Another point that's crucial: the compound blásvartr, which occurs in eddic poems (Helgakviða Hundingsbana I) and skaldic poems in describing ravens and ships, implies that's there's enough difference between "blár" and "svartr" for a compound of the two terms to be meaningful. There's no point to a compound that means "black-black."
I read that they defined their words blue and black due to the fact that when dyeing fabrics, blue ink looks black. Even the ink in our blue pens has this appearance today. So Harold Bluetooth probably had black looking teeth. Still two different colours, but it does explain the conflation.
And not to mention that Blue Garments have been quite popular in Scandinavia for about 2000 years... I mean, Blue was a rare color and expensive color elsewhere but in the North it wasn't so, as Blue linen and wool clothes have been made here for millenia...
In modern (dialectal) Swedish the term "blåsvart" (blue-black) is used for haircolor etc that, like a ravens feather, has a tone of blue in them. We also use "rö'svart" (red-black) or "brunsvart" (brown-black) being kind of the same color of black with a slight reddish/brownish tone to it when the sun shines on it. We have both color types in my family. To be "svartögd" (black-eyed) in a modern context is more then just ordinary brown or hazzel but yes it is most of the time a matter of dark brown, not rarely with very dark dots in the iris and/or a dark ring outside iris making the eye look darker. But the term also have a more agressive undertone. To be "black-eyed" is often the description when one "nail you" with their eyes in a very agressive way, with"murder in their eyes". A "black-eyed" person is not to be triffel with. Perphaps it comes from that people tend to get larger pupils when they get adrenaline, and usually tilt their head forward if they are in fight-mode letting the brows shading the eyes. If you ot top of that have dark brown eyes withdark spots and a dark circle outside the the eyes would look black indeed. Not saying this is the same in old Norse, just giving further context.
Viking fashion be like..... "Wow, that's fancy. You're really dressed to kill." "Yes, I got in to a fight with Magnus earlier and I'm going to go settle it for good." "Okay. We'll try not to get too much blood on your nice blue shirt, or you won't have anything to wear to Yule."
I mean not really. It's just that you live along the coast, you see the green of the trees, you see the red of blood, and you see the blue of the sea. They had a lot of names for colors, it's just that they only had 3 primary colors, and of course black and white. Svartr, Hvítr, Rauðr, Grønn, Blár. Later on Bleikur for Non-ideal reds, you'd see this if you watched the video, and the old word for blonde was Gulr, which in modern day means yellow.
As soon as I saw in the description, "they called Ravens blue (they are)," I got it. As a kid in the 70s I read the superhero comic books where the blackhaired guys always had a blue strip across the crown of the head. It looked bizarre to me, having never seen anything like that irl. And then in junior high school, I was seated behind a blackhaired kid in music class. His hair was so black that it was blue. It was especially striking in the light streaming through the high windows behind us at that time of day.
Your explanation of the colours is the same our Swedish teacher learned our class in 1973 when we were in ninth class of the basic school and were reading translated old Norse sagas.
Slightly flabbergasted to realize the phrase "dressed to kill" MEANS LITERALLY THAT. Interesting as always. Any chance we could get to read the dissertation?
I've noticed that people first starting out learning about different languages want 'word for word' translations as they perceive that these will be more accurate. However, these kinds of translations inherently forego cultural details that you would know if you understood the language and culture. Ultimately, the job of a translator is to accurately convert meaning from one language to another and not to simply do a 'word for word' conversion.
You’re right, what’s often lost in translation (literally) is the connotation of words. I remember being so off-put back in high school when my German textbook always translated “Tag” as Hello, rather than Hey or Hi which would be far better fits. Part of what makes translation an art is that you need to not only translate words and sentences literally, but recreate the feel and movement of the text as best as possible. I think that’s why your Cowboy Havamal works well.
