# Northern Antiquities/Volume 2/An Idea of the Second Part of the Edda

AN
IDEA
OF THE
SECOND PART
OF THE
EDDA.
ALL the most important points of the ‘northern’ Mythology have been laid open in the preceding Dialogue, which forms the First Part of the Edda. In the Second Part, the Author changing his stile, confines himself to the relation of several adventures which had happened to these Deities whom he hath been describing to us. The ancient Scalds or Poets, are the guides he follows; and his chief aim is to explain the epithets and synonymous expressions, which have been in a manner consecrated in their language. The same taste and mode of composition prevails every where through this Second Part as in the former: We have constantly Allegories, and ​Combats; Giants contending with the Gods; Loke perpetually deceiving them; Thor interposing in their defence, &c. This is nearly the whole of the Second Part. It would tire our Reader's patience to insert it here intire, although it is three-fourths less than the former. I shall perhaps stand in need of his indulgence, while I barely aim at giving him a succinct idea of it.
“Æger, a Danish nobleman, was desirous, in imitation of Gylfe, of going to Asgard, to visit the Gods. The Deities expecting his coming, immediately mounted on their lofty seats, that they might receive him with the greater dignity: and the Goddesses, who yielded to them in nothing, took their places along with them. Æger was splendidly entertained. Odin had ranged all along the hall where they feasted, swords of such an amazing brilliancy and polish, that no other illuminations were wanted. All the walls were covered with glittering shields. They continued drinking for a long time large draughts of the most excellent mead. Brage, the God of Eloquence, sat next to Eger, and the Gods had committed their guest to his care. The conversation that passed between Æger and this Deity, is the subject of this Second Part of the Edda. Brage begins with ​relating an evil turn which Loke had played the Gods. The Reader will remember that they prevented the effects of old age and decay by eating certain apples, entrusted to the care of Iduna. Loke had, by a wile, conveyed away this Iduna, and concealed her in a wood, under the custody of a Giant. The Gods beginning to wax old and grey, detected the author of this theft, and with terrible threats, obliged him to make use of his utmost cunning to regain Iduna and her salutary apples back again for the Gods.”
“This is one of the Fables.” I shall present the Reader with another, concerning a Duel between the Giant Rugner and the God Thor. “The Giant carried a lance made all of whetstone. Thor broke it in pieces by a blow with his club, and made the splinters fly so far, that all the subsequent whetstones found in the world are parts of it; as indeed they appear evidently broken off from something by violence.”
I must detain the Reader somewhat longer, with the account of the origin of Poetry. It is an allegory not altogether void of invention.
“The Gods of the north had formed a man much in the same manner as the Grecian Deities are said to have formed Orion. ​This man was called Kuaser. (Ears accustomed to the musical Greek names must pardon our Gothic appellations.) He was so clever, that no question could be proposed which he was not able to resolve: he traversed the whole world teaching mankind wisdom. But his merits exciting envy, two Dwarfs treacherously slew him; and receiving his blood into a vessel, mixed it up with honey, and thence composed a liquor, which renders all those that drink of it, Poets. The Gods missing their son, enquired of the Dwarfs what was become of him. The Dwarfs, to extricate themselves out of the difficulty, replied, That Kuaser had died, suffocated with his knowlege, because he could not meet with persons to ease and disembogue his mind to, by proposing to him so many learned questions as was necessary to his relief. But their perfidy was afterward discovered by an unexpected accident. These Dwarfs having drawn upon themselves the resentment of a certain Giant, he seized and exposed them upon a rock surrounded on all fides by the sea. In this frightful situation, their only recourse was to purchase their deliverance ​at the price of that divine beverage. The Giant being satisfied with this ransom, carried it home, and delivered it to the custody of his daughter Gunlôda: hence, adds my author, Poetry is indifferently, in allusion to the same Fable, called “The blood of Kuaser:” “The Beverage,” or “The ransom of the Dwarfs,” &c.
