The Raven is a Clever Bird....

The raven might be the brightest of all birds , the myths about it are manifold. The raven was the messenger of the Nordic god Odin -  it was also aboard Noahs Ark, from where it was sent out to find land after the Flood.


After being almost extinct in Denmark for about 100 years the raven has now taken the old land in possession. The raven has a weight of about 1 1/2 kilo and a wing span of about 1 1/2, which means that it is the largest passerine in Europe. When you see the raven from a distance it looks as if it is black as coal, but if you look closer the plumage is more metal shining with a bluish sheen and greenish hues. The older the bird is the more metal shining feathers.

 A scientist and photographer had made a photo hide in the late winter, where the birds really need some food, and he had put out some baits for his models, the birds of prey and the crows. The first hungry birds were the crows, then came the buzzards and the seagulls. Suddenly came the golden eagle - and then he really got busy with his camera. It is rare to be that close to one of the great eagles.

But the raven kept away from the hide, it had discovered that someone was sitting inside under these camouflage nets. The guy had been there an hour before sunrise in order to "fool" the birds, but the black bird had fooled him instead. All the other birds were munching away, while the ravens were hovering above the feeding site and the photo hide shouting its krårk, which can be heard far and wide. He never got his close-up of the raven. His opinion is that the raven is the only bird whom he suspects being able to reason and figure things out.







In the Nordic mythology Odin used the ravens Hugin and Munin as observers. Hugin was the thought and Munin was the remembrance. This was a thousand years ago and there was a great deal of respect around the raven back then. It was a symbol of power, sharp senses and wisdom. Before Dannebrog came down from the sky in 1219 as the oldest national flag in the world, the Danes used the Raven Banner, a red cloth with two black ravens representing the national symbol of the Danes. The raven was a sacred bird.

Yggdrasil and ravens, Silkeborg Museum

Odin depict on a helmet, 7. century. wikipedia.

From the middle of the 1800s the view of nature changed in Denmark, and the raven was brought down with it. Together with raptors and largely all carnivors the raven was excommunicated and violently pursued. The wise black bird was virtually eradicated in the Danish nature, and it has not come back to its old land until the latest decades. But it came back in honor and dignity!  The Danish breeding population of ravens is today more than 1000 pairs and there is probably place and food enough for twice as many.




The raven, the raptors and other carnivors were in the 1800s indirectly victims of some high political changes, which contributed to feed a new approach in many Danes. The time of the land reclamation had taken off . A large part of the Jutland heath was cultivated, and furthermore came the comprehensive drainage of the "useless" wet areas. The new view of nature divided birds and animals in vermins, who had to be killed and useful game who had to be protected at any price. It was a kind of household philosophy. Raptors, ravens and other predators were shot, caught in traps, poisoned and had their nests destroyed. Shooting prizes were given for dead and unwanted birds and mammals. During only half a century several species of raptors were extinct in Denmark - and the raven held barely out.




The pheasant from Southeast Asia had an impact on the raven and the raptors, when this colourful fowl was introduced in Denmark as a hunting object in the 1800s. The hatred grew of the species who ventured to eat some meat now and then, and the omnivorous raven took of course a dead or wounded pheasant, if it got the chance. The raven has a secondary job in the renovation of nature.






In the 1950s were as far as known only about 10 pair of ravens in Denmark, most of the nests were in the southern part of Jutland - and it was from here the raven spread up through Jutland. It is now breeding in the main land of Jutland except in the outernest dunes at the west coast. The ancient bird of the Nordic gods has also won a terrain on the Isles, but it is shy and sceptical everywhere. It might take generations for it to get the distrust out of the body and achieve the confidence in the most dangerous mammal on earth, Man.






