘inscribed’ into the latter. Arguably, this Adolf Friðriksson. Reykjavík: Mál og Menning. act of ‘inscribing’ supernatural meaning into the Ahola, Joonas, & Frog. 2014. “Preface: The Project, landscape reflects an Icelandic understanding of the Goals, Methods and Outcomes”. In Fibula, Fabula, relationship between the settlers and the land in Fact – The Viking Age in Finland. Studia Fennica which the latter becomes a space that is imbued Historica 18. Ed. Joonas Ahola & Frog with Clive with otherworldly properties (cf. Mayburd 2014; Tolley. Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society. Pp. 8–16. Egeler 2015). Bjarni F. Einarsson. 2008. “Blót Houses in Viking Age 6. It might be worth noting as an aside that such Norse Farmstead Cult Practices. New Findings from converts would, after moving to largely-pagan

90

South Eastern Iceland”. Acta Archaeologica 79: Jakob Benediktsson. 1966–1969. “Landnámabók: 145–184. Some Remarks on Its Value as a Historical Böldl, Klaus. 2011. “Auszüge aus dem ‘Buch der Source”. Saga-Book 17: 275–292. Landnahmen’”. In Isländersagas: Texte und Kontexte. Jakob Benediktsson (ed.). 1968. Íslendingabók: Ed. Klaus Böldl, Andreas Vollmer & Julia Zernack. Landnámabók. Íslenzk Fornrit 1. Reykjavík: Hið Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer. Pp. 230–257. Íslenzka Fornritafélag. Brink, Stefan. 2007. “How Uniform Was the Old Norse Jóhannes Halldórsson (ed.). 1959. Kjalnesinga saga. Religion?” In Learning and Understanding in the Íslenzk Fornrit 14. Reykjavík: Hið Íslenzka Old Norse World. Ed. J. Quinn et al. Medieval Fornritafélag. Texts and Cultures of Northern Europe 18. Jón Hnefill Aðalsteinsson. 2005. “Þórsnes”. In Turnhout: Brepols. Pp. 105–136. Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde XXX. Collingwood, W.G., & Jón Stefánsson. 1899. A Comprehensively revised and expanded edn. Ed. Pilgrimage to the Saga-Steads of Iceland. Heinrich Beck, Dieter Geuenich & Heiko Steuer. Ulverston: W. Holmes. Berlin / New York: Walter de Gruyter. Pp. 498–501. Egeler, Matthias. 2014. “Horses, Lakes, and Heroes: Jón Hnefill Aðalsteinsson. 1999. Under the Cloak: A Landnámabók S83, Vǫlsunga saga 13, and the Grey Pagan Ritual Turning Point in the Conversion of of Macha”. Viking and Medieval Scandinavia 10: Iceland. 2nd expanded edn. Ed. Jakob S. Jónsson. 53–63. Appendix trans. Terry Gunnell. Reykjavík: Egeler, Matthias. 2015 (forthcoming). “Reading Sacred Háskólaútgáfan – Félagsvísindastofnun. Places: , the Icelandic Book of af Klintberg, Bengt. 2010. The Types of the Swedish Settlements, and the History of Religions”. Folk Legend. FF Communications 300. Helsinki: Philology 1. Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Einar Ól. Sveinsson (ed.). 1934. Laxdœla saga: Laur, Wolfgang. 2001. Germanische Heiligtümer und Halldórs Þættir Snorrasonar: Stúfs Þáttr. Íslenzk Religion im Spiegel der Ortsnamen. Schleswig- Fornrit 5. Reykjavík: Hið Íslenzka Fornritafélag. Holstein, nördliches Niedersachsen und Dänemark. Einar Ól. Sveinsson & Matthías Þórðarson (eds.). 1935. Kieler Beiträge zur Deutschen Sprachgeschichte 21. Eyrbyggja saga: Brands þáttr ǫrva: Eiríks saga Neumünster: Wachholtz Verlag. rauða: Grœnlendinga saga: Grœnlendiga þáttr. Mayburd, Miriam. 2014. “The Hills have Eyes: Post- Íslenzk Fornrit 4. Reykjavík: Hið Íslenzka Mortem Mountain Dwelling and the (Super)Natural Fornritafélag. Landscape in the Íslendingasögur”. Viking and Frog. 2013. “The Parallax Approach. Situating Medieval Scandinavia 10: 129–154. Traditions in Long-Term Perspective”. In Milek, Karen. 2012. “The Roles of Pit Houses and Approaching Methodology. 2nd revised edn. Ed. Gendered Spaces on Viking-Age Farmsteads in Frog & Pauliina Latvala with Helen F. Leslie. Iceland”. Medieval Archaeology 56: 85–130. Annales Academiae Scientiarum Fennicae Müller-Wille, Michael. 1968/1969. “Bestattung im Humaniora 368. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Boot: Studien zu einer nordeuropäischen Fennica. Pp. 99–129. Grabsitte”. Offa 25/26: 1–203. Frog. 2014. “Germanic Traditions of the Theft of the Roberts, Howell. Dec/Jan 2008/2009. “Journey to the Thunder-Instrument (ATU 1148b): An Approach to Dead. The Litlu-Núpar Boat Burial”. Current Þrymskviða and Þórr’s Adventure with Geirrøðr in World Archaeology 32: 36–41. Circum-Baltic Perspective”. In Heide & Bek- Sävborg, , & Karen Bek-Pedersen (eds.). 2014. Petersen 2014: 120–162. Folklore in Old Norse – Old Norse in Folklore. G sli Sigurðsson. 2014. “Constructing a Past to Suit the Nordistica Tartuensia 20. Tartu: Tartu University Present: Sturla Þórðarson on Conflicts and Press. Alliances with King Haraldr hárfagri”. In Minni Sayers, William. 1994. “Management of the Celtic Fact and Muninn: Memory in Medieval Nordic Culture. in Landnámabók”. Scandinavian Studies 66: 129–153. Ed. Pernille Hermann, Stephen A. Mitchell & Simek, Rudolf. 1995. Lexikon der germanischen Agnes S. Arnórsdóttir. Acta Scandinavica 4. Mythologie. 2nd expanded edn. Kröners Turnhout: Brepols. Pp. 175–196. Taschenausgabe 368. Stuttgart: Alfred Kröner. Heide, Eldar, & Karen Bek-Pedersen (eds.). 2014. New Simek, Rudolf. 2003. Religion und Mythologie der Focus on Retrospective Methods. FF Germanen. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buch- Communications 307. Helsinki: Academia gesellschaft. Scientiarum Fennica. Sveinbjörn Rafnsson. 2001. “Landnámabók”. In Heizmann, W. 2007. “Totenberg”. In Reallexikon der Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde XVII. Germanischen Altertumskunde XXXV. Compre- Comprehensively revised and expanded edn. Ed. hensively rev. and expanded edn. Ed. Heinrich Heinrich Beck, Dieter Geuenich & Heiko Steuer. Beck, Dieter Geuenich & Heiko Steuer. Berlin / Berlin / New York: Walter de Gruyter. Pp. 611–617. New York: Walter de Gruyter. Pp. 186–189. Tally, Robert T. Jr. 2013. Spatiality. London / New Hermann Pálsson & Paul Edwards (eds. & trans.). 1972 York: Routledge. (repr. 2012). The Book of Settlements – Tally, Robert T. Jr. (ed.). 2011. Geocritical Landnámabók. University of Manitoba Icelandic Explorations. Space, Place, and Mapping in Studies 1. Winnipeg, Manitoba: University of Literary and Cultural Studies. New York: Palgrave Manitoba Press. Macmillan.

91

Turville-Petre, G. 1963. “A Note on the Landdísir”. In Wellendorf, Jonas. 2010. “The Interplay of Pagan and Early English and Norse Studies: Presented to Christian Traditions in Icelandic Settlement Hugh Smith in Honour of his Sixtieth Birthday. Ed. Myths”. Journal of English and Germanic Arthur Brown & Peter Foote. London: Methuen. Philology 109: 1–21. Pp. 196–201. Westphal, Bertrand. 2011 [first paperback edn. 2015]. de Vries, Jan. 1956–1957. Altgermanische Religions- Geocriticism. Real and Fictional Spaces. Trans. geschichte I–II. Grundriß der Germanischen Robert T. Tally Jr. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Philologie 12. 2nd rev. edn. Berlin: Walter de Young, Jean. 1937. “Some Icelandic Traditions Gruyter & Co. Showing Traces of Irish Influence”. Études Celtiques 3: 118–126.

Baptizing Soviet Children in Contemporary Rural Narratives Nadezhda Rychkova, Russian State University for the Humanities

Abstract: This paper presents field-work based research on performed in the Soviet Union, especially during the Khrushchev anti-religious campaign. It focuses on the phenomenon of religion being shifted from the public to the private sphere and also addresses the tensions that arose when religion was again returned to the public sphere in the Post-Soviet period. The social, political and religious paradigms happened in the Post-Soviet period, when of Russian society have changed considerably sanctioned authorities of the Church were across the 20th century. Many discussions in introduced into the local communities where RMN Newsletter that address religions take up the domestic form of religion had developed. traditions in the remote past and one concern This discussion is a case study of a that arises is how vernacular religion adapted historically and culturally bound example of or was displaced in historical processes of religious change. More specifically, it is a conversion to Christianity. The present article study of what happens when social religion treats quite a different, if related, theme: it becomes constrained to the private sphere, looks at the adaptation and displacement of and when local or domestic adaptations of Christianity under an alternative ideology religion are confronted with sanctioned advocating . A process of secular- authorities of an institutionalized Church. It is ization – or at least religion moved away from hoped that this case will also be of analogical the center of social life – undoubtedly interest for researchers concerned with other accompanied urbanization and education that periods and religions where only limited transformed a large segment of the population evidence is available for the mechanisms of during the 1920s and 1930s. In November religious change from the perspective of those 1937, the Bolsheviks publicly declared that confronted by hegemonic authority. one-third of the rural population and two- thirds of the urban population – less than half Methods and Fieldwork of all Soviet citizens – had become atheists. The formation and evolution of these With the annulment of religion as a system of religious practices and the narratives about beliefs, society therefore needed new them are approached through folklore explanatory models beginning already early in materials. These are addressed and analyzed the Soviet Period (Groh 1992). As a through folkloristic and anthropological consequence, new ritual practices appeared methods. The research material consists of and old ones changed. The present paper deals fieldwork data that the research expedition of with the case of baptism. It is dedicated to the Centre for Typological and Semiotic Folklore question of how Orthodox rituals managed to Studies (Russian State University for the survive in the everyday life of the Soviet Humanities) has gathered in several villages Union while they were being publicly in the Ukrainian Enclave of the Saratov suppressed by the atheist propaganda. It will Region. This fieldwork was done in the examine how they were adapted and village of Samoilovka and in several villages performed in this social environment. near it during 2012–2014. Ukrainians Consideration will then be given to what migrated to this region in the middle of the

92

18th century. Descendants of these migrants priests and their relationship with the people maintain a local ethnic identity: they call in this period (e.g. Shkarovskii 1995; 2000; themselves Khokhol and refer to their dialect Marchenko 2007; Shlihta 2012), but these as Khoklyachy or Khokhlatsky – a dialect of topics remain beyond the scope of the present Ukrainian. Some archaic traits have been paper. Work has also been done on the preserved in the folk culture of these people. domestic religious life of people during the For the present paper, we made nearly one Soviet period. For example, Irina Paert (2004) hundred interviews about the baptism of discusses how Old Believers in the Urals children in the 1950s and during years of the maintained religious identity. Elena era of the Khrushchev anti-religious campaign, Levkievskaya (2013; 2014) examines sacral the peak of which was in 1958–1964. The specialists in the Ukrainian Enclave of Khrushchev anti-religious campaign was Saratov Region who baptized children, carried out by the mass closing of churches performed funeral rites, sanctified water and and monasteries. The campaign also included sanctified the food at Easter. The present a restriction of parental rights for teaching paper extends these discussions on the basis religion to children, as well as a ban on the of recent fieldwork. presence of children at church services. The social attitudes produced by this environment Babushki as a Substitute for the Priest varied depending on the person and the place, Consequences of the anti-religious campaign but it could produce social pressure even on were that the churches were closed in these any explicit expression of religious identity. villages and there was a lack of priests to For example, some of our informants recalled perform rituals characteristic of Christian teachers’ responses to the wearing of a cross religious practice. This created the funda- in the context of the Soviet atheist education:1 mental question of who should take on that role if the ritual were to be performed. Меня в школе чуть не задушили According to the memories of our крестиком, щас ўси крэсты носють, а тоди тико мы носили, отэц нам начипляў. informants, there were several ‘sacral И она як тяγла, учительница, у мэнэ аж specialists’ who took over the role of the пина з γрудив шла, чуть нэ задушила. priests in this district. These people performed (Inf#7.) essential activities to meet the religious needs of the people. They baptized children, I was almost strangled with the cross at school. These days everybody wears a cross, performed funeral rites, sanctified water and but in those days, we were the only ones to also the food at Easter. wear it. Our father hung crosses around our Our informants called such specialists necks. The teacher pulled so hard that foam babushki [‘grandmothers’], as said, for dripped from my chest, she almost strangled example, “[они] о γу ве рили и мы им...” me. (Inf#4) [‘[they] believed in God and we believed them...’]. These were old ladies, who – Не носили крестик? perhaps had worked in the local church before – А то – укра дко , пря тали. а ещ как the revolution. They had icons, some church пря тали! И до ма моли лись и вс . На books and candles. The villagers also told людя не показывали, а дома верили – about a man – one of my informants called вся семья . И ольшинство тоγда все him a pop [‘folk priest’], whereas another так и де лали. (Inf#4.) called him a yurodivy [‘strange person’ or – Didn’t you wear a cross? ‘holy fool’]. During our fieldwork expedition, – Furtively – we hid the crosses. Yes, we we interviewed people who had used the even hid them! We prayed only at home. We didn’t show people, but at home our services of ‘grandmothers’, for example in the whole family believed. Those days most baptism of their own children or of the of people did so. children of their relatives or neighbours. They had also used the services of assistants of There is a great deal of literature on both the these ‘grandmothers’ – women who had relationship between the state and the church participated in the rites many times. None of during this period and also on the work of

93 these people who performed religious rites – Церкве не ыло, как же крестили? and rituals. However, it was possible to – А-а-а, церкве не ыло. Я своего сына interview the daughter of one of the дома кре… крестила. […] Батюшки не ‘grandmothers’, who had been her assistant. ыло, а за атюшку а ушка ыла. We also had a possibility to interview one […] – Все крестили? woman (Inf#8), who was a companion of – Крестили, только активисты-коммунисты, ‘blind T.’, one of these ‘substitute priests’. они о лизывали власть, и они, The fear of dyingbecoming deceased некрещ ные у ни дети. (Inf#6.) without having been baptized is very strong in traditional culture. Death before baptism is – Were children baptized? considered to be a horrible thing because an – Certainly! – Even in the Soviet times? unbaptized child will become a restless soul. – Yes, they were. There are, in addition, traditional notions – How were they baptized? about the terrible afterlife of unbaptized – Well, in the way you baptize children. children. Informants would usually tell about – If there were no churches, how did you dreams in which they saw such an afterlife. In baptize them? these narratives, unbaptized children are – Aaah, there were no churches. I... had my described as downcast and sickly in a place son baptized at home. [...] There were no where the sun does not shine on them. priests; there were ‘grandmothers’ Furthermore, some narrative linked the lack instead of priests. of baptism with the baby’s illness, in which – Did all of the people baptize their children? case baptism appears to be regarded as a – Yes. Only the communists-activists, they healing practice: were desperate for power, and their С мужем пло о жила, он при одил children were unbaptized. пьяны , я ре енка держу так на рука , он However not all of the communists were у меня его вырвал да вот так вот в угол atheists. For example, one informant told us росил. После этого он стал олеть, ну я смотрю, делать нечего. Позвала П., С., that the godfather of her child was the village а ушка крестила его, ну по всем council chief (predsedatel’ sel’skogo soveta). правилам дома. (Inf#2.) In spite of that, almost all of the women stressed that they baptized their children It was not a good life with my husband. He secretly, and sometimes even their husbands came [home] drunk. I carry the baby in my arms, he snatches it out from my hands and did not know about it: throws it into the corner. After that he [the Inf#3: А уло то ищо, мы же ўти аря, baby] fell sick, I understood there was ўти аря издыли потом рыстыть [...] nothing I could do, so I called for P., S., Inf#5: С Яловатки оγомольны како -т grandmother baptized him at home, старик. according to all the rules. Inf#3: Вин прие ал… и рэстыл, и мине For these people, it is reasonable to say that сказалы, вин ще у нас ув и я γо пид ватыла, ни уло новинькаγо, я на the baptism of children was considered велосипед села, ключ нашла, открыла, obligatory even in the Soviet times. And this шо новинька надеть на γо. А rite was supported owing to so-called Сер жку в Ялань возылы, тож вин нэ grandmothers who were the bearers of the зна, а этоγо тута рэстылы, а γо Т. cultural memory. [первы секретарь РК КПСС (1957– This situation is explained in the following 1962)] и вызав: ‘Ты че, — кажэ, — interview: рэстишь дете ?’ А мы тэ е ще и тоγо, коньяк ув, понэмножку выпылы тут, – ете раньше крестили? шо , то кума та ще нэ знаю то, и – О язательно. тэ и оставылы, а ты кажэшь: ‘Чо эт – аже в советское время? таке ты пидносышь мэнэ?’ А я кажу: – Крестили. ‘Та за здоровье С.’. (Inf#3.) – А как крестили? – Ну как крестят.

94

Inf#3 (wife): And once, we went to baptize a – Ну не таз, а... ыла такая ну child in secret. специальная, вот держали, в не уже Inf#5 (husband): There was a pious man in не ель не стиралось, ничего, чистую Yalovatka. посуду держали такую. Вот. И эта Inf#3: He came and performed the baptism. когда крестить, вода, о ыкновенно And somebody told me, he was at our воды наливали, т пло воды и home. And I took my child, he did not погружали ре нка. have new clothes. I got on a bicycle, – И чего говорили? found a key, opened [the door] to put – Ну, это уж я не знаю, а уш… some new clothes on him. We took S. to [смеется], а ушка читала молитвы. Я Y., he did not know anything either, but эти уже не запомню, конечно. he was baptized there. And T.* called for – А когда крестила ре енка, она сколько him and asked, ‘Why do you baptize молитв читала? children?’ And we would give you, there – О , много, вот, много молитв, не так, was cognac, we drank a little there for что вот раз-раз и вс . (Inf#8.) the... and godmother and I do not know – Did you see how she baptized? who else and left you something, and you – Yes, she dipped the child into water. said, ‘What is it that you are offering Usually I acted as a godmother because me?’ And I said ‘To the health of S.’ people were afraid to invite outsiders. * The first secretary of the district Committee of the Sometimes the baptism was conducted Communist party of the Soviet Union (1957–1962). without the husband even knowing about So, the closure of churches and the traditional it. idea that it is necessary to baptize children led – Tell me, how did the grandmothers baptize? Did they take some washbasin to the emergence of a local religious ‘insti- with water? tution’. Women, who were called ‘babushki’, – Well, not a washbasin, but... they had served people at home. some special bowl that was not used for washing clothes any more, but was just a Baptizing at Home clean vessel. That’s it. And when it was The circumstances of the anti-religious time to baptize, water, they poured in environment prompted a transformation of ordinary water, warm water, and dipped church rituals into domestic rituals. The the child into it. Church does allow baptism rituals to be – And what did they say? performed by laymen under special – Well, I don’t know that, grandm... [laughs] circumstances. This is a formally prescribed grandmother was saying prayers. I can’t practice in which it is necessary to immerse a remember those, of course. child in water three times, pronounce one – And while baptizing the child, how many prayers did she say? specific prayer and hang a cross around the – Oh, a lot, well, a lot of prayers, it was not child’s neck. Before the Soviet times such like only one or two. ritual was used only if a child was in danger. If a child was still alive in the morning, he Our informants emphasized that every would then be carried to the church and a grandmother did everything correctly, like in priest would administer sacraments without church. For example: dipping the child into water. ‘Grandmothers’ – И а ушку домо приγласила, она вс kept up orthodox rituals during the anti- сво со рала, святая вода что religious period. Informant #8 explained о язательно ыла, а она перекрестила. about the home baptizing rituals as follows: – А а ушка тазик свято воды налила и туда окунула? – А вы видели, как она крестила? – Е вс приγотовили: и воду, и тазик – и – а, как же, в воду погружала. вс е приγотовили, а читать, по- Большинство я крестная ыла, потому церковному она знает. Почитала, что рать со стороны оялися. аже перекрестила, завернула в пел нки – и крестили, что ы муж ни знал. ре нок крещ ны . (Inf#6.) – Расскажите: дома крестили, рали како -то таз с водо …

95

– I invited home a grandmother. She brought grandmother would hang a cross (which had her own things. Holy Water had to be to be provided by the parents) around the there, and she would christen [the baby]. child’s neck. – The grandmother poured holy water into the bowl and dipped [the baby] in it? Remembering Domestic Rituals – She prepared everything: the water and the We should pay close attention to the fact that bowl, and she knows how to prepare the details are not consistent between the them and how to say [the prayers] according to the Church’s way She read, interviews and sometimes the accounts seem crossed the baby, wrapped him up in a to contradict one another. The memory of cloth – and the child had been baptized. informants is inevitably selective. Leaving aside the question of how and with what – Церкве не ыло, а как же тогда дете degree of accuracy the ‘grandmothers’ крестили? remembered what had been practiced in the – Крестили, эта ыла нас в Еловатке одна Church, it can be said that the informants were а ушка, М., на дому […] of a generation that no longer remembered the – И она сама крестила детишек? authentic Church rituals. They could – И крестила дете , да. remember only those details which were of – А как крестила, в воду окунала? great importance to them and to their family – а, поставит тазик среди комнаты и крестны с крестно одят, она там history. For example, one informant whose молитву читает. (Inf#1.) child died young remembered only one episode from the description of the whole –If there were no churches, so how were the ritual. This was the episode in which the children baptized? length of her child’s life was predicted: – They were baptized, there was a grandmother in Yelovatka, M., she – А что она делала? Как она делала? baptized them at home. – Ни знаю, я ни присутствовала – So she baptized the kids herself? – Нельзя ыло родителям? – Right, she baptized the children. – Нет, родители нет – How? Did she dip them into water? – Только с крестными? – Yes, she would put a basin in the centre of – Только там крестные ыли, да. Ну the room, the godparents would walk волосики там отрезала, ч -то, куда-то around it while she was saying a prayer. с воском, а е видно ыло, видно, тоγда, сколько жизнь его. The ‘grandmothers’ clearly upheld the ritual – Как это видно? practice of baptism in the community and – А всегда так делается, не знаю как. they were viewed as performing these (Inf#2.) practices precisely as they were required and done by a priest in a church. The descriptions, – What did she do? How did she do it? – I don't know, I was not there. however, do not seem to reflect the layman’s – Was it prohibited for parents to be there? form of baptism prescribed by the Church, – Yes, they should not be there. nor do they necessarily correspond to the – Only the godparents? rituals performed by priests when the religion – Only the godparents were there, yes. Well, was still openly practiced. By comparing a they cut the hair, and did something with number of these narratives, it becomes the wax, and she saw it, saw how long his possible to reconstruct the domestic ritual of life would be. baptism, or at least its principle features. – How could she see it? According to the narratives, it appears that all – It is always done like that, I do not know ‘grandmothers’ sought to imitate the church how. rituals as well as they could remember and This example is interesting because the part of perform them. They dipped children into the ritual that the informant remembers is water, cut their hair, godparents walked from the folk tradition, a practice of telling around the basin, and by touching the baby fortunes with wax, and had no place in with holy water, they may have imitated the Church rituals. immersion. At the end of baptism, the

96

According to the informant's memories, out of the domestic sphere into the official some grandmothers only sprinkled the child sphere of Church authority. The Church with water rather than dipping him or her into advocated that the domestic baptisms should water during a domestic ritual. As in one of be annulled and people should be re-baptized the examples quoted above, some informants by sanctioned priests. However, the domestic remembered that holy water should be used. rituals were considered fully binding and In the rural folk tradition, holy water has effective for the local villagers (who were miraculous properties. It is used, for example, roughly in their sixties and seventies). They to cure the evil eye. Though according to did not accept the Church’s idea. Church rules, the water is sanctified during The collision between official views and the rite, the use of different holy water such as those of the local inhabitants was bound up holy water for the Epiphany is not allowed. with social memory and the anxieties in the Tradition bearers believe in the healing folk tradition concerning what would happen properties of such holy water. Our informants to those who would not receive baptism in the seemed in general to believe that the church. The most common alternative points ‘grandmothers’ used holy water in the of view are: baptism ritual. It is uncertain whether these 1. The domestic rite received in the Soviet ‘religious specialists’ considered the use of years is validated by the official church. holy water obligatory. Informant #8 told that the grandmother ‘blind T.’ used ordinary 2. The person baptized during the Soviet years water. It could be that her mother knew the must go to the church and the priest will administer the sacrament of anointing. prayer for sanctifying water and said it during the rite. However, it seems unlikely that they 3. The person must be baptized in the church would distinguish between holy water for again. baptism and holy water blessed for use in Regarding view (1), I would like to underline other ritual contexts, as prescribed by the that holy water is considered necessary for the Church. baptism to be official in narratives that retell a The informants stressed that saying prayers priest’s opinion. View (2) acknowledges that is the main part of baptism. All of the the domestic baptism has validity, but asserts villagers mentioned several prayers. They that there is a need for the Church to further seemed to feel that a lot of spiritual texts had authenticate the baptism. This view never- to be said for the baptism to seem correct. On theless implies some insufficiency in the the other hand, no one remembered which domestic baptism from the perspective of the prayers were said. Even the many women Church. View (3), rejects the validity of the who participated in the rite and were domestic baptisms entirely, leading to godmothers many times seemed not to controversy: remember which prayers were used. The А потом атюшка, вот открылась церковь, domestic baptism is accepted by the official атюшка говорит: ‘Перекрещива тесь, Church if one specific prayer is said, but the это неправильно, что она крестила.’ informants could not confirm that this ‘Батюшка, какая разница, молитва одна и particular prayer was used. та же, только те е теперь надо денежек отдать сколько мноγо, а тоγда…’ (Inf#9.) Today’s Priests and Yesterday’s babushka: The Fight for Memory When the church had been opened, the priest said: ‘You must be baptized again, it was not Nowadays, the situation has changed. The correct, that the grandmother baptized you.’ churches were opened once again and the ‘Father, it makes no difference. It was the priests reappeared in the villages. As a rule, same prayer. The only differences is that these priests are young. In places where now I have to pay to you a lot of money...’ informal religious authorities had been maintaining a connection with the era before In spite of the second and third official atheism, the arrival of priests led to a opinions, most of our informants are sure that collision. The religious change pushed religion the domestic baptism by grandmothers is valid, because the grandmothers believed in

