Stolt Herr Alf
Encyclopedia
The Types of the Scandinavian Medieval Ballad
The Types of the Scandinavian Medieval Ballad classifies all "types" of traditional ballader known in one of more of the Scandinavian languages .In its turn, the list of types is divided into six groups , as infra...
which, due to its content, is thought to originate from pre-Christian times
Norse paganism
Norse paganism is the religious traditions of the Norsemen, a Germanic people living in the Nordic countries. Norse paganism is therefore a subset of Germanic paganism, which was practiced in the lands inhabited by the Germanic tribes across most of Northern and Central Europe in the Viking Age...
. There are two different manuscripts of this ballad in the National Library of Sweden, and some dialectal words indicate that the ballad was current in south-western Sweden before its documentation.
The Norse god Odin
Odin
Odin is a major god in Norse mythology and the ruler of Asgard. Homologous with the Anglo-Saxon "Wōden" and the Old High German "Wotan", the name is descended from Proto-Germanic "*Wodanaz" or "*Wōđanaz"....
is appealed to with an epithet which has aroused scholarly interest, and he is called Oden Asagrim, meaning "Odin, leader of the Æsir
Æsir
In Old Norse, áss is the term denoting a member of the principal pantheon in Norse paganism. This pantheon includes Odin, Frigg, Thor, Baldr and Tyr. The second pantheon comprises the Vanir...
". The suffix -grim is a virtually unique word for "leader" and which is otherwise only attested in the runestone Sö 126, but in the earlier form grimR. It is not attested as a noun in the sense "leader" in West Norse sources. In Old Norse
Old Norse
Old Norse is a North Germanic language that was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and inhabitants of their overseas settlements during the Viking Age, until about 1300....
, the basic meaning of the adjective grimmr is "heartless, strict and wicked", and so grimmr is comparable in semantics to Old Norse gramr which meant both "wrath", "king" and "warrior".
Synopsis
The ballad tells that Lord Alf's wife woke up from a nightmare. She informed her husband that she had dreamt that she had seen a stone and brick house at her father's estate in which her husband had been burnt to deathQuickfire
Quickfire or Quick-fire was a type of arson sometimes employed in blood feuds in medieval Scandinavia and Iceland. In committing quickfire, a group of attackers would set fire to the home of an opponent, sometimes by quickly and surreptitiously piling wood, brush and other combustible materials...
with his retinue
Retinue
A retinue is a body of persons "retained" in the service of a noble or royal personage, a suite of "retainers".-Etymology:...
.
Lord Alf told his wife that she must not worry and instead go to sleep again. The next day Lord Alf rode to his father-in-law, King Asmund, with his retinue and asked the king for a house where they could sleep during the night. King Asmund told them that they could sleep in a house at the orchard.
The king then appealed to Odin:
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Odin responded that King Asmund should bar the door of Lord Alf's house and set its gables aflame. In that way, he could defeat Lord Alf without incurring any harm.
Toward the end of the ballad, the people decide to take vengeance and slay King Asmund because he refused to pay weregild
Weregild
Weregild was a value placed on every human being and every piece of property in the Salic Code...
—usual punishment, according to medieval Scandinavian laws when a killer refuses to pay weregild
Weregild
Weregild was a value placed on every human being and every piece of property in the Salic Code...
(as in the story) or commits quickfire
Quickfire
Quickfire or Quick-fire was a type of arson sometimes employed in blood feuds in medieval Scandinavia and Iceland. In committing quickfire, a group of attackers would set fire to the home of an opponent, sometimes by quickly and surreptitiously piling wood, brush and other combustible materials...
.