Asatru Folk Assembly - February 05, 2024


GuĂ°rĂșnarhvöt, a reading

Hosted by
Steve McNallen
Mentioned
Svanhild Regius Bridal Sigurth Guthrun Randvar Gunnar Hogni Biki Guthranar Havot Guthran Guthernotervot GuĂ°rnarvold Icelander Jormenrek Jormenric Brunhild Homeward Svanhird Sunirdo Jadonis Sunirda and 16 more
Atlamål En Grönlenzku, a reading Hamðismål, a reading

Episode Stats


Length

13 minutes

Words per minute

111.26

Word count

1,484

Sentence count

70

Harmful content

Misogyny

1

sentences flagged

Toxicity

1

sentences flagged

Hate speech

14

sentences flagged


Summary

Summaries generated with gmurro/bart-large-finetuned-filtered-spotify-podcast-summ .

Guthrunar Hvot and the Hamthesmal, or The Ballad of Hamther, are two of the most famous poems in the Old Norse sagas. They tell the story of the tragic death of the queen, Svanhilda, and the death of her husband, Theodoric, King of the East Goths.

Transcript

Transcript generated with Whisper (turbo).
Misogyny classifications generated with MilaNLProc/bert-base-uncased-ear-misogyny .
Toxicity classifications generated with s-nlp/roberta_toxicity_classifier .
Hate speech classifications generated with facebook/roberta-hate-speech-dynabench-r4-target .
Hosts, guests, and mentioned names generated with spaCy (en_core_web_sm), reconciled against Wikidata.
00:00:00.000 Guthranar Hvot
00:00:23.000 Guthran's inciting
00:00:26.000 The two concluding poems in the Codex Regius, the Guthrunar Hvot, and the Hamthesmal, the Ballad of Hamther,
00:00:36.480 belong to a narrative cycle connected with those of Sigurd, the Burgundians, and Atli, by only the slenderest of threads.
00:00:46.040 Of the three early historical kings who gradually assumed the dominant place in Germanic legend,
00:00:52.100 Ur-Monaric, king of the East Goths in the middle of the 4th century, was actually the least important,
00:00:59.920 even though Jordanus, the 6th century author of Deirubus Geticus, compared him to Alexander the Great.
00:01:08.260 Memories of his cruelty and of his tragic death, however, persisted along with the real glories of Theodoric,
00:01:16.380 a century and a half later, and of the conquest of Attila, whose lifetime approximately bridged
00:01:21.880 the gap between Armonarch's death and Theodoric's birth.
00:01:26.920 Chief among the popular tales of Armonarch's cruelty was one concerning the death of a
00:01:32.940 certain Sunirdo, or Sunile, whom, according to Jadonis, he caused to be torn asunder by
00:01:41.040 wild horses because of her husband's treachery. Her brothers, Sauros and Amias, seeking to avenge
00:01:48.640 her, wounded but failed to kill her monarch. In this story is the root of the two Norse poems
00:01:56.400 including in the Codex Regius. Sunirda easily became the wife as well as the victim of the 0.68
00:02:03.940 tyrant, and by the process of legend blending so frequently observed, the story was connected
00:02:10.400 with the more famous one of the Nibirums by making her the daughter of Sigurd and Guthrun.
00:02:17.100 To account for her brothers, a third husband had to be found for Guthrun. The Sorus and Ammius of
00:02:23.820 Dredonis are obviously the Sorli and Hamthur, sons of Guthrun and Jönik of the Norse poems.
00:02:31.900 The blending of the Sigurd and Elmoneric legends, probably, though not certainly,
00:02:36.600 took place before the story reached the north, in other words, before the end of the 8th century.
00:02:43.560 Regarding the exact status of the Guthernotervot and the Hontismal,
00:02:48.520 there has been a great deal of discussion.
00:02:51.140 That they are closely related is obvious.
00:02:53.640 Indeed, the first parts of the two poems are nearly identical in context,
