Towards a Method of Mythology - Germanic Mythology

and I support the assertion that if Groa were not a common name within mythological
circles, then Petronella was not a common name among mortal ladies.
The Judge (who never argues with attorneys): Gentlemen, the question can be
settled at once, if there is reason to assume more than one Groa in the three sources [458]
referred to here: Gróugaldur, the Prose Edda, and Saxo.
The 2 nd lawyer: Unfortunately, this is the easy way out, to assume that the matter
is not open. But absence of proof for a theory only proves that the opposite view is
correct. We all remember that, since we first read logic into the world.
The 1 st lawyer: I concede this willingly and I am delighted that my colleague has
logic in mind.
The 2 nd lawyer: The absence of direct evidence for my subject indicates this even
less, of course, the more one contemplates the fragmentary state of our sources.
The 1 st lawyer: I also concede that.
The 2 nd lawyer: Besides, the burden of proof is on my honorable colleague. No
other mythologist imagined that Groa must be a single entity, before he troubled us with
this assertion. He who makes a claim should prove it; I am not obligated to disprove it.
My duty is only to review the evidence he presents, and if I strike it down, the matter
remains as before.
The 1 st lawyer: I concede that the burden of proof lies with me.
The Judge: Then proceed!
The 1 st lawyer: Your Honor, Norse mythology has a particularly rich synonymy…
The 2 nd lawyer: The question here is not one of synonymy but of homonymy —
not a question if a mythological person bore many names, but whether two or more
persons bore the same name. I hold the latter, you deny it.
The 1 st lawyer (continues): …but a particularly insignificant homonymy. Your
Honor, here is a list of the individual designations and their synonyms. They appear en
masse; they number in the hundreds, and fill many columns. And here is a list of
homonyms. They amount to a dozen. Two may be shown to be false conjectures of
Gylfaginning’s author; four others may be shown not [459] to be actual homonyms, but
names that Odin called himself on the occasions he played the role of the name’s actual
owner. Of two others, the sources do not agree on their documentation or one’s existence.
The actual homonymy is thus insignificant. But, nevertheless, let us assume that the
indisputable homonyms number a dozen, so that new points of debate do not
unnecessarily lengthen the process. In the disputable cases, the probability of the
occurrence of a homonym stands in relationship to the ratio of the number of pure
individual names and their synonyms on one side and the number of indisputable
homonyms on the other. When one number is divided by the other, you can see, your
Honor, how it correlates to this probability statistically. It constitutes a very small percent
and its very smallness confirms (if confirmation is required) the direct proof I shall
present that one has an equally small right to speak of more than one mythological Groa,
as he does to speak of more than one Hlodyn, or one Freyja, one Fulla, one Nanna, one
Gerd, one Gefjon, one Idun, one Skadi, one Urd, one Verdandi, one Skuld, one mother
Night, one Bödvild, one Eir, one Hild, or one Göndul, one Skögul, one Gunnlöd, one
Gna, one Angeyja, one Bestla, one Beyla, one Fenja, etc., as he does to speak of more
than one Odin, or one Thor, one Tyr, one Bragi, one Vidar, one Vali, or one Baldur, etc.
Homonymy, your Honor, has its natural limits in that a more extensive homonymy would