97

God and maintained the villagers’ connection ‘real’ priests should now perform the Church with the religion. The folk beliefs about the services in these villages, conflict arose with specific status of the unbaptized person – that the local Church authorities at the point where his or her grave must be in specific place, their views devalued the grandmothers and prohibitions against praying for him or her, a their religious authority for the local people. terrible fate in the afterlife – determined that At the same time, and perhaps more performing baptism was essential even in the significantly, the cultural memory of these atheistist period. This ritual was supported informal religious specialists became a means due to so-called ‘grandmothers’, who were for local people to construe their own shared keepers of cultural memory. This fact is identity in contrast to that of the newcomers. reflected in their narratives, which include Thus the babushki and their rituals became a individual notions about the correct method of symbolic center that first united the identity of baptizing. Those ‘grandmothers’ are all dead local people in contrast to Soviet authority now and it was only possible to interview and the “communists-activists” who “were some of their assistants during fieldwork. desperate for power”. Later, this symbolic These assistants did not perform this ritual, center continued to function as a unifying because they used the services of center for the religious life of the community ‘grandmothers’ in Soviet times and the in the Post-Soviet era, when it set them apart churches were opened again before another from the newly-arrived authorities of the generation of ‘grandmothers’ was established. official Church. Nadezhda Rychkova (nadya.vohman[at]gmail.com), Conclusion Miusskaya Sq. 6, Moscow, GSP-3, 125993, Russia, The banning of the church rituals in the RSUH. Soviet anti-religious period produced tensions Acknowledgements: The research presented here was where the appropriate performance of the supported by grant 15-04-00482 from the Russian rituals was considered essential for the Foundations for the Humanities. welfare of individuals in the community. When the priests sanctioned by the Church Notes were not available to perform these rituals, a 1. The Ukrainian dialectal features are reflected in the new form of the ‘folk priests’, most often quotations of the spontaneous speech of our informants. Special symbols: [ў] – [у] non-syllabic, called babushki [‘grandmothers’], appeared in which is pronounced at the end of words and in the the atheistic period of the Soviet State. These beginning of words before consonants instead were overwhelmingly old ladies who had consonant [в]; [γ] – [г] fricative. good knowledge of Orthodox traditions. They performed the church rituals necessary for Works Cited people in the community, especially the Sources baptism at home. This was kept outside of the Inf#1 – Informant #1, female, born 1931, Samoilovka village public sphere, where expression of religious Inf#2 – Informant #2, female, born 1933, Samoilovka faith and religious identity could be subject to village strong, negative social views. This development Inf#3 – Informant #3, female (wife of informant #3), is a testament to the emotional investment that born 1927, Samoilovka village people have in particular religious practices Inf#4 – Informant #4, female, born 1934, Samoilovka village and the adaptability of those practices even Inf#5 – Informant #5, male (husband of informant #3), when people are pressured to abandon them. born 1925, Samoilovka village All of the grandmothers who took up the Inf#6 – Informant #6, female, born 1923, Samoilovka officiating duties of absent priests are now village dead. Nevertheless, their acts and significance Inf#7 – Informant #7, female, born 1940, Samoilovka village survives in cultural memory. The regard for Inf#8 – Informant #8, female, born 1928, Samoilovka their significance and the authority of the village rituals they performed led to conflicts Inf#9 – Informant #9, female, born 1936, Ol’shanka between members of the community and the village priests sanctioned by the Church. When these

98

Literature Paert, Korovushkina I. 2004. “Memory and Survival in Groh, Dieter. 1992. “Die verschwörungstheoretische Stalin’s Russia: Old Believers in Ural during the Versuchung: Why Do Bad Things Happen to Good 1930s–50s”. In On Living through Soviet Russia. People?”. In Anthropologische Dimensionen der Ed. Daniel Bertaux, Paul Thompson & Anna Geschichte. ed. Dieter Groh. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp, Rotkirch. London / New York: Routledge. Pp. 195– 1992. Pp. 267–304. 214. Levkievskaya E.E. 2013. “Svjatochnaya I pashalnaya Shkarovskii M.V. 1995. “Russkaya Pravoslavnaya obryadnost ukraintsev Samoilovskogo raiona tserkov v 1943–1964 godah: ot peremiriya k voine” Saratovskoi oblasti” [‘Rites of Christmas Time and [‘The Russian Orthodox Church and the Soviet Easter of the Ukrainians of the Samoilovskii State in 1943–1964 Years: From Truce to War’]. District of the Saratov Region’]. Zhivaya Starina SPb, Dean-Adia-M, 1995. (2013)4. Shkarovskii M.V. 2000. Russkaya Pravoslavnaya Levkievskaya E.E. 2014. “‘Prosto nesli veru tserkov pri Staline I Khruscheve gosudarstvenno- khristianskuyu v massy…’ (sakralnyie cpetsialisty tserkovnyie otnosheniya v 1939–1964 godah [‘The v ukrainskom anklave Saratovskoi oblasti)” Russian Orthodox Church in the Era of Stalin and [‘“They Simply Were Bringing Christian Faith in Khruschev (The Relationship between the State and Mass...” (Sacral Specialists in the Ukrainian the Church in the USSR in 1939–1964)’]. Мoskva: Enclave of the Saratov Region)’]. Zhivaya Starina Krutitskoie patriarshee podvorie; obschestvo 2014(4): 50–53. lubitelei tserkovnoi istirii. Marchenko A.N. 2007. “Khruschevskaya tserkovnaya Shlihta N. 2012. “‘Ot traditsii k sovremennosti’: reforma”: ocherki tserkovno-gosudarstvennyh pravoslavnaya obryadnost’ I prazdniki v usloviyah otnoshenii ((1958–1964) (po materialam arhivov antireligiznii bor’by (na materialah Ukrainskoi Uralskogo regiona) [‘“The Reform of the Church SSR, 1950–1960-e gody” [‘“From Tradition to of Kruschev”: An Essay on the Relationship Contemporary”: Orthodox Rites and Holidays between the State and the Church (1958–1964) (On during Anti-Religion Fight (On Materials from the Materials from Archives of Ural Region)’]. Perm: Ukrainian SSR, 1950–1960)’]. Gosudarstvo – Izdatelstvo Permskogo Universiteta. Religiya – Tserkov 2012(3–4): 380–408.

99

REVIEW ARTICLES AND RESEARCH REPORTS

Meta-Mythology and Academic Discourse Heritage Frog, University of Helsinki

Across the past few years and in a number of (Lotman & Uspenskii 1976), which enables it different contexts, I have touched on the to become emotionally invested (Doty 2000: phenomenon that I describe as ‘meta- 55‒58). This may be in an environment where mythology of academic discourse heritage’, the symbols are consciously contested or but I have not offered a focused presentation where they generally function unconsciously. of my approach to it. Between Text and This definition of ‘myth’ removes the popular Practice: Mythology, Religion and Research deictic bias that ‘myth’ is a false under- seems an appropriate venue for a preliminary standing from the perspective of ‘truth’, introduction to this topic. I will thus briefly ‘science’ or a status quo (cf. Kuhn 1970: 2): outline ‘meta-mythology’ and ‘discourse myth is a quality of signification that determines heritage’1 as terms used in this context. Focus how we process signs regardless of their will be placed on their intersection in the relation to an objective reality. context of academic discourse in particular. Meta-mythology emerges through the mythologization of discourse about mythology. What Is Meta-Mythology? In other words, it occurs when discussion The term ‘meta-mythology’ has been subject about myths or a mythology develops distinct to diverse and inconsistent usage. These myths attached to the signifiers of mythology include macro-structures in which individual or to the mythology as a meaningful entity myths participate, deep structures or recurrent and integer addressed through discourse. patterns in culture of mythic or archetypal Meta-mythology can be classed according to quality, objectifications of mythology through one of two broad categories: emic and etic. literature and art, and so forth. These will not Emic meta-mythology emerges among be reviewed here for reasons of space. The groups for whom a mythology is already vital. present approach has evolved on the back- Understandings surrounding a variety of ground of a framework that I have been elements of mythology are indeed constructed developing for the theorization of mythology through the way that people talk about them – and an associated research methodology (see i.e. through discourse. For example, an Frog, this volume). In the present context, understanding that a particular story narrated meta-mythology is considered mythology at the opening of a charm is the ‘first’ healing about mythology. event of that type in the world is not ‘Mythology’ is approached here in terms (normally) entailed in the text; it is constructed of (often ambiguous) symbols along with the through discourse surrounding that text. The constructions and conventions with which these same is true of whole categories of texts or are combined (see pp. 35–38, this volume). genres. This is the case, for example, with This frame for mythology allows the inclusion epic traditions in which it is believed that of a broad range of integers of religious heroes and events have objective existence at practice rather than being narrowly limited to the time of narration (e.g. Honko 1998: 136), ‘stories’ and their constituent elements. and in charm traditions where it is understood ‘Myth’ is understood in terms of a quality of that one will lose the power of an incantation signification (Barthes 1972), distinguished by when communicating its text (e.g. Siikala 1991: the sign being engaged non-reflectively 197). A performative practice itself may be

100 mythologized in this way, as in the common in 17th-century Europe, that all conception that a ritual funeral lament will occult traditions ultimately derive from Ancient cause a death if performed outside of a ritual Egypt, formed no less of a meta-mythology.2 context (Stepanova & Frog, this volume). Meta-mythologies may diverge significantly However, it should be stressed that the utility from the emic traditions around which they of addressing these phenomena in terms of develop. For example, medieval Christian meta-mythology has yet to be demonstrated. meta-mythology of and There may be cases in which such a had very little connection with Muslim distinction is warranted, but emic meta- practices. Etic meta-mythologies may therefore mythology seems in general to converge with be in a variety of relationships with the the emic integer of the mythology (a charm traditions that have been mythologized. The historiola or charm whole), or to constitute a vitality of such a meta-mythology can be distinct integer of that mythology (e.g. the correlated with the degree of presumption and mythologization of lament performance). conviction that the discourse’s image of the Etic meta-mythology is the mythologization mythology and the ‘othered’ mythology itself of mythology that is somehow ‘othered’. The are, in fact, the same. mythologization of discourse surrounding an As products of discourse, etic meta- ‘othered’ mythology can be viewed as a mythologies develop at the level of process of social investment by a group in the communities and their networks. It is possible mythology as providing meaningful symbols to generalize, for example, characteristic and frames of reference for that group. This features of the medieval Christian meta- may be through appropriation as heritage and mythology of paganism in Western Europe, involve strategic action. For example, the but this is necessarily very abstract. Meta- 19th-century epic Kalevala was strategically mythologies are no more homogeneous than developed to present a unified image of any other mythologies. The meta-mythology Finnish and Karelian mythology in the wake of Scandinavian paganism current in 13th- of rising nationalism (e.g. Järvinen 2010). It century Rome would have been considerably codified the systems of symbols and their different from that of Snorri Sturluson and his entextualization which were then mythologized contemporaries in Iceland. Like Kalevala, through discourse to produce a meta- Snorri’s so-called Edda advanced and mythology: the mythology of Kalevala advocated models of an ‘othered’ mythology. became what Finns and Karelians generally, This was, however, an engagement in mythic both then and today, consider their cultural discourse (see Frog, this volume) that targeted mythology. This meta-mythology emerged as certain groups and networks, advocating the a modern mythology in the construction of interpretation of the ‘othered’ mythology as heritage. It might be described as an heritage viewed through the Christian lens of emotionally invested model of the mythology euhemerism (e.g. Wanner 2008). Edda, or at and religion of pre-Christian Finns and least elements from it, seem to have been Karelians. However, mythologization was assimilated into the local meta-mythology (cf. dependent on the cultural environment: in Frog 2011). It cannot, however, be assumed Spain, for example, Kalevala could provide that the meta-mythology evolving in relation information about a foreign mythology without to Edda penetrated significantly beyond those mythologization in local discourse. Such networks that it targeted as its audience, at processes are not dependent on nationalism: least not until much later. Variation in relation the deep-rooted presence of Scandinavian or to communities and networks produces , and so forth in potentially great differences between popular the West have enabled the development of and academic meta-mythologies. popular meta-mythologies about each of these – socially invested constructs of what these What Is Academic Discourse Heritage? mythologies and religions are, including their Every discipline develops many types of relevance and significance, that provide models heritage. One variety that is easily overlooked for understanding them. The conception, is the manifestation of discourse itself as

101 heritage. A distinctive feature of academic This can occur at many levels, including the discourse is the pervasive and ongoing images of relative authority of voices in the dialogic engagement with voices in the past. discourse (e.g. Kaarle Krohn, John McKinnell), Such engagement is most evident in the rather images of methods, theories and methodo- ritualistic ‘review of previous scholarship’ logies (see e.g. Frog 2013), images of sources that reintroduces those voices into the present and their authority (cf. Snorri Sturluson’s as a context for discussion. Engagement then Edda or Elias Lönnrot’s Kalevala in different also becomes explicit through quotations and periods), or hierarchies of authority among arguments for and against earlier (although types of sources (e.g. poetry versus prose or co-present) views, and more subtly through ‘late’ versus ‘early’), and so forth. What I citations3 and appended lists of works cited. wish to focus on here, however, is the The dialectic engagement with these voices is mythologization of the object of research and enabled by the concretization through associated interpretations in the case of publication (or archival preservation) of mythology. utterances within the discourse, and through Two points should be stressed at the outset. such engagements we “add, singly and in First, not all ‘facts’ of a discourse’s frame of combination, to the ever growing stockpile” reference are necessarily mythologized or are (Kuhn 1970: 2). I use the term discourse uniformly mythologized. Many if not most heritage to refer to the ever-accumulating ‘facts’ of the discourse frame are more or less body of concretized utterances in a discourse. critically and analytically handled units of Academic discourse of a discipline or information linked to discussions and subject operates within a contemporary problematics concerning their veracity. There framework of negotiated knowledge and is also variation within any discourse by local understandings. This might be described in and national scholarships, ‘schools’ of terms of shared sets of acknowledged ‘facts’ interpretation and so forth.4 Mythologization which are agreed to or recognized as may also not affect all participants in the contested to varying degrees (see e.g. Lotman discourse evenly – e.g. some mythologization 1990: 217ff.). Such frameworks interface with may be especially common among younger theories, methodologies and paradigms (see scholars. Second, mythologization functions e.g. Kuhn 1970; Lakatos 1980 [1978]) and are at the quality of signs, their valuation and often linked to particular registers of interpretation, irrespective of veracity. In other discourse in which the vocabulary has been words, mythologization is linked to emotional structured by the history of use and the investment and non-reflective apprehension development of distinct terminology (cf. Frog or reaction; it produces a capacity to influence with Latvala 2013: 56–58). Such shared people’s minds irrespective of cognitive value frames of reference have become a practical and utility in analysis or analytical reasoning. necessity of scientific discussion: without This process can occur equally with such a platform, it would either be necessary scientifically demonstrable claims considered to provide analytical discussions of every objectively ‘true’ as with understandings that detail in the background of an argument, or can be scientifically disproven as erroneous. there would otherwise be a levelling of the The vulnerability of academic discourse to veracity of arguments and interpretations (cf. mythologization readily links to both ‘blind 18th and 19th century discussions of spots’ and ‘core beliefs’ of the discourse. etymology, mythology, history, etc.). These Blind spots are topics or problems that have shared frames of reference in the present simply never been brought into focus, and emerge from the discourse heritage in may remain peripheral or as external frames dialectic with the views expressed by current of reference. As a consequence, they may voices. A discourse heritage anchors become generally taken for granted and can contemporary discussion by situating it in function with the quality of non-reflective relation to those discussions of the past. presumptions that would be surprising, The operation of academic discourse confusing or disruptive to challenge. A more naturally inclines toward mythologization. subtle and significant site of mythologization

102 results from emotional investment in However, this inclination of mythologization arguments and interpretations – we easily to nest in relation to a hierarchy of centrality come to love our own ideas. Although such suggests the following: the greater the arguments and interpretations may be based centrality of ‘facts’ and conceptual models on objective analysis, they also inevitably that are interfaced with these integers and engage with numerous ‘facts’ of the discourse their mythologization, the more that as the frame of reference through which they participants naturalized to them in a discourse have developed. Such primary ‘facts’ easily will collectively incline to defend said ‘facts’ become emotionally invested because of their and theories or collective ‘core beliefs’. centrality, whereby changing them would The discourse heritage in research on require that other arguments and historical cultures plays a significant if subtle interpretations dependent on them also be role in the process of mythologization in two reassessed and altered (Converse 1964: 208). key ways. First of all, and most obviously, it Mythologization especially surrounding so- is oriented to the construction and testing of called ‘core beliefs’ of a discipline or ‘facts’ in the discourse, and reviews of discourse can be viewed in this light. scholarship and citations situate each Centrality operates directionally by both utterance within that web of utterances and the number and degrees of relations that form ‘facts’ of varying degrees of centrality. networks (Converse’s ‘belief system’), and Second, and more subtly, the ‘facts’ of the these relations can be assumed to produce discourse are constructed through the claims, hierarchies, leading back to what have been arguments and interpretations of voices in that called core beliefs, or Converse’s (1964: 211) discourse and propagated through accumu- crowning postures: lating utterances. As a consequence, ‘facts’ can become removed from empirical evidence premises [that] serve as a sort of glue to bind or circulate in relation to specific evidence together many more specific attitudes and that has been interpreted and is no longer beliefs, and [that] are of prime centrality in critically reviewed. As an outcome of such the belief system as a whole. (Converse mythologization, new ‘facts’ advanced and 1964: 211.) argued within that discourse may appear, in A distinction relevant here is that between the context of other discourses or in later conceptual models or ‘beliefs’,6 which operate periods, to have suffered from empirical as theories and ‘facts’ of that discourse, and underdetermination as other ‘facts’ and motifs the signifiers that undergo mythologization. operative at the deep structure have been Such conceptual models or ‘facts’ and theories revaluated or demythologized (cf. Figure 1). interface with apprehendable symbolic integers through which they can be communicated and From Discourse Heritage to Meta- discussed – through which they manifest in Mythology discourse, socially constructing referent Academic discourse on mythology evolves a ‘facts’ and theories as well as their relative meta-mythology – a socially construed and valorization (cf. Siikala 1990: 197). Such emotionally invested model of the mythology include the Darwinian motif SURVIVAL OF THE and religion of another culture. As a FITTEST, the Marxist motif MATERIAL metasemiotic entity, ‘a mythology’ as a whole CONDITIONS DETERMINE SOCIETAL ORGANI- is readily mythologized concerning what it ZATION AND DEVELOPMENT, or hermeneutic does or does not include, whether it is motifs like FIELDWORKER AFFECTS OBSERVED presumed coherent and unified, whether its SUBJECT (on ‘symbolic integers’ and ‘motif’ documented forms are ‘authentic’ or its as used here, see pp. 38–40, this volume). ‘authentic’ form existed only before Mythologization enables such integers to Christianity and must be reconstructed, and so operate at the deep structure of a discourse forth. Insofar as these become “a set of (whether valorized or rejected with prejudice), unconsciously held, unexamined premises” although their relative centrality may vary by (Jewett & Lawrence 1977: 17) about the period, discipline and network or school. mythology of a culture or religion, they

103

the correct materials would produce a desired outcome, such as reconstructing the Urform of a story about Þórr. Such meta-mythology evolves through, and is reinforced by, the ever-accumulating discourse heritage. This process might be described metaphorically as momentum. Challenging basic conceptions or ‘core beliefs’ about ‘a mythology’ is to challenge that discourse heritage and the principles according to which it evolved: it is set in opposition to their momentum. For example, variation in mythology regionally and locally has long been acknowledged (e.g. de Vries 1956–1957). However, the principle that ‘a mythology’ was coherent and its elements had been (at some point) integrated into a system Figure 1. Gold IK 357. The process of mythologization may occur with archaeological as well has been a basis of operating principles in the as textual sources. This process has been advancing study of mythology since it developed under with the interpretation of the coin-like charms called Romanticism. Challenging this idea might from the . These are seem on the surface to be a rather simple issue normally preserved in gold and are readily linked to of only acknowledging some types of Germanic religion. Karl Hauck has advocated an interpretation of a group of these (Type C) depicting a variation or looking at a particular case in a man (or his head) and a horse or horse-like animal different way (cf. pp. 47–48, this volume). (with visually twisted forelegs) in terms of the Second However, it is actually to challenge an Merseburg Charm, in which Wodan (Odin) heals a implicit frame of reference at the basis of horse with a sprain (e.g. 1970). This interpretation research and argumentation for the vast has gained increasing acceptance. It can be viewed as in a process of mythologization as it ceases to be majority of the discourse heritage. It therefore critically reviewed and begins to be treated as an carries the threat of unravelling the whole unequivaocal point for reference when thinking about model of the mythology that has evolved Wodan/Óðinn, the Second Merseburg Charm and early through that discourse. In other words, it Germanic religion. Nonetheless, the interpretation threatens the views and understandings of remains speculative and problematic. Comparative evidence suggests, for example, that the curious mythology to which we have become position of the horse’s legs may signify bowing rather naturalized, and in which, whether we like it than injury (Beck 2003). (Illustration by the author.) or not, we have invested our ways of thinking. constitute a meta-mythology that shapes the The discourse heritage constructs images operating principles according to which of the integers of the mythology, normally in research is undertaken (cf. Kuhn 1970). relation to their sources and interpretations. Accordingly, the meta-mythology about what Images of peripheral integers of the mythology a mythology is can extend to the mytholo- that less frequently receive attention may be gization of research strategies and their affected more easily in the discourse, yet these may not undergo mythologization per potential. For example, the Romantic 5 construal that the sources produced in se, or simply remain in ‘blind spots’ of the discourse, potentially quite peripheral but Christian contexts were historically removed 7 from a coherent and authentic form of a remaining among basic operating assumptions. mythology was interfaced with the methods The meta-mythology may also simply be which could reconstruct (at least parts of) that idealized and reconstructive, so that it is not accurately representative of all or even most coherent and authentic state. In other words, 8 the implementation of methods rapidly of the traditions it is used to discuss. In other advances to the equivalent of rites in a ritual cases, the element may appear peripheral but context: it was a ‘fact’ that their appropriate actually interface with the broader implementation in the correct order and with envisioning of the mythology. For example,

104 part of the basic frame of reference for thinking mythology with which researchers operate in about Scandinavian mythology includes the discussion. These ‘facts’ are not only taken ‘facts’ that the goddess Freyja is the source of for granted, but they remain largely beyond Óðinn’s knowledge of seiðr-magic, and that the scope of critical attention.10 she brought it from among the gods to Mythologization may occur with contested the Æsir gods, who had lacked it. elements as well as those taken for granted. These ‘facts’ about the origins of seiðr For example, the eddic poem Þrymskviða derive from a short sentence in presents a story of the theft and recovery of (4): Dóttir Njarðar var Freyja, hon var Þórr’s hammer, in which the god is blótgyðja, ok hon kendi fyrst með Ásum seið, humorously humiliated by being compelled to sem Vǫnum var títt [‘The daughter of Njǫrðr disguise himself as the goddess Freyja in a was Freyja, she was a sacrifice-priestess, and wedding gown. This is generally taken for she first taught to the Æsir seiðr-magic, which granted as an element in the mythology, much was customary for the Vanir’]. According to as is Freyja’s association with seiðr. The lack the saga, this knowledge ultimately enabled of any early reference to this plot or its the Æsir to defeat the Vanir in war. This war distinctive elements has led to a long-standing is also referred to in other sources although debate concerning whether the story is not the origin of seiðr. This saga is treated ‘authentic’ Scandinavian mythology or a with caution as a source for mythology on ‘late’ poem by Christians making fun of Þórr other topics because it euhemerizes gods and (see Frog 2014 and works there cited). events as human history, and its accounts Interpretations of the plot hinge on this seem to differ significantly from other sources interpretation of provenance. This question of where comparative materials are available (cf. provenance is no less significant when using Simpson 1963–1964: 42–43; Tolley 2009 I: this tradition or text in discussions of gender 507–513). Freyja is only unambiguously representations, humour in mythology, Þórr’s characterized as a practitioner of seiðr here, hammer as a mythic symbol, and so forth. It although she is also attributed with practicing also affects uses of more specific features of magic in a peculiar story in Sǫrla þáttr, where the poem such as the role of Þórr’s hammer in the euhemerized presentation of the gods the poem’s concluding wedding ceremony or seems to be based on Ynglinga saga,9 and the (unique) identification of the god some association with magic might be as one of the Vanir. Whole webs of inferred from calling her a fordæða interpretation running through the mythology [‘evil-doer, witch’] albeit in an insult can be affected by the perspective taken on ( 32). In contrast, Ynglinga saga the provenance of Þrymskviða. Even where elaborates on the magical practices of Óðinn, arguments and counter-arguments may begin who is also associated with seiðr in several objectively, participating scholars readily other contexts and sources (see e.g. Price develop (perhaps subtle) emotional investments 2002: 91–107). Although seiðr is said to be in their view on this element of the customary among the Vanir, the Vanir gods mythology. This occurs as that view advances Njǫrðr and Freyr also lack any such from framing dependent interpretations as associations with magic, and no gods cautious conditionals to the view becoming a identified as Vanir seem significant to the naturalized aspect of the researcher’s incantation tradition – in contrast to e.g. modelling system for thinking about the Óðinn and even Þórr. Nonetheless, this origin mythology, which thus affects his or her of seiðr has held a significant position in the views and understandings of other elements construction of academic images of Freyja, of the mythology. This view nonetheless the Vanir and seiðr magic. It has provided a shares a social if minority view on the basis and frame of reference for a variety of mythology that can be seen as part of a comparisons and interpretations (see e.g. competing meta-mythology.11 Dronke 1997). These ‘facts’ seems to have undergone mythologization, evolving into socially invested elements of the image of the

105

Mythologization and Centrality be ‘taken for granted’, with few or no note- Attention here has been on ways of worthy consequences. The mysterious story understanding and thinking about constitutive about the ride of the goddess(?) Gná has been elements of a mythology as an object of scarcely addressed in the discourse heritage research – ways of thinking that can be (cf. Lorenz 1984: 445–446) and might not considered meta-mythology (bearing in mind qualify as a narrative integer of the meta- that mythologization of the research object mythology at all. In contrast, challenging the can be found in any area of study). A factor centrality and authority of the god Óðinn in relevant to mythologization seems to be the mythology (e.g. Gunnell forthcoming) has centrality in the sense of the number and implications that would require countless degree of other views that could require adjustments to understandings of the mythology reassessment and revision if the element is if accepted, and which can be expected to changed. Observing this factor is of interest meet with resistance (if only for ‘feeling’ for considering controversies in a discourse. counter-intuitive) where these interface with a An academic meta-mythology is, in essence, meta-mythology. This is crucially relevant to the image of the mythology to which we the so-called Vanir Debate, and the challenge become enculturated and naturalized through to the validity of Vanir as a category of gods the discourse heritage on that mythology and (esp. Simek 2010 [2005]). If this category is contemporary dialectic engagements with it. rejected, it also requires the reassessment of Meta-mythology is not about ‘true’ versus both the identities and significance of all gods ‘untrue’ but rather investment in the image of defined and interpreted through a Vanir a mythology and its elements, and how these identity, as well as the category of the Æsir are viewed or understood. The greater the gods, which has been defined in relation to centrality of a certain element or feature to the the Vanir in what has been considered a basic meta-mythology, the greater the resistance structuring feature in the mythology. Basically, that can be anticipated to reassessing it in a accepting this position means accepting that way connected to its centrality. It is possible rather fundamental (or ‘core’) operating to address the more central elements in terms principles of the discourse heritage have been of ‘core beliefs’ or ‘core integers’ of the wrong and that we need to give up ideas and mythology at the level of deep structure. understandings to which we have been However, it is important to keep in mind that naturalized as basic ‘facts’ of the mythology. centrality is a matter of both scope and degree Developing an awareness of meta- forming hierarchies and networks within the mythology and its relation to discourse system, and identifying one feature or element heritage enables a sensitivity to its workings, as a ‘core’ element may easily marginalize with the potential to objectify and demytho- other elements and the dynamics of the logize it. This same sensitivity can also multiple hierarchies in which these participate. become a resource in framing argumentation Some integers of a mythology may be that challenges central elements of a meta- sufficiently peripheral that they remain mythology, as well as for considering the largely outside of the social meta-mythology. implications of such challenges. Perhaps more In Scandinavian mythology, for example, the importantly, such a sensitivity can also be widely discussed mysterious female being employed reflexively in order to consider our called Heiðr in Vǫluspá (st. 22) may have a own responses to arguments that challenge position as a symbolic integer in the academic views and interpretations to which we meta-mythology. Her obscure identity (cf. ourselves have become naturalized through McKinnell 1998–2001) can nevertheless remain the discourse heritage, in which we inevitably ambiguous and unresolved rather than being ground our understandings. mythologized to a particular interpretation. The fact that other elements of the social meta- Acknowledgement: I would like to thank Inkeri mythology are not dependent on a particular Koskinen for her extremely valuable comments, questions and suggestions that have greatly helped to interpretation alleviate such mythologization, strengthen this paper. or their mythologization leads them simply to