“This valuable acquisition was eagerly sought after by the Gods, but very difficult to obtain, because it was concealed under rocks. Odin was nevertheless determined to try for it, and he made the attempt in the following manner. Transforming himself into a Worm, he glided through a crevise into the cavern where the Beverage was kept. Then resuming his natural shape, and gaining the heart of Gunloda, he prevailed on her to let him drink three draughts of the liquor entrusted to her care. But the crafty Deity, resolving to make the most of his advantage, pulled so deep, that at the last draught, he left none behind him in the vessel; and transforming himself into an eagle, flew away to Asgard, to deposit in safety the precious treasure he had obtained. The Giant, who was a Magician, instantly discovered the ​artifice that had been practised, and changing himself also into an Eagle, flew with all speed after Odin; who had almost reached the gates of Asgard. Then the Gods all ran out of their palaces to assist and support their master; and foreseeing that he would have much difficulty to secure the liquor, without exposing himself to the danger of being taken, they immediately set out all the vessels they could lay their hands on. In effect, Odin finding he could not escape but by easing himself of that burden which retarded his flight, instantly filled all the pitchers with this miraculous liquor: and from hence it hath been distributed among both Gods and men. But in the hurry and confusion in which the liquor was discharged, the bulk of mankind were not aware that Odin only threw up part of it through his beak; the rest was emitted from a more impure vent: And as it is only the former liquor that this God gives as a Beverage to the good Poets, to such as he would animate with a divine inspiration: so it is only the latter fort that falls to the share of bad Rhymers; for as this flowed from its inferior source in greatest abundance, the Gods bestow it in liberal draughts on all that will apply; this makes the crowd very great about the vessels, and this is the reason why the world ​is overwhelmed with such a redundance of wretched verses."
AFTER this remarkable fiction, there are many Fables in the Edda which have little or no relation to Mythology. These are historical strokes, blended with fictions, which are neither important for their instruction, nor agreeable for their invention. I shall therefore proceed, without farther delay, to say something of the Scalda, or “Poetical Dictionary,” which I have before mentioned in the Introduction to this Volume.
We have already seen that it was compiled by Snorro, for the use of such Icelanders as applied themselves to the profession of Scald or Poet. As this Author wrote in the thirteenth century, he hath not only given the Epithets belonging to the ancient Poetry, but also such as were become necessary, in consequence of the new religion, and new sources of knowlege that had been introduced into the north. The work begins with the Names of the Twelve Gods, which Snorro produces afresh, in order to range under each their several epithets and synonymous appellations. Odin alone has one hundred and twenty-six; whence we may judge of the number of ancient Poems which had been written to celebrate this Deity. I shall present the Reader with a ​few of those Epithets; selecting such as have not already occurred in the Edda.
“Odin, the Father of the Ages; the Supercilious; the Eagle; the Father of Verses; the Whirlwind; the Incendiary; he who causes the arrows to shower down,” &c.
Thor is designed by twelve Epithets; the most common is that of “The son of Odin and the earth.”
Loke is stiled, “The Father of the Great Serpent; the Father of Death; the Adversary, the Accuser, the Deceiver of the Gods,” &c.
Frigga is “The Queen of the Gods.”
Freya, “The Goddess of Love; the Norne or Fairy who weeps Golden Tears; the Kind and Liberal Goddess,” &c.
After these Epithets of the Gods, follows an alphabetical list of the Words most commonly used in Poetry. Some of them are now unintelligible, some appear insipid, and others are like those idle Epithets of the ancient Classics, which follow a word as constantly as the shade does the body, and are introduced rather to fill up the measure of the verse, than to add to the sense. Some are nevertheless worth knowing, were it only for their singularity. For instance, Rivers are called by the Scalds “the sweat of the earth;” and “the blood of the vallies.” Arrows are “the ​daughters of Misfortune;” “the hailstones of helmets.” The Battle-Ax is “the hand of the Homicide, or Slaughterer:” The Eye, “the torch or flambeau of the countenance;” “the diamond of the head.” The Grass and Herbage, “the hair, and the fleece of the earth.” Hair, “the forest of the head:” and if it be white, “the snow of the brain.” The Earth is, “the vessel that floats on the ages;” “the basis, or foundation of the air;” “the daughter of the night.” Night, “the veil of discourse and cares.” A Combat, “the crash of arms; the shower of darts; the clangor of swords; the bath of blood.” The Sea is “the field of pirates:” A Ship, “their skate;” and “the horse of the waves.” Rocks are “the bones of the earth.” The Wind is “the tiger, the lyon, who darts himself upon the houses and vessels,” &c. &c.
Snorro’s work, as published by Resenius, concludes with this collection of Epithets; but in the old MS. preserved at Upsal, and in some others, we find at the end of this Dictionary a small Treatise, by the same Author, on the Construction and Mechanism of the Gothic or Icelandic Metre. If we had a greater number of the ancient Celtic verses remaining, this ​work would be extremely valuable, since it would then facilitate the knowlege of a species of Poetry, which might serve to many useful purposes: but it has the misfortune to have become exceedingly obscure. However, as some persons of distinguished learning have undertaken to explain it, there is room to hope, that such curious Readers as are fond of researches of this kind, will shortly have nothing wanting to gratify their desires on this subject. What we know of it at present is, that their art of Versification consisted in combining together a number of syllables, with a regular repetition of the same letter at the beginning or end of each verse, at once resembling the nature of our modern Versification with rhyme, and the taste for acrosticks. Were this inquiry to be traced very far back, I believe we should find the original or model of this sort of Mechanism, to have been taken from some eastern nation, either from the ancient Persians or ​the Hebrews. The Hebrew poetry abounded with acrostics of various kinds. The same are found in all the ancient Odes of our Icelandic Scalds. It is equally probable, that the verses of the Bards, those ancient British and Gallic Poets, were of the same kind: some few fragments which we have of the poetry of Gaul or Bas Bretagne, put this matter out of doubt. The fact is still more certain with regard to such verses of the Anglo-Saxons as have been handed down to us.
