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Thorgerd replied in a loud voice, "I have had no evening meal, nor will I do so until I join Freyja. I know no better course of action than my father's. I do not want to live after my father and brother are dead."
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Hálfs saga ok Hálfsrekka
In the first chapter of the 14th century legendary saga Hálfs saga ok Hálfsrekka, King Alrek has two wives, Geirhild and Signy, and cannot keep them both. He tells the two women that he would keep whichever of them that brews the better ale for him by the time he has returned home in the summer. The two compete and during the brewing process Signy prays to Freyja and Geirhild to Hött ("hood"), a man she had met earlier (earlier in the saga revealed to be Odin in disguise). Hött answers her prayer and spits on her yeast. Signy's brew wins the contest.
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Sörla þáttr
In Sörla þáttr, a short, late 14th century narrative from a later and extended version of the Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar found in the Flateyjarbók manuscript, an euhmerized account of the gods is provided. In the account, Freyja is described as having been a concubine of Odin, who bartered sex to four dwarfs for a golden necklace. In the work, the Æsir once lived in a city called Asgard, located in a region called "Asialand or Asiahome". Odin was the king of the realm, and made Njörðr and Freyr temple priests. Freyja was the daughter of Njörðr, and was Odin's concubine. Odin deeply loved Freyja, and she was "the fairest of woman of that day." Freyja had a beautiful bower, and when the door was shut no one could enter without Freyja's permission.
Chapter 1 records that one day Freyja passed by an open stone where dwarfs lived. Four dwarfs were smithying a golden necklace, and it was nearly done. Looking at the necklace, the dwarfs thought Freyja to be most fair, and she the necklace. Freyja offered to buy the collar from them with silver and gold and other items of value. The dwarfs said that they had no lack of money, and that for the necklace the only thing she could offer them would be a night with each of them. "Whether she liked it better or worse", Freyja agreed to the conditions, and so spent a night with each of the four dwarfs. The conditions were fulfilled and the necklace was hers. Freyja went home to her bower as if nothing happened.
As related in chapter 2, Loki, under the service of Odin, found out about Freyja's actions and told Odin. Odin told Loki to get the necklace and bring it to him. Loki said that since no one could enter Freyja's bower against her will, this wouldn't be an easy task, yet Odin told him not to come back until he had found a way to get the necklace. Howling, Loki turned away and went to Freyja's bower but found it locked, and that he couldn't enter. So Loki transformed himself into a fly, and after having trouble finding even the tiniest of entrances, he managed to find a tiny hole at the gable-top, yet even here he had to squeeze through to enter.
Having made his way into Freyja's chambers, Loki looked around to be sure that no one was awake, and found that Freyja was asleep. He landed on her bed and noticed that she was wearing the necklace, the clasp turned downward. Loki turned into a flea and jumped onto Freyja's cheek and there bit her. Freyja stirred, turning about, and then fell asleep again. Loki removed his flea's shape and undid her collar, opened the bower, and returned to Odin.
The next morning Freyja woke and saw that the doors to her bower were open, yet unbroken, and that her precious necklace was gone. Freyja had an idea of who was responsible. She got dressed and went to Odin. She told Odin of the malice he had allowed against her and of the theft of her necklace, and that he should give her back her jewelry.
Odin said that, given how she obtained it, she would never get it back. That is, with one exception: she could have it back if she could make two kings, themselves ruling twenty kings each, battle one another, and cast a spell so that each time one of their numbers falls in battle, they will again spring up and fight again. And that this must go on eternally, unless a Christian man of a particular stature goes into the battle and smites them, only then will they stay dead. Freyja agreed.