Source: 
Ravn til Gavn. Som sendebud og sladrehank, Jan Skriver, Natur og Miljø, nr. 1, 2013, Danmarks Naturfredningsforening

photos of ravens: grethe bachmann, Vilsted sø, 2009. 
photo: Silkeborg Museum: stig bachmann nielsen, naturplan.dk 


 EXTRA:
I have found the most wonderful Japanese blog about ravens and crows. If you are interested try to see this:

www.avesnoir.com/yata-garasu-the ravens-of-japanese-myth

Grethe ´)

The Vikings - the Old Religion.

The world before the new religion. 

Bjørn Nørgaard: The Viking Age. Tapestry, Christiansborg Castle

Ygdrasil, Silkeborg Museum

The Midgard Serpent, Silkeborg Museum

Johannes Gehrts: Valhalla

Iceland gave with  Vøluspa and Snorre Sturlasson great literature and a magnificent insight into the old religion of the Vikings. The ancient myths in the Edda,  all very different and from everywhere, old legends and religious traditions, foreign and local ideas and thinking, the story of the figths of gods and jotuns, the æsirs and the vanirs' pantheon. In the center is the residence of the gods, Asgard, where the major god Odin has his Valhalla with 640 gates and from where he in his high seat looks across all creation, and here is the bridge Bifröst, the trembling rainbow, that divides heaven from earth. Around the disc of the earth lies the ocean with the big monster, the Midgard Serpent, and by the faraway shores stretches the homeland of the Jotuns, Jotunheim with the castle Udgard. Under the disc of the earth is the kingdom of death, Hel. And in the corner is the mighty ash, Ygdrasil, in itself a worldly image of good and evil, of joy, sorrow and pain. Mighty is Ygdrasil. Its crown reaches the sky, its branches overshadow the earth, its three roots reach Hel and Jotunheim and down under Midgard, the world of humans. At the trunk of the ash is the spring of the god of wisdom, Mimir and the spring of the goddess of fate, Urd - in the branches sits the eagle, and between the eyes of the eagle is a hawk, paled by wind and weather; at the root of the ash a snake gnaws, and between the snake and the eagle a squirrel brings evil words up and down. Four deer bit off the young buds of the ash, and the trunk is rotting along the side. Indeed  - the ash Ygdrasil suffers more than humans know. But the norns give solace at Urd's well, where they pour water over the ash each day to prevent it from drying out. And the bees are nourished by Ygdrasil's honeydew. Upon a sacred place at Urd's spring are the gods gathering at the Thing, and here live the highest norns, the goddesses of past, present and future, Urd, Verdandi and Skuld. In the middle of the world, above the humans, lies the residence of the gods, where the families of the æsirs and vanirs live.

Dagfinn Werenskjold: The Norns, Oslo Town Hall.

Ragnarok

Johannes Gehrts: Ragnarok

Lorenz Frölich: Heimdall.

Nothing exists forever, and when the gods have worked through their time, the final is near where everything and everyone shall pass away. The great poet of Vølvuspá describes life's final, and Snorre Sturlasson completes the picture. First evil times will come among humans, all desires are out: sword time, wolf time, whore time, brother and sister beget children and brother kills brother. The cocks crow in the halls of Odin, in Hel and in the sacrificial grove. Horror and scary grows, the time of the big monsters has come. The hellhound Garm howls, the Fenrirwolf is loose from his chain, his gap reaches from earth to heaven, the Midgard Serpent whips the ocean into foam and spits venom across the earth. The jotun Hrym comes across the ocean in the ship Naglfar, built from dead men's nails, and the Muspelsons sail out with Loki as their leader. The ash Ygdrasil is trembling, the sky is breaking, the rocks are falling, Jotunheim is rumbling, the dwarfs are whining. Odin scouts, Heimdall blows in his Gjallarhorn, the bridge Bifröst breaks, the jotun Surtr rushes forward with his flaming fire. Then comes the world's last great duels between gods and monsters.The Fenrirwolf swallows Odin, but is killed by his son Vidarr, who tramples his gap into bits with his heavy shoes. Thor kills the Midgard Serpent, but only walks nine steps before he falls and dies, poisoned by venom. Tyr and the dog Garm kill each other. Heimdall and Loki kill each other. Surtr kills Freyr and burns everything with his fire. The sun turns black and the stars go out. But hope lives. Earth rises from the ocean again. Two blameless among the æsirs, Balder and Hoder, return and live guiltless upon the golden Gimli. The eagle flies across the roaring cataract. A new sun shines over a new world.

