I T is now time to describe what remains of the former EDDA, compiled by SOEMUND, furnamed the LEARNED, more than an hundred years before that of Snorro. It was a collection of very ancient poems, which had for their subject some article of the Religion and Morality of Odin, The share that Sæmund had in them, was/probably no more than that of first collecting: and committing them to writing. This collection is at present confidered as loft, excepting only three pieces, which I shall describe below: But some people have, not without good reason, imagined that this ancient EDDA, or at least the greatest part of it, is still preserved. It were to be wished, ε wished, that the possessors of such a treafure could be induced to esteem the communication of it to the world, the greatest advantage they can reap from it; and they are now urged, in the name of the public, to this generous action. Be that as it may, the admirers of the antiquities of the north have, in the fragments of this work, which may be seen and consulted, sufficient to reward their researches. The remainder is probably less interesting; and this may perhaps have been the cause of its being configned to oblivion. THE first of these pieces is that which I have so often quoted under the title of VoLUSPA; a word which fignifies the Oracle, or the Prophesy of Vola. It is well known, that there were among the Celtic nations, women who foretold future events, uttered oracles, and maintained a strict commerce with the Divinity. Tacitus makes frequent mention of one of them, named Velleda, who was in high repute among the Bructeri, a people of Germany, and who was afterwards carried to Rome. There was one in Italy, whose name had a still nearer affinity to this of Vola, viz. that Sibyl, whom Horace (Epod. V.) calls Ariminenfis Folia. VOLA OF FOLIA might perhaps be a general name for all the women of this kind. As these names are evidently connected with the N 3 the idea of FOLLY or Madness, they would at least be due to those enthusiastick ravings and mad contortions with which such women delivered their pretended oracles. The word For bore the same meaning in the ancient Gothic, as it does in French, English, and in almost all the languages of the north; in all which it signifies either a Fool or a Madman *. This Poem attributed to the Sibyl of the north, contains within the compass of two or three hundred lines, that whole system of Mythology, which we have seen difclosed in the EDDA; but this laconic brevity, and the obsoleteness of the language in which it is written, make it very difficult to be understood. This, however, does not prevent us from observing frequent instances of grandeur and sublimity, and many images extremely fine: then the general tenor of the work, the want of connection, and the confusion of the style, excite the idea of a very remote antiquity, no less than the matter and subject itself. Such were, 3 * FOOL, (antiq. Fol) Stultus, delirus, fatuus, rationis expers. Gallicè Fol. Islandice Fol, ferox, iracundus, fatuus infipiens. Folska, Stultitia, Ang. Folly: Gall. Folie. Hinc forfan Ital. Fola, Ineptia, doubt doubtless, the real Sibylline verses so long preserved at Rome, and so ill counterfeited afterwards. The Poem of the VOLUSPA is perhaps the only monument now remaining, capable of giving us a true idea of thoma Iri asob si culto e mjalt to I need not here quote any passages from this Poem: the text of the EDDA, is (as we have seen) quite full of them; and I have given pretty long extracts from it in my Remarks. It is sufficient briefly to obferve, that the Prophetess having imposed filence on all intellectual beings, declares, that she is going to reveal the deerees of the Father of Nature, the actions and opera tions of the Gods, which no person ever knew before herself. She then begins with andescription of the chaos; and proceeds to the formation of the world, and of that of its various species of inhabitants, Giants, Men and Dwarfs. She then explains the employments of the Fairies or Destiniess the functions of the Gods, their most re markable adventures, their quarrels with Loke, and the vengeance that ensued. At last, she concludes with a long description of the final state of the universe, its diffolution and conflagration: the battle of the inferior Deities and the Evil Beings: the renovation of the world: the happy lot of the good, and the punishment of the wicked. -iduob THAT |