One time when I was in high school I died my hair black for some reason. Everything was fine at home when I did it under 2700K and 4700K light. But as soon as i got to school in those 6700K lights and when the sun came up my hair was unquestionably blue.
the fact the cognate word in (to my knowledge) every other Germanic language (with the exception of Gothic?) also means blue (and not black) seems to strongly suggest that the word had that sense in the proto-Germanic era (at least after the departure of Gothic) and so it would be quite surprising if Old Norse lost this sense, merging it into another colour, only to later regain the original sense as you say, the entire thing seems kinda absurd
I love how you can make such an interesting video about such a simple thing as colors. But it’s good to realize one can’t just translate things 1 on 1 from language to language, especially older ones. Btw the ON color screen only stays up for a very short time 4:06
The discussion of whether or not the Norse had a word for blue reminds me of discussions about whether ancient Greeks could see blue as poetically the Mediterranean was referred to as "wine dark". I find the whole discussion of cultural color perception fascinating as I am red-green color blind, so in my world people are a shade of green, and the grass is orange.
I really appreciate your channel Dr Crawford, I'm Norwegian and Scottish, American born, it's great to learn and hear about my Scandinavian ancestors language, well half of me, you know what I mean, grateful to be following you 🙏
The job market in academia is scary in general, but especially after this pandemic I think things are going to take a turn for the worse. As a classicist, this means I need to keep a serious eye out for alternative job opportunities. Good for you, I think TH-cam is a wonderful platform and accessible for almost anyone. Perhaps I should start a channel.
It's harder than it's ever been to build an audience as a small vlogger on a niche subject on TH-cam. So don't build your hopes up. But you might get lucky! Just don't expect it.
@@cygil1 Of course nothing is guaranteed, but it shouldn't prevent anyone from trying. If anything, it would be a great learning experience for me to synthesize my own knowledge for a broad audience, a valuable skill for life in general and in academia. Thanks for looking out!
Most people on youtube: It is difficult to keep up my channel and post anything in these times of social distancing and/or lockdown. Dr. Crawford (who had delivered quality content from in front of an attractively well-stocked bookshelf before he upgraded to the "spectacular Western background" package): Hold my mead... (Also: When your world has shrunk to a tiny apartment, getting introduced to yet another breathtaking slice of scenery you wouldn't stand a chance to visit anyway is truly a marvelous thing.
I first encountered this concept when I learned about Harald Bluetooth (and the fact that bluetooth technology is named for him with a symbol based on the H and B runes) and that, because "Norse had the same word for blue and black" it could also mean "blacktooth" indicating that his tooth was black and rotten. But I can also imagine a dead tooth looking more blue (since the bit that's gone bad would have white enamel on top of it, thus fading the color to a bluish hue).
As he has pointed out in other videos, trolls/undead are also described as blár - for example, "Blár sem Hel" or "blue as Hel," - so you might be on to something.
I'm from Dalarna in Sweden, my dad speaks one of the very old-fashioned dialects we have here. He would never use the "modern" words 'rosa' (pink), 'orange', 'lila' (purple), he would use red for pink and orange, and blue for purple. The newer words have only been in the Swedish language since like the mid 1800's, so they haven't yet entered the old peoples' dialect here...
Thanks Dr. Crawford, awesome analysis as always. It's interesting to observe how the norse cognitive filter of the reality is expressed by linguistic terms. Well, nowadays many studies are quite into the behavioral aspects of social sciences, especially politics or economics, and is nice to see how linguistics is extraordinary relevant too from this viewpoint, in the historical perspective.
"orange and yellow are shades of red" omg that makes so much sense now! So many of our (norwegian) old songs describe gold as red. "raudaste gull". Well dang
Go big Red! I took Scandinavian Grammar in 1984 from the Scandinavian Languages Dept...only Scandinavian Grammar...I needed 2 credits to fill out my schedule and there were no prerequisites...not even a Scandinavian language...LOL...even got an A.
It's interesting that in old Russian folklore Freya's cats were described as blue, when the same word was used for blue so dark we would call it black by the old Norse. There's also early european Christian laws against owning black cats not reflected in their religious texts, meaning it was likely a response to another religion or cultures practice. There's not Russian folklore about the Norse gods preserved in text from long enough ago to be certain of a connection though.
