![]() I thoroughly enjoyed reading this first volume of the Edda. ![]() Thus Snorri, a Christian, both preserves the old tradition and derides it at the same time. In this apostrophe he refers to the Prologue: Remember, these tales are to be used only as Chief Skalds have used them, and must be revered as ancient. By my count, they sired the Romans (according to Vergil), the British (according to Geoffrey of Monmouth), and now the Norse as well. Those Trojans certainly were a prolific bunch. In the Prologue, he tells us that the Aesir, the main Norse gods, were actually Trojan refugees who became so powerful in Scandinavia that they became regarded as Gods. That's somewhat true, but I hadn't realized how he used such an ironic frame to the overall narrative. After a few pages I was able to read a paragraph or more at a time fairly fluently, with a few word checks in the glossary.įrom the extracts in "Viking Language," my concept of Snorri's Edda was that he retold all the Norse myths to help explain the references in Norse poetry. And Faulkes includes excellent notes and a full glossary, making it very friendly to a novice Old Norseman like me. Anthony Faulkes's edition of the first part of Snorri Sturluson's Edda was a perfect fit.įirst of all, the second volume of "Viking Language" includes numerous excerpts from the Gylfaginning, so parts of the text and narrative were familiar already. ![]() When I finished the two volumes of Jesse Byock's "Viking Language" textbooks, I wanted to find a good book in Old Norse to continue my progress in the language. ![]()
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |