Amleth: The Norse Source of Hamlet
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 8 ก.พ. 2025
- The story of Amleth (Amlóði) in Saxo Grammaticus's 'History of the Danes' is the frame on which Shakespeare built the tragedy of Hamlet.
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I understand you are not interested in Viking pop culture, but please review the Northman, Dr. Crawford. I think this is a Viking movie you would enjoy.
The Northman was pretty much a retelling of Hamlet.
I for one, really want to see his analysis of the realism (how loyal it is to norse mythology through the mystical sequences, and how historically accurate the movie’s details are everywhere else).
I don’t know. I do think there might be a vein to mine for the channel in Amelth and his father seeming to hold to Odin while his uncle seemed to worship Freyr to the exclusion of the other gods. I suppose that isn’t so strange for a farmer, but put upon by what is initial thought to be evil spirits I’m not sure Freyr is who I’d seek relief from if I were a follower of the Norse gods.
@@VoodooViking Without Rosencrantz and Gildenstern, Ophelia, and Yoricke?
@@donkeysaurusrex7881 yeah, however the story is there. Avenge his fathers’ death, by his uncle who married his mother. And eventually they kill each other in the end. Even the head of Willem Defoe was a form of the Yorick skull scene.
I don't think Shakespeare generally invented plots. I think most of his core plots can be traced to folk tales or other sources - it isn't the stories he told so much as the way he told them that make his work so special. That said, watching a good performance of a Shakespeare play knocks the socks off reading it alone from the page.
Well, this is it. Been at it for a year or two, but now I've seen every video on this channel. I made a point of giving each one a thumbs up, as I can't afford to donate on Patreon, but I probably missed a few. Will keep watching as new videos come out, of course, but I wanted to take this opportunity to thank Dr. Crawford for providing us all with this free, good information in his unique style and to just wish him all the very best from the bottom of my heart.
I thought I was done with this same project, except ... Finishing the most recent episode, 306, of Crawford Jackson, I found it was Jackson Crawford who had 603 episodes. 🙃
" You have not experienced Shakespeare untill you have read it in the original Klingon" - Chancellor Gorkon
A delightful presentation, Dr Crawford. I just now noted your ring with the serpent, which is cool.
This spring Hubble took a picture of some objects, but within that picture is the furthest away single star ever found. They have named it Earendel.
It's interesting to note that Shakespeare's son, Hamnet, died at age 11 a few years before Shakespeare started writing _Hamlet_ ; many have speculated a connection between how similar the names "Hamlet" and "Hamnet" are and Shakespeare's choice to turn this particular story into a play.
On a side note: when _I_ was required to read Hamlet back in High School, I was also made to read a bunch of arguments on whether Shakespeare actually existed or not, despite me also not particularly caring one way or the other. What I got was that there was actually a decent amount of evidence (for someone who died 400+ years ago) that Shakespeare a real person that wrote most of the stuff attributed towards him, and most of the arguments that "Shakespeare wasn't real" were poorly written, contained some pretty big chronological flaws ("All of Shakespeare's works were _actually_ written by this guy who wasn't even born yet!!1!") and were all a little Batshit.
(Except for Mark Twain's argument, that was beautifully written and _totally_ Batshit.)
It's worth noting that questions about whether Shakespeare was real or not did not start until 2 centuries after his death. If there was really a doubt as to his authorship or even existence, why did it only start in the 1800s?
What you learn in school is what “they” want you to know. Not the same as truth. Question everything you have been taught.
Fun fact: in the hyponasal Warwickshire dialect, "Hamnet" was pronounced "Hamblet". Hamnet Shakespeare was named for Shakespeare's friend Hamnet Sadler. In Shakespeare's will, he is referred to as "Hamlett Sadler".
Fun fact 2: in 1579, when Shakespeare was 15, a Stratford woman drowned in the River Avon. The coroner held an inquest to see if she killed herself, but it was determined to be an accident so she could be buried in hallowed ground. If this sounds just like Ophelia's death, you might be interested to know that the drowned Stratford woman was named Katherine Hamlett.
Except for Mark Twain, Shakespeare trutherism was, and largely is, rooted in a 19th century quasi-religious authoritarian movement that believed that proving Shakespeare was a fraud would somehow "disprove" democracy.
Petition to call all Norse Sources "Nources" from now on.
DJ Crawf flexing like "Oh yeah, there weren't any translations around so I just read the source material in the original Latin, no big deal."
I happened to have been reading that Saxo Grammaticus for the last month or so, glad to see its a good translation. Thanks for the deeper look into the character!
Follow-up edit: I found your Aurvandil video!! Woo, love when something I want exists 🙌 Keep up the amazing work, very much appreciated!
Second edit: it had been a while since watching this and I had forgotten that you indeed touch on Horvendil within this video, lol. Cheers!
I would super love a breakdown of the roots of Horwendil and Gervendil with your knowledge of the languages, if you ever felt like doing it.
Enemies of the Danes would say 5:52 is a perfect representation of Danish pronounciation
But then again we don´t have any enemies now...do we :)
Haha
@@Akkolon Nej, jag tror vi är vänner nu. :) Heja Danmark!
I have been waiting for this video for years! Thank you!!
I spent yesterday amd today in Helsingør and spent several hours in Kronborg Castle today. Fun coincidence.
Your mention of Saxo Grammaticus intrigued me as an interesting source of Old Norse legends and myths. I can read Latin, but you are implying that his style was more complex and obscure than that of Cicero-not a good sign. I really liked your comments about the names, and the connections between the characters of Saxo's version, and what Shakespeare began with. He interpreted the old tale in a very profound way.
Great info!
I had no idea that so many elements of the Hamlet story dated back so far.
Just saw the movie. I most enjoy how relentlessly unrelatable the movie is. It makes zero, absolutely zero effort to ease modern audiences into the ethos and culture of pagan Norsemen, Amleth gets decidedly less and less sympathetic as a character from our modern standpoint as he relentlessly follows the logical conclusion of the honor-based vengeance he must take. Very atmospheric experience and I liked the extensive Old Norse poetry that was chanted in the film. I caught the famous deyr fé, deyja frændur stanza from Hávamál at the boat funeral scene which is directly lifted from Ibn Fadlans' account.
In modern(ish) we would call someone “óttarlegur amlóði” someone that always bungles everything he tries to do in life.
Interestingly, it sounds like Amleth has more in common with Shakespeare's Hamlet than either of those stories have to do with The Northman. it appears it took less inspiration from them than previously thought
The movie is indeed very much a medley of Norse sagas and preserved firsthand accounts of Vikings; the burial rite witnessed by ibn Fandlan even makes its way in :)
Never mind whether or not Shakespeare really existed. Did Jackson Crawford's ska band "Saxogrammaticus" ever really exist? If not, why not?
Epic Saxo Guy
There's a story from Scottish folklore called the Giant with the Three Golden Hairs that features the motif of a note being altered
You know someone is a hardcore/next-level lingo/myth/story nerd when they say "Tolkein *of course* uses the name Earandil associated with the evening star in his Silmarillion..." as if we've all read that insane tome 😂😅
Love it! Thanks for all the amazing info.
Also (paraphrasing) 'Where is Polonius?' 'At dinner, not where he eats, but where he is eaten'
At least in undergrad level theater history Hamlet is thought to derive its structure mainly from the Greek myth/play of Orestes, but in a Danish setting there would have to be some Norse legend influence as well of course
Is it possible for the “Aml” in Amlothi/Amlethus to be cognate with Gothic “Amal”found in names like Amali and Amalasuntha?
In any case, Dr Crawford, thank you for all you do/say on your channel, from discussing obscure details of Norse myths to griping about career prospects in US academia. I am learning a lot from your videos, and I enjoy watching them almost as much as I enjoyed reading Egils saga for the first time in my early teens (in a Polish translation in my native Poland).
I also share this theory too. I think "Amal" is suppose to mean something like "work" based on what I read in Wikipedia, but I'm not really sure if it's true. Still, it's interesting to think about it.
"Shakespeare's Hamlet is worth reading" - wow, controversial hot take ;)
The word "amlóði" in Icelandic is still used to refer to clumsy people or just losers
I recently watched a video on the battles between the regional king of what is not England and the Danes under Cnut. I feel that some of the real history lies under Saxo's story, that is the business about sending the young prince (which ever name he might have) to England to be murdered. Saxo lived about a millennia after Cnut's victory.