106

Notes 9. The euhemerized account of the origins of the gods 1. I have earlier used the expression ‘heritage of and the story of the origin of Freyja’s necklace discourse’. The latter formulation was easily preface the þáttr as a background for the endless interpreted as any heritage that has been mytho-heroic battle known as the Hjaðningavíg: constructed or maintained through discourse. The Óðinn has had Freyja’s necklace stolen and will revised term is intended to foreground that the only return if she will use magic to create an discourse is itself the heritage referred to. endless battle. The story is peculiar in several 2. Works such as Athanasius Kircher’s (1652–1654) respects and it is not clear that Freyja had any Oedipus Aegyptiacus, (inventively) translating the relationship to the Hjaðningavíg tradition outside of Egyptian hieroglyphics as the language of Adam this one text. and Eve, which simultaneously constructing an 10. E.g. Clive Tolley, in his magnum opus (2009), image of and its relevance as offers excellent source-critical assessments of contemporary heritage. representations of and references to seiðr, but this 3. In many disciplines, there seems to have been a critical attention does not turn to assess the marked increase in the use of citations in the latter identification of seiðr with Freyja and the Vanir, half of the 20th century. which is part of the framework of the mythology 4. Cf. ‘dialects of mythology’ in Siikala 2012 and also within which that study operates. p. 34 in this volume; cf. also Lakatos 1980 [1978]. 11. On competing perspectives on symbols of a 5. For example, E.N. Setälä (1907: 249–250) mythology, see pp. 44–47, this volume. Such revitalized an etymology of the name of the competing meta-mythologies may also be primordial being of Finnic mythology Kalev(a) as interfaced with broader competing research connected to Baltic words for ‘smith’ (e.g. Latvian methodologies or ‘research programmes’ (on kalvis [‘smith’], kal(e)velis [‘smith.DIM’]), recon- which, see Lakatos 1980 [1978]: 103–121). structing a Baltic *kalevias. This was initially viewed critically by folklorists because a semantic Works Cited connection was lacking (e.g. Krohn 1903–1910: Sources 815). Matti Kuusi (1963: 154) later advocated that Kalevala = Lönnrot 1835; 1849. that Kalev(a) evolved from the smith-god Kalevias Lokasenna = Neckel & Kuhn 1963: 96–111. without acknowledging that the latter is a Second Merseburg Charm = Braune, Wilhelm, & Karl hypothetical reconstruction rather than an attested Helm (eds.). 1979. Althochdeutsches Lesebuch. 16th Baltic theonym and god. This allowed Kalev(a)’s edn. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer. P. 89. origin in a fabricated Baltic smith-god to be further Snorri Sturluson. Edda = Faulkes 1982; 1998; 1999. circulated on Kuusi’s authority (e.g. Hakamies Sǫrla þáttr = Guðni Jónsson & Bjarni Vihjálmsson. 1999: 80–81; although cf. Harvilahti 1990: 60). 1943–1944. Fornaldarsögur Norðurlanda I–III. However, it is not clear that there was any Reykjavik: Forni. Vol. II, pp. 97–110. emotional investment in this understanding of Þrymskviða = Neckel & Kuhn 1963: 111–115. Kalev(a) individually or socially: the advanced Vǫluspá = Neckel & Kuhn 1963: 1–16. ‘fact’ was not necessarily mythologized. Ynglinga saga = Bjarni Aðalbjarnarson. 1941. 6. On the problematics of the term ‘belief’ and its I. Íslenzka Fornrit 26. Reykjavík: Hið subjective implications, see p. 38, this volume. Íslenzk Fornritafélag. Pp. 1–83. 7. For example, it is a general operating principle in research that Old Norse was invariably Literature conceived as the handmaid of the goddess , Barthes, Roland. 1972 [1957]. Mythologies. New York: rather than sometimes or also as e.g. Frigg’s sister, Hill & Wang. as her cognate appears in the Old High German Beck, Wolfgang. 2003. Die Merseburger Second Merseburg Charm; or that -names Zaubersprüche. Wiesbaden: Reichert. such as Gǫndul and Skǫgul designated distinct and Converse, Philip. 1964. “The Nature of Belief Systems unique identities in the mythology. in Mass Publics”. In Ideology and Discontent. Ed. 8. This sort of development easily happens in dialogue D. Apter. London: Free Press. Pp. 206–261. with a popular meta-mythology. In the case of Doty, William G. 2000. Mythography: The Study of kalevalaic mythology, for example, the god Myths and Rituals. 2nd edn. Tuscaloosa: University Väinämöinen is postulated as the demiurge in The of Alabama Press. Song of Creation, but the role of the Dronke, Ursula (ed. & trans.). 1997. The anthropomorphic agent disappears from the epic in II: Mythological Poems. Oxford: Clarendon Press. regions to the south where Christian influence had Faulkes, Anthony (ed.). 1982. Snorri Sturluson, Edda: been longer and more pervasive (Frog 2012: 222– Prologue and . London: Viking Society. 226). Similarly, The Song of Lemminkäinen is Faulkes, Anthony (ed.). 1998 Snorri Sturluson, Edda: imagined as entailing the hero’s death and Skáldskaparmál I–II. London: Viking Society. resurrection, although this was only met in quite Faulkes, Anthony (ed.). 1999. Snorri Sturluson, Edda: few local traditions, and was falling out of use even Háttatal. London: Viking Society. there (Frog 2010: 72–102). The general meta- Frog. 2010. Baldr and Lemminkäinen. UCL Eprints. mythology is in fact an inaccurate frame of London: University College London. reference for most tradition areas. 107

Frog. 2011. “Snorri Sturluson qua Fulcrum: Kuusi, Matti. 1963. “Varhaiskalevalainen runous”. Perspectives on the Cultural Activity of Myth, Suomen Kirjallisuus 1. Ed. Matti Kuusi. Helsinki: Mythological Poetry and Narrative in Medieval Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Pp. 129–193. Iceland”. Mirator 12: 1–29. Lakatos, Imre. 1980 [1978]. Philosophical Papers I: Frog. 2012. “Confluence, Continuity and Change in the The Methodology of Scientific Research Evolution of Myth: Cultural Activity and the Finno- Programmes. Ed. John Worrall & Gregory Currie. Karelian Sampo-Cycle”. In Mythic Discourses: Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Studies in Uralic Traditions. Ed. Frog, Anna-Leena Lönnrot, Elias. 1835. Kalewala, taikka wanhoja Siikala & Eila Stepanova. Helsinki: Finnish Karjalan runoja Suomen kansan muinoista ajoista. Literature Society. Pp. 205–254. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Frog. 2013. “Revisiting the Historical-Geographic Lönnrot, Elias 1849. Kalevala. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Method(s)”. RMN Newsletter 7: 18–34. Kirjallisuuden Seura. Frog. 2014. “Germanic Traditions of the Theft of the Lorenz, Gottfried. 1984. Snorri Sturluson: Thunder-Instrument (ATU 1148b): An Approach to Gylfaginning: Texte, Übersetzung, Kommentar. Þrymskviða and Þórr’s Adventure with Geirrøðr in Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. Circum-Baltic Perspective”. In New Focus on Lotman, Yuri M. 1990. Universe of the Mind: A Retrospective Methods: Resuming Methodological Semiotic Theory of Culture. Bloomington: Indiana Discussions: Case Studies from Northern Europe. University Press. Ed. Eldar Heide & Karen Bek-Petersen. FF Lotman, Iu. M., & B.A. Uspenskii 1976. “Myth – Communications 307. Helsinki: Academia Name – Culture”. In Semiotics and Structuralism: Scientiarum Fennica. Pp. 120–162. Readings from the Soviet Union. Ed. Henryk Baran. Frog. This volume (2015). “Mythology in Cultural White Planes: International Arts & Sciences Press. Practice: A Methodological Framework for Pp. 3–32. Historical Analysis”. RMN Newsletter 10. McKinnell, John. 1998–2001. “On Heiðr”. Saga-Book Frog with Pauliina Latvala. 2013. “Opening Cross- 25: 394–417. Disciplinary Dialogue: A Virtual Workshop on Neckel, G. & H. Kuhn (eds.). 1963. Edda: Die Lieder Methodology”. In Approaching Methodology, 2nd des Codex Regius nebst vewandten Denkmälern I. edn. Ed. Frog & Pauliina Latvala with Helen F. 4th edn. Heidelberg: Carl Winters Universitäts- Leslie. Annales Academiae Scientiarum Fennicae buchhandlung. Humaniora 368. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Price, Neil S. 2002. The Viking Way: Religion and War Fennica. Pp. 49–69. in Late Iron Age Scandinavia. 31. Uppsala: Gunnell, Terry. Forthcoming. “How High Was the Department of Archaeology and Ancient History. High One? – The Role of Óðinn in Pre-Christian Simek, Rudolf. 2010 [2005]. “The Vanir: An Icelandic Society”. In Myth and Theory in the Old Obituary.” RMN Newsletter [1]: 10–19. First Norse World. Ed. Stefan Brink. Turnhout: Brepols. published in Herzort Island: Aufsätze zur Hakamies, Pekka. 1999. “Ilmarinen ja kansanomaiset isländischen Literatur- und Kulturgeschichte: Zum teknoutopiat”. In Kalevalan hyvät ja hävyttömät. 65. Geburtstag von Gert Kreuzer, Ed. V. T. Seiler. Ed. Ulla Piela et al. Helsinki: Suomaliasien Seltmann & Söhne, Lüdenscheid. Pp. 140–155. Kirjallisuuden Seura. Pp. 79–92. Setälä, E.N. 1907. “-Hamlet: Ein Harvilahti, Lauri. 1990. “Jumalat, tammet ja laulut: sagenvergleichender versuch III: Die finnischen Piirteitä balttien kansankulttuurista”. In Dainojen Kullervolieder”. Finnisch-Ugrischen Forschungen henki: Latvian ja Liettuan kirjallisuudesta ja 7: 188–264. kulttuurista. Ed. Urpo Vento. Helsinki: Siikala, Anna-Leena. 1991. “Singing of Incantations in Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Pp. 55–91. Nordic Tradition”. In Old Norse and Finnish Hauck, Karl 1970. Goldbrakteaten aus Sievern. Religions and Cultic Place-Names. Ed. Tore München. Ahlbäck. Åbo: The Donner Institute. Pp. 191–205. Honko, Lauri. 1998. Textualising the Siri Epic. FF Siikala, Anna-Leena. 2012. Itämerensuomalaisten Communications 264. Helsinki: Academia mytologia. Helsinki: SKS. Scientiarum Fennica. Simpson, Jacqeline. 1963–1964. “M mir: Two Myths Järvinen, Irma-Riitta. 2010. Kalevala Guide. Helsinki: or One?”. Saga-Book. 16(1): 41–53. Finnish Literature Society. Stepanova, Eila, & Frog. This volume (2015). “Social Jewett, Robert, & John Shelton Lawrence. 1977. The Movement and a Structural Distribution of Karelian American Monomyth. Gardon City: Anchor– Ritual Genres”. RMN Newsletter 10. Doubleday. Tolley, Clive 2009. Shamanism in Norse Myth and Kircher, Athanasius. 1652–1654. Oedipus Aegyptiacus. Magic I–II. FF Communications 296–297. Romæ. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Krohn, Kaarle 1903–1910. Kalevalan runojen historia. de Vries, Jan 1956–1957. Altgermanische Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Religionsgeschichte I–II. 2nd edn. Berlin: de Kuhn, Thomas S. 1970. The Structure of Scientific Gruyter. Revolutions. 2nd edn. International Encyclopedia of Wanner, Kevin J. 2008. Snorri Sturluson and the Edda: Unified Science: Foundations of the Unity of The Conversion of Cultural Capital in Medieval Science II.2. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Scandinavia. Toronto Old Norse and Icelandic Studies 4. Toronto: University of Toronto Press.

108

The Blurry Lines among Humans, Gods, and Animals: The Snake in the Garden of Eden Robert A. Segal, University of Aberdeen

In the West, though by no means in the East, supernatural human-animal combinations as the gap between the human and the divine is centaurs and the minotaur, transformations of conventionally considered to be clear-cut and gods into animals are only a temporary insurmountable. The differences between change of forms. By contrast, transformations divinity and humanity are assumed to be of of humans into animals are widely found in kind, if also of degree. God has qualities that the Greco-Roman world. They are either a humans do not, of which the most commonly punishment or an alleviation of suffering. Either named is immortality. Where humans may be way, those humans are thereby transferred knowledgeable and powerful, God is from the social and supernatural order to the omniscient and omnipotent. natural order of the environment (Ovid, Similarly, the differences between humans Metamorphoses). In the later Christian world and animals are assumed to be of kind, if also animals belong no less to the natural order. of degree. In Genesis 1 human beings are Rather than exhibiting independent will and given dominion over all animals. The divide responsibility, they enact the will of God between humans and animals is unambiguous. (Jacobus de Voragine, Legenda aurea). Humans, who in this first of two biblical creation myths are unnamed, are closer to Exceptions that Prove the Rule God than to anything created by God. In The West does permit exceptions, but they are Genesis 2, the first of two chapters on the assumed to be exceptions. In the ancient Garden of Eden, Adam is commanded to world the grandest exception was name all the animals – another form of (Hercules), who, while born to , was still dominion over them. With the exception of mortal, accomplished superhuman feats of the snake, Adam and in turn Eve have strength, outmaneuvered death in his last qualities that animals do not, of which the three great feats, and was rewarded with most conspicuous are intelligence and speech – immortality by Zeus for his yeoman service or at least human speech. (Apollodorus III.vii.7). Yet for some ancient Not only is there assumed to be a divide writers, such as Herodotus, Heracles’ very between humans and God, but also the divide, stature meant that he had been born a god, so it is assumed, cannot be overcome. Humans that his case was the proverbial exception that cannot become gods. In fact, the most proves the rule. Greeks did establish cults to egregious sin in the West is the attempt by worship human heroes, but only after their humans to become gods, epitomized by the deaths. vain efforts of in Genesis 3. Humans who can become gods are not The hiatus between humans and gods is necessarily heroes. But heroism constitutes an assumed to apply as fully to polytheistic in-between category that narrows the divide religions as to monotheistic ones. For ancient between humans and gods. Heroes are Greeks, those who dared to seek divinity were humans who, in usually just a single, if killed for their hubris. Those who directly varying, respect, are so exceptional as to be challenged the gods, such as Tantalus and god-like. Sisyphus, were often consigned to eternal In Christianity the grandest exception to punishment in a section of Hades that was the divide between humanity and divinity is, later incorporated into (Homer, of course, Jesus. (In the Messiah is Odyssey XI:582–600). believed to be a mere human, descended from Animals are conventionally assumed to fall King David.) Yet even Jesus’ capacity to be at outside the issue of challenges to divinity. once fully human and fully divine is taken to They lack independent agency and therefore be a paradox, and a paradox difficult to responsibility. Leaving aside such maintain in practice. Throughout its history, 109

Christianity has veered between making Jesus all humanity save Noah and the need to merely an ideal human being, as in the destroy the world and then to re-create it Victorian period, and making him a sheer (Genesis 6–9). God scarcely knows whether god, as in ancient . Noah’s descendants will be any better than The present article questions the present humanity. God thus creates the commonly assumed divide both between gods rainbow as a promise never again to destroy and humans and between humans and the world, no matter how humanity behaves animals. I do not presume to generalize to all (Genesis 9.8–17). mythologies. I take just one test case: that of God is not omnipotent. God does not, in either the Hebrew Bible, and above all that of the of the creation stories (Genesis 1–2.4a or snake in Eden. As readers of RMN Newsletter 2.4b–25), create ex nihilo. Instead, God are perhaps aware, clear-cut distinctions organizes raw materials into an orderly world. among the supernatural, the human, and the God fears the building of the Towel of Babel animal were not current in all cultures of lest humans reach God and thereby threaten Europe prior to their Christianization (Frog God (Genesis 11.1–9). God forbids the 2015). The relationship of the Hebrew Bible making of graven images lest they, as icons, to the is a traditional topic be used magically against God (Exodus 20.4– that will not be considered here. 5). God forbids the taking of his name in vain for the same reason (Exodus 20.7). The Gods and Humans Consider the Hebrew Bible. God is not cry out for a human king because omniscient, omnipotent, singular, or non- God has failed to defeat the Philistines (I anthropomorphic. And humans can become Samuel 8). A king, while human, is thus gods. I am not concerned with later expected to be stronger than God. philosophical interpretations of the Bible, God is not singular. God may be the chief interpretations going back to Philo. I am god, but he is not only the only god. When, in concerned with popular religion as found in Genesis 1, God declares, “Let us create man the Bible. in our image” (Genesis 1.26), he is not The difference between God and humans is speaking in the royal “we,” which he never merely a difference of degree. God knows uses of himself alone. Rather, he is addressing more than humans but is not all knowing. God gods. When, again, God uses the first- is more powerful than humans but is not all person plural to announce the eviction of powerful. There is more than one god. God, Adam and Eve from the Garden (Genesis one or more, has human qualities of all kinds, 3.22), he is likewise addressing fellow gods. mental and physical alike. Overall, the The Bible takes for granted that each nation Hebrew God is like Homer’s gods. Subsequent has its own god. The contest between Aaron philosophical characterizations of God are as and Pharaoh’s magicians is over the strength, distant from the biblical depiction as Plato’s not the existence, of each side’s god or gods characterization of Homeric gods, let alone of (Exodus 7). The same is true of the contest his creator god in the Laws, is from Homer’s, between Elijah and the priests of (I and also Hesiod’s, depictions of the gods. Kings 18). The earth in Genesis 1 is Even if the difference between God and commanded by God to produce living things, humans is only of degree, the difference can so that the earth is a deliberative, living figure still prove insurmountable. The issues are in her own right (Genesis 1.24). In Proverbs separate. But it turns out that the divide is not the goddess Wisdom creates the world insurmountable, which is why God must alongside God (Proverbs 8.22–31). continually fend off the threat of humans’ God is anthropomorphic. God sees, hears, becoming divine themselves. talks, breathes (Genesis 2.7), rests (Genesis God is not omniscient. God does not 2.2), and eats, enjoying the smell of Noah’s anticipate the sinning by Adam and Eve and sacrifices (Genesis 8.21) and later consuming the need to evict them from Eden (Genesis 3). part or all of priestly sacrifices. God has a God does not anticipate the disobedience of body, and it is visible. Otherwise at the

110 burning bush (Exodus 3.6) and later the varying, respect, are so exceptional as to be Israelites at Mt. Sinai would not have to look god-like. away to avoid seeing God. God is male. There is no neuter gender in biblical Hebrew. At the Animals, Gods, and Humans same time the “image” of God in which Just as the boundary line between humans and humans in Genesis 1 are made is not merely gods in the Hebrew Bible is blurry, so is the physical but sexual: it is the division into line both between animals and gods and male and female sexes (Genesis 1.26–27). between animals and humans. Take, as the Either God is androgynous, or some of the grandest example, the snake in the Garden of fellow gods are female. God has the same array Eden (Genesis 3). of emotions as humans, ranging from happiness The snake is categorized as a wild creature, to anger and even jealousy (Exodus 20.5). not as either a human or a god. True, the God initially resides in a physical place, snake is deemed the craftiest creature in the even if he, like Britain’s Royals, has more garden, but that difference is merely one of than one home. God resides in the Garden of degree. Eden (Genesis 3.8). God later resides in the In its pre-fallen, natural state the snake Ark. Otherwise the taking of the Ark by the talks, thinks, and deliberates. Presumably, the Philistines (I Samuel 4) would not be only way the snake knows the contents of the discombobulating for the Israelites. Ezekiel sees Tree of Knowledge is by having eaten from it God on his throne in heaven (Ezekiel 1.26–28). himself. (That is likely as well the way God knows the contents.) But then the snake is Humans can become gods. God throws out automatically half-divine. He lacks only Adam and Eve because they can become gods immortality, if in fact he is mortal. The snake (Genesis 3.22). In the Garden of Eden story is smarter not only than Eve but also than divinity means knowledge and immortality, God, whom he outwits. Contrary to later, no more. God halts the building of the Tower especially Christian interpretations, God does of Babel lest the builders reach God and not anticipate what the snake and in turn Eve thereby presumably equal him (Genesis 11.1– and Adam will do. Otherwise God would not 9). When God takes the people’s demand for have to scurry to evict Adam and Eve. a king as a repudiation of him, God is The punishment of the snake is that he will elevating the king to equality with himself (I now crawl on his belly rather than walk Samuel 8.7). And what characteristics does upright and that females will hate him. For the the first king, Saul, harbor? He is the tallest hatred to occur, the snake must get evicted as man in Israel in one source (I Samuel 10.23) well. Presumably, the snake loses his ability and the handsomest as well in another (I to speak. Or else the speech of the snake, like Samuel 9.2). In religion generally, gods are that of birds, can no longer be understood by gods because they are bigger, stronger, humans. kinder, wiser, or better looking than humans. In Christianity the snake is Satan, who is The difference is of degree, not kind. The more than an animal and even turns out to be biblical God himself may not be pre-existent, a son of God. But in the Hebrew Bible the for the Bible begins in medias res, with God snake is merely an animal, however already existing. God’s own immortality may extraordinary he is. Satan in general plays a depend on his eating from the . far smaller role in Judaism than in Otherwise why not just cut down the Tree? Christianity, and in Judaism the real In short, the Hebrew Bible assumes no beginning is in Genesis 12, when God straightforward, let alone insurmountable, chooses Abraham (then Abram) to be the divide between humans and God. founder of his chosen people. But the very Humans who can become gods are not differentiation of the biblical snake from later necessarily heroes. But heroism constitutes an Satan underscores the looseness of the in-between category that narrows the divide boundary between animals on the one hand between humans and gods. Heroes are and humans and gods on the other. The snake humans who, in usually just a single, if falls from an elevated status to an ordinary

111 one, but that fall is not the natural state of the Works Cited snake. Had Eve resisted the snake’s Sources temptation, the snake would presumably have Apollodorus. The Library. Trans. Sir James George continued to reside in the Garden, and with all Frazer. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1921. Hebrew Bible = The Complete Jewish Bible with Rashi his human-like and god-like talents intact. Commentary. Available at: And maybe the snake is eligible to return to http://www.chabad.org/library/bible_cdo/aid/63255 Eden insofar as the post-Edenic ideal is a /jewish/The-Bible-with-Rashi.htm (last accessed near-return to the original state. July 2015). Hesiod. Theogeny. In Hesiod, The Homeric and Conclusion Homerica. Trans. Hugh G. Evelyn-White. London: William Heinmann, 1914. Pp. 78–155. Today we take for granted sharp divisions Homer. Odyssey = The Odyssey of Homer. Trans. among gods, humans, and animals – and even George Herbert Palmer. / New York: if we ever more treat pets as if they were Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1894. humans. But these divisions are far less sharp Jacobus de Voragine. Legenda aurea = The Golden in the Hebrew Bible. In fact, the natural state Legend: Readings on the . Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2012. of humans, gods, and at least the snake in the Ovid. Metamorphoses. Trans. Charles Martin. New Garden of Eden is one of near equality – that York / London: W.W. Norton & Co., 2003. is, until God begins to institute rigid divisions Plato. Laws. Plato in Twelve Volumes X–XI. Trans. in the living world. But then God does so to R.G. Bury. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, protect his shaky power. He alters the very 1967–1968. natural order that he has created. In short, the Literature categorical distinctions that we take for Frog. 2015. “Are Trolls, Bears and Sámis People too? granted have not always been assumed. (See – Considering the Mythic Ethnography of Old Frog’s article on “Mythology in Cultural Norse Culture”. RMN Newsletter 9: 122–124. Practice”, this volume.)