00:02:58.220 and occasionally so in actual diction.
00:03:01.120 The annotator, including the prose note,
00:03:04.240 which refers to this second poem as the Old Ballad of Hamtler,
00:03:08.380 wherefore it has been assumed by some critics
00:03:10.900 that the composer of the Guthronautervault
00:03:13.180 used the Hamtlismal approximately as it now stands
00:03:16.700 as the source part of his material.
00:03:20.740 The extant Hamtlismal, however, is almost certainly a patchwork.
00:03:25.320 Part of it is in Fornish law,
00:03:27.280 including most of the stanzas parallel to the Guthronautervault,
00:03:30.420 and likewise the stanza is followed directly
00:03:33.080 by the reference to the old ballad, while the rest is in Marahattar.
00:03:38.320 The most reasonable theory, therefore, is that there existed an old ballad of Hamther,
00:03:43.320 all in Fornishalog, from which the composer of the GuĂ°rnarvold borrowed a few stanzas
00:03:49.560 in the introduction for his poem, and which the composer of the extant, or new, Hamther
00:03:55.440 and small, likewise used, therefore far more clumsily.
00:04:01.500 The title, GuĂ°rnarrvot, which appears in the Codex Regius, really applies only to stanzas
00:04:07.940 1-8, all presumably borrowed from the old Ballad of Hamther.
00:04:13.560 The rest of the poem is simply another GuĂ°rn lament, following the tradition exemplified
00:04:18.680 by the first and second GuĂ°rn lays.
00:04:22.020 It is possible, indeed, that it is made up of fragments of two separate laments, one
00:04:28.040 stanzas 9-18 involving the story of Svanhild's death, and the other stanzas 19-21 coming
00:04:35.540 from an otherwise lost version of the story in which Guthrun closely follows SigurĂ°
00:04:40.240 and Brunhild in death.
00:04:42.940 In any event, the present title is really a misnomer.
00:04:46.580 A poet, who presumably was an 11th century Icelander, used the episode of Guthrun's inciting their sons to vengeance for the sling of Vanhild simply as an introduction to his main subject, the last lament of the unhappy queen.
00:05:02.020 The text of the poem in the Regius is by no means in good shape, and editorial indignations have been many and varied, particularly in interchanging lines between the Gusnallervolt and the Homfismal.
00:05:18.000 The Vorsunga Saga paraphrases the poem with such fidelity as to prove that it lay before the compilers of the saga approximately in its present form.
00:05:27.520 Guthranar Havot
00:05:34.520 Guthran went forth to the sea after she had slain Atri.
00:05:39.940 She went out into the sea and Fang would drown herself, but she would not sink.
00:05:46.440 The waves bore her across the fjord to the land of King Yonach. 0.90
00:05:52.020 He took her as wife.
00:05:54.460 sons were sorely in Ulpenhamther. There was brought up Svanhild, Sigurd's daughter. She
00:06:04.520 was married to the mighty Jormenrik. With him was Biki, who counseled that Randvar,
00:06:11.520 the king's son, should have her. This Biki told to the king. The king had Randvar hanged,
00:06:20.860 And Svanhild trodden to death under horses' feet.
00:06:25.500 And when Guthrun learned this, she spake with her sons.
00:06:30.460 A word strife I learned, most woeful of all, A speech from the fullness of sorrow spoken.
00:06:37.900 When Fierce have hollered her sons to the fight, Did Guthrun wet with words full grim.
00:06:45.740 Why sit ye idle, why sleep out your lives, Why grieve ye not in gladness to speak?
00:06:54.140 Since Jormenrek your sister young Beneath the hooves of horses hath trodden,
00:07:00.440 White and black on the battle-way, Gray road-wanted the steeds of the Goths.
00:07:09.260 Not like are ye to Gunnar of yore, Nor have ye hearts such as Hogni's was.
