The Völuspá

Источник: The Völuspá. Read April 6, 1838, before the Leicestershire Literary Society. By T. Smith, Esq. F. S. A. Leicester. Printed by Combe and Crossley. 1838. Взято: http://www.germanicmythology.com/

 

¹ Be silent

All living beings,

High and low,

Children of Heimdallr.

I, of the World-Father

Will unfold wonders;

The old lays

Which in time past I learned

 

³ It was the beginning of time

When Ymer was:

There was no shore, nor sea,

Nor cool waves,

Earth was no where seen,

Nor heaven above

An all swallowing abyss there was

But no greenth.

 

⁴ Until the sons of Bor

Found the golden orbs;

They who Midgard^[1]

Glorious created.

Then shone the sun

On its rocky walls;

The first the earth grew green

With springing grass.

 

⁵ The sun on the south,

Companion of the moon,

With his right hand harnessed

The heavenly steeds.

And the sun knew not

Where were his courts;

Nor did the stars know

Their habitation;

The moon knew not

The place of her abode.

 

⁶ Then the heavenly powers took

Their high-raised seats, -

The most holy Gods,

And consulted of these things,

To night and new moon

Names they gave;

Morning they appointed,

And noon,

Afternoon and evening,

To be signs for years.

 

⁷ The Asir met

On Ida plain;

Fanes and courts

Did they raise high.

Furnaces they made,

Precious metals wrought,

With power they strove,

All things they assayed:

Tongs they invented,

And forge tools.

 

⁸ With golden orbs played

The Asir all-glad:

No want was there to them

Of gold.

Until there came

Three Thurse maids,

All fearful,

From Iotunheim.

 

⁹ Then took the heavenly powers

Their lofty seats –

The most holy gods,

And there counsel took

Which of them of dwarfs

The troops should create,

Of Ymer’s blood,

And blue bones.

 

The next five stanzas of the Völuspá [not shown] contain a catalogue of the names of the various dwarfs, who were thus called into existence.

… to return to the Völuspá, which after the creation of the dwarfs proceeds to describe how man was formed out of two ash trees called Asc and Embla:

 

¹⁷ There came from that meeting

Of the heavenly powers,

Three mighty and beautiful

Asir to the earth.

There found they on the ground,

Of little worth,

Asc and Embla

Without sense or life.

 

¹⁸ Soul they possessed not,

Reason they had not,

Neither blood, nor motion,

Nor bright colour.

Soul Odin gave,

And Hænir reason.

Blood Lodur granted

And a beauteous form.

 

¹⁹ An ash know I standing

Ygdrasil is it called;

A high tree teeming

With pure water.

Thence come the showers

Which on the vallies fall.

It stands ever-flourishing

By Urda’s well.^[2]

 

^R21/H26 The first death among the folk

Remember I in the world.

When from the earth

The gold ore men dug,

And in the high one’s courts

It did burn.

Three times born,

Again and yet again

Yet it still liveth.

 

^R22/H27 They called it money,

When to the house it came,

With its magic art.

Wolves themselves it tamed.

in the magic fire

the metal flows.

It has ever been the delight

of evil men.

 

^R23/H28 Then took all the gods

Their lofty seats,

The most holy powers,

And consulted of this thing:

Whether the good gods

The crime should avenge,

or whether atonement

For the sin they should accept.

 

^R24/H29 Odin sped his spear

Among the folk;

Thus first was slaughter

Brought into the world.

Broken was the bound

Of the Asa burg.

The Vanir^[3], spirits of strife,

Swept the plains.

 

The Völuspá now proceeds with detached allusions to Heimdallr’s horn, to the Valkyriar, and to the acts of the greater divinities of Asgard, such as the anger of Thor at the giant race, and the visit of Odin to Mimer’s well; but the notices are so obscure and disconnected, that we must have recourse to the Edda of Snorro for an account of the chief Asir and their attributes.