'In Sexy's version of the story....'
I would like to see you do a video on the story of The Northman movie. Supposedly, it is based on Amleth. I'd be curious how accurate the story is in addition to how accurate the culture was represented in the movie. Thank you!
While the setup seems borrowed from Amleth I thought the main story was taken from Hrafninn flýgur.
Dude Hamlet is boss! My whole class in high school was super into reading it, then later watching the Kenneth Branagh movie.
3:45 I would say, some of the changes found in Shakespear are already found in Holinshed's chronicle, so it is safer to assume Holinshed read Saxo, and Shakespear read Holinshed. Macbeth is also based on Holinshed.
Came here for the Shakespeare info, got Tolkien info on top. 11/10
I didn't finish the video yet, I've got a bit of a backlog.
I simply must say I was just explaining this to me daughter a over the weekend. I have a scholarly background in both English literature and early medieval studies, particularly Norse and Anglo-saxon, so this is kinda exactly my territory. A couple minutes in, and all I can do is agree. I tend to doubt that this will change.
I must add... My advice on reading Saxo is... Take Latin courses until you reach graduate level. Then buy all the notebooks in a store to write it down. Then cry in frustration and go translate some nice Catullus poetry instead.
I don't generally like reading other peoples' translations, if I can figure it out myself. There are obvious exceptions, I memorized your translation of the Hávamál in English, And then was inspired to memorize the ON too. Yes, the whole thing. And Tolkien has some very good translation work, "sir Gawain and the green Knight" is very well done, methinks.
An analysis of Seamus Heaney's translation of Beowulf would be nice, I'd be interested to know your thoughts.
This is a little wild of a recommendation because I just watched the Northmen and thought “dang, this kinda reminds me of hamlet”, having studied it a bit in college
Thoughts on The Northman 2022 movie?
0:01 The Intro
2:02 The Source
3:58 The Name
7:49 The Father
8:42 The Tale
Will you be watching the Northman?
I'm waiting for Dr Crawford to drop his ska album
Can you tell us what the Viking and Norse characters in AoE2 and AoM say (in English), respectively?
there is a fabulous film called Royal Deceit, Helen Mirren and Christian Bale as Amled. The film tells this story historically
I wonder if JC will watch the film. I reckon not. I did notice some Ibn Fadlan stuff in there
Earendel has also just been used as the name for the furthest away star that we've seen. For details see th-cam.com/video/VChgsXbIgdw/w-d-xo.html.
There is a place named Arundel. Don't know where it is, but I have seen it written in books as a location of birth... I just hope it is not a star (😁).
@@YearZeroHero may be, there is an Arundel in the U.K. as well, and they all likely share a namesake.
I was wondering when you were going to do a vid on this.
In Danish the sking of a snake is a "ham". If you now tell me that the latter half of the name "lelth" mean "crazy or mad"...them maybe it means "they who wrap themselves in the skin of madness"
I must point out a thing my father always told me.... Hahaha, sorry, when I typed that I couldn't resist thinking I sounded a bit like the Egill poem popularly named, "my mother told me". But, I digress, my dad used to say it does not make one but of difference what you study. It does matter the degree that you study. He taught that to understand everything in a greater degree we needed to understand something to a greater degree. I am also reminded by these pontifications that it has been commonly said that a person must master a thing before they teach it, or like an old lady told my son when he tried to teach something when he was like 20 years younger than his audience, she said, " I bet you learned far more than you could ever teach us." I suspect the same is true for the many things Jackson Crawford teaches us.
Btw does anyone know of an english translation of Gesta Danorum / History of the danes beyond book 9?
Ah yes the Gaelic name MacAuley in Gaelic is Mac -Amhlaith
Makes sense In Scottish Gaelic the name is prominent in the Hebrides and indeed cites roots in the Old Norse Olafr. Both the Irish and the Scots distribution of the name are congruent with known areas of occupation / settlement resulting in an amalgamation of cultural and genetics resulting in what are known today as Norse-Gaels
Will you watch the Northman
Why didn’t you include the link to your ska band in the notes??? I’m trying to hear it
I think a video about how to insult in Old Norse would be both enlightening and wildly popular... Just saying...