The last words gives a clue about a new and victorious religion, the replacement of the ancient belief. Christianity is not mentioned at all, but the old religion feels and predicts its own final. It is all a great death- and resurrection drama.

The Gods
Odin

Arthur Rackham: Odin

Frölich-Lundbye-Skovgaard: Odin

The religion of the Nordic Vikings was polyeistic. They believed in many gods. Odin was the highest one, a magnificent, demonic, terrifying, sadistic figure. He is obsessed with a devouring craving after wisdom and he sacrifices his eye for it; he is merciless, capricious, callous, he is the god of war and of killed warriors. He owns the spear Gungnir, the self-renewing goldring Draupnir, the eight-legged black horse Sleipnir; he is guarded by his two wolves, Geri and Freki, and he receives news from everywhere by his two ravens Huginn and Muninn, (Thought and Memory). He consults the severed head of the wise Mimir, he discovers the runes and knows their power, he hunts in the night with his entourage across mountain, forest and field, he appears on the battlefield and for those dedicated to death as a tall, one-eyed figure, swept in a long, wide mantle and with a broad-brimmed hat. Odin is also the god of the scalds, he is the manager of the mysterious assignation, the great pathos, the rage of the soul. And he knows about witchcraft and Seid. Nothing in mind and soul is strange to him, he is the god of great people, he's an aristocrat and a dangerous god. To describe him as an Allfather might be true if he leads the seat among the æsirs, but if the Allfather is meant to be fatherly, loving and protecting, mild and understanding, then Odin is not the Allfather. His clientele among humans are kings, earls, chiefs, wizards, poets. Whoever is killed in the battlefield in Odin's name is brought by the valkyries to Valhalla to be incorporated in his incalculable crowd of warriors, the einherjars, who will assist Odin when Ragnarok comes. In order to reach his great purpose, the collection of all knowledge and wisdom , of all secrets and all hidden truth Odin will never miss anything, evasion, cunning, breach of promise; if he's hard to others he's just as hard to himself,  he covers a wide field, from cynical generosity till a Dionysian roaring of ferocity and ecstasy.


Thor

J.H. Füssli: Tor

Frölich-Lundbye-Skovgaard: Thor

There is a big distance from Odin till the next æsir god, his son Thor, the redbearded power guy with his goat-drawn chariot and his electric hammer, Mjölnir. He's the democrat where Odin is the aristocrat. If Odin takes care of the upper-class, Thor is the popular god. And if Odin might lack humor Thor has got plentiful of it. There are numerous myths and anecdotes about Thor, this strong and faithful protector of the Viking farmers; Thor, the big brawler - and the thunder rolls when Thor rushes above the clouds with his goat team. He is irrestible wherever he comes, eager to fight and with his hammer in his hand. But he is not cunning or sly. That's not his ways. The jotuns, who know about witchcraft, often bring him in trouble, but he always manages in the end. The Vikings invented colourful and wonderful adventures about his exploits: he fetches the giantic beer-vessel at Jotunheim, he fetches his stolen hammer, he goes fishing the Midgard Serpent himself, he experiences the weirdest adventures at the king of the jotuns, Utgarda-Loki, where he brings with him the sly Loki - without much luck anyway.  The farmers in the Viking period did like and understand Thor, he was important to the farmer,  he was the manager of crop and wellfare, he was the god of farming, and he seemed more necessary than Odin himself. It was Thor, not Odin who had to "vie runerne" ( bless the runes). It was characteristic that the heathen Vikings in the early Viking period chose Thor's hammer and not Odin's spear as a strong sign against the Christian cross. Thor was a more general god than Odin, he was invoked by many kinds of people, beside the farmer also by the blacksmith, the fisherman and the captain on the sea. He was closer to people,  more down-to-earth and familiar than the incomprehensible and remote Odin.