Social Movement and a Structural Distribution of Karelian Ritual Genres Eila Stepanova and Frog, University of Helsinki

In the pre-modern cultural environment of (van Gennep 1960 [1909]). The hypothesis Karelia, there were two central modalities of presented here has been developed to account verbal art employed by vernacular ritual for a pattern of the distribution of labour specialists who acted as intermediaries with between genres of verbal art and the the forces and inhabitants of the otherworld. communities by which the relevant rites are These were kalevalaic incantations and prerformed (Table 1). lament. These categories of performance behaviour were quite different from one The Basic Model another. The present discussion briefly reports The social movements addressed here are a working hypothesis concerning a general birth, marriage, conscription to military pattern of correlation between a) the modality service, and death. Each of these involved an of verbal art in rituals, and b) the stage of an individual’s separation from one community individual’s social movement between two and integration into another, although in some communities. This hypothesis developed from cases the second community may be in the the discussion of Eila Stepanova’s paper otherworld. The structural distribution of “Movement between Worlds in Karelian specialist roles within a community identifies Ritual Poetry”, presented at the American lamenters as orchestrators of rituals of Folklore Society’s annual meeting in separation. The lamenter represents the November 2014 (Santa Fe, New Mexico; community from which the person is published Stepanova E 2015a). The rituals in departing. The liminal stage of transition was question qualify as transition rituals, which a dangerous period for the individual. can be conceived in terms of the three-phase Incantations were used to secure and protect process: separation – transition – incorporation the subject in this process. These incantations

112

Table 1. The distribution of genres of verbal art in rituals involving social movement from one community into another. In all cases, laments are performed in rituals orchestrated by a specialist of the community from which an individual is being separated and incantations are performed in rituals orchestrated by a specialist of the community into which the individual will be integrated. Situations where the ritual activity would take place in a foreign or supernatural community are indicated by “Otherworld” in square brackets. The phase of integration will not be addressed here. Social Movement Phases of Transition Ritual Separation Transition Integration Birth [ Otherworld ] Incantation – Marriage Lament Incantation – Conscription Lament [ Otherworld ] [ Otherworld ]

Death Lament Lament / [ Otherworld ] [ Otherworld ] were performed by a representative of the does not explore this variation and remains at community into which the person would a level of broad generalizations. arrive. In the public social ritual of a wedding context, this was the responsibility of a ritual Karelian Laments specialist known as a tietäjä [‘knower, one Laments may be generally defined as: who knows’]. Birthing rituals were concealed melodic poetry of varying degrees of and private, and the incantations would be improvisation, which nonetheless follows performed by a midwife (cf. Pentikäinen conventionalized rules of traditional verbal 1978: 178–180). From this view, transition expression, most often performed by women rituals for social movement from one in ritual contexts and potentially also on non- community into another require the involve- ritual grievous occasions. (Stepanova E ment of specialists from both communities. 2012: 58.) However, the social movements addressed The most common ritual contexts for only involve movement between two Karelian lamenting in Karelia are funerals and communities of the living in the case of commemoration rituals, weddings, and the weddings. The present approach builds from departure ceremonies for men conscripted the emic perspective that a) otherworld into military service. However, laments were communities have objective existence and also performed ‘occasionally’, outside of , and b) socially ‘other’, ‘foreign’ ritual contexts, as a valued medium for and supernaturally ‘other’ communities fall emotional expression; in some contexts they into a single category of ‘other’ (cf. Lindow were also otherwise used as a mode of 1995). From this perspective, the expectation elevated speech.1 is inferred that all ‘other’ communities will The verbal art of Karelian lament lacks practice rituals of separation and incorpor- fixed meter. Units of utterance of up to ca. 40 ation paralleling other living communities of words are united by alliteration in a Karelians (or Russians) in weddings (on the descending melodic phrase. Expressions are otherworld conceived through social and characterized by semantic parallelism within empirical realities of the living, see Tarkka, and between units of utterance.2 The most this volume). This leads to the diagram in striking feature of the register is its dense Table 1. systems of avoidance vocabulary and extensive The correlation of a type of social use of and plural forms, as well as movement between communities with rituals possessive affixes. The avoidance vocabulary characterized by a mode of verbal art is most includes verbs but is especially characterized evident in the case of laments, which will by a rich, flexible, generative system of therefore be introduced first. It should be nominal circumlocutions (see Stepanova A noted that the rituals surrounding birth, 2012). This circumlocution system depends marriage and death were extremely complex on culture- and genre-dependent symbolic and and lasted for several days. They also varied metaphorical patterns and also includes both locally and regionally. The following semantically subordinated equivalence vocabu-

113 lary (including e.g. lexica adapted from integrated into a foreign community). All of Russian). It cannot be correctly interpreted these contexts irrespective of category are without some degree of specially-developed generally characterized as emotional situations competence. The poetry is interfaced with charged with grief and thus a mood mythic knowledge and conventional repre- appropriate to laments. sentations of the unseen world (Stepanova E Wedding laments were performed at the 2012). Lament was also a deferent home of the bride surrounding her departure register, structured in a way that the addressee but not in the home of the groom, where other was elevated and positive while a lamenter’s songs were sung. In rural Karelia, marriage self-characterization was effacing and entailed the movement of the bride to the miserable (Stepanova E 2015b; Wilce & household of the groom, which constituted a Fenigson 2015). ‘foreign’ community, with very limited or no The social significance of the lament contact with her parents’ household thereafter. register and its uses were bound to the Conscription laments were performed for men conception that it was a language for going into military service, which would reciprocal communication with the other- equally remove them to a ‘foreign’ community. world. It was believed that the dead could still Military service would be for many years, and hear and interact with the living but that they if they returned at all, they would no longer could no longer comprehend normal be the same men who had left. Both wedding language: the lament language (register) was and conscription laments are generally the only language that they could understand. thought to be ultimately extensions of the This situated lamenters as intermediaries funerary lament tradition through a symbolic between the communities of the living and correlation of these types of separation (e.g. dead branches of kin groups, as well as with Honko 1974). These are all rituals of separation other types of supernatural beings. They in which a member of the living community would actively maintain these relationships by must depart and be integrated into a ‘foreign’ visiting the deceased kin in the cemetery community (see also Tarkka, this volume). outside of social ritual contexts, awakening The symbolic correlation of marriage and them and opening communication with the military service with death may seem dramatic anticipation that deceased individuals could by modern standards, but it warrants observing provide responses in dreams or visit in the that the cemetery was a village of the dead form of a bird or butterfly. Lament was also (Siikala 2002: 126) that would be more understood to have supernatural efficacy. regularly visited than either the departed brides Laments performed in funeral rituals were or soldiers.3 understood to actualize the unseen world, the deceased individual’s successful journey to Kalevalaic Incantations the realm of the dead, and his or her The so-called Kalevala-meter is an alliterative, integration into the community of deceased trochaic tetrameter, characterized by parallelism kin. Without lamenting, it was believed that and highly crystallized formulaic diction, and the deceased’s journey would be unsuccessful. was employed across a remarkable range of The mythic power of lament is also reflected genres (Kuusi et al. 1977: 62–75; Frog & in beliefs that the performance of a funeral Stepanova E 2011: 198–204; Tarkka 2013: 53– lament outside of a ritual context would cause 102). Kalevalaic incantations are incantations a death. (Honko 1974; Konkka 1985; in this poetic mode. There are a number of Stepanova A 1985; Nenola 2002; Stepanova varieties of such incantations associated with E 2014b.) different uses and users (e.g. charms used Ritual performances of laments fall into two when herding cattle). The best known are broad categories: laments for the departure of incantations belonging to the ritual an individual to be integrated into a new technology of the tietäjä (e.g. Siikala 2002: community, and laments of commemoration 71–120). This institution of specialist took the and reciprocal communication with deceased place of a shaman as the primary intermediary kin (i.e. individuals who have already been between the living community and inhabitants

114 and communities of the unseen world (except on their journey from the household of the for the ancestral dead) in Finno-Karelian bride to the household of the groom.6 The cultural areas (Siikala 2002: 330; Frog 2013). kalevalaic epic, The Song of Lemminkäinen, This technology was interfaced with the was one of the resources used in this context. mythology of kalevalaic epic, for which the The core of the epic describes a youthful tietäjä provided a conduit of authority in its hero’s ability to use magical power to pass transmission (Frog 2013: 57–58). Historically, various supernatural ‘deaths’ (dangers) on a this seems to have been a male institution (but journey to the otherworld (cf. Kuusi et al. not necessarily exclusively).4 1977: 205–237). Images and motifs from this The tietäjä’s ritual performance involved a epic, the description of the journey or the hyperactive trance that is linked to raising whole epic could be performed in or as an anger and aggression (Siikala 2002: 242– incantation to protect the wedding party (Frog 248). The aggressive stance is built into the 2010a: 80, 82, 84, 86–87). Incantations rather incantations. These position the performer as than laments were also performed in a powerful and dominant authority who conjunction with childbirth. These were commands unseen allies (the thunder god, the performed in closed women’s rituals to ensure Virgin Mary, etc.) to provide weapons, the successful transition of the individual into armour, tools, power, and so on, or to take the world of the living community.7 These more direct action to resolve a crisis. incantations involved the same authoritative Adversaries, such as forces and beings that and commanding stance as the tietäjä’s incan- cause harm, are combatively challenged and tations. They characterized the arriving child banished (cf. Siikala 2002: 100). Unlike as a traveller and could also employ images, incantations and Christian verbal magic motifs and lines of verse associated with The elsewhere in Europe, efficacy is linked to the Song of Lemminkäinen (Tarkka 1990: 249−254; tietäjä’s own power: the performance could 1994: 277–287). Although a distinction may fail; it is only through his power and will that be made between the category of specialist the incantations effectively compel the performer in these rituals, a clear connection responses of the unseen agents and forces can be observed between the incantation (Keane 1997: 49–52; Frog 2010b). traditions that these specialists employ. To make a sweeping (over-)generalization, an extensive range of tietäjä rituals might be A Structural Distribution of Genres? described as centrally concerned with boundary An overview of these Karelian traditions maintenance (both of the community and of the suggests a structural distribution of the roles body in issues of health), and more generally of genres in rituals for social movement with the maintenance of social and natural between communities. In all cases, social order in the world, insofar as this connected movement is not simply metaphorical: it is with the tietäjä’s immediate community.5 conceived through physical movement in The tietäjä did not orchestrate rituals of geographical space (cf. van Gennep 1960 separation. He would use incantations to [1909]: 10–11), which in the cases of birth aggressively expel agents of harm from the and death extends into the mythic topography community and ensure that these would not of the otherworld (Stepanova E 2015a). The return (Siikala 2002: 178–194). He would genre employed seems to correlate with the secure the living community from the deceased community from which the specialist taking the community’s resources on his or orchestrating the ritual derives. A lamenter her journey to the otherworld (Stepanova A represents the community from which the 1999: 45). The tietäjä’s technology would, individual departs and orchestrates the ritual however, also be employed to secure an of separation leading to the transition. individual or party in the hazardous transition Incantations are employed as aggressive of physical movement between worlds. expressions of power intended to secure that In wedding rituals, the tietäjä’s technology same individual in the dangerous process of was associated with the party of the groom transition. This genre is, however, employed and especially with securing the bridal party by a specialist of the community into which

115 the new member will arrive. The role of volume). If these patterns are taken for lament in funeral rituals, ensuring the granted, it seems only natural that a lamenter deceased’s integration into the otherworld orchestrates rituals for the community from community, may appear to vary from this which an individual departs and an incantation pattern, but that becomes less clear when it is specialist does the same for the receiving placed in a broader perspective. The lamenter community. The question becomes interesting actualizes the deceased’s dangerous journey when it advances to why the lamenter (rather through her performance which creates a than e.g. a tietäjä) should be the specialist narrative with a successful outcome. However, responsible for the deceased’s successful she requests rather than commands the journey, and why incantations take a counter- ancestral community to prevent the dog of the role for which the other community is otherworld from barking and to open the gates responsible. to their realm, or she may structure this For the present discussion, it is sufficient sequence as a series of questions that seek to observe that a structural distribution of confirmation from the deceased that events labour has developed between these genres did indeed unfold in this way. In either case, and between the types of specialists who used responsibility for action falls to the them. These genres can be seen as otherworld community. That community can complementary resources: they could be used be expected to anticipate the arrival of the by different specialists within the broader deceased no less than the household of the frame of a complex ritual, such as a wedding, groom anticipates a bride or the living or the same individual could fill the role of community anticipates a new member through different specialists, such as a woman who birth – and they can be expected to act was both midwife and lamenter. This accordingly. complementarity was, however, historically In itself, this distribution of genres is not maintained in spite of the intimacy of their surprising. Lament rituals are interfaced with contexts of use. feelings resulting from especially changes that produce a permanent separation. Thus move- Notes ment from the community provides a basic 1. Generally in Finnish, see Honko 1963; Konkka context for lament performance. Lamenters 1985; Stepanova E 2014b; in Russian: Stepanova A 1985; in English: Honko 1974; in English on the use their verbal art to orchestrate and also to Karelian lament register and its dialects among moderate both the grief of the community as Finnic lament traditions, see Frog & Stepanova well as that of the individual subject to the 2011: 204–209; Stepanova E 2015b; on Finnic transition (cf. Stepanova E 2014c; 2015b), laments in an Uralic context, see Stepanova E 2012: both of which are fundamentally affected by 258–260; on areal characteristics of lament traditions in the Circum-Baltic cultural area, see the change in that individual’s status. By Stepanova E 2011; cf. also Nenola 2002. contrast, incantations present more aggressive 2. Stepanova E 2014b; in English, see also Frog & tools for the assertion of power, offensively or Stepanova 2011: 204–209; Stepanova E 2014a. defensively, or more generally tools to affect 3. An additional extension of laments in departure aspects of the environment. The incantations ceremonies is found in the poorly-attested rituals for banishing bedbugs (e.g. SKVR I4 1957). In these used in these rituals seem to follow the rituals, the bedbugs would be lamented and pattern of the tietäjä’s technology, oriented to removed from the household and community with boundary maintenance and concern for order symbolic actions linked to their death and/or inside that boundary rather than outside of it departure (with parallels in Komi and North (cf. also the discussion of the otherworld in Russian traditions, on which see Mišarina 2012). This adaptation of laments would seem to be rooted Tarkka, this volume). The distinction between in a conception of the ritual efficacy of lament these genres was potentially quite deep: the performance in accomplishing the successful verbal art of each genre was interfaced with transition of someone from within the living mythic images, motifs and narrative patterns, community into a foreign community and and there are clear differences in the environment – irrespective of the lamented’s will before and after the performance (but actualized mythology linked to each of these traditions through the implicit role-taking in the ritual). (Stepanova E 2012; cf. pp. 47–48 in this

116

4. Many women filled this role in the time when the Honko, Lauri. 1963. “Itkuvirsirunous”. In Suomen traditions were recorded. However, the prominence kirjallisuus I: Kirjoittamaton kirjallisuus. Ed. Matti of women tietäjäs at that time should be viewed in Kuusi. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. the context of social processes whereby women Pp. 81–128. became active tradition bearers as men stopped Honko, Lauri. 1974. “Balto-Finnic Lament Poetry”. In maintaining the particular vernacular practices. Finnish Folkloristics I. Ed. Pentti Leino et al. 5. This generalization is not intended to encompass all Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Pp. 9–61. incantations, such as those for hunting, fishing, Keane, Webb. 1997. “Religious Language”. Annual cattle charms, etc. Review of Anthropology 26: 47–71. 6. The representative of the groom and groom’s Konkka, Unelma. 1985. Ikuinen ikävä: Karjalaisia riitti- community was called a patvaška, who would be a itkuja. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. tietäjä. The origin of this role is even identified Kuusi, Matti, Keith Bosley & Michael Branch (ed. & with Väinämöinen, the mythic model of the tietäjä trans.). 1977. Finnish Folk Poetry: Epic. Helsinki: institution (the tietäjä iän ikuine [‘tietäjä of age Finnish Literature Society. eternal’]): according to Sihippa Inninen, Lindow, John. 1995. “Supernatural Others and Ethnic Väinämöinen oli ensimmäinen maailmassa, joka oli Others: A Millennium of World View”. patvaskoja (SKS KRA Inha 89 Kuivaisjärvi 1894) Scandinavian Studies 67(1): 8–31. [‘Väinämöinen was the first in the world who was a Mišarina, Galina. 2012. “Banishing Rituals and patvaška’]. The incantations of rites performed by a Lament-Incantations of the Komi-Zyrjans”. In Frog patvaška were nevertheless relatively limited et al. 2012: 288–307. (Siikala 2002: 80–82, 285–286, 292–293) and thus Nenola, Aili. 2002. Inkerin itkuvirret – Ingrian a skilled patvaška need not also be, for example, a Laments. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. powerful healer. The patvaška as a spokesman for Pentikäinen, Juha. 1978. Oral Repertoire and World the groom’s kin could also be distinguished as a View. Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia. role from the tietäjä responsible for the Siikala, Anna-Leena. 2002. Mythic Images and supernatural protection of the bridal party. Shamanism: A Perspective on Kalevala Poetry. 7. These incantations are here identified with midwives Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. as performers, but they were also known to tietäjäs Stepanova, Aleksandra. 1999. “Itkuvirret ja (Tarkka 1994: 277). Hautajaisrituaali Neuvosto-Karjalassa”. In Uskonto ja Identiteeti: Suomalais-Ugrialaisten Kokemuksia Works Cited ja Vaiheita Venäjällä ja Neuvostoliitossa. Ed. Sources Teuvo Laitila & Tuija Saarinen. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Pp. 42–54. SKS KRA = Folklore Archives of the Finnish Stepanova A 1985 = Степанова, А. С. 1985. Literature Society (SKS) Метафорический мир карельских причитаний. SKVR = Suomen Kansan Vanhat Runot I–XV. Helsinki: Ленинград: Наука. Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura, 1908–1997. Stepanova, Aleksandra. 2012. Karjalaisen itkuvirsikielen sanakirja. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Literature Kirjallisuuden Seura. Agha, Asif, & Frog (eds.). 2015 (in press). Registers of Stepanova, Eila. 2011. “Reflections of Belief Systems Communication. Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society. in Karelian and Lithuanian Laments: Shared Frog. 2010a. Baldr and Lemminkäinen: Approaching Systems of Traditional Referentiality?”. the Evolution of Mythological Narrative through Archaeologia Baltica 15: 128–143. the Activating Power of Expression. UCL Eprints. Stepanova, Eila. 2012. “Mythic Elements of Karelian London: University College London. Laments: The Case of syndyzet and spuassuzet”. In Frog. 2010b. “Narratiiv kui ravi: Riituse-etendus ja Frog et al. 2012: Pp. 257–287. narratiivi aktualiseerumine kogemusena”. Stepanova, Eila. 2014a. “Parallelism in Karelian Mäetagused 45: 7–38. Laments”. In Parallelism in Verbal Art and Frog. 2013. “Shamans, Christians, and Things in Performance: Pre-Print Papers of the Seminar- between: From Finnic–Germanic Contacts to the Workshop, 26th–27th May 2014. Ed. Frog. Helsinki: Conversion of Karelia”. In Conversions. Ed. Leszek Folklore Studies, University of Helsinki. Pp. 136–145. Słupecki & Rudolf Simek. Vienna: Fassbaender. Stepanova, Eila. 2014b. Seesjärveläisten itkijöiden Pp. 53–98. rekisterit: Tutkimus äänellä itkemisen käytänteistä, Frog & Eila Stepanova. 2011. “Alliteration in (Balto-) teemoista ja käsitteistä. Kultaneiro 14. Joensuu: Finnic Languages”. In Alliteration and Culture. Ed. Suomen Kansantietouden Tutkijain Seura. Jonathan Roper. Houndmills: Palgrave MacMillan. Stepanova, Eila. 2014c. “The Soundscape of Karelian Pp. 195–218. Laments from the Seesjärvi Region”. In Song and Frog, Anna-Leena Siikala & Eila Stepanova (eds.). Emergent Poetics – Laulu ja runo – Песня и 2012. Mythic Discourses: Studies in Uralic видоизменяющаяся поэтика. Ed. Pekka Huttu- Traditions. Helsinki: Finnish Literature Society. Hilttunen et al. Kuhmo: Juminkeko. Pp. 173–181. van Gennep, Arnold. 1960 [1909]. The Rites of Stepanova, Eila. 2015a. “Elämä on matka: Passage. Trans. Monika B. Vizedom & Gabrielle Elämänkulun käsitteellistäminen karjalaisessa L. Caffee. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. rituaalirunoudessa”. Elore 22(1): 1–16.

117

Stepanova, Eila. 2015b (in press). “The Register of Siikala & Sinikka Vakimo. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Karelian Laments”. In Agha & Frog 2015. Kirjallisuuden Seura. Pp. 250–298. Tarkka, Lotte. 1990. “Tuonpuoleiset, tämänilmaiset ja Tarkka, Lotte. 2013. Songs of the Border People: sukupuoli: Raja vienankarjalaisessa Kansan- Genre, Reflexivity, and Performance in Karelian runoudessa”. In Louhen sanat. Ed. Nenola Aili & Oral Poetry. FF Communications 305. Helsinki: Timonen Senni. Helsinki.: Suomalaisen Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Kirjallisuuden Seura. Pp. 238–259. Wilce, James M., & J. Fenigsen 2015 (in press). Tarkka, Lotte. 1994. “Other Worlds: Symbolism, “Mourning and Honor: Register in Karelian Dialogue and Gender in Karelian Oral Poetry”. In Lament”. In Agha & Frog 2015. Songs Beyond the Kalevala. Ed. Anna-Leena

Lonely Riders of Nenets Mythology and Shamanism Karina Lukin, University of Helsinki

The present review looks at the images of shamanic singing. The use of this verb in movement and its expressions in Nenets epic meta-discourse construes a parallel in the and shamanistic ritual poetry. Concentration activity type of the shamanic journey in ritual will be on narrative characters and events and the movement of the ŋædalyoda in epic, a associated with the nouns ŋædalyoda and parallel of contrasting direction into or out of ŋædalyowa, both produced from the verb the community’s camp, and yet which is more ŋædalyo-. The first of these, ŋædalyoda, is an generally informed by the mythic construction imperfective infinitive of the verb denoting a of space for these mobile communities of the person moving with a light reindeer sledge tundra. and can thus be briefly translated as ‘rider’. It is used in epic to denote a type of lone Nenets Epic and Shamanistic Poetry character who arrives from outside of the The present review is based on materials that community and produces a complication that were collected among the Nenets in the mid- th th sets the plot in motion or otherwise advances 19 and early 20 centuries. The earliest it. This type of character has a number of materials were gathered by Matthias Alexander associations that build on the opposition Castrén, who made two extensive linguistic between the tundra, as a dangerous space and ethnographic excursions to Northern associated with the ‘other’, and the camp of Russia and Siberia in the 1840s. While still the Nenets community, as a place of security travelling in Western Siberia during his first and belongingness. The second term, excursion, Castrén proposed the linguistic ŋædalyowa, refers to the process of the verb affinity of Tundra Nenets and other Samoyedic ŋædalyo- itself. Strictly interpreted, it is a language to Finnish. He also collected Nenets deverbal noun with emphasis on locality and epic poetry, genres called syudbabts and thus denotes the distance that one can travel yarabts, that he believed would bring to light without giving the reindeer a break. (See the history of . Castrén left Salminen 1993–2012.) It thus is not only a a mighty legacy to the Finnish humanities. It description of movement itself, but also a was, however, not until the 1910s that the next qualifier of time situated in place or rather Finnish scholars were to leave for fieldwork landscape. The distance denoted by among the Samoyedic-speaking peoples. While ŋædalyowa differs depending on the quality Kai Donner concentrated on other Samoyedic of the environment one is moving in and the languages, Toivo Lehtisalo collected linguistic circumstances of travel. Consequently, it is materials and folklore among the speakers of not an exact unit of measurement, but a Tundra and Forest Nenets. He also invited contextually dependent qualifier, which is one of the Nenets to Finland in 1928, which creatively exploited in Nenets poetic art. The resulted in important recordings of Nenets interest in this verb here is that it is used in ritual poetry. The texts that Lehtisalo meta-discourse to refer to the journey of a collected during his first field excursion shamanic séance. Other verbs, symbolically among the Nenets comprise one of the largest linked to specific spirit-forms, are used in and broadest collections of Nenets folklore

118 made by a single person. His published word, called syudbabts-wada [‘syudbabts- edition contains most of the genres that we word’], a mythological being in itself know Nenets to have had, and presents this in (Puškaryova 2003a: 192). Their narration several different dialects along with even tends to be more distant if we compare them some knowledge about the performers. to the yarabts and xynabts that are both told in Lehtisalo also edited and published Castr n’s first person singular, and also concentrate on collections. (Castrén 1940; Lehtisalo 1947.) I the emotions and suffering of the heroes. On have used these texts as primary material for the whole, these genres of epic poetry share my study but have not ignored the other many poetic devices and images, and it is not published texts of Tundra Nenets folklore at all clear what the difference between (Kupriyanova 1965; Tereščenko 1990; Lar yarabts and xynabts is. For example, the 1998; Labanauskas 2001; Puškaryova & image of the rider, ŋædalyoda, discussed in Homitš 2001; Golovnyov 2004). The this article, is shared by all of these genres. secondary texts have served as material for Nenets shamanistic ritual poetry is only comparison, but they have not been analyzed sung during a shamanistic séance. The ritual in detail for the present discussion. poems are sung by the shaman and repeated by Nenets epic poetry consists of three genres: his or her assistant, and possibly also repeated syudbats, yarabts, and xynabts. All three by the audience. In the poems, the shaman genres are long epic forms (cf. Honko 1998), describes the question at hand, calls the spirit with documented examples ranging from 300 helpers, describes his or her journeys in the to several thousand lines. The epic sung otherworld, and sends the spirit helpers back to poems are highly valued among the Nenets. the otherworld. The answers to the shaman’s Their themes vary from marriage and blood questions are also given during the ritual, and vengeance to the hardships and tough fates of the audience is addressed through different their heroes. The stories are all mythic in expressions. The shamanistic ritual poems are nature, and the Nenets tend to interpret them called sampadabts, which is derived from the historically, as narratives telling about the verb sampa- [‘to be able to communicate with mythic past (Siikala 1992: 145; 2004). Some the deceased or to carry the deceased to the of the themes in the poetry are situated in otherworld’] and the verb sampada- [‘to recent history, giving special value to some of shamanize’]. (Kuprijanova 1965: 21–56; Niemi the figures and events that are also 1998: 52–78; Puškarjova 2001; Salminen remembered in other contexts or even written 2005: 70.) The term sampadabts is used even about in Russian histories of the Nenets. when the rituals are not only about carrying (Niemi 1998; Vasilyev 1984.) Soviet scholars the deceased to the otherworld or communi- have emphasized the events known to western cating with the deceased or ancestor spirits. that are also told within the The rituals are also performed for more genres of yarabts and xynabts, giving them mundane problems and for securing the means value through their reference to historical of livelihood. Although the shamans do events (Kupriyanova 1965: 55–56; Puškaryova communicate with ancestral spirits, the imagery 2000; cf. also Tarkka, this volume). The and cultural meanings of many of the spirits relationships of epics of these genres to are attached to mythological texts in a way history is probably more complicated than that, as a consequence, has had the result that that, but the historical aspects of Nenets epic they no longer represent ancestral spirits per se. poetry is outside of the concerns of the present review, which emphasizes the mythic Movement and Knowledge in Myths values that are expressed in and arise from Mythic texts are very often about movement. these poems. However, the places and environments in As poetry, the main difference between which movement takes place, the otherworld syudbabts, yarabts, and xynabts lies in their topography, its inhabitants and societies, use of grammatical person and tone of customarily project and reflect the empirical narration. The syudbabts are told in third environs, societies and experiences of the person singular by a personified poem or people maintaining the mythology (e.g. Siikala

119

Photo 1. Tundra landscape on the Island of Kolguyev, where nomadic Nenets have lived since the 19th century. The sharp peak on the right is one of the central sacred places of the island. (Photograph by Inga Ardeyeva, reproduced with permission.) 1992: 145; 2004: 41; Tarkka 2005: 302–305; the camp in a caravan’]. The caravan consists Tuan 2007: 86; Ahola 2014: 55–59, 63–65; of everything the camp as a social and see also Tarkka, this volume.) In nomadic economic unit owns: the reindeer, the people, societies, one tends to move with one’s own their tents, clothes, food, dishes, religious community. As noted by many scholars on objects, etc. The sledges are tied together and nomadic reindeer herding, everyday life while some sit on their sledges, others might builds up cycles of movements that repeat walk. Movement is slow and calm. This is in themselves similarly every year. The routes of strict contrast to the movement of ŋædalyo- one nomadic society, namely the group that [‘to ride a light reindeer sledge alone’], where forms a camp, follows routes in a way that the rider has harnessed a few reindeer and produces seasonally fixed landscapes and aims to move forward fast. It is this latter places; vistas that one experiences every year category of movement that is indexed by the in almost identical times, seasons and thus nouns ŋædalyoda and ŋædalyowa that are in also in the same environmental circumstances. focus in the present article. (Stammler 2005: 83–91; Habeck 2006: 132– Eric Leed has noted that, in the narratives 135.) Together with this communal movement, of non-nomadic societies, movement is there are personal movements that individuals attached to experiencing the ‘other’, and to make on the tundra in order to visit relatives ways of coming into contact with the strange, or close camp communities, to visit towns and and with the dangerous – with all of the things cities, to go hunting and fishing, and so on. that lead to new findings, opportunities and This is also the picture among the nomadic knowledge (Leed 1991: 18–20). In a similar Nenets, who live in Northern Russia and way, the nomadic Nenets have attached Northwest Siberia in the arctic and subarctic images of strangeness, danger and otherness regions. Large-scale reindeer herding has to the motifs of travel and couple these with often been described as their main and new knowledge. Nevertheless, the relationships traditional way of life. When the whole camp between travelling and the other in Nenets moves from one pasture to another, it is epic are not built around clear boundaries and described through the verb myusye- [‘to move crossing them. The boundaries, in other