Watching this before the norseman for a little mythological background
Very interesting 🤔
Was assigned to read Hamlet in h.s., then again in college. Easiest and most entertaining read was with the Hamlet No Fear Shakespeare Graphic Novel.
I can’t stop thinking how much you sound and look like Tuomas Holopainen lol (the composer and keyboardist from Nightwish)
Aerendel...like in the movie Frozen ..or any fantasy book 😃😁 do you want to make a snowmaaan??
Maybe the best "Spoiler Alert" of all time!
What about this transition: "arn-" to "am-" ? *Arnlóði to Amlóði.
Yay study time
amleth - take the h and put it at the front you get hamlet
I wonder what the murder rate was among the Norse.
Time to sue Shakespeare for plagiarism! How evil! Retelling a story without paying. Monster!
Interesting that Shakespeare named his son Hamnet.
Not your favourite Shakespeare, but perhaps the most Nordic?
I enjoyed my introduction to Shakespeare in high school, but that might have been due to the teacher taking a couple of days to teach the grammar of Early Modern English, and making it fun. Dear Mrs. Chidester was a prim and proper daughter of early 20th century missionaries, but she understood how to speak to teens.
You should put the times you showed at the beginning in the description so that people can automatically scroll through it
I couldn't get through Bede's Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for similar reasons. It wasn't poetic and verbose, in fact it was prosaic, but just grinding. Everything that happened was immediately explained as the work of the Almighty and constant interruption of the narrative to give ample due to God as the cause of.....everything.
To be fair to Bede, he was a monk, and he didn’t write the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. He wrote the Ecclesiastical History of the English which, as the name implies, is a history of the English Church.
@@cerdic6305 Aren't I embarrassed. It's been so long ago that I confused the two. Now I'm not sure which one I was reading that gave me this impression. Thanks for the correction.
@@juliancate7089 to be fair they are both a bit like that, so either way your point stands.
@@cerdic6305 Whew!
Chopped him up and fed him to the pigs?!?!? How very Deadwood!!!! Wait, so that makes Sweringen … hmmm
What's with all the looking up and sighing and rolling your eyes? It's almost like someone is holding you hostage there against your will. Have you been kidnapped?
My reaction exactly!! Such a fascinating topic, yet the delivery is like someone forced to do a report on it for school. And referring to Hamlet as something "you maybe were forced to read in HS and hated ever since," lol--does not really sound like he's a fan.
This is so not true. Shakespeare obviously stole Hamlet from the Klingons!! Duh.
The negau hamlet
Viking lion king
I've been thinking that maybe our categorization of low german languages are wrong. I see so many indications that the angles and saxons were closer to the norse than to old high german.
I would rewrite the tree as:
West Germanic - dutch
High/South Germanic - high german
North Germanic - norse, saxon*, anglian
East Germanic
Maybe saxon should be in the western branch.
Under the language tree currently accepted, they claim that the angles would have split off from the cultures of upper germany at a later stage than they split off from the danes. I find that claim to be really hard to believe considering their location and known history. There doesn't seem to be any evidence of any major isolation between northern and southern germanic tribes ever taking place. It seems to have been moreso a gradual thing. The view of the roman scholars seemed to be that germans saw themselves as part of a tribe rather than a nation. So germans were decentralized and there were no real sense of hard borders that we have today.
I think they were looking at it from a modern lens, connecting lower germany to upper germany. It makes more sense to tie the angles to Denmark and the norse if you look at their history before and during the early parts of the Frankish empire. It wasn't until the emergence of the Holy Roman Empire, the final stage of the Frankish Empire, that you started to connect lower Germany with upper Germany politically. Before that, atleast the Saxons and Angles had more dealings with Denmark and Frisia. Many parts in northern Germany were even slavic back then, and yet were still absorbed into the HRE.
Apart from the many similarities of Old Norse and Old English, we know that the homeland of the angles, Schleswig, were incorporated into Denmark shortly after its founding, and it remained so for much of the viking and medieval era. We know that the later Danelaw conquests mainly focused on the british territories of the Angles, which makes it look like the reason why Denmark's involvement escalated, was because they were intervening in Anglian political struggles, which they had authority to do because of their existing relations.