Tyr, Balder, Heimdall, Ull.

Frank Dicksee: Balder's Death.

Tyr is brave and frank, he loses a hand when the Fenrirwolf is being tied up, and he fights the hellhound Garm during Ragnarok. There is not much information about Tyr except that he's a main god together with Odin and Thor. He was possibly mostly worshipped in Denmark in the Viking period. The handsome blonde god Balder has a special position among the æsirs. He is son of Odin and Frigg. He is helpful and friendly, he has difficult dreams, his death is tragic, his ceremonial cremation, nature's complaint, the attempt of the æsirs to save him from Hel, Loki's evil trick and plot - the whole tale about Balder is a famous piece of the art of storytelling.  Another æsir is Heimdall, the god with the Gjallarhorn, he is alert, sharp-eyed and responsive, he is the watchman of the gods and the guardian of the bridge Bifröst. The god of hunting is Ull, a master of the longbow and of skiing. There are no myths about this deity.

The Vanirs

Bjørn Nørgaard: Freya

Three deities who are not æsirs are Njord, Freyr and Freya. They are vanirs and they belong to another and maybe older family of deities, they are representatives of a half surpressed religion, competing with the æsirs. the working area of Njord, Freyr and Freya is erotica, growth, breeding power, sensuality. They are ancient fertility gods. Njord is the god of seafaring and wind, and he gives prosperity and fertility. Freyr, Njord's son, is the god of intercourse, he is one of the most important gods in Norse paganism, he is highly associated with farming and weather. He has a statue in the temple of Uppsala , where he is fashioned with an immense phallus. Freya, sister of Freyr,  his female counterpart; her domain is love and fertility, she is a generous deity, she has a waggon drawn by cats, she is the death goddess of women, but half of the fallen warriors from the battle field are dedicated to her. The vanirs were very old in the North; they might be earlier than both Odin and Thor,  probably even before Tyr.

Loki

Arthur Rackham: Loki

The last god among the æsirs is Loki, half god and half devil; he was son of a jotun and a jotun woman, he begets three terrible monsters, the Midgard Serpent, the Fenrirwolf and Hel. Loki is sarcasm and corrosive satire, never humor, he knows about cunning and malice, but never about friendship, he can hurt, tease and hit and his attacks on all deities are without any mitigating elements. Loki is the psychopath among gods; he amuses himself by hurting people. He has like all intelligent slanderers a sharp eye for the weak points of his victims, and he owns all nuances of wickedness in his hatred of morality. But he's got a weak point himself. He is venturing too far and meets the catastrophe.

Carl. J. Bilmark: Uppsala hovet

The Cult.
There is not much knowledge about the Viking cults, the heathen services or the heathen temples,  only  few informations exist, partly archaeological, partly from literature, from Adam of Bremen, Tietmar of Merseburg and Snorre Sturlasson. There was a flowering heathen assembly in the big temple in Gamla Uppsala in Sweden. This temple was the heathen center and the strongest fortification against Christianity. It was dressed in gold outside and inside, a golden chain  hang above the roof, and the building was shining far away across the plain, where it was built. The plain was surrounded by mountains in a circle, like a theater. Inside were three statues, in the middle of the hall was Thor with Odin and Freyr on each side. Priests were assigned to the gods, they came carrying the sacrifice gifts from the people. If sickness and hunger threatened, they sacrificed to the idol Thor, if war to Odin, if a wedding had to be celebrated the sacrifice was for Freyr.