REMARKS on the foregoing PASSAGE.
[Our ingenious Author appears to me to have here thrown together several things, in their nature very different, without sufficient discrimination.
In the first place it may be remarked, that even if we should admit that the Logogryphs of the Icelandic Scalds, are composed in a taste not very different from that of the Hebrew Acrostics; yet these Acrostics ought by no means to be confounded with the Alliterations of the Runic or Scaldic Metre: for these are as natural to the Icelandic verse, as Dactyl and ​Spondee feet are to the Greek and Latin numbers. So that I must beg leave to differ from my Author, in thinking the Alliterative Metre of the Scalds similar either to the Taste for Acrostics, or our modern Rhyme. Not but the Scalds often used Rhyme in the same manner as the moderns, and that with very nice exactness.
But granting that the Icelandic Scalds often composed little artificial poems, much in the taste of the Hebrew Acrostics, I fear it will be going too far, to fetch their Original from those of the Hebrews: for it may be safely affirmed, That all nations (without deriving it from each other) have, in the infancy of taste, run into all the species of False Wit. The Chinese, for example, deal in many little artificial forms of poetry, very much resembling the Rondeaus and Madrigals, so current among the French and us in the last age, and yet neither party will be suspected of imitation. So again, some of the other eastern ​nations have innumerable small poems, very mechanically disposed into the shapes of Ovals, Lozenges, and other mathematical figures, exactly parallel to the Eggs, Wings and Axes of some of the Greek minor Poets; yet both sides may be acquitted from the suspicion of stealing this happy invention from each other. Upon the whole, therefore, I much doubt whether we ought to attribute the Icelandic attempts of this kind, either to a Persic or Hebrew origin: even though some of the first emigrations of the northern people may be allowed to come from the neighbourhood of Persia.
As to the Anglo-Saxon, and Icelandic poetry: these will be allowed to be in all respects congenial, because of the great affinity between the two languages, and between the nations who spoke them. ​They were both Gothic Tribes, and used two not very different dialects of the same Gothic language. Accordingly we find a very strong resemblance in their versification, phraseology and poetic allusions, &c. the same being in a great measure common to both nations.
But there is also a resemblance between the laws of versification adopted by the British Bards, and those observed by the Icelandic Scalds; at least so far as this; that the metre of them both is of the alliterative kind: and yet there does not appear to be the least affinity in the two languages, or in the origin of the two nations. But this resemblance of metre, I think, may in part be accounted for on general philosophical principles, arising from the nature of both languages: and in part from that intercourse, which was unavoidably produced between both nations in the wars and piratical irruptions of the northern nations: whose Scalds, as we learn from Torfæus, were respected and admired for their ​poetic talents, even in the courts of those princes whose territories were most invaded by their Danish countrymen. This he expressly affirms of the Anglo-Saxon and Irish kings; and it is to the full as likely to have been the case with the Welsh princes, who often concurred with the Danes in distressing the English. I am led to think that the latter Welsh Bards might possibly have been excited to cultivate the alliterative versification more strictly, from the example of the Icelandic Scalds, and their imitators the Anglo-Saxon Poets; because the more ancient British Bards were nothing near so exact and strict in their alliterations, as those of the middle and latter ages: particularly after the Norman conquest of England, and even after king Edward the Ist’s conquest of Wales: whereas some centuries before this, the Icelandic metre had been brought ​to the highest pitch of alliterative exactness. This conjecture, however, that the Welsh Bards borrowed any thing from the Poets of any other country, will hardly be allowed me by the British Antiquaries, who, from a laudable partiality, are jealous of the honour of their countrymen; nor is it worth contending for: It is sufficient to observe, that a spirited emulation between the Bards ​and the Scalds, might excite each of them to improve their own native poetry, and to give it all that artificial polish, which they saw admired in the other language. Whoever would understand thoroughly the Poetry of both people, and compare their respective metre, may examine, for the Icelandic, Wormius’s Literatura Runica; and for the British, John David Rhys’s Cambro-Britannicæ Cymraecæve Linguæ institutiones & rudimenta, &c. Lond. 1592.]
T.
* ↑ Celtique, Fr.
* ↑ It is probable, that by the blood of this wise man blended with honey, was meant that union of reason or good sense, with the sweeter embellishments of sentiment and language, so essential to the perfection of true Poetry.
