Hrafnagaldr Óðins or Forspjallsljóð ("prelude poem") is an Icelandic

Icelandic language

Icelandic is a North Germanic language, the main language of Iceland. Its closest relative is Faroese.Icelandic is an Indo-European language belonging to the North Germanic or Nordic branch of the Germanic languages. Historically, it was the westernmost of the Indo-European languages prior to the...

 poem in the style of the Poetic Edda

Poetic Edda

The Poetic Edda is a collection of Old Norse poems primarily preserved in the Icelandic mediaeval manuscript Codex Regius. Along with Snorri Sturluson's Prose Edda, the Poetic Edda is the most important extant source on Norse mythology and Germanic heroic legends, and from the early 19th century...

. It is preserved only in late paper manuscripts. In his influential 1867 edition of the Poetic Edda, Sophus Bugge

Sophus Bugge

Sophus Bugge was a noted Norwegian philologist and linguist. His scientific work was directed to the study of runic inscriptions and Norse philology. Bugge is best known for his theories and his work on the runic alphabet and the Poetic Edda and Prose Edda. -Background:Elseus Sophus Bugge was...

 reasoned that the poem was a 17th century work, composed as an introduction to Baldrs draumar

Baldrs draumar

Baldrs draumar or Vegtamskviða is an Eddic poem, contained in the manuscript AM 748 I 4to. It relates information on the myth of Baldr's death in a way consistent with Gylfaginning....

. Since then it has not been included in editions of the Poetic Edda and not been extensively studied.
But prior to Bugge's work the poem was considered a part of the Poetic Edda and included, for example, in the English translations of A. S. Cottle (1797) and Benjamin Thorpe

Benjamin Thorpe

Benjamin Thorpe was an English scholar of Anglo-Saxon.-Biography:After studying for four years at Copenhagen University, under the Danish philologist Rasmus Christian Rask, he returned to England in 1830, and in 1832 published an English version of Caedmon's metrical paraphrase of portions of the...

 (1866) as well as Karl Simrock's influential German translation (1851). In 1852, William and Mary Howitt

William Howitt

William Howitt , was an English author.He was born at Heanor, Derbyshire. His parents were Quakers, and he was educated at the Friends public school at Ackworth, Yorkshire. His younger brothers were Richard and Godrey whom he helped tutor. In 1814 he published a poem on the Influence of Nature and...

 characterized it as "amongst the most deeply poetical and singular hymns of the Edda".

Date

Based on linguistic evidence and the seemingly corrupt state of the text Jónas (2002) argued in favor of an earlier dating than Bugge, perhaps to the 14th century. Linguist Kristján Árnason disagreed and argued on the basis of a metrical analysis that the poem as it has come down to us can hardly be older than from the 16th century. Annette Lassen argued that only a few lines have metrical indications of being young and that this is not proof of a young age for the entire poem. She concludes that the poem is a valid source which should not be subject to greater skepticism than e.g. Fjölsvinnsmál

Fjölsvinnsmál

Fjölsvinnsmál or The Sayings of Fjölsvinnr is the second of two Old Norse poems commonly published under the title Svipdagsmál "The Lay of Svipdagr". These poems are found together in several 17th century paper manuscripts with Fjölsvinnsmál...

and Sólarljóð

Sólarljóð

The Sólarljóð is an Old Norse poem, written in Iceland ca 1200. It is written in the traditional metric style of the Poetic Edda, but with a content from Christian visionary poems....

.

Contents

The poem consists of 26 fornyrðislag eight-line stanzas. It involves several known figures from Norse mythology

Norse mythology

Norse mythology, a subset of Germanic mythology, is the overall term for the myths, legends and beliefs about supernatural beings of Norse pagans. It flourished prior to the Christianization of Scandinavia, during the Early Middle Ages, and passed into Nordic folklore, with some aspects surviving...