00:07:16.700 Vengeance for her ye soon would have, If brave ye were as my brothers of old, 0.95
00:07:24.500 Or hard ye hearts as the Hunish kings. 0.94
00:07:29.580 Then Hamther spake, the high of heart, Let all the deed of Hogni dislove, 0.97
00:07:37.820 In Sigurth they wakened from his sleep, Thy bed covers white with red with blood,
00:07:45.480 Of thy husband drenched with gore from the hearts.
00:07:51.940 Bloody revenge didst have for thy brothers, Evil and sore when thy sons didst slay,
00:08:00.460 Thus yet might we all on Jormenric, Together our sisters slaying avenge.
00:08:08.780 The gear of the Hunnish king now gives us, Thou hast whetted us so to the battle of swords.
00:08:18.180 Laughing did Guthrin go to her chamber, The helm of the kings from the cupboard she
00:08:23.900 took, and mail-coats broad to her son she bore them. On the horses' backs the heroes leaped.
00:08:34.400 Then Hamther spake, the high of the cart. Homeward no more, his mother to see comes
00:08:41.780 the Spear-god, following mid Gothic folk. One death draught thou, for us all shall drink, 1.00
00:08:49.740 For Svanhild then, and thy sons as well.
00:08:55.220 Weeping Guthrun, Gilkey's daughter, Went sadly before the gate to sit,
00:09:01.300 And with tear-stained cheeks to tell the tale, For mighty griefs so many in kind.
00:09:09.720 Three home fires knew I, Three hearths I knew,
00:09:14.460 Whom was I brought by husbands three, But Sigurth only of all was dear,
00:09:20.960 He whom my brothers brought to his death.
00:09:23.960 A great sorrow I saw, not nor knew, Yet more it seemed I must suffer yet,
00:09:32.460 When the princess greats who aughtily gave me.
00:09:37.060 The brave boys I summoned to Sigurth's speech, For my woes requital I must not win. 1.00
00:09:44.460 To off the heads of the Niflungs I blew, To the sea I went my heartful sore, 1.00
00:09:53.960 To the Norns whose wrath I would now escape. 1.00
00:09:59.220 But the lofty billows bore me undrowned, To the land I came so I longer must live,
00:10:07.840 Into the bed of old was it bitter, Of a king of the folk a third the time I came.
00:10:17.000 Boys I bore his heirs to be, Heirs so young, the sons of Yannick.
00:10:25.000 But round Svanhird had made in sats, She was dearest ever of all my children.
00:10:33.760 So did Svanhild seem in my hall, As the ray of the sun is far to see. 0.98
00:10:41.880 Gold I gave her in garments bright, Ere I let her go to the Gothic folk. 0.99
00:10:49.140 Of my heavy woes the hardest it was, When Svanhild's tresses fair were trodden, 1.00
00:10:55.440 In the mire by hoofs of horses wild, The sorest it was with Sigurd's mind,
00:11:04.780 On his couch of victory rob they killed, And grimmest of all went to Gunnar's heart,
00:11:13.140 Their crept bright-hued crawling snakes, And keenest of all when they cut the heart
00:11:20.440 from the living breast of the king so brave.
00:11:24.400 Many woes I remember.
00:11:29.440 Bridal Sigurth, 1.00
00:11:31.840 thy steed so black.
00:11:34.740 Hither yet run,
00:11:36.860 thy swift-firing horse.
00:11:40.200 Here there sits not son nor daughter,
00:11:43.480 yet yet who to Guthron gift shall give.
00:11:48.600 Remember Sigurth,
00:11:50.440 But once we said, and together both on the bed we sat,
00:11:56.060 That mightily thou to me wist come, From hell and I from earth to thee.
00:12:02.820 Pile ye up, Jarls, the pyre of oak, Make it the highest a hero ever had.
00:12:11.300 Let the fire burn my grief-filled breast, My sore-pressed heart till my sorrows melt. 0.98
00:12:20.320 May nobles all, lest sorrow know, and lest the woes of women become. 0.89
00:12:26.840 Since the tale of this lament is told.
00:12:50.320 Thank you.