Post-Christianization and Scandinavian folklore
Ripe rye in Northern Europe
Although the Christianization of Scandinavia beheld a new institution in Scandinavia, the church, that sought to demonize the native gods, belief and reverence in the gods, including Freyja, remained into the modern period and melded into Scandinavian folklore. Britt-Mari Näsström comments that Freyja became a particular target under Christianization:
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Freyja's erotic qualities became an easy target for the new religion, in which an asexual virgin was the ideal woman [...] Freyja is called "a whore" and "a harlot" by the holy men and missionaries, whereas many of her functions in the everyday lives of men and women, such as protecting the vegetation and supplying assistance in childbirth were transferred to the Virgin Mary.
However, Freyja did not disappear. In Iceland, Freyja was called upon for assistance by way of Icelandic magical staves as late as the 18th century, and as late as the 19th century, Freyja is recorded as retaining elements of her role as a fertility goddess among rural Swedes.[39]
The Old Norse poem Þrymskviða (or its source) continued into Scandinavian folk song tradition, where it was euhemerized and otherwise transformed over time. In Iceland, the poem became known as Þrylur, whereas in Denmark the poem became Thor af Havsgaard and in Sweden it became Torvisan or Hammarhämtningen. A section of the Swedish Torvisan, in which Freyja has been transformed into "the fair" (den väna) Frojenborg, reads as follows:
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Swedish
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Det var den väna Frojenborg
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hon tog så illa vid sig
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det sprack av vart finger blodet ut
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och rann i jorden ner.
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Britt-Mari Näsström translation
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It was the fair Frojenborg
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She was so upset [over Þórr's demand]
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her blood burst from each of her fingers
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and ran down into the ground.
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In the province of Småland, Sweden, an account is recorded connecting Freyja with sheet lightning in this respect. Writer Johan Alfred Göth recalled a Sunday in 1880 where men were walking in fields and looking at nearly ripened rye, where Måns in Karryd said: "Now Freyja is out watching if the rye is ripe". Along with this, Göth recalls another mention of Freyja in the countryside:
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When as a boy I was visiting the old Proud-Katrina, I was afraid of lightning like all boys in those days. When the sheet lightning flared at the night, Katrina said: "Don't be afraid little child, it is only Freyja who is out making fire with steel and flintstone to see if the rye is ripe. She is kind to people and she is only doing it to be of service, she is not like Thor, he slays both people and livestock, when he is in the mood" [...] I later heard several old folks talk of the same thing in the same way.
In Värend, Sweden, Freyja could also arrive at Christmas night and she used to shake the apple trees for the sake of a good harvest and consequently people left some apples in the trees for her sake. However, it was dangerous to leave the plough outdoors, because if Freyja sat on it, it would no longer be of any use.
Eponyms
Several plants were named after Freyja, such as Freyja's tears and Freyja's hair (Polygala vulgaris), but during the process of Christianization, the name of the goddess was replaced with that of the Virgin Mary. In the pre-Christian period, the Orion constellation was called either Frigg's distaff or Freyja's distaff (Swedish Frejerock).
Place names in Norway and Sweden reflect devotion to the goddess, including the Norwegian place name Frøihov (originally *Freyjuhof, literally "Freyja's hof") and Swedish place names such as Frövi (from *Freyjuvé, literally "Freyja's vé").[42] In a survey of toponyms in Norway, M. Olsen tallies at least 20 to 30 location names compounded with Freyja. Three of these place names appear to derive from *Freyjuhof ('Freyja's hof'), whereas the goddess's name is frequently otherwise compounded with words for 'meadow' (such as -þveit, -land) and similar land formations. These toponyms are attested most commonly on the west coast though a high frequency is found in the southeast.
Place names containing Freyja are yet more numerous and varied in Sweden, where they are widely distributed. A particular concentration is recorded in Uppland, among which a number derive from the above-mentioned *Freyjuvé and also *Freyjulundr ('Freyja's sacred grove'), place names that indicate public worship of Freyja. In addition, a variety of place names (such as Frøal and Fröale) have been seen as containing an element cognate to Gothic alhs and Old English ealh ("temple"), although these place names may be otherwise interpreted. In addition, Frejya appears as a compound element with a variety of words for geographic features such as fields, meadows, lakes, and natural objects such as rocks.