* ↑ In his first Edit. our Author had given here some farther circumstances of this Icelandic Tale; which in his second Impression (here followed) he dropt as unimportant and puerile. T.
* ↑ If by “Celtic Verses” here, our Author means those of the ancient Gauls in particular; I know not that there is one of these remaining: if he means those of the Celtic nations in general, then it may be observed, that not only the British, but the Irish and Erse languages are Celtic; and in these are innumerable quantities of ancient verses still extant: but, I fear, none of these would receive much illustration from the Scaldic Rules. If he applies the word “Celtic” to the ancient verses of the Scalds themselves, then it may be remarked, that there is no want of them in the libraries of the north, or even in print. T.
* ↑ See Vol. I. p. 404.—Wormij Literatura Runica, p. 183. 4to.
* ↑ Vid. Vol. I. p. 401, 402. Note.
* ↑ See the Icelandic original of Egill’s Ode, among the “Five Pieces of Runic Poetry," 8vo, p. 92.—Vid. [[Northern Antiquities/Chapter 13#399. I. p. 399]].
* ↑ See Specimens of Chinese Poetry (the Rhymes of which are very artificially disposed) at the end of the Translation of a Chinese novel: intitled, Hau Kiou Choaan, &c. 4 Vol. 12mo. 1761.
* ↑ The Reader may find many of these little mechanic Trifles translated into English, in an ancient Art of English Poesie, 1589, 4to. p. 77, 78. The writer (one Pultenham) says, These are in great request among the Sultans of Tartary, Persia and the Indies, (and even the Chinese) who often make presents to their ladies of poems arranged in these forms; the letters of which are composed of diamonds, rubies, &c.—This sort of gallantry is also practised in Turkey, as we learn from Lady Mary Wortley Mountague’s Letters, Vol. III. Letter XL.
* ↑ Compare the Anglo-Saxon Ode on Athelstan’s Victory, preserved in the Saxon Chronicle, (Ann. dccccxxxviii. beginning, Aþelsean cyning, &c. Gibson. Edit. 1692. p. 112.) with any of the Scaldic poems. See also Reliques of Anc. Eng. Poetry, Vol. II. p. 268, 269. 2d Edit.
* ↑ See Vol. I. p. 402. the latter part of the Note.
* ↑ Præfat. ad Hist. Orcad. folio.
* ↑ A very learned and ingenious British Antiquary thus informs me, “Our prosody depends entirely on what you call Alliteration, and which our Grammarians term Cynghannedd, i. e. Concentus, vel Symphonia Consonantica. This at first was not very strict: for the Bards of the sixth century used it very sparingly, and were not circumscribed by any rules. The Bards from the [Norman] conquest to the death of Llewellyn our last prince, were more strict. But from thence to queen Elizabeth’s time, the rules of Alliteration were to be observed with great nicety; so that a line not perfectly alliterative, is condemned as much by our Grammarians as a false quantity by the Greeks and Romans. They had six or seven different kinds of this consonantical harmony, some of which were of a loose nature, and were allowed in poetry, as well as the most strict Alliteration, &c.” “The most ancient Irish Poems, were also Alliterative according to Mr. Llwyd, of the Musæum; and as he was well versed in all the branches of the Celti now extant, viz. The British, Irish, Armoric, Cornish and Manks, no person was better qualified to judge in this matter.”
* ↑ It would be unfair to conceal the objections of the same learned person, especially as it would deprive the Reader of some very curious information concerning the ancient Celtic Poetry. “I can by no means think that our Bards have borrowed their Alliteration from the Scalds of the north: for there are traces of it in some very old pieces of the Druids still extant, which I am persuaded are older than the introduction of Christianity; and were composed long before we had any commerce or intercourse with any of the inhabitants of Scandinavia, or any branch of the Gothic race whatsoever and I believe before the Roman Conquest. Cæsar says, The Druids learned a great number of verses by rote, in which no doubt a great deal of their Morality was couched, and their mystical doctrines about the Oak and the Misseltoe. These kind of Verses are, by the Britons, called Englyn Milwr, or The Warrior’s Song, and consist of a triplet of seven syllables each verse, which are unirythm: For Rhyme is as old as poetry itself, in our language. It is very remarkable, that most of our old Proverbs are taken from the last verse of such a Triplet, and the other two seem almost nonsense; they mention the Oak, high Mountains, and Snow, with honour. Those are certainly remains of the Pagan Creed.”
* ↑ See also some account of the Welsh Poetry in Selden’s Remarks on Drayton’s Poliolbion.——And a remarkable passage in Giraldus Cambrensis (Cambriæ Descriptio, p. 260, 261.) beginning thus, Præ eunctis autem, &c.