Ynglingatal
Encyclopedia
The line of kings according to Ynglingatal
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Ynglingatal is a skaldic poem listing the kings of the House of Ynglings, dated by most scholars to the late 9th century.
The original version is attributed to Þjóðólfr af Hvini who was the skald
Skald
The skald was a member of a group of poets, whose courtly poetry is associated with the courts of Scandinavian and Icelandic leaders during the Viking Age, who composed and performed renditions of aspects of what we now characterise as Old Norse poetry .The most prevalent metre of skaldic poetry is...
of a Norwegian
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
petty king named Ragnvald the Mountain-High
Ragnvald the Mountain-High
Ragnvald "the Mountain-High" Olafsson was a petty king of Vestfold in what is today Norway. He was the son of Olaf Geirstad-Alf, a cousin of Harald Fairhair and the father of Åsa Ragnvaldsdatter , who married Eystein Ivarsson.His greatest contribution to posterity was that he asked the skald...
and who was a cousin of Harald Fairhair. The reason was that the Norwegian kings claimed descendance from the Norse gods through the royal dynasty of Sweden, a dynasty which apparently shed glory on the Norwegian kings.
Ynglingatal survives in three versions of which the best known is the Ynglinga saga
Ynglinga saga
Ynglinga saga is a legendary saga, originally written in Old Norse by the Icelandic poet Snorri Sturluson about 1225. It was first translated into English and published in 1844....
in Snorri Sturluson
Snorri Sturluson
Snorri Sturluson was an Icelandic historian, poet, and politician. He was twice elected lawspeaker at the Icelandic parliament, the Althing...
's Heimskringla
Heimskringla
Heimskringla is the best known of the Old Norse kings' sagas. It was written in Old Norse in Iceland by the poet and historian Snorri Sturluson ca. 1230...
. The second version, in Historia Norwegiae
Historia Norvegiæ
Historia Norwegiæ is a short Latin history of Norway written by an anonymous monk. The only extant manuscript, in the private possession of the Earl of Dalhousie and kept at Brechin Castle, Scotland, is fragmentary; what we have of the Historia is found on folios 1r-12r...
, is a translation into Latin and contains essentially the same information. The third version is the most terse one and is preserved as only a listing of the names in Íslendingabók
Íslendingabók
Íslendingabók, Libellus Islandorum or The Book of Icelanders is an historical work dealing with early Icelandic history. The author was an Icelandic priest, Ari Þorgilsson, working in the early 12th century. The work originally existed in two different versions but only the younger one has come...
from the early 12th century.
Controversy
The historicity of the matter in Ynglingatal has been a contention among scholars since the 19th century. However, in the early 90s even the dating of the poem was disputed.The late origin hypothesis
The authenticity of this poem has been questioned by Krag (1991), who believed it to be a 12th century propaganda work fabricated to enhance the legitimacy of the Norwegian kings.Krag claimed that it was based on the teaching of the four elements by Empedocles
Empedocles
Empedocles was a Greek pre-Socratic philosopher and a citizen of Agrigentum, a Greek city in Sicily. Empedocles' philosophy is best known for being the originator of the cosmogenic theory of the four Classical elements...
, in that the first four kings' deaths (Fjölnir
Fjölnir
In Norse mythology, Fjölnir, Fjölner, Fjolner or Fjolne was a Swedish king of the House of Yngling, at Gamla Uppsala. Fjölnir appears in a semi-mythological context as the son of Freyr and his consort Gerðr...
, Sveigðir
Sveigder
Sveigðir, Sveigder or Swegde was a Swedish king of the House of Yngling in Norse mythology. He was the son of Fjölner, whom he succeeded as king, and he married Vana of Vanaheimr, probably one of the Vanir. Lured by a dwarf, Sveigðir disappeared into a stone and never came back...
, Vanlandi and Vísburr
Visbur
Visbur or Wisbur in Scandinavian mythology was a king of the House of Ynglings and the son of Vanlandi. He was burned to death inside his hall by the arson of two of his own sons in revenge for rejecting their mother and denying them their heritage...
) are associated to such elements. According to Krag this suggests that Ynglingatal is not from the 9th century, but a much later work. He also pointed out that there is an euhemeristic approach in the early parts.