Ravens have a Blue , and a purple sheen to them. Crows, a purple, and sometimes green, depending on the lighting. It is also worth noting , Blue jays are also Corvids.They are closely related to both Ravens, and Crows as well. The same idiocy also prevails towards Old Irish. Where grey wolf hounds are described both as grey, and green. The Celts were also not color blind, nor lacking in the perception between grey and green.
I wonder how differently colour was described outside of poetry, particularly in everyday situations. Some of the old Swedish dialects here in Finland use colour-terms in ways similar to Old Norse, such as "svart" for people with dark hair even if they are otherwise pale.
Thank you, professor. If you would be so kind, have you done any videos or would you do any videos on how the Vikings made new words? - A very eager Faroese who wants to learn how to make new Faroese words (Icelandic/Faroese: nýyrði/nýggjyrði)
In Icelandic most new things get a new name and are most often not just a copy from english for example TV: Sjónvarp. Mobile: Farsími or Snjallsími for smartphones etc. Most of the time its rather logical like for TV the word Sjónvarp if broken down is Sjón meaning vision and Varp meaning to project. In Norwegian its most of the time just straight copy out of english sadly. I hope in Faroese its the same as Icelandic.
Oops, this reply became long: Nifilheimur, yes, luckily we in the Faroes are fairly decent at making new Faroese words from Faroese ground, and we do for example also say sjónvarp for television and útvarp for radio as do the Icelanders, as the words sjón, varp and út- also exist in Faroese and have the same meaning as in Icelandic, but we say telefon and not sími or farsími, though the word røðil also exists (from røða, to speak). However, Icelanders often are more diligent at making new words than us, and they are more diligent at sticking with them, and not for example, saying the Icelandic word in one sentence and then the outlandish word in the next, as there can be a tendency to do in the Faroes. However, sjónvarp is an example of putting words together. That kind of word-making is relatively easy, though it should not be underestimated. I should be more precise in my question. I am interested in that kind of words, but even more interested in umlaut and ablout words. There are many such words that are old in the language, for example "finna" (to find) > "fundur" (a meeting). A newer word, that unfortunately is not much used, is "tøli" (mechanics) which comes from tól (tool). These kind of words demand knowledge of the deeper mechanics of the language, and I wonder how aware the Vikings were of this, and what paradigms they used to make words. The Icelandic word for CD is geisladiskur, made up of geisla- (rays) and diskur (disc). The story in the Faroes goes that it was a Faroese linguist that made the word and that Icelanders adopted it from us. We have also adopted many of their words, as they are fully compatible with both languages. But the Faroese word for CD is fløga. To my knowledge, it is related to the words flag and fláir, which both have meanings of "layers". It is an example of an old word that used to mean a layer in hay, but that now also has the new meaning of CD. If one were to make the word "fløga" without it pre-existing, I suspect that one must know the mechanics of the language and sound change rules in order to discern whether it should have "a" or "ø", and "g" or not, what gender it should have, how it should be conjugated, etc, when you draw it from it's related words "flag" and "fláir". Perhaps you have to know some Germanic or Indo-European in order to do it well. Btw, sími originally meant "rope, thread". It was first called talsími (speech thread), I believe, and has since been shortened to sími for the most part.
This was very informative and fascinating in light of what little I know on South Asian literary culture, expecially in regards to Sanskrit. It also supports my notion of what the bifröst represents. Fun fact: the Sanskrit word "nīla" can mean "blue" or "black", which probably expresses a similar concept as deities of dark complexion are often depicted as blue.
Seems like you are getting a bit of exhaustion dealing with ignorant people. Anyway thanks for video man. I love Ravens and their feathers are beautiful. They have more colour under uv too
I have a strong suspicion that this notion is further perpetuated by people having heard a fact about the ancient Greeks lacking a word to describe blue, remembering only half of this fact and then misapplying it to the old Norse, and/or sloppily applying it to all cultures from "the old times", because they're simpletons.
Just want to say I love your videos. They are very informative and interesting, and I like hearing the pronunciations. I’ve watched a few of your videos as I’m learning Icelandic and they helped correct a few difficulties I was having. However, I struggle with the pronunciation of the word two, the ‘tv’ sound is not clear for me. Do you have videos with this in it? Thanks again, I hope you will keep making videos!