120 words, are unclear, not marked, and they are crossed without being noticed or crossing boundaries is not mentioned in the narration at all. Regardless, the heroes are inclined to arrive in unknown countries, territories, or worlds. Leaving his home camp often means that the social role of the hero will be changed – from a boy to a man, or from a man to a husband and father, or to the head of the camp. Thus, the change is not only personal but communal or societal, and it might benefit the whole community. On the other hand, it Photo 2. Winter tundra on the Island of Kolguyev. might also be spiritual, as the hero acquires Especially in winter, the tundra, covered with ice and mythic or shamanistic qualities, gains attributes snow, seems to be a vast and unbounded territory, where of a god or spirit, or is even named as such at it is easy to get lost and wander aimlessly. (Photograph by the author.) the end of the narrative. (Lukin 2015.) Move- ment is a central in myths all over the movement on the tundra. The ŋædalyoda is a world that entail new, socially and spiritually lone stranger, that might be described as a important know-ledge and revitalization of personification of the ‘other’, and whose the community. (E.g. van Leeuwen 2007; appearance bodes trouble. He always arrives Tarkka 2005: 300–302; Siikala 1992: 256– into a camp, whether it is moving or staying 257; 2012: 261.) in one place. He might be noticed already In mythic stories, movement never happens days before his actual arrival, or alternatively in places or landscapes that are just a he is only spotted by the dogs that bark at background for the narrative, as Richard van him. The other type of character is the Leeuwen has shown with such flourish in his wandering hero who seems to move on the study of movement in the stories of A tundra almost aimlessly, often unaware of his Thousand and One Nights. Quite the opposite, whereabouts or his destination. Both of these the narrators of epic texts have situated their types of characters are in a sense defined heroes in environments that already have according to how their movement relates to some meaningful connotations in the minds of the camp: the ŋædalyoda is always arriving, their listeners and readers. Thus, the places whereas the wandering hero rides or walks on and the landscapes give significance to the the tundra and remains outside. The symbolic movements, to the heroes’ emotions, and they image of the ŋædalyoda as the lonely rider also gain new meanings through the stories and the meaning attached to it are closely that happen in those places and landscapes. related to the image of the wandering hero. Consequently, Nenets mythology happens in The difference between them is in part only tundra landscapes that are part of the one of perspective: the wandering hero appears everyday living environment of the Nenets; exclusively in the role of the protagonist, the of heroes live in camps that are from whose perspective the story is told; the organized in a way paralleling the everyday lonely rider is characteristically an antagonist. camps of epic singers and their audiences. As In other words, they are representatives of the a consequence, movement and the placement in-group and the ‘other’, respectively. of the actors in these mythic texts become A significant difference between these understandable through the everyday: the roles is in the character’s knowledge. head of the camp rides in the head of the Journeys that are characterized by having caravan; the socially lowest sit near the door unknown destinations and aimless wandering of the conical tent, etc. are central elements in Nenets epic poetry. The basic plot of such narratives is structured The Ŋædalyoda – The Lonely Rider around the movement of a character who Nenets epics exhibit two broad types of lacks knowledge: an orphan or a hero who character whose defining feature is linked to otherwise does not know the reasons for the death of his or her father. During the journeys, 121 the characters encounter otherworldly creatures, my wife you have taken visit the underworld, or suddenly realize that the daughter of the Uyna [‘Feeble Bow’] they are having a conversation with the Give me compensation!” deceased. They also establish relations with In most cases, the ŋædalyoda is a suitor that is individuals, whose supernatural powers or coming to get the wife that he had been equipment will help the protagonist later. promised. He is often not recognized by the These journeys produce important social and characters in the camps, but if he is, the camp supernatural (martial) capital and allies for the begins to prepare itself for war or to plot heroes and their societies. The journeys also conspiracies. In addition, if the lonely rider is entail a change in family relations and status, recognized by someone, he is also named. both social and shamanistic. The Hence, in the syudbabts called Teryi ya [‘The otherworldly, mythic instruments and the Unknown Land’], recorded by Castr n, the ability to use them, which are won by the hero host of the camp immediately recognizes the on these journeys, make him or her a rider and hides his daughter, who has been powerful figure in his or her surroundings. promised to the rider but whom the father These instruments and relationships are does not want to give to him. This is the symbols of mythic power and shamanistic opening scene of the whole narrative: knowledge. In contrast, the ŋædalyoda does not lack knowledge, but rather has such (2) teri yana sidya mya”. knowledge that motivates his arrival to the nyundye nya camp or otherwise manifests an event or syidye po agreement in the past of the community that xanoidi mewæ appears from the tundra and seeks to take yirisyu something from the camp in order to resolve xanoityi nye amdawe that history. In the poem Nyeru yaxan tyikyi yana xæwxana [‘On the Willow River’], for amdi yud yalya, example, one of the heroes is moving with his nyisyiyu nyimdye newly wedded wife back to his home camp xæxonya xabt, with the dowry reindeer and sledges, and their nyuyu nyimdya caravan is attacked by previous suitor: yalinsya xabt nyisyiyu (1) tarem myusye xart easonda” xoyi nyin tewi’. sæta parmsyetya’ Yinyenyad anyi ximsyitye’ ob [ŋ]ædalyoda to, xabt yalinsya: sa yorkalŋada, “amgæ manyiyen?” metada tida “many, mow, manyiyem: nyarawa puyelyo’ syiw yiryi tyana yanamada yangu’: wayetyilye’ xabt. “Mendaw nyew (KK MAC VII Samoiedica 2, Jurak- nyew mewan, samoiedica 1: 1–22.) uyna nyeyum, In an unknown land xayusyendu ta’!” there are two conical tents. (KK MAC VII Samoiedica 2, Jurak- With his son samoiedica 1: 557–568.) two years And so he moved their sledges came to a mountain beside each other from the left side on their sledges they sat down one rider (ŋædalyoda) came, in this place captures with a strap, they sit ten days. the reindeer that he caught The name of the father has copper trimming is Xæxonya xabt [‘Holy [male] Reindeer’] it will not calm down: the name of the son “A wife I have taken is Yalinsya xabt [‘Fair [male] Reindeer’].

122

The father’s wanderer, on the other hand, is always own side potentially in danger, as he is moving in the his face is black strange environment where supernatural powers and it is getting more black. reside, and he is lacking proper mythic Xabt Yalinsya: knowledge or social networks. Nevertheless, “What do you see?” his journeying is a source of knowledge and “I,” he said “see: within seven months networks, which are gained through suffering Wayetyilye’ xabt or through the help of relatives and characters who recognize the protagonist and hence can As can be noted, here the performer has not explain to him the state of affairs. The ‘other’ used the term ŋædalyoda, but s/he is making world of the tundra, then, is inhabited by the use of the image of a lonely rider who is possibilities of gaining knowledge about the arriving at the camp, bringing trouble with past and acquiring social networks for future him. This extract also beautifully illustrates battles. The journey itself provides the the structural importance of the ŋædalyoda: protagonist with the knowledge of the paths the figure often comes up in the beginning of of the otherworld. narration, or in the beginning of a new cycle or scene in the narration of epic songs. Thus, The Ngaedalawa – A Shamanistic Ride the ŋædalyoda brings complication to the A different derivative of the verb ŋædalyo- plot. What precedes the appearance of the comes up in connection with the shamanistic ŋædalyoda is a typical and often formulaic sampadapts poems. This is based on the description of the status quo, where nothing simple fact that the sampadabts is not a really happens, no one is coming and no one narrative about events that happened before, is going, or as here: the men are sitting on but rather a depiction of what is happening in their sledges having a conversation. the present, in the ritual context. Moreover, as When considering the ŋædalyoda, it is the ritual itself is considered to realize one important to keep in mind that the tundra is great journey, the journeys that shamans take not simply a background for these journeys. during a s ance are imagined as ‘rides’ The tundra is the landscape where the Nenets (ŋædalyowa). What is important, however, is situate knowledge. This is not only in the that the word ŋædalyowa is not mentioned in sense that the landscape is strange and the sampadatbts itself, but comes up in the unfamiliar: it is also a landscape of supernatural meta-discourse about shamanistic séances. To or mythic powers. Even in the everyday clear this up, it is necessary to look at the practices of the Nenets, one is not allowed to practical and ideational frames of the wander on the tundra alone before one has the shamanistic séance in general and at the verbs proper technical and mythic knowledge to do so of motion in the sampadabts in particular. (Stammler 2005: 83–91; Anderson 2002: 116– As Anna-Leena Siikala has noted in her 131; Lukin 2011: 170–194). The unfamiliar studies about Siberian shamanism, the shaman tundra is opposed to the camp site, where one describes a rather concrete journey in his is secured by the community. The potential of ritual singing during the séance. The shaman the strange is acknowledged in epic poetry in not only describes his journey, but also the multiple ways. The character of the lonely spirit helpers whose form s/he takes, and the rider is one of these. The ŋædalyoda is the discussions that s/he has with other spirit character that brings the strange to the helpers. (Siikala 1987: 205–211.) The verb campsite or to the camp caravan. In the last used for the shaman’s movement and how it example, the father recognizes the rider whom is described are linked to the form s/he takes, he does not want to see in the camp area; in as illustrated in the examples in (3): the first example, the rider intrudes on the camp caravan demanding compensation. In (3.i) namna xora myirkananyi’ both poems, as is typical, the rider’s presence tyeta ŋæmyi is linked to a prior injustice that will be layikuts compensated or resolved during the course of (Lehtisalo 1947: 498b) the poem. The character of the aimless 123

(ii) yesya xora’ xabtyeyemda myirkananyi’ podyermi” tyeryi tonyi” ye-e-e-ei! wyinatambiw’. (Lehtisalo 1947, 209.) (Lehtisalo 1947: 474b–475a.) ye-e-e-ei! (iii) yesya pyiryi Iron tube’s myirkananyi’ forger, toreryini’ ye-e-e-ei! nasabarŋga. Iron knife’s (Lehtisalo 1947: 481a.) forger, ye-e-e-ei! (i) [In the] one year calf Iron axe’s figure of mine forger, my four legs ye-e-e-ei! are galloping. Iron sledge’s (ii) [In the] iron reindeer forger, figure of mine ye-e-e-ei! I let my wings Wadeŋkenki whistle. hill’s male reindeer (iii) [In the] iron pike harness! figure of mine ye-e-e-ei! along my stream I paddle. Whereas the shaman’s movement is described through concrete verbs of motion, the spirit On the other hand, the movements of the helpers’ presence and movement is illustrated spirit helpers are also brought out in the through the sounds they make. This is sampadabts. In the course of the ritual, the accomplished with the help of different spirit helpers are first invited to the scene, and expressions of sounds but also through verbal then their arrival is depicted; in the end of the evidential modes that authenticate evidence ritual, their departure is correspondingly that has been heard. Such passages describe described. The spirit helpers are often the presence of the otherworld, which for the numerous and the shaman collects them as Nenets can only be sensed – besides in though they were his or her herd. The parallel dreams – through hearing, whether in the lines listing the spirit helpers are separated form of all sorts of random sounds or as a with intervening calls such as ye-e-e-ei, as human voice and narration. seen in example (4). These calls reference the calls that a herder makes when driving the (5.i) syidya syiw herd to the corral. (See Dobžanskaya 2008: nun’ xasya 53–65, 88–91.) wiwryudu” towanontu” (4) ye-e-e-ei! ŋamtyusyemyi” yesya pudu myadn’ syin yadibada, tyintu” xamuwontu” ye-e-e-ei! (Lehtisalo 1947: 477a.) yesya xarw’ (ii) yisyadarka yadipada, nun’ nyumyi’ ye-e-e-ei! mokadanta yesya tuptusyi yamparyin yadipada, wirkadoda ye-e-e-ei! xamawonta, yesya xanu syimzipanta yadipada paxalyina. ye-e-e-ei! (Lehtisalo 1947: 493a–b.) wadeŋkenta syelyaxi

124

(i) Two times seven As these passages show, the movement of heavenly youngsters the shaman is quite concretely depicted in the rustling sampadabts. It is more interesting to note – in can be heard to arrive the context of this article – that the whole to my sitting place ritual is imagined as a journey, and the overall in the back of the tent scheme of the shamanistic séance is one of can be heard to settle. movement. This comes out in the beginning (ii) my father of sampadaptses when the shaman suggests my heavenly son that everyone depart on the journey with [along] the middle pole of the tent phrases such as ŋanyimpoi / xæxertsyenyiq! along, [‘Once more / let us depart!’]. Moreover, this to the base of the pole can be heard to land, is also clear in the meta-discourses of the to the syimzi pole’s rituals that Toivo Lehtisalo briefly discussed base. in his report on the visit of Matvei Yadne, one of his informants, to Helsinki in 1928. The use of the auditive mode and the whole According to Yadne, the one journey within idea that the presence of the otherworld is based the ritual, i.e. the one song in which the on auditory evidence relates the shamanistic shaman depicts how s/he travels to and in the séance to the movement of ŋædalyo- in an otherworld, who s/he meets there and what interesting way that has been beautifully kind of discussions s/he has there, is described by Oksana Dobžanskaya (2008). conceptualized as a ŋædalyowa. The shamanistic ritual of the Nenets is based The wandering protagonist of the epic songs, on, in addition to mythic and shamanistic could be compared to the shaman initiate who images, the meaningful use of different kinds is sent by his or her teachers to the otherworld of sounds and melodies. The ritual itself is a to meet the spirit helpers s/he will work with heterophonic soundscape consisting of the in the future. The spirits might be benevolent shaman’s singing, the repetitions and or malevolent and the initiate is helped and explanations of the shaman’s ritual helper (the guided by his or her teachers. The teachers, teltaŋgoda), and the audience. The idea is to however, do not teach the initiate through the create a soundscape where different sounds, meta.discourse: the initiate learns through varying in both rhythm and pitch, form a helping the instructing shaman in that shaman’s continuous stretch of noise that carries the séance and by performing séances him- or shaman on his journey. The sound, however, herself. Shamanistic powers and knowledge is an attribute of the movement at a more are gained through the practice of movement general, conceptual level. According to in the otherworld that is potentially dangerous Dobžanskaya, this conception derives from for those who do not yet have the proper the performative context of the personal songs knowledge. The landscapes of the epics and called syo. These are intimate and short lyrical the séances gain their symbolic power from songs that a person him- or herself composes each other and, moreover, they are based in about his or her life. While these songs can be parallel patterns of new empowering knowledge performed by others in a context where the that can be acquired within the landscape of subject of the song is not present, the the other. What is more, the image of the stereotypical place of performance is the ride lonely rider can be viewed in comparison to with a sledge, consequently, a ŋædalyowa. the reasons for a shamanistic séance. The The journey is the place for the performance ŋædalyoda is an outsider who brings compli- of the syo, but because of their close cation to the plot of epics and creates problems relationship, the song has come to symbolise that have to be resolved; he represents that movement. The shamanic songs of the which is outside of the community. In the ŋædalyowa can therefore be seen as the same way, the shamanistic séance is based on mythic counterpart to the personal syo, which the assumption that the problem to be solved both narrates and actualizes the unseen world is coming from outside of the community, and the shaman’s adventures there on his or from the otherworld. The problem is solved her journeys to distant places. 125 by taking a journey in otherworldly the nouns derived from it receive their central topographies. The parallels between the epic symbolic power in poetic contexts that make and shamanistic journeys are then further built use of the everyday as a frame of reference, around the image of the danger being outside but rely on the mythic images of the tundra the community, threatening its wellbeing. and knowledge attached to the tundra and While the shamanistic séance clearly links journeys taken there. the otherworld through the aural evidence that The mythic knowledge of the Nenets actualizes it, the epic singing is also based in circulates, among other forms, in epic and the notion of indirect evidence. The teller of shamanistic poetry, and in their performance Nenets epics is the wada-syudbabts [‘Word- contexts. This knowledge is poetically syudbabts’], a personified word or narrative. structured and, though performed publicly, This character appears in the narration not performable for everyone in the carrying it ahead, opening up new scenes and community. The poems transmit an image of giving power to the heroes. The performance mythic knowledge that is gained through of epic, then, is an event where both the travels that take the heroes to unknown lands listeners and the singer himself are listening and people or characters who transform their to the events that the wada-syudbabts brings status. This is based on the dichotomy about. Informants interviewed by Jarkko between the tundra and the camp as different Niemi have stated that the personified word is social and religious landscapes: the tundra as the main actor of the performance. (Niemi a landscape for transformative and mythic 1998: 57.) Hence, the song, the text of an knowledge, the camp as a site for memory epic, is mediated knowledge, and this is that is circulated within the community. In paralleled in the meta-discourse: the singer Nenets mythology, the lonely rider, ŋædalyoda, does not allege to have seen the otherworld arriving at the camp brings this trans- s/he is singing about, but s/he does allege that formative, potentially dangerous element into s/he is repeating what the wada-syudbabts is the community and sets the story in motion telling. (Puškaryova 2003b, 188.) This further either in the beginning of the poem or in the connects the epics with shamanism and the middle, when complication is needed. notion of an otherworldly being known only Because the shamanistic séance is through aural evidence. conceptualized as a ŋædalyowa, a lonely ride, it receives mythic meanings from the above- The Ride: Movement, Sound, and mentioned whole. The journey takes place in Knowledge the ritual space, which is the conical tent, but This review has looked at the symbolic means also in the poetic space that the shaman builds that Nenets oral poetry uses in describing the up through his singing. In the sampadabts, the otherworldly journeys in epic and shamanistic journey is depicted as a very concrete one. ritual poetry, with concentration on two This concreteness is communally created in deverbal nouns derived from the verb the heterophonic singing and noise that ŋædalyo-: ŋædalyoda denoting the (lone) carries the shaman, but consequently the rider, and ŋædalyowa denoting the distance or whole ritual community, to the otherworld place of a lonely ride that one can take on the and back, ideally with answers and advice tundra. As indicated, both of the nouns gain gained during the journey. their meaning from the everyday activities of These journeys are all based on sound. The the nomadic Nenets, for whom a lonely ride otherworld and the journeys to and in the in the tundra is a possibility if one has proper otherworld are known through aural evidence knowledge about that physical and mythic only. These sounds are needed both for environment. The lonely ride is also the place shamanic travel and for the depiction of for the performance and composition of the heroic tales about the journeys of Nenets personal songs that should not be performed mythic figures. As the lonely rider is the one publicly by the individual who composes who often sings his or her own personal song, them, nor by outsiders if that person is the link between travel and sound is also present. Nevertheless, the verb ŋædalyo- and

126 important in Nenets conceptions of sound and Niemi, Jarkko. 1998. The Nenets Songs: A Structural knowledge. Analysis of Text and Melody. Tampere: University of Tampere. Acknowledgements: This review has been made Puškaryova, Y.T. 2000. “Spetsifika žanrov folklora possible by the Finnish Academy project “Oral nentsev i ih ispolnitelskie traditsii”. In Puškaryova Poetry, Mythic Knowledge and Vernacular & Homitš 2001: 23–49. Imagination: Interfaces of Individual Expression and Puškaryova, Y.T. 2001. Nenetskie pesni-hynabtsy: Collective Traditions in Pre-Modern Northeast Syužetika, semantika i poetika. Moskva: Europe” of Folklore Studies, University of Helsinki. I “Vostotšnaya Literatura” RAN. would like to thank Frog for his thorough and Puškaryova, Y.T. 2003a. “Kartina mira v folklore i inspiring comments that have helped to sharpen my traditsionnyh predstavleniyah nentsev: sistemno- argument, and for the invaluable work on my English. fenomenologitšeski analiz”. Unpublished doctoral dissertation. Moskva: RAN, Insitut etnologi i Works Cited antropologi im. N. N. Mikluho-Maklaja. Ahola, Joonas 2014. Outlawry in the Icelandic Family Puškaryova, Y.T. 2003b. Istoritšeskaya tipologiya i Sagas. Helsinki: [Ahola]. etnitšeskaya spetsifika nenetskih mifov-skazok. Anderson, David G. 2002. Identity and Ecology in Moskva: “Mysl” Arctic Siberia. The Number One Reindeer Brigade. Puškaryova, Y T., & L.V. Homitš. 2000. Folklor Oxford: Oxford University Press. nentsev. Novosibirsk: Nauka. Castrén, M.A. 1940. Samojedische Volksdichtung. Ed. Salminen, Tapani. 1993–2012. “Tundra Nenets T. Lehtisalo. Helsinki: Suomalais-Ugrilainen Seura. Homepage”. Available at: http://www.helsinki.fi/ Dobžanskaya, Oksana. 2008. Šamanskaya muzyka ~tasalmin/tn.html. samodiiskih narodov Krasnoyarskogo kraya. Salminen, Tapani. 2005. “Religious Terminology in Novosibirsk: “Apeks”. Forest Nenets and Tundra Nenets”. In Golovnyov, A.V. 2004. Kotševniki tundry. Nentsy i ih Shamanhood: An Endangered Language. Ed. Juha folklor. Yekaterinburg: RAN. Pentikäinen & Péter Simoncsics. Instituttet for Habeck, Otto Joachim. 2006. “Experience, Movement, sammenlignende kulturforskning B:117. Oslo: and Mobility: Komi Reindeer Herders’ Perception of Novus. Pp. 65–75. the Environment”. Nomadic Peoples 10(2): 123–231. Siikala, Anna-Leena. 1987 [1978]. The Rite Technique Honko, Lauri. 1998. Textualising the Siri Epic. FF of the Siberian Shaman. Helsinki: Academia Communications 264. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica. Scientiarum Fennica. Siikala, Anna-Leena. 1992. Suomalainen šamanismi: Kupriyanova, Z.N. 1965. Epitšeskie pesni nentsev. Mielikuvien historiaa. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Moskva: Nauka. Kirjallisuuden Seura. Labanauskas, K.I. 2001. Yamidxi laxanaku / Skazy Siikala, Anna-Leena. 2004. Kalevalaisen runon sedoi stariny. Moskva: “Russkaja Literatura”. myyttisyys. In Kalevala ja laulettu runo. Ed. Anna- Lar, Leonid A. 1998. Šamany i bogi. Tyumen: Institut Leena Siikala, Lauri Harvilahti & Senni Timonen. Problem Osvoyeniya Severa SO RAN. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Pp. Leed, Eric. J. 1991. The Mind of the Traveler: From 17–49. Gilgamesh to Global Tourism. New York: Basic Stammler, Florian. 2005. Reindeer Nomads Meet the Books. Market: Culture, Property and Globalisation at the van Leeuwen, Richard. 2007. The Thousand and One “End of the Land”. Münster: LITVerlag. Nights: Space, Travel and Transformation. Tarkka, Lotte. 2005. Rajarahvaan laulu: Tutkimus Abingdon / Oxon: Routledge. Vuokkiniemen kalevalamittaisesta runokulttuurista Lehtisalo, T. 1947: Juraksamojedisches Volksdichtung. 1821–1921. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Helsinki: Suomalais-Ugrilainen Seura. Seura. Lukin, Karina. 2011. Elämän ja entisyyden maisemat: Tereštšenko, N.M. 1990. Nenetski epos: Materialy i Kolgujev nenetsien arjessa, muistelussa ja issledovanija po samodiskim jazykam. Leningrad: kerronnassa. Helsinki: Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Nauka. Seura. Tuan, Yi-Fu. 2007 [1977]. Space and Place: Lukin, Karina. 2015. “Matka ja liike nenetsien Perspective of Experience. Minneapolis / London: epiikassa ja šamanistisessa runoudessa”. Elore University of Minnesota Press. 22(1): 1–31. Vasilyev, V.I. 1984. “Istoritšeskie osnovy nekotoryh žanrov folklore narodov Severa”. In I etnografiya. Ed. B.N. Putilov. Lenigrad: Nauka. Pp. 137–142.