, including Odinn, Idunn, Heimdall

Heimdall

In Norse mythology, Heimdallr is a god who possesses the resounding horn Gjallarhorn, owns the golden-maned horse Gulltoppr, has gold teeth, and is the son of Nine Mothers...

, Loki

Loki

In Norse mythology, Loki or Loke is a god or jötunn . Loki is the son of Fárbauti and Laufey, and the brother of Helblindi and Býleistr. By the jötunn Angrboða, Loki is the father of Hel, the wolf Fenrir, and the world serpent Jörmungandr. By his wife Sigyn, Loki is the father of Nari or Narfi...

 and Bragi

Bragi

Bragi is the skaldic god of poetry in Norse mythology.-Etymology:Bragi is generally associated with bragr, the Norse word for poetry. The name of the god may have been derived from bragr, or the term bragr may have been formed to describe 'what Bragi does'...

, but does not appear to describe a myth known from other sources.

The poem begins with five stanzas of ominous introduction, the narrative proper setting in in stanza 6. Idunn falls from the world-tree (stanzas 6-7) and is given a wolfskin to wear (stanza 8).
Alarmed, Odin sends a trio of messengers led by Heimdall to get news from a woman designated as "the doorpost of Gjöll's sun" (Giallar sunnu gátt, a kenning for woman) (stanza 9).
The identity of the woman that Heimdall and his companions visit in the lower world is not revealed. She has been variously identified as Idunn (Sophus Bugge, 1867), Hela (Emil Doepler, 1881), and as Urd (Viktor Rydberg, 1889).
The messengers ask her the beginning, duration and end of heaven, the world, and hel (stanza 11). Tears are her only response (stanzas 12-13).
The failed messengers return to Asgard, joining a feast in progress (stanzas 14-15). Heimdall tells the gods of their mission; Loki informs the goddesses (stanzas 16-19).
The festivities conclude (stanza 21), and the onset of night is described in mythological terms (stanzas 22-26).
In the final verse, Heimdall lifts his horn toward heaven.

Manuscript tradition

Hrafnagaldur Oðins is transmitted in a single version contained in at least thirty-seven copies, now housed in Iceland, Denmark, Sweden, Great Britian, Germany and the United States. Of these, only five are considered to have independent textual value. All manuscripts that contain the poem include the subtitle Forspallsljóð. The earliest manuscripts, known as A and B, date from the second half of the 17th century. The A manuscript of the poem was first brought to Sweden in 1681 by Guðmunður Ólafsson. The B manuscript, according to Páll Eggert Ólason's catalogue, was written c.1600 and in the 18th century. Most other manuscripts of Hrafnagaldur Óðins are derived from them. The number and ordering of stanzas is the same in all manuscripts. There are only minor differences in the texts. The text of the poem is cryptic and most probably corrupt. The final stanza does not appear to form a satisfactory conclusion, suggesting that the poem as it has come down to us is incomplete.

According to analysis of the best manuscripts, the various copies all derive from a single archetype. Since it is not transmitted in other than paper manuscripts, the poem is often considered a later work, possibly a post-medivael imitation of an Eddic poem, akin to Gunnarslagr, composed by Gunnar Pálsson. Nevertheless, a vellum manuscript of the poem may once have existed. Árni Magnússon makes reference to the poem in a letter dated June 18, 1729 to Jón Halldórsson, Dean of Hítardalur, raising the possibility that such a manuscript was lost in the Great Fire in Copenhagen of 1728

Copenhagen Fire of 1728

The Copenhagen Fire of 1728 was the largest fire in the history of Copenhagen, Denmark. It began on the evening of October 20, 1728, and continued to burn until the morning of October 23. It destroyed approximately 28% of the city , left 20% of the population homeless, and the reconstruction lasted...

, which destroyed a large part of Arni's library, including as many as 15 bound manuscripts of Eddic poetry.