The Freyja name Hörn appears in the Swedish place names Härnevi and Järnevi, stemming from the reconstructed Old Norse place name *Hörnar-vé (meaning "Hörn's vé").[45]
Archaeological record and historic depictions
A 7th-century phalara found in a "warrior grave" in what is now Eschwege in northwestern Germany features a female figure with two large braids flanked by two "cat-like" beings and holding a staff-like object. This figure has been interpreted as Freyja. This image may be connected to various B-type bracteates, referred to as the Fürstenberg-type, that may also depict the goddess; they "show a female figure, in a short skirt and double-looped hair, holding a stave or sceptre in her right hand and a double-cross feature in the left".
A 12th century depiction of a cloaked but otherwise nude woman riding a large cat appears on a wall in the Schleswig Cathedral in Schleswig-Holstein, Northern Germany. Beside her is similarly a cloaked yet otherwise nude woman riding a distaff. Due to iconographic similarities to the literary record, these figures have been theorized as depictions of Freyja and Frigg respectively.
Theories
Relation to Frigg and other goddesses and figures
Due to numerous similarities, scholars have frequently connected Freyja with the goddess Frigg. The connection with Frigg and question of possible earlier identification of Freyja with Frigg in the Proto-Germanic period (Frigg and Freyja origin hypothesis) remains a matter of scholarly discourse. Regarding a Freyja-Frigg common origin hypothesis, scholar Stephan Grundy comments that "the problem of whether Frigg or Freyja may have been a single goddess originally is a difficult one, made more so by the scantiness of pre-Viking Age references to Germanic goddesses, and the diverse quality of the sources. The best that can be done is to survey the arguments for and against their identity, and to see how well each can be supported."
Like the name of the group of gods to which Freyja belongs, the Vanir, the name Freyja is not attested outside of Scandinavia, as opposed to the name of the goddess Frigg, who is attested as a goddess common among the Germanic peoples, and whose name is reconstructed as Proto-Germanic *Frijjō. Similar proof for the existence of a common Germanic goddess from which Freyja descends does not exist, but scholars have commented that this may simply be due to lack of evidence.
In the Poetic Edda poem Völuspá, a figure by the name of Gullveig is burnt three times yet is three times reborn. After her third rebirth, she is known as Heiðr. This event is generally accepted as precipitating the Æsir–Vanir War. Starting with scholar Gabriel Turville-Petre, scholars such as Rudolf Simek, Andy Orchard, and John Lindow have theorized that Gullveig/Heiðr is the same figure as Freyja, and that her involvement with the Æsir somehow led to the events of the Æsir–Vanir War.[50]
Outside of theories connecting Freyja with the goddess Frigg, some scholars, such Hilda Ellis Davidson and Britt-Mari Näsström, have theorized that other goddesses in Norse mythology, such as Gefjon, Gerðr, and Skaði, may be forms of Freyja in different roles and/or ages.
Receiver of the slain
Freyja and her afterlife field Fólkvangr, where she receives half of the slain, has been theorized as connected to the valkyries. Scholar Britt-Mari Näsström points out the description in Gylfaginning where it is said of Freyja that "whenever she rides into battle she takes half of the slain," and interprets Fólkvangr as "the field of the Warriors". Näsström notes that, just like Odin, Freyja receives slain heroes who have died on the battlefield, and that her house is Sessrumnir (which she translates as "filled with many seats"), a dwelling that Näsström posits likely fills the same function as Valhalla. Näsström comments that "still, we must ask why there are two heroic paradises in the Old Norse view of afterlife. It might possibly be a consequence of different forms of initiation of warriors, where one part seemed to have belonged to Óðinn and the other to Freyja. These examples indicate that Freyja was a war-goddess, and she even appears as a valkyrie, literally 'the one who chooses the slain'."
Siegfried Andres Dobat comments that "in her mythological role as the chooser of half the fallen warriors for her death realm Fólkvangr, the goddess Freyja, however, emerges as the mythological role model for the Valkyrjar [sic] and the dísir."