Carl Larsson: Midvinterblót

Sacrifice

J. I. Lund: En Offerscene (Sacrifice)

Every ninth year was a common celebration in Gamla Uppsala. Living male creatures, humans, horses, dogs were sacrificed, nine of each, nine was a significant number. The blood of the victims had to reconcile the gods, the bodies were hung up in a grove close to the temple, humans, dogs and horses among each others. A Christian described how he had seen 72 bodies hanging in the grove. Close to the temple stands a large tree with branches stretching broad and wide, it is green both winter and summer, and no one knows what kind of tree it is. There is a spring where sacrifices are done, living humans are lowered down into the water, and if they don't come up, people's wish will be fullfilled. A sacrifice feast, celebrated each ninth year in January, is described in Lejre at Sjælland. 99 humans and 99 horses were sacrificed, and also dogs and cocks; these sacrifices had to give people protection against evil powers and to work as an atonement for evil deeds. A heathen holy sacrifice feast is called a blót. There was a blót feast in Trøndelag in Norway, where all peasants had to come and bring beer and borsemeat. The walls of the celebration hall were smeared with horseblood outside and inside, fire was lit on the floor and the horsemeat was cooked and distributed. The food had to be consecrated to Odin, Njord and Freyr and to the god Brage.

The Lesser Gods. 

Ethel Larcombe: Elves

But people also sacrificed to lower divine creatures like to the disirs and the elves. The disirs were secrecy female creatures, and it was best to keep on good terms with them and not neglect sacrificial gifts. The disirs warned about death and had to do with the worship of the dead; they protected the home and the crop of the field. The disirs were not always friendly, people were often afraid of them. The elves was the name of some lower deities, they were not exactly gods, but they were worshipped in house and home as protecting creatures. Other invisible creatures who lived close to humans were the vættirs and small trolls and pixies, but there was no actual worshipping of them.
 
Primitive cults.

Freyr, Swedish, Bronze

In isolated districts existed some primitive cults, described in a poem from the Edda called Volsapáttr (the chapter about Vølse) - this happens in the northernest Norway upon a lonely farm with six people, a farmer and his wife, their son and daughter and a thrall and a thrall woman. Vølse is the cut phallus from a horse, whish is kept carefully; the farmer's wife has conserved it with onions and herbs and swept it in linen; each evening the Vølse goes from hand to hand, and everyone talks to it in the form of a short spoke. This has bow become a custom, but one night king Olav the Holy arrives unexpectedly with a couple of travelling companions. He ends the phallus cult by throwing the Vølse to the farm dog and teach the family about Christianity. Cults and cases like this were not unique in a primitive Nordic peasantry.
 

Harald Bluetooth's rune stone in Jelling.

Christianity arrived and replaced the old religion; the heathen customs were forbidden or re-shaped into Christian customs. This did not happen in one blow, people kept on being loyal to the old gods and using the old customs for a long time, before they had accepted the new religion. The Christian church was relatively patient and wise, Freya was gradually replaced by Virgin Mary, and various Saints did fill in where it was needed. Everything clicked. Christianity had come to stay. Harald Bluetooth raised the great runestone in Jelling, Denmark's birth certificate. But this was actually meant for all of Scandinavia, although it is not certain that the farmer family in the northernest Norway had given up their primitive cult yet. Communication was a long-winding process at that time, and even in a little country like Denmark were isolated places, where people had not yet heard the latest news. Odin and Thor and the other Nordic gods were still alive for a long period, until they finally faded out. These ancient gods have experienced a certain revival during the latest years, which is quite astonishing. The history and the old legends about the Norse mythology are exciting and interesting and they can really catch the interest of almost everyone.

"The past is behind, learn from it. The future is ahead, prepare for it. The present is here, live it".       

GB


Source: Johannes Brøndsted : Vikingerne, Gyldendal, 1960.

(click to enlarge pictures, especially the Carl Larsson: Midvinterblót).