Ég hafðe (sem brann) bref Sal. Sra Olafs (Skolameistara ockar) ahrærande eina af þessum odis (mig minnir Hrafnaga. Odins) ad Mag. Brýniolfur hafe þá qvidu uppskrifa láteð epter gömlu saurugu einstaka blade, og minnir mig þar stæde, ad þar aftan vid hefde vantad, og eins kynne um fleira gengid vera. Þetta verður svo sem allt i þoku, því documentin eru burtu,'

"I had (which burned) holy Rev. Ólafur's (our principal's) letter regarding one of these odes (I believe Hrafnagaldur Odins) a song that Magister Brynjólfur had allowed to be copied from one old, dirty leaf, and as I recall, he said that there was something missing at the end, and that it may have occurred in the same manner. This is all as if in a fog, the documents are gone."

Publication history

The first printed edition of the poem appeared in Guðmundar Magnússon's Edda Sæmundar hinns fróði, 1787 p. 199-232, with commentary by Gunnar Pálsson (1728-1787). The text is that of MS Icel. 47, a manuscript edition made by Jón Eiríksson, which contained variant readings, used in the critical apparatus of the edition. The poem next appeared in Edda Sæmundar hinns fróða, 1818, edited by Erasmus Rask and Arvid August Afzelius. Hallgrimur Scheving (1837), P.A. Munch (1847), Hermann Lüning (1859), Theodor Möbius (1860), and Frederich Wilhelm Bergmann (1875) also published editions of the poem. Finnur Magnusson (1822), Karl Simrock (1851) and Benjamin Thorpe (1865) produced translations into Danish, German and English respectively.

Sophus Bugge

Sophus Bugge

Sophus Bugge was a noted Norwegian philologist and linguist. His scientific work was directed to the study of runic inscriptions and Norse philology. Bugge is best known for his theories and his work on the runic alphabet and the Poetic Edda and Prose Edda. -Background:Elseus Sophus Bugge was...

 in his 1867 edition of the Poetic Edda argued that the poem was a work of the 17th century, and after this, it was mostly ignored by editors and students of the Edda. An exception is Viktor Rydberg

Viktor Rydberg

Abraham Viktor Rydberg was a Swedish writer and a member of the Swedish Academy, 1877-1895...

, who in 1886 accepted the poem as authentic and sought to explain its narrative as referring to the time Idun was taken from Asgard by Thjazi.

Interest in the poem has been renewed after 1998, when Eysteinn Björnsson and William P. Reaves posted an edition of the poem with English translation and commentary online.
Althought this edition was "for the most part removed again in 2002", leaving only the English translation of the poem in its place, "Eysteinn Björnsson and Reaves' work on the poem led to the performance of the choral and orchestral work 'Hrafnagaldur Óðins with music by Sigur Rós

Sigur Rós

Sigur Rós is an Icelandic post-rock band with classicaland minimalist elements. The band is known for its ethereal sound, and frontman Jónsi Birgisson's falsetto vocals and use of bowed guitar. In January 2010, the band announced that they will be on hiatus. Since then, it has since been announced...

, Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson

Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson

Hilmar Örn Hilmarsson , also known as HÖH , is a musician, an art director, and allsherjargoði of Ásatrúarfélagið ....

, and Steindór Andersen

Steindór Andersen

Steindór Andersen is an Icelandic musician.Andersen is noted for his Rímur chanting, and is most widely known for his collaborations with the band Sigur Rós...

." In support of this, their translation was printed in the program of the London performance of the work at the Barbicon Centre in 2002.
This popular interest in the poem was followed by an Icelandic edition, edited by Icelandic philologist Jónas Kristjansson, former head of the Arni Magnusson Institute, published in the Lesbók of the Icelandic newspaper Morgunblaðid, 27/4 2002 in which he acknowledges the recent popular works.

External links

• Forspjallsljóð Sophus Bugge's edition
• Odins ravnes sang Finn Magnussen's Danish edition
• Odins Rabenzauber Karl Simrock's German Translation, 1851.