 

^R31/1-4 I saw of Baldur,

The blood-bestrinkled god,

The son of Odin,

The appointed doom.

 

^R34 There saw I lying

Bound near the boiling springs,

The faithless form

Which Loki’s features bore.

There sits Siguna,

Of her wretched lord

No longer proud.

Understand ye yet, or no?

 

^R37/H34 I saw a dark abode

Far from the sun

On Naströnd’s^[4] icy shore,

Whence gates open to the cutting north.

Its walls are formed

Of wreathed snakes,

Whose venom rains

Eternally within.

 

^R38/H35 Thither must go,

Across the dark torrents,

The souls of evil men,

The perjured, the coward,

The secret murderer,

The voluptuous man,

There Nidhog forever gnaws

The corpses of the dead.

The Hell-wolf rends them,

Understand ye yet, or not?

 

^{R39/H24 (1-4)} In Ironwood,

towards the east,

Sits night, the mother,

And still brings forth

the giant brood,

^R40/H25 Nourished with the breath

Of dying men.

Red blood smears

The holy temples.

Then shall the sun grow dim

In summer tide,

And storms shall sweep the earth.

Understand ye yet, or no?

 

^{R44 (H37)} Brother brother slays.

Rent asunder are

The bonds of kindred;

{missing line}

Hard will be the time!

Luxury prevails;

Axe-time, storm-time

Ere the world falls!

Nor shall one man

Another spare.

 

^R50/H40 What affrights the Asæ?

What affrights the Elves?

The giant world rages.

The Asæ flock together.

the dwarfs tremble

Before their rocky doors

Of their cavern haunts.

Understand ye yet, or no?

 

^R51/H44 Surtur comes from the south,

On flames of fire;

A sun shines from the sword

Of the Almighty God.

The mountains shiver,

The giants rush headlong,

Men travel the path of death,

the heavens are cleft asunder.

 

^R55/H49 The sun is darkened;

The earth sinks into the sea:

Disappear from heaven

The bright stars.

The fire rages

Around the tree of ages:

The flames climb {to}

Heaven itself.

 

^R57/H51 But lo! rising

Above the waves,

I see a new earth

In its young beauty green.

the waters disappear.

the eagle, which of late

Fished in the mountain tops,

Flies away.

 

^{R60/H54 (1-6)} The unsown fields

Shall bring forth corn.

All crimes shall cease

Baldur shall return.

Baldur and Hödur shall

Together dwell

In Odin’s blessed seats.

 

^R62/56 And I see a bright abode

In the highest heaven,

The roof glittering with gold.

More glorious than the sun.

There shall the just

Together dwell;

And through eternal time

Happiness shall taste.

 

^H57/1-4 Then at the great day

Shall come to judgement,

The everlasting God

Who governs all.

{From late paper mss.} He shall declare his laws;

And all strife shall cease;

And peace and truth shall reign

For evermore.

 

Notes:

[1] Midgard. Middle-guard or middle-yard. In the same way Asgard was the guard or yard of the Asir, and Utgard, where the Iötnur were confined, was the outer yard or utter yard. Yard, guard, garden seem to be derived from the same root.

[2] After verse 20 the two manuscripts versions of Völuspá diverge. Here R is Codex Regius and H is Hauksbók. The stanzas were not numbered in the original text. On occasion, Mr. Smith has combined parts of two verses into one, and in the final stanza has added lines from a late paper manscript.

[3] Vanir. Little is told of the Vanir except that they were spirits inhabiting the atmosphere, and were thought to have the control of aerial tempests, etc.

[4] Naströnd. the coast of dead corpses and evil beings, encompassing the abyss of Hvergelmer and situated in the lowest depths of Niflheim. The dark and poisonous streams, ‘Elivagar,’ surround it: Nidhog, the great dragon who dwells beneth the central root of Ygdrasil, torments the dead, with the innumberable serpents which inhabit ‘Hvergelmer.’