This video makes me think of a Swedish Christmas song lyric, where the night sky is referred to as "djupblå", i.e. "deep blue". The notion that "blár" in old Norse would simply mean black seems way more unlikely to me, than it being used in similar ways back then as well.
Adding a comment a bit late, I know. The nordic countries are at a latitude where in summer it never becomes really dark. Twilight is divided into three types: civilian, nautical, and astronomical (darkest), and in the summer months, there is no true night darkness, meaning the sky remains a dark blue even at midnight. (In Aarhus, where I am, it is at most nautical twilight from 31. May to 12. June, and at most astronomical twilight from 6. May to 6. August.) This of course becomes more pronounced when approaching the polar circle. I suppose it makes a lot of sense to call the sky blue at all hours all year long, even if the winter nights are black.
Do you think that with someone like Sigurd Snake-in-the-eye, they might have been talking about a unique or unusual eye colour (Like yellowish, or a very light green, like those of a snake) but not a a specific word for that colour? I'm wondering if sometimes poetic allusion could make up for a nonspecific categorization of a colour. It would be the opposite of generalizing the colour to one we do have (The sea is very rarely actually blue, but we often call it that anyways) and instead finding something so specific, you wanted to get that across, but weren't going to invent a new colour over it. I know he's supposed to have had an Ouroboros in his eye (there's a couple conditions that could cause this) but I was wondering if something like a strange colour might be handled that way.
When I heard you speak about the need to make money and the absence of Old Norse (Mythology) programs, it brought to mind the online courses in Regenerative Agriculture that Richard Perkins has designed in Sweden. He's a farmer, with very little time for anything during the growing season, but he is also an intermittent TH-cam creator, wrote a book, and designed this course of which I speak. You might take a peek at his channel to see how he is supplementing his income. There is a video called "An Online Training affordable for ALL" that announces the roll out. I may be whistling in the wind, but who knows?
FWIW,there are several accounts of Napoleonic cavalry and even some infantry officers who would carry their best uniforms only to wear for parade or battle. Given limited storage and the weight and bulk of the heavy cloth,perhaps that seems odd to modern eyes,but the French in particular kept this up. Courage and èlan and pride win battles.
As I understand it, color words have an effect on color perception, just not in the direct sense that you actually have better or worse color vision. It's more about what differences you pay attention to. E.g. anyone can tell that turquoise and aquamarine are different when you put them next to each other, but seen in isolation you probably won't know one from the other unless you're used to saying "that ones turquoise; that ones aquamarine"
I've heard the same rumor about ancient Greek - that it had no word for blue - because Homer supposedly never used the word and called the sea "wine dark." I'd be curious to know if the two rumors have anything to do with each other
Oh that's why your raiding party in Valhalla all wear blue. I thought they were just using the video game "blue ally, red enemy" code. It's cool to learn that it has a basis in history.
Interested in your thoughts on the name of Harald Bluetooth. His Wikipedia page even perpetrates the myth about blue meaning black, but personally I’m especially interested in what a literal blue tooth would mean
Hopefully, some day, you'll have a look at the LITI VITI thing. Also, there is something about how "vikings" were calling Africans "blue men" that would seem to underpin the notion that black = blue ... however some maintain that "blue men" were referring to North African Tuaregs and their habitual blue dresscode, so the jury is still out on that one.
"Hel er dóttir Loka og skessunar Angurboðu. Hún hefur ásjónu fallegrar ungrar stúlku á sér hálfri en hún er blá á hörund hinum megin" Description of Hel daughter of Loki and her face being of a beutiful young woman on one side and blue on the other side from Snorra Edda.
Dr Crawford, thank you. The difference between a private murder and a public killing is really interesting! Have you written about this somewhere or can you recommend any literature on the topic?
Some of the very dark-colored africans eg from Sudan or Niger, apperas to me as having a slight blue sheen. Blámenn properly refers to that, but I suspect that word is much later than the viking age.
