Talk:Freyr/Archive 1

Old material

I have removed most of the material introduced by anonymous editor 172.194.214.69 on July 18, 2003. The material follows:

, though there are echoes throughout Saxo's Ancient History Of The Danes, which is a history of old Danish and Icelandic mythic poems. There are also traces of his lore in the Robin Hood tales and May Games.

During the War between the Aesir (the protector-warrior gods) and the Vanir (the peace and fertility gods), chaos broke out on earth, and the giants were able to invade Midgard. Frodi helped fight off many of these giants, using his magical powers ; Saxo transforms this into a pseudo-history. When you read underneath the lines, a kind of guerilla warfare from beneath emerges with many very interesting themes : Frodi "dies" and is reborn twice (Saxo says he "feigned his death", but he was actually put into a tomb or barrow), he divides a huge river into several smaller streams, he crossdresses in order to infiltrate a town, and he demonstrates a tendency to make the earth cave in beneath his opponents. Here we see themes of death and resurrection, ability to identify with the feminine, a penchant for working from beneath and turning what was below the earth to above the earth, and an ability to work with the land such that the waters evenly distribute fertility to peoples.

It is very likely that Frodi had to make his forays against the invading, ruling giants from wilderness areas or the forest, and this is where the Robin Hood material enters in. Robin Hood, like Freyr, is a figure of merriment, joy, freedom, liberation, and even sexual innuendo, as the May Games played with sexuality as a theme of the fertility of summer. It's true that Freyr was never associated with the bow and arrow, but he was King of the Elves, and elves are associated with bows and arrows, so as the legends got transformed under Christian centuries, it would be logical for people to remember that the leader of a group of bowmen living in the forest and making forays on the tyrants in the towns would himself be a bowman as well.

Like Frodi, Robin has a tendency to win by losing, a kind of Germanic ahimsa or judo: when Robin gets whipped by an opponent, then they bow down before him. Overall, there are several themes which show resonance with the myths of Jesus, and indeed, in early poetry of the conversion, Jesus is often referred to as "Frey". While this does mean "lord" (amongst other meanings, including "free"), there were at least two other words they could have used, including "dryhten" and "balder", and thus we must assume that there were some felt parallels amongst the folk. This is magnified by the fact that in several early Christian churches, sacred dildos have been found inside the altars, and Freyr was a phallic god similar to Liber (as well as Priapus). This shows that the "Jesus" early folk converts may have been worshipping may have been a different figure than commonly assumed.

The parallels, when we take into account the above lore, are considerable : both figures are said to free all captives; both figures are said to have died, been placed in a barrow or tomb, and risen again, both figures are associated with agricultural lore (Jesus tells very earthy, farming parables ; Freyr is Lord of the Plow and of the Boar who plows in the earth), both figures work from beneath and try to turn the social soil as it were (Jesus' Sermon on the Mount, Frodi's taking the ground out from beneath opponents so they are below and the soil above, Robin's tendency to win by going down); Jesus represents love and peace while Freyr represents frith (a concept analogous but not identical to peace), love and merriment; Jesus abandons the violence of the zealots, and Freyr gives up his sword for love ; and both have been called the "Lord of the Dance". Of course no assertion is made that these two are identical by any means, but there are some striking similarities that probably would have been felt by the Old Folk. Given that Jesus was often paired up with Mary Magdalene, who was portrayed as a sexually free woman (and may be reflected in Maid Marion), in Medieval times, Jesus and Mary amongst the common folk may merely have been the latest incarnations of Frey and Freya.

Animals sacred to Freyr included the stag and the boar. Like these animals, he could be very peaceful and gentle, and also very fierce when provoked. These reflect two sides of Freyr : Freyr the Gentle Lord of Mirth and Harvests, and Freyr as Frodi the Liberator, who can be quite fierce, one might even say revolutionary, in the defense of freedom. The formation known as the "battle boar" was dedicated to this spirit of his. At the end of time, he will fight with Stag's Antlers. (Which brings to mind the Abbots Bromley Horn Dance.)

The arguments are idiosyncratic and seem to me to be unbalanced in both meanings of the word. I suspect "original research", either by the editor who placed this here or from some single source which the editor did not provide. If put into a separate article called Freyr and Robin Hood the above would be a prime candidate for VfD unless someone was able to put it into an NPOV context. Is anyone aware of what the source for this might be?

Jallan 01:59, 22 Aug 2004 (UTC)

Nice work, Jallan.--Wiglaf 17:20, 23 Aug 2004 (UTC)