Stealing the Hammers of Thor









Foreword:



Today we'll take a look at the exploits of prince Magnus "The Strong" Nielsson of Denmark, (1106-1134). Magnus was a strong player in the 12th century Danish game of thrones, but despite his many political alliances, his place on the throne was far from secure. At this point of time, Denmark was an elective monarchy, and there were many contenders for the throne, which of course fostered intense rivalry between claimants. Magnus was no stranger to the more brutal ways to secure a claim, as he possibly had his cousin Karl of Flanders murdered in 1128.



Among potential rivals was Cnut Lavard (1096-1131), whose power and popularity had increased dramatically in the years 1127-1130. Unsurprisingly, Magnus perceived Cnut as a strong rival, and their rivalry motivated Magnus' raids on the pagan Swedes in this excerpt of Gesta Danorum.



Magnus later ended their rivalry by deceiving Cnut and cleaving his skull in twain in the woods near Haraldsted, thereby kicking off the devastating Danish civil war of 1131-1134, which lead to Magnus' own death in the battle of Fodevig 1134.



Whoever said "violence doesn't sole any problems" just split too few skulls.





Text:





Gesta Danorum, liber XIII, Saxo Grammaticus, late 12th century.





Location:





Sweden





Translation by Karsten Friis-Jensen:





"Cnut afterwards wandered through the regions of the East as a sea-rover, returning home with glittering prizes and hoping thereby to gain enhancement to his authority; in recompense for his services, however, he was confronted by an accusation from the king, who blamed him for plundering within the bounds of Sweden. Now Magnus, too, emulated his vigorous pursuits with similar deeds of worth; among other distinctive trophies he had his followers bring back to his native country, some unusually heavy implements known as Thor's [Lat: Ioviales] hammers, which were venerated by men of primitive religion on one of the islands. Ancient folk, in their desire to understand the causes of thunder, using an analogy from everyday life, had wrought from a mass of bronze, hammers of the sort they believed to instigate those crashes in the heavens, since they supposed the best way of copying the violence of such loud noises was with a kind of blacksmith's tool. But Magnus, in his enthusiasm for Christian teaching, hated the heathen religion, and held it an act of piety to rob the shrine of its objects of worship and Thor [Lat: Iovem] of his emblems. The Swedes even today look on Magnus as a sacriligeous despoiler of heavenly treasures. If only his end could have matched his beginnings!"











Interesting stuff:



Though Saxo Grammaticus have no qualms about writing "Thor" other places in his patriotic tome, here he makes a reverse interpretatio romana and identifies Thor with Jupiter. It's not very surprising, since his work is a tour de force of silver age Latin, masterfully composing poetry in many metres and containing numerous parallels to Roman writers such as Valerius Maximus. His prose is a far cry from the more laconic Old Norse of the Icelandic writers, and can be tough to get through, though it's #worthit.



The location is apparently an island off the coast of Sweden. Petersen identifies it as Gotland, and Perkins is tempted to place the shrine in Torslunda on Öland, but it's really not to say what island it is. Not that it matters - there might well have been pagan worship in Sweden at this period of time. Perkins note that islands in general "seem to have been favoured places for meteorological magic, wind-raising and the like" (Perkins, 32), but it's doubtful whether Saxo knows of an account of heathens working mimetic meteorological magic (what a tongue twister), or if it comes down to the usual Christian discourse explaining pagan religion.

The Swedish heathens are not depicted as particularly stupid or gullible, which is very uncharacteristic of Saxo, who was fond of bashing any other ethnicities than Danes. Saxons, Slavs, Englishmen, Swedes, Jutes, other Danes. Damn Danes, they've ruined Denmark!



The idol itself is unusual. It's not an anthropomorphic depiction of a god, but a depiction of one of his belongings - a sort of pars pro toto. It's very interesting that there are several hammers and not just the one we're familiar with. The heathens use the hammers to mimic the thunder in the skies. Whereas Perkins sees it as mimetic magic, the excerpt is probable rooted in Christian ideas. A popular learned theory was, that even though the descendants of Adam and Eve forgot the name and existance of God and became heathens, they still sensed a divine order and connection in the world.

This is evident in this excerpt too: The heathens observe a natural phenomenon, and rightfully assume that a divine power is behind its occurrence. In essence, this is the teleological argument for the existence of God. However, they do not reach the correct conclusion, and instead worship the pagan god of thunder, Thor. The same idea is expressed more fully in the prologue to Snorris Edda.