From what I could find Blámenn (also Blámaðr) was actually used to refer to Moors and the translation for it is still blue men. The reason they might have referred to them as "blue men" could have been as simple as the color of clothes that they were wearing at the time. The root origins of the word black is completely separate from Old Norse as far as I can tell.
I never heard of this particular myth before. It could be that it doesn't survive very well in the Nordic countries, precisely because people would instantly see the link between blár/blå and svartr/svart. Black people were called "blue men", by the way. If anything, it would be easier to convince people that the Norse didn't have a word for black. But that's silly too, of course.
Even to do this day, some of those same color interpretations are used by other cultures. The Japanese for example, refer to brown eyes as “black eyes”, because from far away they’re too dark to tell most of the time. And if you tell a Japanese person “No, they’re ‘brown’, not black.” They’ll look at you like you’re a crazy person who doesn’t know what he’s/she’s talking about.
Can we be sure of that every word the Old Norse-speaking used was written down? Everyday launguage and poetry are maybe not the same. Same blue-word maybe existed. When I was child we used colour-words (Swedish) I never hear today . Two examples: "Skär" meaning "pink" and "brandgul" meaning "orange". Another example: A "black" horse in Swedish is not "svart"(black) but more brownish/grey with a black mane.
I think it owes something to the claim (pure crankery IMO) that people in the past were unable to see blue (ignoring the fascination of the earliest civilisations with lapis lazuli)
Also, bilberries are called blåbär. In Finnish, where it seems proto-finnic truly dodnt have a word for blue, they are called mustikka, meaning blackberry. Of course in reality they are more purple, especially the inside. - modern Finnish word for blue, sininen is a Russian loanword, from zini, dark blue. As far as understand the vikings called the Africans they saw 'blue men', partly perhapd because 'svart' was already in use for a dark haired person, also maybe to underline how unusual they looked to the Nordic people encountering them the first time?
Do you think top level categories were fewer because they had no economic need to express other colors other than perhaps 'lighter' or 'darker' It seems that descriptive terms have been driven by economic need throughout history?
Another point that's crucial: the compound blásvartr, which occurs in eddic poems (Helgakviða Hundingsbana I) and skaldic poems in describing ravens and ships, implies that's there's enough difference between "blár" and "svartr" for a compound of the two terms to be meaningful. There's no point to a compound that means "black-black."
Unless you're naming a caffeinated Japanese chewing gum.
Black Black: Hi-technical excellent taste and flavor!
I read that they defined their words blue and black due to the fact that when dyeing fabrics, blue ink looks black. Even the ink in our blue pens has this appearance today. So Harold Bluetooth probably had black looking teeth. Still two different colours, but it does explain the conflation.
And not to mention that Blue Garments have been quite popular in Scandinavia for about 2000 years... I mean, Blue was a rare color and expensive color elsewhere but in the North it wasn't so, as Blue linen and wool clothes have been made here for millenia...
Am I the only one who would listen to Dr. Crawford talk about his dissertation on color for an hour?
Anthony Ridgway He has such a good voice I could spend an hour listening to him reading the terms of use of any app and still call it ASMR hahahaha
Nope I've been waiting for him to bring it up on video again for ages.
I could listen for days.
@@abigailmacewan8017 I would listen to Crawford read the (Icelandic?) phone book.
I would, but I also find concepts of color to be interesting.
In modern (dialectal) Swedish the term "blåsvart" (blue-black) is used for haircolor etc that, like a ravens feather, has a tone of blue in them. We also use "rö'svart" (red-black) or "brunsvart" (brown-black) being kind of the same color of black with a slight reddish/brownish tone to it when the sun shines on it. We have both color types in my family.
To be "svartögd" (black-eyed) in a modern context is more then just ordinary brown or hazzel but yes it is most of the time a matter of dark brown, not rarely with very dark dots in the iris and/or a dark ring outside iris making the eye look darker.