127

CONFERENCES AND EVENTS

Austmarr IV: The Plurality of Religions and Religious Change Around the Baltic Sea, 500–1300: Methodological Challenges for Multidisciplinary Data 4th–5th December 2014, Sundsvall, Sweden Kimberly La Palm, University of California, Los Angeles

The Austmarr Network held their fourth scholars over the last one hundred years. He symposium on 4th–5th December 2014 at Mid- offered an analysis of these theories using Sweden University in Sundsvall. The topic of both literary and historical evidence. Kendra this meeting was religious change in the Willson (University of Tartu) presented a Baltic region between 500–1300, with a project she is co-authoring with Karen particular focus on the methodological Sullivan (University of Queensland) titled challenges of working with multidisciplinary “Conceptual Metaphors in seiðr Magic”. data. Presenters from folklore, literature, Willson’s work focuses on the Icelandic archeology, and history of religions among literary sources, while Sullivan works with others covered topics as distinct as burial the cognitive metaphor theory. For this practices in Norway, the intersection of meeting, Willson presented the integration of legends from medieval Iceland and Poland their work through a discussion of seiðr and and the cognitive analysis of magic narratives, cognitive metaphor. which facilitated lively discussion. The After lunch, the participants were treated to meeting was particularly well planned as “‘The Past is a Foreign Country’: A regards the schedule, offering the participants Postcolonial Perspective on the Study of the invaluable opportunity to discuss with Religious Change” by keynote speaker Sæbjørg colleagues across multiple fields, reinforcing Walaker Nordeide (Bergen). Dr. Nordeide’s the theme of supporting interdisciplinarity archeological work considers evidence of the within the humanities. Christianization of Norway by looking at pre- Frog (University of Helsinki) opened the Christian and early Christian burial sites. She meeting with a talk entitled “Mythology as a suggests that, contrary to written sources, Symbolic Matrix: Approaching Contacts and which reflect the bias of their post-conversion Variation in the Austmarr Arena”. He authors, the archeological evidence suggests suggested a revised methodology for the that conversion was gradual and localized, analysis of prehistoric mythologies of regions with individual communities changing their bearing the influence of multiple cultures. ritual practices independently. Maths Bertell This method looks at mythology as a matrix, (Mid-Sweden University), the host and being experienced and interpreted differently organizer of the meeting, presented “A Carrot by individual cultures and communities. As or a Whip? A Comparative Perspective on an example case, Frog addressed the ‘claw Conversion.” Dr. Bertell’s paper focused on paw rite’ in Viking Age Åland, noting the the conversion of the Sámi in the 17th and 18th Finnic and Germanic influences on the centuries as a comparative tool with which to islands. Klas af Edholm (Stockholm address questions about the conversion of the University) sought to bridge the gap between Nordic peoples to Christianity some seven literary historians and historians of literature hundred years earlier. His discussion of with a discussion of Týr as literary figure and indigenous religions as localized when deity. His talk, “A Comparative and Critical compared to missionary religions which tend Analysis of the God Týr”, considered the to have a central organizational body pointed various interpretations of Týr put forth by 128 back to the work presented by Dr. Nordeide sources regarding the Christianization of and Frog earlier in the day. Sweden. The final paper of the day was presented The final session of the symposium by Leszek Słupecki (Universities of Rzeszów included papers by Kimberly La Palm and Warsaw). His paper “Golem and (UCLA) and Sirpa Aalto (University of Oulu). Mökkurkalfi” explored the similarities and La Palm’s paper, titled “‘De uno peccatore differences between Old Norse stories of qui promeriut gratium’ and the International insentient figures animated through magic Nature of Late Medieval Religious Drama”, with the golem figure from Jewish folklore. In presented her ongoing dissertation research on particular he discussed the similarities between the medieval performance tradition in Snorri’s Mökkurkalfi and the golem of Scandinavia, focusing specifically on the Prague, both of whom served as bodyguard/ oldest surviving vernacular play from sidekicks to their human counterpart. Scandinavia and the work that has been done The second day began with a guided visit with it to date. Her project seeks to expand to the Sundsvalls Museum and their exhibit the discussion of the early performance featuring the archeological finds from the tradition in Scandinavia. Aalto’s paper excavation of four Iron Age burial mounds at “Imagined, constructed, or real borders? Högom. The excavations, which took place Textual evidence of Scandinavian-Sámi between 1949 and 1960, unearthed some of contacts in the Middle Ages” looked at the most extensive collections of Iron Age medieval documents regarding Scandinavian- objects in Sweden. After their return to the Sámi interactions alongside archeological symposium site (and a brief fika), Mart evidence of the same. The paper specifically Kuldkepp (University of Tartu) presented on looked at the evidence of extensive “Genre, Textualization and Religious Change interactions between Norwegians and the in Old Norse-Icelandic Literature”. Dr. Sámi during this early period, positing that Kuldkepp’s work focused on conversion borders were established to keep the Christian narratives in the Old Norse sources with an community from interacting with non- eye to the transformation of the narrative in Christians who were believed to participate in the move from oral tradition to written supernatural practices. Earlier evidence shows description. By looking at the texts as the seemingly regular interactions between pagan interaction of two belief systems, he offered a Norwegians and the Sámi. theory of these narratives as an attempt by the This fourth meeting of the Austmarr authors to reconcile differing concepts of Network was a productive and enjoyable religion. event. It provided an excellent opportunity for Daniel Sävborg (University of Tartu) networking between scholars from across spoke on “The Pagan Resistance in 11th Europe and North America while highlighting Century Sweden”. He addressed the recent the possibilities available for present and debate over the existence of the Swedish King future collaborative work. Special thanks Blotsven, asserting that the evidence in favor should be given to Maths Bertell and the of such a rebellion outweighs arguments Department of Humanities at Mid-Sweden against. His paper explored connections University who did a splendid job organizing between Icelandic sources that tell of an 11th this meeting and introducing all of the century pagan rebellion, and Swedish, attendees to Norrlands huvudstad. The next Icelandic and international contemporary meeting of the Austmarr Network will be in Visby on 15th–16th October 2015.

129

Interdisciplinary Student Symposium on Viking and Medieval Scandinavian Subjects 19th–20th March 2015, Aarhus, Seán D. Vrieland,

The Interdisciplinary Student Symposium on centuries and the influence of manuscript Viking and Medieval Scandinavian Subjects tradition in runic graffiti. Roberto Pagani has come a long way since it first started, as (University of Iceland) followed by debunking eight students from Aarhus University. the concept that individual inherently Bergdís Þrastardóttir, the founder and bore magical properties, taking instead the organizer of the symposium’s first four years, sensible approach that the writing system was recalls that in the first year, “We had to twist used as a tool in casting spells. Jonas our classmates’ arms just to get them to come Koesling (University of Bergen) reeled in the and talk about something.” Now in its eighth session with an exploration of saga scenes consecutive year, the symposium has grown such as the fishing for the Miðgarðsormr and into a two-day event with 24 speakers from broader literary tropes as depicted on the eleven universities in six different countries. Gotland picutre stones. Eighteen MA students and six PhD students After a sociable lunch, the session “Social presented on subjects relating to Old Norse Issues in Saga Literature” opened with literature, society, language, religion, and Elizabeth Skuthorpe’s (University of Iceland) material culture, divided among eight themed conviction of outlaws as superhuman or sessions over the two days. Programs for this monstrous beings crossing in and out of and previous years’ events can be found on society. This discussion transitioned smoothly the website vikingoldnorse.au.dk. to Alexander J. Wilson’s (Durham University) The symposium began Thursday morning presentation on the use of monstrous language with an opening by Sophie Bønding, chair of in the propagandist telling of Sverris saga. this year’s organizing committee. She heartily Jennifer Hurd () kept the welcomed over 100 students from eleven session turning with her discussion on the different countries and reminded them of the subversive twisting of a maiden-king tale and symposium’s purpose: to be a place where the roles of women in Nítída saga. Christine students can have a friendly, professional Amling (Goethe University Frankfurt am environment to share their ideas, ask Main) concluded the session with a compare- questions, learn from each other, and gain ison of two politically charged hagiographies experience in the art of research presentation. of local Germanic heroes, St. Edmund and St. The opening session bore the theme “Old Óláfr. Norse Poetry”, beginning with Hannah R.F. The final session of the day was a lively Hethmon’s (University of Iceland) comparison pair of presentations on the theme “Dealing of Óðinn’s trickery in posing neck-riddles to with (Dead) Bodies”. Rebecca Conway Vafþrúðnir and Heiðrekr. This was followed (University of Iceland) opened by introducing by two colorful lectures: Bob Oscar Benjamin the motif of wooden legs and its relevance to van Strijen (University of Iceland) spoke on material culture and the technology of the tripartite color division black-white-red in embodiment. William Biel (University of connection with social class and myth in both Oslo) wrapped up the day right in time with Old Norse poetry and around the world. Claire another motif: barrow-breaking as a chronotope Organ (University of Aberdeen) brought the separating the (often pagan) ‘then’ from ‘now’. session full-circle with her discussion of the Moving forward in time, the second symbolic use of red-gold rings, wolf hair, and morning opened with the theme “Reception otter skins in foretelling death. History”. Vanessa Iacocca (University of Shifting focus in the second session to Iceland) started the day by comparing the use “Runes and Monuments”, Giacomo Bernobi of ancient mythology in building national (Ludwig-Maximilians University ) identity by Icelandic and Irish poets. Minjie presented on runic revival in the 11th–15th Su (University of Iceland) followed by

130 portraying the poet and painter William Li Tang (University of Iceland) added to the Morris’ use of color in illustrating the session with a discussion of pagan and Volsung as a hero. The session ended with Christian number symbolism and their use in Capucine André (University of Iceland) Knýtlinga saga. Bethany Rogers (University presenting on how Nordic characters are of Iceland) concluded the session with a depicted in the newest generation of Franco- lecture on the importance of emotional Belgian comics (bandes dessinées). investment in the teacher-student relationship The following session went further afield in Old Norse fosterage and Ancient Sparta. with the topic “Peripheral Beings in Old The second day concluded with the down- Norse Literature”. Jonathan Correa (University to-earth session “Landscape Studies”. Ryan of Iceland) began with a treatment of the Foster () showed the berserkr-drive in the Old Norse world and geographical distribution of -setr/-sætr and among Vietnam-Era veterans. Shirley McPhaul -ærgi place-names in the Scottish Hebrides, (University of Iceland) followed by posing with considerations of Norse farming practice. the question of why Brynhildr takes on Finally, Johanna Nowotnick (University of multiple forms in Vǫlsunga saga and whether Iceland) wrapped up the unforgettable she could be considered the tragic hero rather symposium by examining associations with than the antagonist. Judith-Sarah Berger (Kiel natural phenomena as an aid to the survival of University) closed by tracking down the myth in cultural memory. elusive nature of the dísir in Old Norse Bergdís Þrastardóttir closed the two-day literature and the cult practices described in event by giving a few words on why such a the historical record. platform for students to share their ideas is The scholarship continued after lunch with still needed, evident by the impressive turnout the topic “Manuscripts and Learned Culture”, of students from all over. We can only look opened by Mathias Blobel’s (University of forward to how the International Student Iceland) use of network-analysis tools on Symposium on Viking and Medieval Scandi- manuscripts and a case study of the so-called navian Subjects will continue to be a place ‘political sagas’. Seán D. Vrieland (University that attracts students and their ideas for many of Copenhagen) followed with a study of a years to come. Or, to use her words: “Keep up single Old Gutnish manuscript and the scribal the good work, and I can’t wait to see where and linguistic influence of Danish on the text. this madness ends.”

Public Engagement with Research: A Viking TeaBreak Lisa Turberfield, Claire Organ and Blake Middleton, University of Aberdeen

In 2013, the University of Aberdeen launched and Shire offering mini-Viking TeaBreaks its inaugural May Festival with over 7,500 prior to the festival, which turned out to be people attending 100 events across the very popular with teachers and pupils alike. Northeast of Scotland. As part of this festival, Upon its launch, our event was fully booked PhD candidates Claire Organ and Lisa within a few days and an extension on the Turberfield of the Centre for Scandinavian number of tickets was required. On the day of Studies organised a new public engagement the VTB, the public came out in force, filling event called the Viking TeaBreak (VTB). the large room to the very last seat. The purpose of the VTB was to stimulate The idea of VTB was to give the public interest and encourage discussion regarding insight and access into current Scandinavian the research taking place at the Centre of studies research as well as raising the Scandinavian Studies. This was the first department’s profile. Unfortunately, academics public event organised by the Centre and as within university settings can appear to the such we were keen to engage the public as general public as stiff, unapproachable and much as possible. To accomplish this, the even scary. With this in mind, we chose to VTB was made a free of charge event and conduct the event as an informal ‘Tea Break’ letters were sent to schools in Aberdeen City with scholars using a speed dating model. 131

After an initial welcome and introduction, approach; ship building, writing secret PhD students rotated between tables every 15 messages in runes and discussing daily minutes, discussing their theses with guests activities of the , encouraging the over a cup of tea and some cake. Whenever a children to ask questions and thus stimulating participant wanted, they could join another an interest in the Vikings and history in table, look at the poster boards or view the general. The highlight of the day was the Camtasia (narrated slideshow) presentation. A story-telling by the Centre’s own version of special crafting corner at the back of the room the god Thor (Blake Middleton) who, dressed was set up for the children, where they could in Viking clothing and with a replica of build Viking ships, write their name in runes, Thor’s hammer (), began telling myths or listen to stories while volunteers cut out in Old Norse and English. Following the shields and swords for them to take home. We conclusion of the May Festival 2014 the also included two competitions during our Vikingling Thing went ‘on the road’, visiting event – ‘Best Dressed Viking’ and ‘Best an additional two primary schools with Question’ – several children dressed up for students who could not attend the University this and we had numerous entries for the event itself. The feedback from the schools question competition including, How many showed that the children (and teachers) Vikings does it take to change a light bulb? enjoyed the alternative approach to learning, and, Did Vikings wear underwear? whilst developing an interest in history and a To make our first event run smoothly we better understanding of its relation to their worked closely with the University’s own world. In 2015 after another successful Researcher Development and Public application to the May festival, we further Engagement with Research units, to produce a extended our Vikingling Thing event to review of the running, organisation and accommodate even more groups of children outcome of our event. We also had the event and named it The Viking Teabreak Returns. evaluated through audience feedback forms All sessions were immediately booked out and a detailed report from an assigned and we were asked to hold an additional event (neutral) observer. The reviews showed that at another school, which had failed to secure a our guests welcomed the different approach, space. All the events were a great success, as the VTB ‘was a far cry from a formal both with the children and with the PhD seminar or lecture’. The VTB was also highly students. commended for ‘exceptional achievements in The University’s May Festival gave us public engagement’ by the judges of the great opportunities to work within a large Principal’s Prize for Public Engagement with public event, whilst organising and running Research 2013 and is now used as one of the our own individual events (VTB and the case studies on the University’s Public Vikingling Thing). The process benefitted all Engagement with Research website. the PhD students involved, as we were Due to the popularity and success of the encouraged to view our research from an event, we gained the opportunity to host a alternative point of view, whilst developing second VTB in 2014 and decided to expand our organisation and presentation skills in the event by offering an additional three days order to make our work accessible to our of primary school events under the rebranded target audience(s). In addition, we formed Vikingling Thing name. The Vikingling Thing ongoing partnerships with the schools gave us the opportunity to specifically target involved and our visibility as individual our ‘research presentation’ towards a younger scholars increased, not only within our own audience. We achieved this by bringing department, but within the University itself. historical studies to life using a fun, hands-on

132

DISSERTATIONS AND THESES PhD Priojects

Myth in Translation: The Ludic Imagination in Contemporary Video Games (working title) Robert Guyker, Jr., Pacifica Graduate Institute

Research project undertaken for the completion of a degree of in Mythological Studies at Pacifica Graduate Institute (US); scheduled for submission in late 2015. Supervisor: Laura Grillo (Pacifica Graduate Institute). This doctoral dissertation investigates the  Text: On the textual , I follow the adaptation and creative use of mythological protocol of analyzing mythic texts (Lincoln themes, narratives and motifs in video games. 1999: 150–151; Doty 2000: 466–467), in The main body of source material for my case relation to ergodic literature and cybertext studies consists of contemporary video games (Aarseth 1997; Eskelinen 2012). produced within the last two decades  Participation: Knowingly or unknowingly, alongside culturally significant and historical the consumer of myth and the player of a antecedents ranging back to the earliest game retain traits of active participation in computer games developed in academic labs the ideology of the myth and the rules of the of the 1960s, and domestic computer games game, though both can be subverted and and home consoles of the 1980s through the overturned internally for purposes of ludic late 1990s. The sources present explicit interpretation and configuration. Here the engagement with culturally derived sacred mythos is transmuted into a semi-ritualized traditions of Eurasia in general with emphasis space of play, action and the non-verbal. on Greco-Roman antiquity, Japanese folk  (Other)Worldliness: Aspects made natural to religion, tales and national mythologies, and gameworlds and myths are the generation of Ancient Near East religions. Recognizable mental worlds. Here, I build on Jesper Juul’s to the Norse , Celtic legendry liminal positionality of video games between and Arthuriana offer auxiliary discourse on fictional worlds and real rules (2005). the reception and transmission of imagined Viking lore, Romanticism and neo- Theory and Method Medievalism (Stern 2002). Modern poetic and In theory and method I emphasize a artful conceptions of myth will also be polysemic and polyfunctional perspective on considered through the creative traditions of the study of myth and game studies. Overly mythopoeic literature as they relate to the deterministic and monistic theories are distinct branches of modern high fantasy, and situated beside multivocality and multi- speculative and science fiction media. To this authorship (Doniger 1998: 84–88). In this extent, referents and significations are built way, my case studies analyze various sub- on, or defined by, either cultural sources of types of myths (e.g. theogonic, cosmogonic, myth or poetic inventions of in-game lore. , heroic, etc.) as they migrate and Based in both a theoretical framework and become re-contextualized in various genres of pragmatic methodology, this study develops a games like real-time strategy, computer role- media-conscious perspective on mythic playing games, and massively multiplayer discourse, intertextuality, performance and online role-playing games. By assembling and personal narrative as they converge in the focusing comparanda, I give attention to the video game medium through process and distinct voices and modes of mediation case- product. Problematics in both myth and game by-case, pace wide-ranging (‘strong’) are addressed in three avenues: comparison of Claude-Lévi Strauss, Mircea 133

Eliade, and C.G. Jung—in favor of a ‘weaker’ transmuted form of myth and localizes it in a kind of close comparison as proposed by world of extraordinary deeds, mythmakers, scholar and critic Bruce Lincoln (2012: 122– and culture heroes of fictional worlds. 123). As such, mythic structures used in the The central premise of my thesis is the assemblage of gameworlds are considered in coterminous development through history of relation to smaller etic units of international the cultural categories of myth and game as motifs and tale types. And finally, sets of emic they are presented in contemporary video units are to be assembled for case studies games. As activities of leisure, nascent subjects involving idiosyncratic ecologies of video of research, tools of business strategy (e.g. game culture and specific video game gamification in marketing mythologies), and communities that engage in online interaction scapegoats in popular discourse (i.e. myth as in persistent worlds. Thus, in conjunction true/false and game as a productive/wasteful with a textualist perspective, I will include use of time), I argue that myths and games are personal narratives from players and designers. generative interlocutors at play and in My thesis has the aim to address and competition. discuss the following overarching issues of cross-cultural influences and exchanges in Works Cited commercial, material, visual and ludic culture: Aarseth, Espen. 1997. Cybertexts: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature. Baltimore: John Hopkins  Translatability, as developed by Jakobsonian University Press. semiotics and linguistic translation, while Barthes, Roland. 2012 [1957]. Mythologies. New York: extending to the broader application of Hill & Wang. cultural translation (Smith 2004) Doniger, Wendy. 1998. The Implied Spider: Politics and Theology in Myth. New York: California  Syncretism as a mechanism and as a system University Press. of amalgamation and appropriation of Doty, William G. 2000. Mythography: The Study of nd foreign Myths and Rituals. 2 edn. Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press.  Mythogenesis and mythopoeisis Eskelinen, Markku. 2012. Cybertext Poetics: The Critical Landscape of New Media .  The natural genesis of pantheons vis-à-vis International Texts in Critical Media Aesthetics 2. poetical pantheons of artifice or exogenous Ed. Francisco J. Richard. New York: Continuum. contact Juul, Jesper. 2005. Half-Real: Video Games between Real Rules and Fictional Worlds. Cambridge: MIT Press. Concluding remarks Krzywinska, Tanya. 2008. “World Creation and Lore: Basic to my approach is the notion that myth World of Warcraft as Rich Text”. In Digital can take on ‘weaker’ and ‘transmuted forms’: Culture, Play, and Identity: A World of Warcraft Reader. Ed. Hilde G. Corneliussen & Jill Walker Myth can be transmitted either in its Rettberg. Cambridge: MIT Press. Pp. 123–141. immediate shape, sacred narrative anchored Lincoln, Bruce. 1999. Theorizing Myth: Narrative, in theology and interlaced with liturgy and Ideology, and Scholarship. London: University of ritual, or in transmuted form, as past Chicago Press. narrative that has severed its ties to sacred Lincoln, Bruce. 2012. “Theses on Comparison”. In Gods and Demons, Priests and Scholars: Critical time and instead functions as an account of Explorations in the History of Religions. London: purportedly secular, albeit extraordinary University of Chicago Press. Pp. 121–130. happening. (Puhvel 1987: 39.) Puhvel, Jaan. 1987. . Baltimore As a remediated model of interactivity, video / London: John Hopkins University Press. Smith, Mark S. 2008. God in Translation: Deities in games inflect the reality-claims of these Cross-Cultural Discourse in the Biblical World. culturally based transmuted myths, mobilizing Cambridge: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co. them through conscious-consumerism, rather Stern, Eddo. “A Touch of the Medieval: Narrative, than naturalized Barthesian ‘myth consumers’ Magic and Computer Technology in Massively (Krzywinska 2008: 126; cf. Barthes 2012 [1957]: Multiplayer Computer Role-Playing Games”. In Computer Games and Digital Cultures Conference 240, 272). The situation remains ambiguous Proceedings. Ed. Frans Mayra. Tampere: Tampere between production and consumption on the University Press. Pp. 257–276. one hand, and valuation and signification on the other. The gameworld assimilates the

134

Pre-Christian Sources on Odin: The Significance of Text and Iconographic Evidence as well as Archaeological Finds (4th–11th Centuries AD) (working title) Tom Hellers, University of Bergen

A PhD research project affiliated with the Research Group in Medieval Philology, University of Bergen. Supervisors: Jens Eike Schnall (University of Bergen), Alexandra Pesch (Centre for Baltic and Scandinavian Archaeology, Schleswig). In Old Norse literature, the Germanic god which can lead to a one-sided and thus Odin is depicted as a complex divinity that distorted representation of the god. This can, has many different social, religious and for example, be observed in the most recent mythological functions: the Allfather, god of monographs on Odin. Kershaw (2000) focuses runes and poetry, god of magic and ecstasy, on Odin’s function as a god of war and the god of war and the dead, the forefather of dead. Based on Höfler (1934), she interprets royal dynasties and so forth. The age of these him primarily as a god of the Indo-Germanic conceptions, their expansion and evolution Männerbünde. This was criticized due to her still remains an open question and the subject rather non-critical use of sources, and of controversial discussions among researchers. consequently conclusions, that are difficult to Scholarly interest in the historical verify (cf. Hultgård 2007: 780; Lassen 2011: background of written sources has in recent 67). Solli (2003) interprets Odin as a “queer studies led to a stimulating debate on Odin god” for the reason that he practices seiðr, a and his age (most recently Lassen 2011; form of magic that was mainly used by Liberman 2011; cf. also Hultgård 2007: 776– women. This assumption is based on an 782). Archaeological findings such as the almost exclusively shamanistic interpretation recently discovered figurine from Lejre, of the sources, which was met with criticism Denmark, which might depict Odin (Behr 2011: 208ff.). Lassen takes a different (Christensen 2009; 2010; Ellingsgaard 2010), approach by compiling all textual sources raise new questions and one can discuss to from the High Middle Ages dealing with what extent the contents of much younger Odin. She argues that Odin’s complexity and written sources can be transferred to the the different functions ascribed to him result findings and thus what new conclusions about from the intention, genre and literary context the social and religious conditions of earlier of the text. She therefore assumes that Odin centuries can be made. In my PhD project I can be seen as a literary figure that can be will investigate the miscellaneous conceptions changed and adapted as needed. Thus, the about Odin in synchronic and diachronic medieval textual sources can not be used for perspective. By using an interdisciplinary investigations in the field of history of approach, I will analyze how Odin has been religions (Lassen 2011: 81, 391). This depicted, to what degree it is possible to approach has been fast criticized (Heide, verify his complex in older sources that date 2012: 193–198). from before the High Middle Ages, and which In these three monographs, Odin’s functions he had at which time. complexity is either rejected or the god’s significance is reduced to one single function The State of Research by prioritizing a certain category of sources Odin is regularly the subject of investigations and at the same time omitting others. The (lately Price 2015). Scholars have been most selection of sources varies depending on the occupied with Odin’s character, cult and researcher’s academic background and origin and have interpreted the god in various according to the purpose of their investigation. ways. A few attempts have been made so far to interpret Odin in his entirety (e.g. Research Questions and Objectives Steinsland 2005: 165–194; Böldl 2013: 142– Until now it has been difficult to verify Odin 187). More often, specific aspects, functions in older sources dating back to the time before and characteristics have been illuminated, the detailed texts from the High Middle Ages. 135

There exist only a few reliable sources related place names. The older sources include, among to Odin among older sources, i.e. sources that others, texts from late antique and early undoubtedly mention him. These are medieval authors such as The Venerable Bede, exclusively written sources. In contrast, there Germanic weekday names, , are far more dubious sources, i.e. sources archaeological finds, some pictorial sources which to varying degrees are attributed to like the Gotlandic picture stones, pictorial Odin in the literature, including figural , gold bracteates, coins, press plates depictions, word traditions, place names and and small figurines. Only sources dating from archaeological finds. Many scholars when the 4th century on will be considered, because interpreting these sources try to compensate in this period we have occuring for the first for the lack of contemporary material through time several sources which are assumed to be the much younger Old Norse Literature and related to Odin. The younger, High Medieval Saxo Grammaticus’ Gesta Danorum. Others sources are solely textual sources. They limit their research by excluding some of the incorporate such miscellaneous source genres source categories. Thus, uncertain sources and works such as the Poetic Edda, Snorra- have been interpreted rather uncritically as a Edda, skaldic poetry, saga literature, Saxo source for an Odin cult. In my research, I Grammaticus’ Gesta Danorum and Odin’s shall, on the one hand, use a method that is numerous names, which are scattered across adapted to the special source situation around different genres. It is especially the older Odin and that, on the other hand includes, all skaldic poetry, parts of the Poetic Edda and sources categories and sources (see Odin’s names that at least in part can be “Approach and Method” below). traced back to heathen times. I shall investigate three main questions: The corpus will contain all older sources 1. Are there non-written sources that can with that up until now have been discussed as (greater) reliability be considered to be being related to Odin. Previous source connected with Odin? catalogues contain, beside the text sources, 2. How is Odin depicted in older sources from usually just a few uncertain, i.e. iconographic, the 4th to the 11th century AD and how is archaeological and runic sources. Non-literary Odin’s complexity manifested and changed sources are usually interpreted as lone sources over this period? in conjunction with older reliable text sources 3. How are the conceptions about Odin and the and with sources from Old Norse Literature, Odin cult from older sources related to the including Saxo Grammaticus (e.g. Turville- depiction and complexity of Odin in younger Petre 1964; de Vries 1970; Simek 2003; sources? Steinsland 2005; Böldl 2013). A compre- The investigation of these questions demands hensive corpus considering both older reliable a broad knowledge about the conceptions of and unreliable sources does however not yet Odin in heathen times. Therefore I shall exist. Such a corpus is a desirable and assemble a corpus of all the older sources necessary tool to collect, make precise and related to Odin and thereafter evaluate the interpret our knowledge about Odin. significance of every single source. Furthermore I shall map the reliable sources, summarize Approach and Method them statistically in a register and discuss the In addition to the development of a method, changes of the Odin conceptions over the the study consists of three parts: the compo- centuries. sition of a corpus of sources; evaluation of the sources’ significance; the answering of the Sources and Corpus three main questions. The sources can be divided into two main The depiction of Odin in younger sources groups by their age: older sources from the 4th was recently presented by Lassen (2011), so to the 11th century and younger sources from in that case I can refer to her work. In the High Middle Ages. The older ones consist particular cases, I will quote the original of literary, archaeological and iconographic sources. Odin’s numerous and highly symbolic sources, as well as theophoric personal and names were published by Falk (²2005, 1st ed.