Collection of pictures from Norrøn Billedkunst: Dagfinn Werenskjold, Bjørn Nørgaard, Lorenz Frölich, Frank Dickee, Ethel Larcombe, Arthur Rackham, Johannes Gehrts, J.H. Füssli, J.I. Lund, Carl Larsson. , Carl J. Bilmark
Photo Silkeborg Museum: stig bachmann nielsen, naturplan.dk.  

Ancient Belief in the North.

Ancient Belief.

The ancient belief in the gods were the attempts of humans to explain the mighty powers of nature and life. They felt dependent and wanted to be on good terms with these powers. During Stone Age they sacrificed to creatures which they believed lived in nature, in trees, in water streams and in fire. In Bronze Age was invoking the heavenly phenomenons especially in force. The god of thunder,Thor was considered a god who kept an eternal fight against the trolls which destroyed the crop and sent diseases. The gods were worshipped in the open, especially in sacred groves where the sacrificial feasts were celebrated. In the same place people had thing meetings and from this origin came thing places like Lund in Scania and Ringstedlund at Zealand.

During Iron Age the gods were of a more personal character. People built gudehuse/Hov = temples and carved the pictures of the gods in wood. The significance of the gods was more like a relation to the people. The god Thor became a guardian of human life in all forms and not least of the peace in the things and the sepulchral monuments, he killed the evil vætter (demons) with his stone hammer Mjølner .The young Balder became a special good too.The west German tribes worshipped another god whose fame spread stronger and stronger to the North. This was Odin , and elderly man, always hunting on wild travels, riding the storm horse. In the storm he takes the souls from the dead along to the dark land of the dead, Hel, which becomes a sinister and disgusting woman, or they are brought to Valhal, the valley of the those killed in the war. He is the god of those killed in the war "Valfader and the giver of victory" and he was therefore especially envoked by warriors. In this way every nature force was invented into a good and supernatural human. The reasonable friendly gods were called Aser.



In fjeldene/the mountains lived the huge misanthropic jætter (giants), in lesser rocks and stones lived the little dwarfs, the finest of all blacksmiths. In the meadows lived elves and fairies. In lakes, water streams, everywhere lived supernatural vætter which humans had to beware of.

But also dead people did live. They returned to the surviving, especially at night and weighed heavily upon them and scared them in their dreams. In the ancient language it was not called "I dream" - it was called "I dream me", i.e. "it weighs heavily upon me". When a father died the son had to give him jewels, a horse and a ship with him in the grave hill where the dead now had to live. He had to bring sacrifices at the grave so the dead would not grow angry and injure him. From all these spirits in the hills, in the air, from ghosts and dreams wise men and women could find out secrets and legends, make magic and be fortune tellers. They were sitting out in the open on sacred nights mostly on cross roads to receive messages from the spirits.



The Nordic people knew of no special priesthood. The worldly chief herse (the leader of the district, the earl or the king were at the same time a sacrificial priest.) The sacrifice was always bloody , animals as a rule, sometimes humans, prisoners of war or trælle (slaves). The Blot (sacrifice) took place in sacred places , in a holy grove or a temple, a hov. The blood was spread on the walls of the temple or over the crowd. Then there was a feast and the drinking horns were emptied sending a message to the gods about the wish for a good harvest and luck in war etc. Sometimes people gathered from big areas for the big Fællesblot (common blot) , either when spring came or when summer ended - and especially in midwinter, when the sun Freyr returned promising light, warmth and fertility.

A Greek historian Prokopios from the 500s tells much about the North. He knew the tribe of the Danes upon the Jutland peninsula and says that the finest sacrifice in their opinion was the very first prisoner of war. They sacrificed to the highest god(Odin) and they did not just sacrifice the prisoner, they also hang him in a tree or threw him upon thorns or tortured him in other ways. Songs and legend tell about the god's/aserne's fight against the jætterne (giants)- especially during the Viking Period there was a rich poetry describing the gods, which is preserved by the Icelandic people in den ældre Edda and den Yngre Edda.

photo 2005/2006 grethe bachmann