But the term also have a more agressive undertone. To be "black-eyed" is often the description when one "nail you" with their eyes in a very agressive way, with"murder in their eyes". A "black-eyed" person is not to be triffel with. Perphaps it comes from that people tend to get larger pupils when they get adrenaline, and usually tilt their head forward if they are in fight-mode letting the brows shading the eyes. If you ot top of that have dark brown eyes withdark spots and a dark circle outside the the eyes would look black indeed.
Not saying this is the same in old Norse, just giving further context.
@@BurnBird1 I have
Viking fashion be like.....
"Wow, that's fancy. You're really dressed to kill."
"Yes, I got in to a fight with Magnus earlier and I'm going to go settle it for good."
"Okay. We'll try not to get too much blood on your nice blue shirt, or you won't have anything to wear to Yule."
Oh man so Old Norse was already ahead of the times using an RGB color scale haha
I wonder what they called brown (aka dark orange): a dark & pale red?
@@wim0104 in modern Norwegian we call it "brun". They probably used a similar word.
edit: they called brown "Brùnn"
j0n31 *brúnn
I mean not really. It's just that you live along the coast, you see the green of the trees, you see the red of blood, and you see the blue of the sea.
They had a lot of names for colors, it's just that they only had 3 primary colors, and of course black and white.
Svartr, Hvítr, Rauðr, Grønn, Blár. Later on Bleikur for Non-ideal reds, you'd see this if you watched the video, and the old word for blonde was Gulr, which in modern day means yellow.
"... which is blár in Icelandic, and blå in the continental languages."
Faroese: "Am I a joke to you?"
Anyway, it's bláur /ˈplɔɑːvʊɹ/ :)
Føroyskt gang REPRESENT
Weeping Scorpion you r right
Blue in Dutch is "blauw" which looks similar in writing. Could there be an etymological connection?
Pyrus Yes, both are descended from the same Germanic root word. (Vergelijk met Duits _blau_ , Engels _blue_ en Frans _bleu_ )
Lol, gotta love the Faroese invisible V.
As soon as I saw in the description, "they called Ravens blue (they are)," I got it. As a kid in the 70s I read the superhero comic books where the blackhaired guys always had a blue strip across the crown of the head. It looked bizarre to me, having never seen anything like that irl. And then in junior high school, I was seated behind a blackhaired kid in music class. His hair was so black that it was blue. It was especially striking in the light streaming through the high windows behind us at that time of day.
Milton, in Paradise Lost, says that the rainbow has three colors.
Old paintings, if you look closely, often have 3 colour rainbows too.
Your explanation of the colours is the same our Swedish teacher learned our class in 1973 when we were in ninth class of the basic school and were reading translated old Norse sagas.
Slightly flabbergasted to realize the phrase "dressed to kill" MEANS LITERALLY THAT.
Interesting as always. Any chance we could get to read the dissertation?
I've noticed that people first starting out learning about different languages want 'word for word' translations as they perceive that these will be more accurate. However, these kinds of translations inherently forego cultural details that you would know if you understood the language and culture. Ultimately, the job of a translator is to accurately convert meaning from one language to another and not to simply do a 'word for word' conversion.
You’re right, what’s often lost in translation (literally) is the connotation of words. I remember being so off-put back in high school when my German textbook always translated “Tag” as Hello, rather than Hey or Hi which would be far better fits. Part of what makes translation an art is that you need to not only translate words and sentences literally, but recreate the feel and movement of the text as best as possible. I think that’s why your Cowboy Havamal works well.
One time when I was in high school I died my hair black for some reason. Everything was fine at home when I did it under 2700K and 4700K light. But as soon as i got to school in those 6700K lights and when the sun came up my hair was unquestionably blue.
Meatwad Baggins: "for some reason" - just might have had something to do with "when I was in high school" 🤣🤣🤣
@@sericarose1828
True 😊👍
Good luck with your endeavors. We're wishing you, all the best
@Prof. Crawford: Methinks that that raven you heard calling in the background was seconding your argument!!
;)
Re. the closing PSA: Stay safe and healthy, and keep filming and posting videos when you can!