136

1924). With the aid of these publications, I Ellmers’ method (1992). He defines criteria to will clarify the main features (functions, interpret finds as “Germanic” and as characteristics, myths) of the god in the “religious” and uses runic inscriptions as a younger sources, and use them as a starting link between archaeological sources from the point for the evaluation of the conceptions Iron Age and text sources from High Middle related to Odin in older sources. Ages. Regarding possibilities and limits of In recent years, research has introduced using Old Norse Literature, I will follow Beck several complementary methodological (1992; 1994; 2007) and the works that are approaches for an interdisciplinary interpret- based on and enhance his research (Schjødt ation of the sources. Nevertheless, no 2009; Krümpel 2013; van Nahl 2013; comprehensive and commonly accepted Sundqvist 2013). These scholars evaluate the method yet exists with which to verify Odin source’s value of the different texts by in older, non-written sources. For this reason, examining their literary context, the author’s I will select and combine methods used so far methods and purposes and the cultural in scholarship, and, thereafter, advance them. environment in which the texts were written Such an adapted method will allow me to down. The same applies to Polomé (1992) relate some of the sources to Odin with higher and Timpe (1992), who use a similar reliability and to exclude others. Furthermore, approach for antique sources. The rich great importance will be attached to the material of theophoric names has been treated inclusion of all source categories, i.e. texts, several times and analyzed in relation to images, language and word traditions, methodological problems (e.g. Hald 1963; archaeological finds and theophoric name Andersson 1992; 2005; Reichert 1992; material. Vikstrand 2002). They introduce a method Research methods used to analyze gold whereby theophoric names are used as bracteates combines, amongst others, archaeo- sources for the by logical, iconographic and runological methods determining the age of the names, placing and can be seen as a methodological them into a cultural landscape, incorporating prototype in this context. This research has other religious and cultic sources from the succeeded in coming forward with compre- closer and more distant surrounding hensible interpretations of many pictorial environment and by interpreting the names elements and inscriptions and, thus has linguistically and onomastically. With a managed to set the bracteates in a supra- starting point in these works and methods, it regional social and religious context, in which will be possible for me to analyze the the Odin cult apparently played an important significance of the sources and to re-evaluate role (firstly done by Hauck 1954a; 1954b; their relevance. In this way I will be able to 1980a; 1980b; then based on Hauck e.g. present a reliable collection of older written Pesch 2007; 2011; 2012; Beck 2011; Behr and non-written sources related to Odin, 2011; Düwel & Nowak 2011; Hauck 2011a; which at the same time will provide the 2011b; Heizmann 2011; 2012; Müller 2011). I answer to the question of whether there are will interpret the gold bracteates using this indeed older, non-written sources that can be method and in addition try to transfer and related to Odin with (greater) reliability than adapt it to other sources that contain previously possible (main question (1)). inscriptions and/or pictures (e.g. rune stones On the basis of the results from the first with pictures). Helmbrecht (2011) and Pesch main question, I will examine how Odin is (2007; 2012) work with a method for depicted in the sources from the 4th to the 11th religious interpretations of pictorial sources, century and how Odin’s complexity is which is based on Panofsky’s art historical displayed and changes during this period theories (1932; 1955). According to this (main question (2)). According to how broad method, pictures are interpreted in three levels: the reliable source material is, various pre-iconographical description, iconographical questions may be discussed: Is it possible to analysis, iconological interpretation. I will detect miscellaneous conceptions of Odin? interpret archaeological sources using Which functions can be defined? What is the

137 interrelationship between the miscellaneous Beck, Heinrich. 2011. “Lese- und Deutungsprobleme conceptions and functions? Could one here im Namenschatz des Brakteatencorpus”. In Die Goldbrakteaten der Völkerwanderungszeit: Aus- speak about competitive concepts related to wertung und Neufunde. Ed. et Odin from different regions and/or periods, al. Ergänzungsbände zum Reallexikon der which are related to different functions? If germanischen Altertumskunde 40. Berlin/New this is the case, how can this development and York: Walter de Gruyter. Pp. 297–315. the interaction between the competitive Beck, Heinrich, et al. (eds.). 1992. Germanische Religionsgeschichte: Quellen und Quellenprobleme. concepts be illustrated? Is it possible that the Ergänzungsbände zum Reallexikon der different conceptions are manifested in, for germanischen Altertumskunde 5. Berlin/New York: example, ritual acts? Are there regions with Walter de Gruyter. several sources related to Odin and others Beck, Heinrich, et al. (eds.). 2012. Altertumskunde – where the god cannot be verified? Is it Altertumswissenschaft – Kulturwissenschaft: Erträge perhaps even possible to concretize the und Perspektiven nach 40 Jahren Reallexikon der th germanischen Altertumskunde. Ergänzungsbände expansion of the Odin cult from the 4 zum Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde century onwards? 77. Berlin/Boston: Walter de Gruyter. Finally, I shall analyze the relation between Beck, Heinrich, et al. (eds.). 2013. Snorri Sturluson: conceptions about Odin in older sources and Historiker, Dichter, Politiker. Ergänzungsbände zum Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde depictions of the god and his complexity in 85. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. younger sources (main question (3)). This Behr, Charlotte. 2011. “Forschungsgeschichte”. In concerns similarities and differences between Heizmann et al. 2011: 153–229. the older and the younger tradition, as well as Böldl, Klaus. 2013. Götter und Mythen des Nordens: any impact that could have affected the older Ein Handbuch. München: CH Beck. Christensen, Tom. 2009. “Odin fra Lejre”. Årskrift fra conceptions related to Odin over the centuries. Roskilde Museum: 6–25. I shall take account of possible external Christensen, Tom. 2010. “Odin fra Lejre”. In Danefæ - impacts, such as emigrations, cultural contacts Skatte fra den danske muld. Ed. Poul Otto Nielsen and the expansion of Christianity. The et al. København: Gyldendal. Pp. 183–186. consequences of such external impacts, if Düwel, Klaus, & Sean Nowak. 2011. “Die semantisch lesbaren Inschriften auf Goldbrakteaten”. In existing, will be investigated further. Has Heizmann et al. 2011: 375.473. Odin undergone a significant change of Ellingsgaard, Óluva. 2010. “Var Odin en kvinde?”. meaning in different regions over a longer Videnskab.dk, available at http://videnskab.dk/ period? What kind of understanding can be kultur-samfund/var-odin-en-kvinde. obtained from such new knowledge in matters Ellmers, Detlev. 1992. “Die archäologischen Quellen zur germanischen Religionsgeschichte”. In Beck et of Odin’s position, especially in relation to al. 1992: 95–117. the other Germanic gods? Falk, Hjalmar. 2005. Odensheite. Oslo: Kulturorgan My research shall contribute to a more Skadinaujo. complete understanding of the enigmatic Hald, Kristian. 1963: “The Cult of Odin in Danish figure Odin on the basis of an evaluated Place-Names”. In Early English and Norse Studies Presented to H. Smith in Honour of His Sixtieth source corpus and facilitate future studies. Birthday. Ed. Arthur Brown et al. London: Methuen. Pp. 99–109. Works Cited Hauck, Karl. 1954a. “Halsring und Ahnenstab als Andersson, Thorsten. 1992. “Orts- und Personennamen herrscherliche Würdezeichen”. In Herrschafts- als Aussagequelle für die altgermanische Religion”. zeichen und Staatssymbolik: Beiträge zu ihrer In Beck et al. 1992: 508–540. Geschichte vom dritten bis zum sechzehnten Andersson, Thorsten. 2005. “Theophore Namen”. In Jahrhundert I. Ed. Percy Ernst Schramm. Schriften RGA 30: 442-452. der Monumenta Germaniae Historica 13.1. Beck, Heinrich. 1992. “Die religionsgeschichtlichen Stuttgart: Hiersemann. Pp. 145–212. Quellen der Gylfaginning”. In Beck et al. 1992: Hauck, Karl. 1954b. “Herrschaftszeichen eines 608–617. Wodanistischen Königtums”. Jahrbuch für Beck, Heinrich. 1994. Snorri Sturlusons Sicht der fränkische Landesforschung 14: 9–66. paganen Vorzeit. Nachrichten der Akademie der Hauck, Karl. 1980a. “Gott als Arzt: Eine Wissenschaften in Göttingen, phil.-hist. Klasse exemplarische Skizze mit Text- und Bildzeugnissen 1994.1. Göttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. aus drei verschiedenen Religionen zu Phänomenen Beck, Heinrich. 2007. “Die Uppsala-Edda und Snorri und Gebärden der Heilung (Zur Ikonologie der Sturlusons Konstruktion einer skandinavischen Goldbrakteaten XVI)”. In Text und Bild: Aspekte Vorzeit”. Scripta Islandica 58: 5–32. des Zusammenwirkens zweier Künste in Mittelalter

138

und früher Neuzeit. Ed. Christel Meier et al. Panofsky, Erwin. 1932. “Zum Problem der Wiesbaden: Reichert. Pp. 19–62. Beschreibung und Inhaltsdeutung von Werken der Hauck, Karl. 1980b. “Völkerwanderungszeitliche bildenden Kunst”. Logos 21: 193–119. Bildzeugnisse eines Allgottes des Nordens und ihre Panofsky, Erwin. 1955. “Iconography and Iconology: älteren mediterranen Analogien (Zur Ikonologie der An Introduction to the Study of Renaissance Art”. Goldbrakteaten XVII)”. In Pietas: Festschrift für In Meaning in the Visual Arts: Papers in and on Art Bernhard Kötting. Ed. Ernst Dassmann et al. History. Ed. Erwin Panofsky. New York: Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum, Ergänzungs- Doubleday. Pp. 26–54. band 8. Münster: Aschendorff. Pp. 566–583. Pesch, Alexandra. 2007. Die Goldbrakteaten der Hauck, Karl. 2011a. “Machttaten : Die Völkerwanderungszeit: Thema und Variation Chiffrenwelt der Brakteaten und die Methoden ihrer Ergänzungsbände zum Reallexikon der Auswertung”. In Heizmann et al. 2011: 1–60. germanischen Altertumskunde 36. Berlin/New Hauck, Karl. 2011b. “Die Bildformeln der York: Walter de Gruyter. Goldbrakteaten in ihren Leitvarianten (Zur Pesch, Alexandra. 2011. “Netzwerke der Zentralplätze: Ikonologie der Goldbrakteaten, LV)”. In Heizmann Eiltenkontakte und Zusammenarbeit frühmittel- et al. 2011: 61–152. alterlicher Reichtumszentren im Spiegel der Heide, Eldar. 2012. “Å konkludere etter å ha vurdert Goldbrakteaten”. In Heizmann et al. 2011: 231–277. eitt alternativ – Annette Lassen 2011: Odin på Pesch, Alexandra. 2012. “Fallstricke und Glatteis: Die kristent pergament: En teksthistorisk studie, germanische Tierornamentik”. In Beck et al. 2012: Bokmelding”. Collegium Medievale 24: 193–198. 633–687. Heizmann, Wilhelm. 2011. “Die Formelwörter der Polom , Edgar C. 1992. “Schamanismus in der Goldbrakteaten”. In Heizmann et al. 2011: 525–601. germanischen Religion?”. In Der historische Heizmann, Wilhelm. 2012. “Die Bilderwelt der Horizont der Götterbild-Amulette aus der völkerwanderungszeitlichen Goldbrakteaten als Übergangsepoche von der Spätantike zum religionsgeschichtliche Quelle”. In Beck et al. Frühmittelalter. Ed. Karl Hauck. Göttingen: 2012: 689–736. Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht. Pp. 403–420. Heizmann, Wilhelm, et al. (eds.). 2011. Die Price, Neil. 2015. Odin’s Whisper: Death and the Goldbrakteaten der Völkerwanderungszeit: Vikings. London: Reaktion Books. Auswertung und Neufunde. Ergänzungsbände zum Reichert, Hermann. 1992. “Altgermanische Personen- Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde 40. namen als Quellen der Religionsgeschichte”. In Berlin/New York: Walter de Gruyter. Beck et al. 1992: 552–574. Helmbrecht, Michaela. 2011. Wirkungsmächtige RGA = Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde. Kommunikationsmedien: Menschenbilder der Berlin: de Gruyter, 1973–2008 Vendel- und Wikingerzeit und ihre Kontexte Acta Schjødt, Jens Peter. 2009. “Freyr and Fróði and some Archaeologica Lundensia Series Prima in 4°, No. reflections on euhemerism”. In Analecta 30). Lund: Institutionen för arkeologi och antikens Septentrionalia: Beiträge zur nordgermanischen historia, Lunds universitet. Kultur- und Literaturgeschichte. Ed. Wilhelm Höfler, Otto. 1934. Kultische Geheimbünde der Heizmann et al. Ergänzungsbände zum Reallexikon Germanen. Frankfurt am Main: Diesterweg. der germanischen Altertumskunde 6. Berlin: Walter Hultgård, Anders. 2007. “Wotan-Odin”. RGA 35: 759– de Gruyter. Pp. 576–579. 785. Simek, Rudolf. 2003. Religion und Mythologie der Kershaw, Kris. 2000. The One-Eyed God and the Germanen. Darmstadt: Theiss. (Indo-)Germanic “Männerbünde”. Journal of Indo- Solli, Britt. 2002: Seid: Myter, sjamanisme og kjønn i European studies, monograph 36. Washington: vikingenes tid. Oslo: Pax. Institute for the Study of Man. Steinsland, Gro. 2005. Norrøn religion: Myter, riter, Krümpel, Thomas. 2013. “Die ‘allzumenschlichen’ samfunn. Oslo: Pax. Götter des Nordens: Zum Streit um den Sundqvist, Olof. 2013. “Snorri Sturluson as a Historian religionsgeschichtlichen Quellenwert der hoch- of Religions: The of the Descriptions of mittelalterlichen mythologischen Überlieferung”. In the Pre-Christian Cultic Leadership and Rituals in Beck et al. 2013: 49–70. Hákonar saga góða”. In Beck et al. 2013: 71–92. Lassen, Annette. 2011. Odin på kristent pergament: En Timpe, Dieter. 1992. “Tacitus’ Germania als teksthistorisk studie. København: Museum religionsgeschichtliche Quelle”. In Beck et al. Tusculanum. 1992: 434–485. Liberman, Anatoly. 2011. “A Short History of the God Turville-Petre, . 1964. Myth and Religion of the Óðinn”. Nowele 62/63: 351–430. North: The Religion of Ancient Scandinavia. Müller, Gunter. 2011. “Von der Buchstabenmagie zur Worcester/London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson. Namenmagie in den Brakteateninschriften”. In Vikstrand, Per. 2002. “Sacral Place-Names in Heizmann et al. 2011: 317–374. Scandinavia”. Onoma 37: 121–143. van Nahl, Jan. 2013. Snorri Sturlusons Mythologie und de Vries, Jan. 1970. Altgermanische Religions- die mittelalterliche Theologie Ergänzungsbände geschichte I–II. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. zum Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde 81. Berlin/Boston: Walter de Gruyter.

139

Porous Bodies, Porous Minds: Emotions and the Supernatural in the Íslendingasögur (ca. 1200–1400) Kirsi Kanerva, University of Turku

Thesis defended for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at the University of Turku, Finland, School of History, Culture and Arts Studies (Cultural history) on 31st January 2015. Supervisors: Professor Hannu Salmi (University of Turku), Professor Marjo Kaartinen (University of Turku) and Adjunct Professor (Docent) Anu Lahtinen (University of Turku). Opponent: Adjunct Professor (Docent) Frog (University of Helsinki). This study concentrates on the conceptions connotations. Secondly, following the example and representation of emotions in medieval of William Ian Miller (1992; 1993), the 13th- and 14th-century Iceland. The main concept is analysed by studying the sources employed in the study consist of motivation behind the behaviour of the Íslendingasögur that are analyzed inter- ógæfumenn [‘men of misfortune’] and how textually. The study contributes to earlier the emotional experience inherent in ógæfa research done on saga emotions where the was represented in the Íslendingasögur, with emphasis has been on their somatic a special focus on Brennu-Njáls saga and representation, and particular focus has been Gísla saga Súrssonar. It is suggested that, like placed on individual emotions such as love, emotions, ógæfa was considered a phenomenon sorrow, anger, empathy and shame (e.g. that could be perceived in somatic changes of Miller 1992; 1993; Le Goff 1992; Wolf 2000; the body and in a person’s physical appear- 2013; 2014; Larrington 2001; Sävborg 2007; ance. It is argued that ógæfa did not refer Ármann Jakobsson 2008). In this study, merely to a state of affairs but had emotional however, two new perspectives are undertaken. connotations as well. Ógæfa was used to Firstly, the emphasis is on possible alternative represent the inner struggles and feelings of emotion discourses that may have existed in guilt in literature in a culture that did not yet literature in addition to the usual manner of have a word for this kind of affective state, representation in dialogue, poetry or in but which can nevertheless be characterized somatic changes. Secondly, the study explores as a ‘culture of gratitude’, often held as the the preliminary outlines for a medieval predecessor of cultures of guilt in cultures Icelandic folk theory of emotions: what whose relations were based on principles of emotions were thought to be, what they reciprocity. Thus, in spite of the lack of the originated from, and how they operated. word ‘guilt’ representing an emotion in saga Consequently, the emphasis is also on the literature, guilt-like emotions were felt in cultural thinking models of emotion that medieval Iceland. Ógæfa was not synonymous existed in the Christianized but peripheral with guilt, however, but also involved medieval Icelandic culture, in whose context feelings of distress, anxiety and hopelessness the emotions were both experienced and as well as fear of the dark, and signified represented. The thesis consists of five absence of approval and forgiveness or the articles and a 181-page introduction that lack of the blessing of one’s kin. discusses and synthesizes the results. Eye Pain Ógæfa [‘Misfortune’] The experience of guilt in medieval Iceland is The article “Ógæfa (Misfortune) as an further discussed in the article “Eye Pain as a Emotion in Thirteenth-Century Iceland” Literary Motif in Thirteenth- and Fourteenth- (Kanerva 2012) analyses the concept of ógæfa Century Íslendingasögur” (Kanerva 2013a), and its connotations and meanings, and the which discusses the episodes of eye pain that essence of the experience of ógæfa in 13th- occur in Fóstbræðra saga, Bárðar saga century Icelandic culture. This is done, firstly, Snæfellsáss, Bjarnar saga Hítdælakappa and by analysing the use of the word and its Ljósvetninga saga. The aim of this study is to derivatives in sagas to examine its examine the meanings given to the eye pain

140 motif in medieval Iceland by examining the and physical environment. For instance, texts intertextually and by using comparative strong-willed people who had magical skills – material from different geographical areas and such as smiths and other people with special historical eras (see e.g. Heide 2009). In the skills, or witches – could affect other people’s article, it is discussed how eye pain in minds and emotions and, consequently, also Íslendingasögur was an external punishment their psychophysical condition. for social misdemeanour, often caused by a Consequently, as discussed in the article person skilled in magic or a supernatural “Eye Pain as a Literary Motif”, the upspring agent. Moreover, the consequences of eye and experience of guilt that was associated pain, such as the bursting out of the eyes, for with the recognition of moral responsibility which the verb springa [‘to burst’] is used, could be represented through eye pain that suggest that eye pain also had emotional was inflicted upon the experiencer in dream connotations such as guilt, as springa is often by a strong-willed person or a supernatural employed to depict conditions associated with being whom the experiencer had betrayed or physical over-exertion or excessive emotions. insulted. The person suffering from eye pain As a result, the article also proposes new could recover, if he ‘atoned for his sins’ and outlines for medieval Icelandic conceptions of made amends which happens in Fóstbræðra emotions, or the medieval Icelandic folk saga. In other case (e.g. Ljósvetninga saga), theory of emotion. According to medieval 13th the eye pain that was presumably regarded as and 14th-century Icelandic conceptions of a kind of supernatural ‘shot’ could result in emotion, emotions were construed as bodily bursting out of the eyes, and finally, death. experiences and processes. An emotion was regarded as movement of the hugr-mind, Disturbances of the Mind and Body hugarhræring [‘emotion’; lit. ‘movement of The example of eye pain suggests that hugr (mind)’] (and manifested, as shown medieval Icelanders also categorised earlier [Miller 1992; 1993; Larrington 2001], differently what in modern terms would be in somatic changes). Not only were called emotions and illnesses. The article relationships and communication with the “Disturbances of the Mind and Body: Effects living in one’s social environment expected to of the Living Dead in Medieval Iceland” propel movements of the mind but the (Kanerva 2014) further discusses different supernatural could also be involved: super- modes of categorisation compared to modern natural powers and beings could make the ones, according to whom the condition caused mind move. From a medieval Icelandic by magical or supernatural means could be perspective, the body and the bodily mind construed as emotion, pain or illness. The were porous: supernatural forces could article concentrates on the effects that penetrate the boundaries of the body through reanimated dead have on the living people in the eyes, mouth and other body openings. sagas, with special emphasis on Flóamanna Consequently, similar to the pre-industrial saga, Eyrbyggja saga, Eiríks saga rauða and Finno-Karelian body schema1 that guides Laxdæla saga. Two aspects of the influence ideas of illness, emotions and their causes,2 of the dead on the living in these sagas, fear the medieval Icelandic body was and physical illness, are concentrated upon, ‘open’ in that the body boundaries were and medieval Icelandic conceptions of mental regarded as “opening up to the external disorder are discussed by examining the environment” (Stark 2006: 152, original meanings given to fear and illness inter- emphasis). Various natural and supernatural textually. It is argued that emotions were not forces could exert their influence on people necessarily distinguished from physical by penetrating body boundaries through illnesses or pain. Instead, emotion could be an bodily orifices.3 Consequently, the boundaries illness, or part of the manifestation of illness, of the body (e.g. skin, etc.) were not or cause or consequence of an illness or considered ‘closed’, but ‘open’, so that the physical pain. Sudden and extreme emotions individual was exposed and sensitive to could also cause instant death. Consequently, external influences originating from the social for medieval Icelanders ‘mental’ was something

141 rather physical, and, although the symptoms This aim of the restless dead to preserve caused by the restless dead – fear, insanity, social order is discussed in the articles illness and death – could be categorized by us “Rituals for the Restless Dead: The Authority as mental or physical, in the sagas these were of the Deceased in Medieval Iceland” all considered bodily in nature. Both emotions (Kanerva 2013b) and “The Role of the Dead and (physical) illness encompassed a state of in Medieval Iceland: A Case Study of disequilibrium and could be dependent on Eyrbyggja saga” (Kanerva 2011). external agents and forces that had the power The article “Rituals for the Restless Dead: to influence the bodily balance and trigger the The Authority of the Deceased in Medieval onset of ‘mental disorder’. Consequently, Iceland”, concentrates on two scenes of actual ‘mental disorder’ could be manifested also in or anticipated posthumous restlessness in physical illness. Egils saga Skalla-Grímssonar and Eyrbyggja As is typical for ethno-theories of emotion, saga. Both are countered with special and medieval Icelandic theory of emotion was not similar rituals, but these have different a thoroughly thought out or unambiguous consequences: the corpse in Egils saga doctrine. Conceptions of the essence and remains peaceful whereas some restlessness operation of emotions varied. The essence of occurs in Eyrbyggja saga. The episodes are emotions could also be considered material examined from the perspective of power and and be preserved in the body. Anger was authority. The article includes a discussion of especially considered a kind of energy and the way in which some of the deceased who substance that could reside in the breast. As were expected to have “strong minds” were the amount of anger in the breast grew, the ascribed authority over the living in sagas. In consequences of this were portrayed in sagas this role the reanimated dead could interfere in somatic changes: the body of the angry in the lives of the living, and occasionally person became swollen (see also Larrington adopt a moral function in that they could 2001). Anger was considered also a kind of rectify injustices, although they were life power and energy. If a person died angry, sometimes malevolent in nature. Nevertheless, the anger was expected to remain in the some individuals could contest their post- corpse. In such cases anger could contribute mortem power and use various means, such as to the reanimation of the corpse and the rituals, to control it or modify it according to deceased could return out of its own will to their own needs. It is suggested that such a harass the living. People who expressed capability was possessed by a certain kind of posthumous restlessness had usually been character, one whose mind was strong enough known for their strong will already when they to bridle the powers of death, but which could were still alive. As they appeared post- in turn be counteracted by magic. humously they elicited fear, especially in The article “The Role of the Dead in people who were regarded as weak, or in Medieval Iceland: A Case Study of Eyrbyggja other words, since their body boundaries were saga”, then, concerns the reanimated dead porous, penetrable. story of Eyrbyggja saga, the so-called ‘wonders of Fróðá’ (Fróðárundr), and Restless Dead examines the meanings of this episode as they Supernatural beings, such as the restless dead, were interpreted in medieval Iceland. It is were particularly expected to appear in social argued that the living dead in Eyrbyggja saga, environments where somebody had broken which are decidedly malevolent rather than norms or betrayed someone, or the social benevolent in nature, act as agents of order equilibrium was shaken in some other whose restlessness is connected to past deeds manner, that is, similar to pre-industrial of those still living that have caused social Finno-Karelian beliefs (Koski 2011). In both disequilibrium. In Fróðárundr these actions medieval Scandinavian and pre-industrial involve expressions of disapproved sexuality Finno-Karelian traditions, the dead returned and birth of offspring with indeterminate as a result of the transgression of norms and social status. It is also shown how the in cases of social disequilibrium. hauntings present an opportunity for the

142 banisher of the reanimated dead to improve to thoughts of the individualization of his own indeterminate status. Christian salvation. In 1215, the fourth Lateran council decreed that every Christian Perspectives individual needed to confess his or her sins A fundamental structuring principle of the once a year. It has been suggested that this medieval Icelandic worldview seems to have indicates an individualization of the concept been the contrast between order and disorder. of Christian salvation (Le Goff 1980). In In terms of the body extended to a model of Norway, this decree was adopted in 1268, and wholeness and the disorder of contamination since Iceland had been part of Norway since or other penetration that has caused internal 1262, the practice is likely to have spread to movement or other disarray. Consequently, Iceland soon afterwards (Nedkvitne 2004). In one means to protect oneself against 13th- and 14th-century Íslendingasögur, guilt supernatural forces such as the dead was represented as eye pain could have been a presumably to live and act according to the way to represent recognition of one’s norms and expectations of the society. responsibility in doing ill deeds – their Moreover, it was good for the person’s awareness of, in the pagan period, that they wellbeing if he or she could control his or her had ‘sinned’ – in a time when the salvation of emotions. Some emotions, such as fear, made the soul, as a consequence of confession and people vulnerable to supernatural influences, repentance, had become the individual’s own since it was thought that a person’s body responsibility. This is despite that, according boundaries would open when he or she to indigenous beliefs, the reactions of these became afraid. According to medieval Icelandic men as depicted in literature could be thought, only those who were mentally strong understood as a sign of their weakness. enough could keep their body boundaries intact and resist the external influences – and Notes could also control the restless dead. 1. That is: the “unconscious organization or of Experiencing the supernatural was ordinary, bodily performance, as distinct from the body image, which is the conscious conceptual construct but being affected by the supernatural was of the body, informed by both experience and considered a weakness. mythic or scientific understanding. [... that] refers However, in the case of eye pain and guilt, to the way in which this image, once internalized, is the sources hint at possible contradiction operationalized in everyday behaviours, most of considering the weakness associated with them minute and intuitive” (Stark 2006: 152). 2. This body schema was adopted in Finno-Karelian vulnerability to supernatural influences and cultures as a consequence of Germanic influences Christian conceptions of sin, and confessing and Christianization (see Frog 2013: 63, 66–67; and repenting one’s sins. In Íslendingasögur, 2014/2015). the men who suffered from eye pain caused 3. See also penetration by spirits and sharp projectiles by a supernatural agent and associated with shot by supernatural agents (i.e. ‘supernatural shots’) in Anglo-Saxon and Old Norse cultures as guilt and recognition of moral responsibility well as in later Scottish and Scandinavian folklore were considered both wise and respectable, in Lid 1921; Hall 2005; 2007; Heide 2006. and many of them thought positively of Christianity or were even portrayed as good Works Cited Christians (Þormóðr in Fóstbræðra saga, Sources Gestr in Barðar saga, Björn in Bjarnar saga Barðar saga = In Þórhallur Vilmundarson & Bjarni and Þorvarðr in Ljósvetninga saga). Vilhjálmsson (eds.). 1991. Harðar saga – Barðar Presumably these men would not have been saga – Þorskfindinga saga – Flóamanna saga. Íslenzk Fornrit 13. Reykjavík: Hið Íslenzka considered weak in medieval Icelandic Fornritafélag. context, although their bodies had been Bjarnar saga Hítdælakappa = In Sigurður Nordal & penetrated by supernatural forces that caused Guðni Jónsson (eds.). 1938. Borgfirðinga sǫgur. them eye pain and although later some Íslenzk Fornrit 3. Reykjavík: Hið Íslenzka experienced eye-bursting. It is possible that Fornritafélag. Fóstbræðra saga = In Björn K. Þórólfsson & Guðni the contradiction between eye pain as guilt Jónsson (eds.). 1943. Vestfirðinga sögur. Íslenzk and ideas of a porous body-mind were linked Fornrit 6. Reykjavík: Hið Íslenzka Fornritafélag.

