Towards the Baldur Myth - Germanic Mythology

One from the aging spring and the other from the approaching summer.‖ 27
That the Asvins also have significance in regard to the seasons is already clear in
that the geniuses of the seasons, the Ribhus, manufacture their car from whose spokes
fertility falls upon the earth. And that these seasons were spring and summer is confirmed
by what is related about Yima-Urvakhshaya and Keresaspa. Yima receives the
assignment from Ormuzd ―to make the world fruitful.‖ Ormuzd gives a golden plow and
a golden shepherd‘s staff to him. Copious life spreads over the earth during Yima‘s reign,
when he ―traveled up toward the light of midday to the sun‘s path.‖ Of him, it says
further: ―Yima is like the sun among mortals. Through his power, he ordained that men
and cattle did not die (as long as he governed), that the water and trees did not dry up,
and that man ate a food that did not diminish. During his reign no cold or heat prevailed,
no old age or death, no jealousy produced by the demons‖ (Yasna 9, 5; Yasht XV, 15).
It is clear from this account that in the annual cycle Yima-Urvakhshaya represents
the season that spreads vegetation and the abundance of life over the earth and, that in the
epic mythology, he represents the golden age of humanity, which, with his death, comes
to an end in a storm-age when the powers of evil and destruction are in the process of
destroying creation.
His brother Keresaspa rules beside him; but his activity, which amounts to a
constant battle against the demons, particularly suggests a time when the existence of the
golden age is threatened, when the powers of storm, cold, and darkness have already
begun their assault, which Keresaspa beats back until he himself succumbs to the demonworld‘s
sorcery and destructive arts and becomes his brother‘s killer, not without guilt,
but nevertheless against his will. He himself finally falls by another‘s weapon. A Persian
tradition relates that it was in Keresaspa‘s time that mankind first traveled over the sea
that divided their primeval home from other parts of the earth—an echo of the myth
about the migration from the Proto-Indo-European homeland caused by the fimbulwinter.
The Germanic mythology has also spoken of a peaceful- and golden age, when
Jötunheim‘s powers were still quiet; nothing interrupted the regular workings of the
world‘s institutions, and the world-mill turned beneath songs that brought blessings. It
was the time when the nature smiths provided the gods everything that they needed and
desired in the way of golden world-benefiting treasures— var þeim vettergis vant ór
gulli. 28 It was before the three dangerous thurs-maidens, that is to say the thrice reborn
Gullveig-Heid-Aurboda, came out of Jötunheim and interfered in world affairs.
Thereafter misfortune after misfortune befell the gods and their world. Freyja, the
goddess of vegetation, was delivered to the giant world. The goddess of rejuvenation was
as well. The fimbul-winter approached and there was nothing that could stop its outbreak
once Balder was killed by his brother Hödur‘s arrow through the ruse of the demon Loki.
The Teutons had to leave their primeval home in search of new dwelling places.
In regard to the epic, Baldur‘s and Yima-Urvakhshaya‘s deaths occupy exactly
the same position. The mythic epic describes one world-year whose seasons follow one
another like that of the common year. After the summer of the Golden Age has passed,
comes the time when evil and good battle one another, a time resembling stormy autumn.
27 Manilius, Astronomica 182 ff.
28 ―For them there was no want of gold,‖ Völuspá 8.