The "Oriental" hypothesis
Gustav Neckel, writing in 1920, connects Freyja to the Phrygian goddess Cybele. According to Neckel, both goddesses can be interpreted as "fertility goddesses" and other potential resemblances have been noted. Some scholars have suggested that the image of Cybele subsequently influenced the iconography of Freyja, the lions drawing the former's chariot becoming large cats. These observation became an extremely common observation in works regarding Old Norse religion until at least the early 1990s. In her book-length study of scholarship on the topic of Freyja, Britt-Mari Näsström (1995) is highly critical of this deduction; Näsström says that "these 'parallels' are due to sheer ignorance about the characteristics of Cybele; scholars have not troubled to look into the resemblances and differences between the two goddesses, if any, in support for their arguments for a common origin."
Modern influence
Into the modern period, Freyja was treated as a Scandinavian counterpart to the Roman Venus in, for example, Swedish literature, where the goddess may be associated with romantic love or, conversely, simply as a synonym for "lust and potency". In the 18th century, Swedish poet Carl Michael Bellman referred to Stockholm prostitutes as "the children of Fröja". In the 19th century, Britt-Mari Näsström observes, Swedish Romanticism focused less on Freyja's erotic qualities and more on the image of "the pining goddess, weeping for her husband".
Freyja is mentioned in the first stanza ("it is called old Denmark and it is Freja's hall") of the civil national anthem of Denmark, Der er et yndigt land, written by 19th century Danish poet Adam Gottlob Oehlenschläger in 1819.[56] In addition, Oehlenschläger wrote a comedy entitled Freyjas alter (1818) and a poem Freais sal featuring the goddess.
The 19th century German composer Richard Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen opera cycle features Freia, the goddess Freyja combined with the apple-bearing goddess Iðunn.
In late 19th century and early 20th century Northern Europe, Freyja was the subject of numerous works of art, including Freyja by H. E. Freund (statue, 1821–1822), Freja sökande sin make (painting, 1852) by Nils Blommér, Freyjas Aufnahme uner den Göttern (charcoal drawing, 1881), and Frigg; Freyja (drawing, 1883) by Carl Ehrenberg, Freyja (1901) by Carl Emil Doepler d. J., and Freyja and the Brisingamen by J. Doyle Penrose (painting, 1862–1932). Like other Norse goddesses, her name was applied widely in Scandinavia to, for example, "sweetmeats or to stout carthorses". Vanadís, one of Freyja's names, is the source of the name of the chemical element vanadium, so named because of its many colored compounds.[60]
Starting in the early 1990s, derivatives of Freyja began to appear as a given name for girls. According to the Norwegian name database from the Central Statistics Bureau, around 500 women have Frøya (the modern, Norwegian spelling of the goddess's name) as a first name in the country. There are several similar names that likely have the same origin, such as the more widespread Frøydis.[61]
Freyja is one of the incarnated goddesses in the New Zealand comedy/drama "The Almighty Johnsons". The part of "Agnetha/Freyja" is played by Alison Bruce[62]
See also
Notes
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^ Hollander (2007), p. 8.
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^ a b Hollander (2007), p. 14.
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^ For Freyja in Iceland, see Flowers (1989), pp. 73,80. For Freyja in Sweden, see Schön (2004), pp. 227–228.
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^ Simek (2007), p. 91 and Turville-Petre (1964), pp. 178–179.
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^ Simek (2007), pp. 156–157 and Turville-Petre (1964), p. 178.
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^ Simek (2007), pp. 123–124, Lindow (2002), p. 155, and Orchard (1997), p. 67.
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^ Andersen (1899), p. 157.
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^ Wiberg, Wiberg & Holleman (2001), p. 1345. A suburb of Minneapolis, MN, an area settled heavily by Scandinavians, is called "Vanadis Heights."
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^
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^
References
External links
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Media related to at Wikimedia Commons