[gothic-l] Re: Odin the man - medieval scholarship at its best

[Einar Gunnar Birgisson <einarbirg@yahoo.com>]

--- In gothic-l at yahoogroups.com, "konrad_oddsson 
<konrad_oddsson at y...>" <konrad_oddsson at y...> wrote:
> Sæll Einar!
>  
> >    # Hej. I would leave out the Nobel in this case. I have never 
> > heard that Odinn was especially a Wind God. That must be a great 
> > oversimplification or simply not right. 
> 
> I think its the former. I agree with others in accepting that Odinn 
> was and is a wind god. This is entirely consistent with everything 
> we know about the etymology of the name and words related to it. It 
> clearly goes back to IE times, as many scholars have pointed out. 

> ### Hej Konrad.
It is not so clear actually. And clearly there were many 
intermeditary meanings: frenzy, madness,poetry,singing, shouting, 
etc,etc. In Gothic 'woþs' meaning crazy etc. From there is a rather 
long way to IE, like in Old Indian 'api-vátáyati' and 'api-vátati' 
which are words basically to do with understanding, to understand.
If we go further back! then the original meaning "gæti þá átt skylt 
við" (might be related to)*(a)ue- which is: wind.
The above was extracted from the Icelandic etymological dictionary. 
There is much more detailed description there of the etymology.
To use etymology to prove that Viking Odin was a especially a Wind 
God is doomed to fail in my view.

I have to stick to my former words that in Icelandic material then 
Odin was not especially presented as a Wind God. Rather it was Thor. 
We cannot use such etymology that says that "maybe" thousands of 
years back in time the word was related to 'wind' to describe the 
function of the Odinn known to 13th centuries Icelanders and claim 
that he was a Wind God. 

It might be that (in some periods at least)the term Odinn was used 
for a leader!, presumably a religious one. That is a persons name was 
not Odin, BUT the person was an Odin, that is a leader, a ringleader. 
Naturally this is speculation.But would explain the name of Snorri's 
Odin.

Bless Einar######
 
> 
 


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