Chapters 114-123 - Germanic Mythology

elonged to the myth cannot be determined. In any case, it is remarkable that in
Völundarkviða we rediscover the Gjuki-name Thakkrad, as in Þidreks Saga af Bern
[Wilkinasaga] we find Völund's brother Egil in Nidhad's environment.
The name Irung, Iring, as a synonym of Gjuki, is of more importance from a
mythological point of view. Widukind of Corvei (about the year 950) tells us in ch. 13 of
his Saxon Chronicle that "the Milky Way is designated by Iring's name even to this day."
Just previously he has mentioned a Saxon warrior by this name, whom he believes to
have been the cause of this appellation (... Iringi nomine, quem ita vocitant, lacteus coeli
circulus sit vocatus; and in the Auersberg Chronicle, according to J. Grimm, ... lacteus
coeli circulus Iringis, nomine Iringesstraza sit vocatus). 85 According to Anglo-Saxon
glosses, the Milky Way bears the name Iringes uueg. 86 One should compile this with the
statement made above that among England‘s Germanic tribes the Milky Way was called
the way of the Vatlings (Vati‘s descendants i.e., Ivaldi‘s descendants). Both of the
statements agree with one another. In the one it is the descendants of Ivaldi in general, in
the [736] other it is Slagfinn-Iring whose name is fastened to the Milky Way. Thus
Slagfinn, like Völund and Örvandil-Egil, was a star-hero. In "Klage" it is said of Iring
and two other heroes, in whose company he appears in two other poems, that they
committed serious errors and were declared banished, and that they, in spite of
reconciliation attempts, remained under the penalty to the end of their lives. Biterolf says
that they were ―fugitives under their enemies‘ threat.‖ We have here a reverberation of
the myth concerning the breach between the gods and the Ivaldi sons, of Njörd‘s 87
unsuccessful reconciliation attempt, and of their flight to earth northern outskirts. In the
German poems they take flight to Attila.
The Gjuki synonym Aldrian is a name formed in analogy with Albrian, which is a
variation of Elberich. In analogy with this, Aldrian should be a variation of Elderich,
Helderich. In Geoffrey of Monmouth's British history 88 there is a Saxon saga-hero
Cheldricus, who, in alliance with a Saxon chief Baldulf, fights with King Arthur's general
Cador, and is slain by him. How far the name-forms Aldrian-Elderich have anything to
do with the Latinized Cheldricus I think best to leave undecided; objective reasons exist
which, alone by itself and without the assistance of a real or apparent name-identity,
indicate that this Cheldricus is the same person as Aldrian-Gjuki. Bugge has already
pointed out that Baldrian corresponds to Baldur, Cador to Höður; that Geoffrey's account
has points of contact with Saxo's about the war between Baldur and Höður, and that
Geoffrey's Cheldricus corresponds to Saxo's King Gelderus, Geldr, who fights with
Höður and falls in conflict with him. 89
85 These sources are cited by Grimm as: ―Mirari tamen non possumus, in tantum saman praevaluisse, ut
Hiringi [Iringi] nomine, quem ita vocitant, lacteus coeli circulus usque in praesens sit notatus‖ and ―faman
in tantum praevaluisse, ut lacteus coeli circulus Iringis nomine Iringesstrâza usque in praesens sit vocatus
(sit notatus in Pertz, 8, 178). [DH (1829), p. 395; DM, Stalleybrass tr., p. 358]
86
―In confirmation, AS. Glosses collected by Junius (Symb. 372) give ‗via secta: Iringes uuec,‘ from which
Somner and Lye borrow their ‗Iringes weg, via secta.‘‖ [Grimm, Stalleybrass tr., ibid]
87 Anderson misread this as ―Frey‘s.‖
88 In ch. 9.1 of Galfridus Monemutensis' Historia Regum Britanniae, a legendary history chronicling the
lives of the kings of the Britons, spanning two thousand years, beginning with the Trojan founding of the
British nation and continuing down to the Anglo-Saxons era. It has little value as history, but is a valuable
piece of medieval literature, containing the earliest known version of the story of King Lear and an early
account of the legend of King Arthur.
89 Bugge, Sophus. Studier over de nordiske gude- og heltesagns oprindelse I, 185.