143

Grettis saga = Guðni Jónsson (ed.). 1936. Grettis saga Iceland”. In Authorities in the Middle Ages: Ásmundarsonar. Íslenzk Fornrit 7. Reykjavík: Hið Influence, Legitimacy and Power in Medieval Íslenzka Fornritafélag. Society. Ed. Sini Kangas, Mia Korpiola & Tuija Ljósvetninga saga = Björn Sigfússon (ed.). 1940. Ainonen. Fundamentals of Medieval and Early Ljósvetninga saga. Íslenzk Fornrit 10. Reykjavík: Modern Culture 12. Berlin / Boston: De Gruyter. Hið Íslenzka Fornritafélag. Pp. 205–227. Kanerva, Kirsi. 2014. “Disturbances of the Mind and Literature Body: Effects of the Living Dead in Medieval Ármann Jakobsson. 2008. “Egils saga and Empathy: Iceland”. In Mental (Dis)Order in Later Medieval Emotions and Moral Issues in a Dysfunctional Saga Europe. Ed. Sari Katajala-Peltomaa & Susanna Family”. Scandinavian Studies 80(1): 1–18. Niiranen. Leiden: Brill. Pp. 219–242. Frog. 2013. “Shamans, Christians, and Things in Koski, Kaarina. 2011. Kuoleman voimat: Kirkonväki between: From Finnic–Germanic Contacts to the suomalaisessa uskomusperinteessä. Suomalaisen Conversion of Karelia”. In Conversions: Looking Kirjallisuuden Seuran Toimituksia 1313. Helsinki: for Ideological Change in the Early Middle Ages. Suomalaisen Kirjallisuuden Seura. Ed. Leszek Słupecki & Rudolf Simek. Studia Larrington, Carolyne. 2001. “The Psychology of Mediaevalia Septentrionalia 23. Vienna: Emotion and Study of the Medieval Period”. Early Fassbaender. Pp. 53–97. Medieval Europe 10(2): 251–256. Frog. 2014/2015. “Are Trolls, Bears and Sámis People Le Goff, Jacques. 1980. Time, Work and Culture in the too? – Considering the Mythic Ethnography of Old Middle Ages. Trans. Arthur Goldhammer. Chicago: Norse Culture”. RMN Newsletter 9: 122–124. University of Chicago Press. Hall, Alaric. 2005. “Getting Shot of Elves: Healing, Le Goff, Jacques. 1992. “Laughter in Brennu-Njáls Witchcraft and Fairies in the Scottish Witchcraft saga“. In From Sagas to Society: Comparative Trials”. Folklore 116: 19–36. Approaches to Early Iceland. Ed. Gísli Pálsson. Hall, Alaric. 2007. Elves in Anglo-Saxon England: Enfield Lock: Hisarlik Press. Pp. 161–165. Matters of Belief, Health, Gender and Identity. Lid, Nils. 1921. “Um finnskot og alvskot: Eit umråde av Anglo-Saxon Studies 8. Woodbridge: Boydell Press. norsk sjukdomsmagi”. Maal og Minne 1921: 37–66. Heide, Eldar. 2006. “Spirits through Respiratory Miller, William Ian. 1992. “Emotions and the Sagas”. Passages”. The Fantastic in Old Norse/Icelandic In From Sagas to Society: Comparative Literature: Sagas and the British Isles: Preprint Approaches to Early Iceland. Ed. Gísli Pálsson. Papers of the 13th International Saga Conference, Enfield Lock: Hisarlik Press. Pp. 89–110. Durham and York, 6th–12th August 2006. Ed. John Miller, William Ian. 1993. Humiliation: And Other McKinnell et al. (Electronic document.) Available Essays on Honor, Social Discomfort, and Violence. at: http://web.archive.org/web/20080926183045/ Ithaca / London: Cornell University Press. http://www.dur.ac.uk/medieval.www/sagaconf/heid Nedkvitne, Arnved. 2004. Mötet med döden i norrön e.htm (last accessed 15th May 2015). medeltid. Trans. Bo Eriksson Janbrink. Stockholm: Heide, Eldar. 2009. “More Inroads to Pre-Christian Atlantis. Notions, After All? – The Potential of Late Stark, Laura. 2006. The Magical Self: Body, Society Evidence”. In Á austrvega. Saga and East and the Supernatural in Early Modern Rural Scandinavia: Preprint papers of The 14th Finland. FF Communications 290. Helsinki: International Saga Conference, Uppsala, 9th–15th Academia Scientiarum Fennica. August 2009. Ed. Agneta Ney et al. Gävle: Gävle Sävborg, Daniel. 2007. Sagan om kärleken: Erotik, University Press. Pp. 361–368. känslor och berättarkonst i norrön litteratur. Acta Kanerva, Kirsi. 2011. “The Role of the Dead in Universitatis Upsaliensis, Historia litterarum 27. Medieval Iceland: A Case Study of Eyrbyggja Upsala: Upsala Universitet. saga”. Collegium Medievale 24: 23–49. Wolf, Kirsten. 2000. “Laughter in Old Norse-Icelandic Kanerva, Kirsi. 2012. “Ógæfa (Misfortune) as an Literature”. Scripta Islandica 51: 93–117. Emotion in Thirteenth-Century Iceland”. Wolf, Kirsten. 2013. “Body Language in Medieval Scandinavian Studies 84(1): 1–26. Iceland: A Study of Gesticulation in the Sagas and Kanerva, Kirsi. 2013a. “‘Eigi er sá heill, er augun Tales of Icelanders”. Scripta Islandica 64: 99–121. verkir’: Eye Pain as a Literary Motif in Thirteenth- Wolf, Kirsten. 2014. “Somatic Semiotics: Emotion and and Fourteenth-Century Íslendingasögur”. Arv: the Human Face in the Sagas and þættir of Nordic Yearbook of Folklore 69: 7–35. Icelanders”. Traditio 69: 125–145. Kanerva, Kirsi. 2013b. “Rituals for the Restless Dead: The Authority of the Deceased in Medieval

144

Master’s Projects

On the dyēus-Semantic Group and the Case of Týr Petra Mikolić, University of Oslo / University of Zagreb

Report on the thesis “The God-Semantic Field in Old Norse Prose and Poetry”, completed from the degree of Master of Philosophy at the Institute for Linguistic and Nordic Studies, University of Oslo, 23rd June, 2013. Supervisor: Karl Gunnar Johansson (University of Oslo). According to Friis-Jensen (2010), Snorri did The aim of this research project was to use not seem to use a completely different the modern linguistic approach, discourse technical and poetical vocabulary for analysis and the theory of the semantic fields Christian and pre-Christian terms, but has in the analysis of the Old Norse sources, rather adopted the old forms that originate namely poetry and prose, and those words in from before Christianization. This implies particular according to their use and function that, as Meulengracht Sørensen (1989) also within texts of Christian and non-Christian pointed out, the words that were used by their topic. forefathers in the pre-Christian times, were One of the words analysed was týr, which still in use in Snorri’s time. Neither Friis- can be reviewed as an illustrative case. Snorri Jensen nor Meulengracht Sørensen seem to in Gylfaginning uses it as an appellative, and distinguish between prose and poetry, lists its plural tívar among other terms for between eddic and skaldic poetry, and pagan gods. According to Edda and between texts with Christian topics and those Lokasenna, Týr the one-handed god of war, with a historic theme or myths. It seems that son of Óðinn (Skáldskaparmál), god of justice Friis-Jensen’s and Meulengracht Sørensen’s (often related to Þing) and as the god of conclusions can well be argued against since sacrifice (sacrificing his arm in order to bind (despite Snorri’s claim) there is still a lack of ). His function as the god of war could sources describing the society from before be found in Old Icelanding translations of Christianity’s official acceptance. After Latin Christian texts rendering the name of having observed the terminology according to god (Klements saga, Breta saga, its use, the data indicated the opposite from Rómverja saga, Páls saga postula) and in the claims of both Friis-Jensen and Gylfagining. He is also known as the god of Meulengracht Sørensen. the þing [‘assembly’], representing justice and When we want to have a better peace, and identification that especially finds understanding of the Old Norse myth, we support in Germanic translations of the ‘day often turn to the same sources, for instance, of Mars’ as both the ‘day of Týr’ (OHG Snorri and his Edda. In his works one will Ziostag, OE Tīwesdaeg, ON Týrsdagr, find words such as týr and tívar, goð and guð, Modern English , etc.) and ‘the day of rǫgn and , ás and æsir, bǫnd and hǫpt, *Thingsus’ (e.g. Modern German Dienstag dróttin, and díar defined as terms for ‘god’ or [‘Tuesday’]). Archaeological findings at ‘gods’ used for the old gods, worshipped Housesteads of an altar dedicated to Deo before the Christian one. He uses one of these Marti Thincso [‘to the god Mars of the Þing’], terms as an apellative in his description of the encompassing both of the functions of Týr – Old Norse myth and – Týr. that of sovereignity and that of battle. Tacitus However, Snorri’s employment of these terms in his Germania IV also mentions a god of raises questions about their earlier use and war equivalent to the god Mars, but describes what their occurrence within different him as the deity of sovereignty – sentencing contexts says about their meaning and the for any kind of punishment was not done gods they describe. unless priests serving the ‘god of war’ first consulted with the deity. Týr seems to

145 encompass many functions (cf. Dumézil 13), Valtýr [‘god of the slaughtered’] 1958) – he is a sky-god, a god of war, a god (Háleygjatal, 12), Farmatýr [‘god of of justice, and fertility. burdens’] (Háleygjatal, 9), Geirtýr [‘spear- Snorri names as the main authorities god’] (Hákornarkviða, 18) and Bǫðvar-Týr for his work, yet skaldic poetry uses some of [‘god of battle’] (Hákonarkviða, 16). All these lexemes differently to that of the prose these are related to the warlike aspect of and, of course, Snorri. In skaldic poems, the Óðinn which could show the relation between lexeme týr appears as a plural common noun, him and the deity Týr, one replacing the other and in singular we find it only as a part of in function. This could indicate that during and heitis. In heitis or kennings it the course of the change between Germanic never refers to the god Týr. The word is used beliefs under various possible influences, a in kennings denoting chieftains or kings, as in god whose name meant something like Vellekla where king Hákon is referred to as ‘prophet’ (Proto-Germanic *wōđanaz, adj. hertýr and is also named týr teinlautar, ‘god *wōđaz, related to Latin vātēs [‘seer, prophet; of sacrifice’. The word týr also often forms poet’]) became more relevant. This is also kennings for warriors which points to the indicated by Tacitus who attested the word being semantically related to victory as worshipping Mars, and and leadership. Furthermore, the word has Hercules, here Mercury likely referencing been reserved exclusively for the chieftains or Óðinn, and Hercules Þórr. As Mercury is not leaders of higher status. This relates to a supreme deity, but rather a messenger of the Snorri’s depiction of Týr as the son of Óðinn, gods, a connector between the divine and or rather lists a for Týr as being sonr earthly, his equivalent could logically be a Óðins in Skáldskaparmál. However, in prophet, or in this case Óðinn. Nafnaþulur he is not mentioned under the list In eddic poetry, we find Týr as the one- of Óðinn’s sons, but is listed only among handed Old Norse deity only in Lokasenna Æsir. Snorri names Týr vigaguð [‘battle-god’] and Hymiskviða, týr as a building block in (Skálskaparmál, 9) as well, thus defining him kennings, and the plural form tívar. In as a deity related to war and battles besides Lokasenna it appears as a theonym in the being only the son of Óðinn. introductory part (Týr var þar, hann var The word týr was also used not only in the einhendr), and stanzas 38 and 40. Here, Loki service of forming kennings for warriors, mentions Týr’s sacrifice and from the context chieftains and kings, but also in the formation it is obvious that he refers to the deity that of compounds, where týr can represent any sacrificed his hand that is also mentioned in god, such as in the example we find in Gylfaginning. In Hymiskviða, on the other Haustlǫng, verses 2 and 6 – the kenning hand, it seems that Týr is not the same deity byrgi-týr in 2, describes the giant Þjazi as as the one described in Lokasenna. In this fort-týr, while the one in the 6, hirði-týr poem, Týr says that his father Hymir, a giant, ‘tending god’, refers to Loki, who then hits possesses a cauldron big enough for Ægir’s Þjazi with a stave. Moreover, in the first feast, unlike in Snorri’s Gylfagining where he stanza of the poem the collective tíva is used is said to be the son of Óðinn. Furthermore, in reference to the three Æsir in question – he is addressed by Hymir’s wife as sonr and Óðinn, Loki and Þórr. But as it can be seen áttniðr jǫtna, and he appears to have both from the examples above, Þjazi is also named hands, fully functional. In the introductory týr. In another stanza of Haustlǫng, the stanzas both Þórr and his companion are kenning reiði-Týr is used to denote Þórr. addressed as tívar (stanzas 1 and 4) and the Another kenning for Þórr karms týr ‘god of only time we come across the possible the chariot’ is found in Þórsdrápa 19. Yet by identification of Þórr’s companion is in the far the most kennings and heitis with týr as a phrase “Týr kvað” in stanza 6. Marteinn H. constituent are in reference to Óðinn, such as Sigurðsson (2005: 203) proposes that the Hertýr [‘army-god’] (Vellekla, stanza 5), word Týr in this poem could have been used Gautatýr [‘god of the ’] (Hákonarmál, as a common noun and was therefore 1), Sigtýr [‘victorious god’] (Gráfeldardrápa, unnecessarily capitalized. He suggests the

146 editors probably capitalized the word týr indicating the fluidity of the borders between believing it to be a proper noun. This could them. It rather seems there was no uniform have shaped our understanding of the consistency or organization, and there often characters in the poem and their functions. seems to be confusion between Æsir, Vanir, The plural collective noun is the most álfar, etc. The research of this thesis also common form of týr in eddic poetry. In points out the influence that Snorri’s works Hávamal 159 the word tívar seems to be have had on our understanding of Old Norse parallel with goð in plural, a term that myth. We see, for instance, Týr with a certain involves all the gods, but most often refers to function and description in Gylfaginning, yet Æsir as they were the victorious gods in the other works do not seem to describe him in battle between the Æsir and the Vanir. In the same way or do not use týr as a theonym Vafþrúðnismál, the word tívar is also referred at all. Snorri used those words rather to as alla goð, while at another instance the differently from how they were used in other plural tívar is paralleled to regin, as in tíva texts, be it prose or poetry. In that way, Snorri rök (Vafþrúðnismál, 38, 42) where the word may have not only reshaped the past for his tívar is used the same way as regin. contemporaries, but may have also done the The lexeme týr in the Old Norse texts (and same for those who try to make sense of Old in Snorri’s time as well) seems to have had Norse tradition and myth today. another function to that of the theonym – it was used in reference to important and Works Cited victorious chieftains, kings, warriors and Dum zil, Georges. 1958. “The Rígsþula and Indo- other deities, which seems to indicate that Týr European Social Structure”. In Gods of the Ancient Northmen. Ed. Einar Haugen. Trans. . might have been replaced in worship and Berkeley: University of California Press. remains only as a common noun, ‘god’. Friis-Jensen, Karsten. 2010. “Fortelling, makt of Evidence of his earlier worship can still be politikk hos Saxo og Snorre”. In Saxo & Snorre. found in the name’s use to translate ‘Mars’ in Ed. Jon Gunnar Jørgensen, Karsten Friis Jensen & names of the days of the , as noted Else Mundal. Københavns Universitet. Museum Tusculanums Forlag. Pp. 167–186. above, which indicates that the deity Týr’s Lexicon Poeticum. Available at: role was once more prominent. https://notendur.hi.is/~eybjorn/ugm/lp/. Other lexemes of the dyēus-semantic group Meulengracht, Preben Sørensen. (1989). “Moderen have also been used differently from how forløst af datterens skød. Om oldtidsopfattelsen hos Snorri employs them. In Skáldskaparmál, Snorri og Saxo”, In Medeltidens födelse, Symposier på Krapperus borg: I. Ed. Anders Andrén. Lund: Snorri quotes skalds using the named terms Gyllenstiernska Krapperuppsstiftelsen. Pp. 263– for deities, but in the course of his storytelling 275. he does not use the same vocabulary himself Sigurðsson, Marteinn H. 2005. “Þórr’s Travel in his Gylfaginning. This might be Companion in Hymiskviða”. Gripla 16: 197–208. problematic as the majority of dictionaries use Ordbog over det norrøne prosasprog. 2005. Available at: http://www.onp.hum.ku.dk/. Snorri as a reference in defining the meanings Skaldic Poetry Project. Skaldic Poetry of the of different lexemes denoting gods. The Scandinavian Middle Ages. Available at: words of the semantic field also shift from http://abdn.ac.uk/skaldic/db.php. one function and meaning to another,

147

Appropriation and Originality: Hending and Alliterative Word Constellations as Tools for Skaldic Composition Cole Erik Nyquist, University of Oslo

Report on the thesis “Compositional Techniques and Perceptions of Authorship in Skaldic Poetry: Alliterative and Hending Word Constellations”, completed for the degree of Master of Arts at the Department of Linguistics and Scandinavian Studies, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway, May 2014 (available at: https://www.duo.uio.no/handle/10852/40824). Supervisor: Mikael Males (University of Oslo). The oral compositional techniques of skaldic alliteration or hending word constellations poetry have been studied from a number of with other works by different authors. 37 perspectives, including through the use of different named skalds and five different kenning and . There are certainly a variety anonymous poems are represented in this of approaches which have been, or could be, study and 16 of these appear more than three used to study skaldic composition, but I have times with different word constellation chosen to approach this topic from the comparisons. This is from the original pool of perspective hending and alliteration. For the 68 different skalds and 19 anonymous poems. purpose of my research I have focused on word Assuming the anonymous poems have combinations, or constellations; involving the different authors, about 48.3% of the poets internally rhyming and alliterating words share alliteration and hending similarity with required by many skaldic meters. The strict at least one other poet in at least one couplet, metrical requirements and the need to some- frequently more than one. This means that times spontaneously compose such poetry nearly half of the poets whose works appear orally required skill and, as such, it is inter- in my research have at least the potential to esting to investigate if any creative methods, have participated as the victim, user, or both small or subtle though they might have been, were in appropriation or inter-skaldic adaptation. used to aid in the composition of oral poetry. I believe there is a strong case to be made I developed a new approach for studying from this research that the appropriation or the oral composition of skaldic poetry. Rather adaptation of another poet’s hending and alliter- than focusing on kennings and heiti in the ative word constellations was an accepted search for compositional aides, I chose instead technique to aid in the composition of oral to analyze the hending and alliterative word poetry, as long as the originality of the new constellations which are typically found in work was sufficiently upheld. If appropriations dróttkvætt poetry. These generally include three were indeed used by such a wide variety of alliterating words in each couplet, with two in skalds from the 9th to 11th centuries and in the first line and the third at the beginning of the such a wide variety of poems, then even if second line as well as two internally rhyming one is not convinced that appropriation was a words within each line. I compiled a data set widely-used compositional technique, this including every alliterating and internally research can still provide insight into the inter- rhyming word found together in 1,486 relevant connectivity and inter-skaldic knowledge of the couplets from 68 different poets and 19 works of both contemporary and earlier skalds. anonymous poems. These word constellations These subtle appropriations seem to have were then compared between the verses of allowed some poets to find a necessary alliter- different authors in order to find instances ation or hending word constellation required for where either the alliterative word combinations, their own poems, perhaps even paying homage hending word combinations, or both, recurred to a famed earlier poet or work, without between the works of different skalds. having to abandon the pride that comes with I found that out of the 1,486 couplets from originality in composition. All that was poetry of relevant meter that I analyzed there required to appropriate or adapt hending and are 240 examples of hending and alliterative alliterative word constellations was a know- similarities between couplets by different ledge of predecessors’ poetry and the creativity skalds. This is roughly 16% of couplets from to subtly incorporate such constellations into which I collected data that share similarity in new works within different contexts.

148

CALLS FOR PAPERS

Versification: Metrics in Practice 25th–27th May 2016, Helsinki, Finland

Versification describes the marriage of  The relationship between meter, melody and language and meter: it is the key to the rhythm production of poetry. This phenomenon  Teaching/communicating and attracts researchers from a wide variety of learning/internalizing meter and intersecting disciplines, ranging from versification systems metricists proper and researchers of cognitive  Competence, communication and practice poetics to scholars of folklore, linguistics,  Generative metrics linguistic anthropology, literature, musicology,  Cognitive poetics philology and more. Meter is often discussed  The language- and/or culture-boundedness of poetry practice abstractly as the formalization of how words,  Performance and the study of versification sounds and sometimes also semantics relate to  Impacts of social or cultural change on rhythm, yet poetic meter cannot exist without metrics and versification instantiation through language and a  The invention and variation of meters in connection with social language practice. The literary poetics 2016 NordMetrik conference brings focused attention precisely here, on versification as Papers may either concentrate on empirical metrics in practice. studies of specific poetries or have a By bringing together the insights and theoretical or methodological emphasis. Each perspectives from different disciplines on the speaker will be allowed 20 minutes for many facets of versification, our aim is to presentation followed by 10 minutes for stimulate multidisciplinary discussion in order discussion. We ask speakers to keep in mind to negotiate shared understanding leading to that the audience will be multidisciplinary, new knowledge. No natural language in and presentations should remain accessible to human history has been without poetry. This specialists in other fields. fact suggests that versification is somehow To propose a paper, please send a title, 3–5 fundamental to culture, and underscores the keywords and a 300-word abstract along with importance of subjecting this phenomenon to your name, affiliation and contact information concentrated discussion. to Eeva-Liisa Bastman at eeva- Keynote speakers of the event are: liisa.bastman[at]helsinki.fi. The deadline for proposals is 1st October 2015.  Paul Kiparsky (Stanford University) For more information please visit our  Tomas Riad (University of Stockholm) website at http://blogs.helsinki.fi/versification/.  Jesper Svenbro (Swedish Academy) Versification: Metrics in Practice is  Kati Kallio (Finnish Literature Society (SKS)) organized by the Department of Folklore  Jarkko Niemi (University of Tampere) Studies and the Department of Finnish We invite proposals for papers on the Literature, University of Helsinki, in following and related topics: cooperation with the Finnish Literature Society (SKS).  The symbiosis of meter and language in practice

149

The Ontology of Supernatural Encounters in Old Norse Literature and Scandinavian Folklore: 4th Symposium of the Old Norse Folklorists Network 11th–12th December 2015, Tartu, Estonia

The 4th symposium of the Old Norse and later sources into closer contact with each Folklorists Network (ONF) is dedicated to the other. question of the ontology of supernatural Keynote speakers of the event are: encounters in Old Norse-Icelandic literature,  John Lindow, University of Berkeley myth and legend, as well as in later  Mikael Häll, University of Lund Scandinavian folklore. It focuses on the  Daniel Sävborg, University of Tartu controversial issue of ‘truth’ or ‘real experience’ behind narrative depictions of All researchers (including PhD students) who such encounters, and seeks answers to are interested in presenting their ideas or questions such as the following: How were research results connected to these or similar encounters with supernatural beings, or visits topics are encouraged submit proposals for to supernatural places conceptualized and 20-minute paper presentations (followed by understood by the individuals or communities 10 minutes of discussion). The venue of the who experienced them, and what was their symposium will be University of Tartu, relationship to accepted “norms of truth”? To Department of Scandinavian Studies. If you what extent were supernatural beings are interested in participating in this event, perceived as physical beings and how was please send a short abstract to Professor their physical appearance interpreted? How Daniel Sävborg at daniel.savborg[at]ut.ee by st can we use various kinds of sources to gain 1 September 2015. knowledge of these matters? What are the The event is organized by Professor Daniel long-term continuities in the ways that the Sävborg, PhD Karen Bek-Pedersen supernatural has been understood in the (karen[at]bek-pedersen.dk), and PhD Mart Scandinavian and geographically close Kuldkepp (mart.kuldkepp[at]ut.ee). The (Baltic, Finnic, etc.) cultural areas? In the conference secretary is Kristel Pallasma spirit of previous events of the ONF series, (kristel_pallasma[at]hotmail.com). the conference seeks to stimulate discussion Further information can be found on the on these issues and to bring philological and symposium website: http://www.flgr.ut.ee/et/ folkloristic perspectives on both Old Norse osakonnad/ontology-supernatural-encounters. Welcome to Tartu in December!

Would You Like to Submit to RMN Newsletter?

RMN Newsletter in an open-access biannual across centuries to developing working publication that sets out to construct an models for the more immediate traditions informational resource and discourse space behind limited sources. RMN Newsletter for researchers of diverse and intersecting welcomes and encourages its readership to disciplines. Its thematic center is the engage in this discourse space and it also discussion and investigation of cultural promotes an awareness that participation will phenomena of different eras and the research support, maintain and also shape this tools and strategies relevant to retrospective emergent venue. methods. Retrospective methods consider The publication is organized according to some aspect of culture in one period through four broad sections: Comments and evidence from another, later period. Such Communications, People, Places and Calls comparisons range from investigating for Papers: historical relationships to the utility of – Comments and Communications analogical parallels, and from comparisons  Short-article (discussion oriented)

150

– preferred length, 3–8 pages body text (plus activities, developments and technologies, images, tables, list of works cited) and research which is ongoing or has been  Conference report / announcement recently completed. Rather than presenting – preferred length, 2–5 pages conclusive findings, short-article  Project announcements contributions for the Comments and – preferred length, 1–5 pages Communications section are generally – People oriented to discussion and/or engaging in  Research report (abstract / summary of discourse opened in earlier issued of RMN conference paper or unpublished research) – max. 1–2 page body text Newsletter or in other publications.  Published article announcement The success of this publication as both a – 1 page resource and discourse space is dependent on  Edited volume summary the participation of its readership. We also – 1–5 pages body text recognize the necessity of opening contact  Monograph summary with and being aware of the emerging – 1–5 pages body text generation of scholars and welcome  PhD project summary summaries of on-going and recently – 2–5 pages body text completed MA and PhD research projects.  MA project summary If you are interested in making – 1–2 page body text information about your own work available – Places or participating in discussion through  Outline of programmes, projects and other comments, responses or short-article activities or research associated with an contributions, please send your contributions institution, organization or network of in *.doc, *docx or *.rtf format to Frog at organizations – preferred length, 1–5 pages [email protected]. – Calls for Papers For more information and access to earlier – preferred length, 1–2 pages issues of RMN Newsletter, please visit our web-page at www.helsinki.fi/folkloristiikka/ The orientation of RMN Newsletter is toward English/RMN/. presenting information about events, people,

151

Published by Folklore Studies of the Department of Philosophy, History, Culture and Art Studies, University of Helsinki 152