Krag's thesis had a certain success among Scandinavian scholars, during the 1990s, and it became the point of view presented in Nationalencyklopedin
Nationalencyklopedin
Nationalencyklopedin is the most comprehensive contemporary Swedish language encyclopedia, initiated by a favourable loan from the Government of Sweden of 17 million Swedish kronor in 1980, which was repaid by December 1990...
when the articles were written in the early 90s. However, since then, many critics and other studies have shown serious problems and deficiencies with Krag's thesis.
Evidence against the late hypothesis
Many have asked, if the work actually is a propaganda work from the 12th century, why does it not end with a famous king such as Harald Fairhair? Instead it ends with the less known king Ragnvald the Mountain-HighRagnvald the Mountain-High
Ragnvald "the Mountain-High" Olafsson was a petty king of Vestfold in what is today Norway. He was the son of Olaf Geirstad-Alf, a cousin of Harald Fairhair and the father of Åsa Ragnvaldsdatter , who married Eystein Ivarsson.His greatest contribution to posterity was that he asked the skald...
. Krag's defense that it was an old text about Ragnvald that had been inserted is considered farfetched and it actually contradicts his thesis.
Hägerdal (1994) doubts that Christian ideas were unknown in Scandinavia before the 11th century and he (1994:4) has pointed out that Borre
Borre mound cemetery
Borre mound cemetery forms part of the in Horten, Vestfold, Norway....
and Skiringssal
Skiringssal
Skiringssal is the name of an area situated in the Norwegian municipalities of Larvik and Sandefjord, in the southern region of the county of Vestfold...
, in the part about the kings of Vestfold
Vestfold
is a county in Norway, bordering Buskerud and Telemark. The county administration is in Tønsberg.Vestfold is located west of the Oslofjord, as the name indicates. It includes many smaller, but well-known towns in Norway, such as Larvik, Sandefjord, Tønsberg and Horten. The river Numedalslågen runs...
, were archaeologically important locations during the Viking Age
Viking Age
Viking Age is the term for the period in European history, especially Northern European and Scandinavian history, spanning the late 8th to 11th centuries. Scandinavian Vikings explored Europe by its oceans and rivers through trade and warfare. The Vikings also reached Iceland, Greenland,...
but not later.
When the royal mounds at Gamla Uppsala
Gamla Uppsala
Gamla Uppsala is a parish and a village outside Uppsala in Sweden. It had 16,231 inhabitants in 1991.As early as the 3rd century AD and the 4th century AD and onwards, it was an important religious, economic and political centre...
and Ohthere
Ohthere
Ohthere, Ohtere , Óttarr, Óttarr vendilkráka or Ottar Vendelkråka was a semi-legendary king of Sweden who would have lived during the 6th century and belonged to the house of Scylfings...
's mound were excavated, they confirmed the dating given by Ynglingatal.
Sapp (2002:2, 85-98) has studied the language of Ynglingatal and other skald
Skald
The skald was a member of a group of poets, whose courtly poetry is associated with the courts of Scandinavian and Icelandic leaders during the Viking Age, who composed and performed renditions of aspects of what we now characterise as Old Norse poetry .The most prevalent metre of skaldic poetry is...
ic poems in kviðuháttr. He found that the expletive particle of had stopped being productive in the 11th century. Sapp's conclusion is that the poem fits the language of the 9th century best, and to a lesser degree that of the 10th century. Sapp excludes the possibility that the language is an imitation of old language, because the linguistic markers are unambiguous. Moreover, other linguistic traits show the same results: the 9th century.
Sundquist (2004) who has done the most thorough and extensive study of Ynglingatal, claims that Krag's arguments are rigid and erroneous. Instead Sundquist points out that there are obvious Swedish traditions in Ynglingatal. This concerns both kennings, place names and proper names. Some traditions go back to the Vendel Age and may be even older, such as the king's role as the keeper of sanctuaries, an aristocratic mounted culture, the divine origins of the kings, presaging, and many other peculiarities. Moreover, some of Krag's objections are not based on Ynglingatal but on the version given by Snorri in the Ynglinga saga, and consequently Krag criticizes the wrong version. Sundquist's conclusion is that Þjóðólfr of Hvinir based his work on an active Swedish tradition in the 9th century.
External links
- Ynglingatal in Old Norse from «Kulturformidlingen norrøne tekster og kvad» Norway.
- Two editions of the Old Norse text
- Ynglingatal in the manuscript spelling with textual notes, and in normalised Old Norse spelling with prose translation into modern Danish.
- Svenska Dagbladet
- Online publication by Hägerdal