It was Odin
'tis some visitor, I muttered.
the fact the cognate word in (to my knowledge) every other Germanic language (with the exception of Gothic?) also means blue (and not black) seems to strongly suggest that the word had that sense in the proto-Germanic era (at least after the departure of Gothic) and so it would be quite surprising if Old Norse lost this sense, merging it into another colour, only to later regain the original sense
as you say, the entire thing seems kinda absurd
I downloaded the 240 page dissertation pdf. to read (for fun). Thank you! Sir, you rock! Hugs
I love how you can make such an interesting video about such a simple thing as colors. But it’s good to realize one can’t just translate things 1 on 1 from language to language, especially older ones.
Btw the ON color screen only stays up for a very short time 4:06
Please do not stop these videos i have finally started in old norse language because of you.
You're the best. Thank you for keeping this alive!
"TAKE A DAMN LOOK AT RAVENS!" - Dr. JC
I'm so thankful I found your channel. The fact Grimfrost is supporting you is awesome. They are fantastic as are you! Thanks for the great content.
Sou do Brasil e estou acompanhando seu canal! Obrigada
The discussion of whether or not the Norse had a word for blue reminds me of discussions about whether ancient Greeks could see blue as poetically the Mediterranean was referred to as "wine dark". I find the whole discussion of cultural color perception fascinating as I am red-green color blind, so in my world people are a shade of green, and the grass is orange.
Thank goodness somebody finally said it! Love your channel! "The Saga Thing" podcast put me on to you. 👍👍
I really appreciate your channel Dr Crawford, I'm Norwegian and Scottish, American born, it's great to learn and hear about my Scandinavian ancestors language, well half of me, you know what I mean, grateful to be following you 🙏
Hail and thanks for advising me on what should be our correct mode of dress.
He is the top source of old Norse information. I am Danish American and I am Learning so much about my culture. Love it...
The job market in academia is scary in general, but especially after this pandemic I think things are going to take a turn for the worse. As a classicist, this means I need to keep a serious eye out for alternative job opportunities. Good for you, I think TH-cam is a wonderful platform and accessible for almost anyone. Perhaps I should start a channel.
It's harder than it's ever been to build an audience as a small vlogger on a niche subject on TH-cam. So don't build your hopes up. But you might get lucky! Just don't expect it.
@@cygil1 Of course nothing is guaranteed, but it shouldn't prevent anyone from trying. If anything, it would be a great learning experience for me to synthesize my own knowledge for a broad audience, a valuable skill for life in general and in academia. Thanks for looking out!
Dr Jackson Crawford....thanks for offering your knowledge to the rest of us.
"Take a damn look at ravens." ::artist applause::
Thank you for this!
As eye-opening as ever. Thanks Professor!
Most people on youtube: It is difficult to keep up my channel and post anything in these times of social distancing and/or lockdown.
Dr. Crawford (who had delivered quality content from in front of an attractively well-stocked bookshelf before he upgraded to the "spectacular Western background" package): Hold my mead...
(Also: When your world has shrunk to a tiny apartment, getting introduced to yet another breathtaking slice of scenery you wouldn't stand a chance to visit anyway is truly a marvelous thing.
I deeply appreciate these videos made for clarification. We need these.
Jackson "take a damn look at ravens" Crawford
I first encountered this concept when I learned about Harald Bluetooth (and the fact that bluetooth technology is named for him with a symbol based on the H and B runes) and that, because "Norse had the same word for blue and black" it could also mean "blacktooth" indicating that his tooth was black and rotten. But I can also imagine a dead tooth looking more blue (since the bit that's gone bad would have white enamel on top of it, thus fading the color to a bluish hue).
As he has pointed out in other videos, trolls/undead are also described as blár - for example, "Blár sem Hel" or "blue as Hel," - so you might be on to something.
I'm from Dalarna in Sweden, my dad speaks one of the very old-fashioned dialects we have here. He would never use the "modern" words 'rosa' (pink), 'orange', 'lila' (purple), he would use red for pink and orange, and blue for purple. The newer words have only been in the Swedish language since like the mid 1800's, so they haven't yet entered the old peoples' dialect here...
Thanks Dr. Crawford, awesome analysis as always. It's interesting to observe how the norse cognitive filter of the reality is expressed by linguistic terms. Well, nowadays many studies are quite into the behavioral aspects of social sciences, especially politics or economics, and is nice to see how linguistics is extraordinary relevant too from this viewpoint, in the historical perspective.
Best of luck to you Dr. Crawford
"orange and yellow are shades of red" omg that makes so much sense now! So many of our (norwegian) old songs describe gold as red. "raudaste gull". Well dang
Go big Red! I took Scandinavian Grammar in 1984 from the Scandinavian Languages Dept...only Scandinavian Grammar...I needed 2 credits to fill out my schedule and there were no prerequisites...not even a Scandinavian language...LOL...even got an A.
All the best to you, and I wish you well in your new projects.
So people who have never seen an iridescent black bird are saying Nore has no word for blue.
It's interesting that in old Russian folklore Freya's cats were described as blue, when the same word was used for blue so dark we would call it black by the old Norse.
There's also early european Christian laws against owning black cats not reflected in their religious texts, meaning it was likely a response to another religion or cultures practice.
There's not Russian folklore about the Norse gods preserved in text from long enough ago to be certain of a connection though.
Blue is a type of colour that a cat can be. It's a sort of grey, I think.
@@Raua12 There's even a cat breed named Russian Blue.
Ravens have a Blue , and a purple sheen to them. Crows, a purple, and sometimes green, depending on the lighting. It is also worth noting , Blue jays are also Corvids.They are closely related to both Ravens, and Crows as well. The same idiocy also prevails towards Old Irish. Where grey wolf hounds are described both as grey, and green. The Celts were also not color blind, nor lacking in the perception between grey and green.
Edward Abbey is amazing! Desert Solitaire is one of my faves!
He mentioned Edward Abbey!
A cowboy linguist debunking myths about Viking poetry was not what I expected to see tonight, but I’m happy I did
Thank you. All the best to you
If you sing it in your head like some 80's kid's toy commercial jingle, 'Comment-Parlor Heros' is kinda funny.
I wonder how differently colour was described outside of poetry, particularly in everyday situations. Some of the old Swedish dialects here in Finland use colour-terms in ways similar to Old Norse, such as "svart" for people with dark hair even if they are otherwise pale.
Good luck Jackson.
Coincidentally, I also recently saw a video by someone else who said that Ancient Greek actually did have a color for blue.
Thank you, professor.
If you would be so kind, have you done any videos or would you do any videos on how the Vikings made new words?
- A very eager Faroese who wants to learn how to make new Faroese words (Icelandic/Faroese: nýyrði/nýggjyrði)
In Icelandic most new things get a new name and are most often not just a copy from english for example TV: Sjónvarp. Mobile: Farsími or Snjallsími for smartphones etc. Most of the time its rather logical like for TV the word Sjónvarp if broken down is Sjón meaning vision and Varp meaning to project.
In Norwegian its most of the time just straight copy out of english sadly. I hope in Faroese its the same as Icelandic.
Oops, this reply became long:
Nifilheimur, yes, luckily we in the Faroes are fairly decent at making new Faroese words from Faroese ground, and we do for example also say sjónvarp for television and útvarp for radio as do the Icelanders, as the words sjón, varp and út- also exist in Faroese and have the same meaning as in Icelandic, but we say telefon and not sími or farsími, though the word røðil also exists (from røða, to speak). However, Icelanders often are more diligent at making new words than us, and they are more diligent at sticking with them, and not for example, saying the Icelandic word in one sentence and then the outlandish word in the next, as there can be a tendency to do in the Faroes.
However, sjónvarp is an example of putting words together. That kind of word-making is relatively easy, though it should not be underestimated.
I should be more precise in my question. I am interested in that kind of words, but even more interested in umlaut and ablout words. There are many such words that are old in the language, for example "finna" (to find) > "fundur" (a meeting). A newer word, that unfortunately is not much used, is "tøli" (mechanics) which comes from tól (tool).
These kind of words demand knowledge of the deeper mechanics of the language, and I wonder how aware the Vikings were of this, and what paradigms they used to make words.
The Icelandic word for CD is geisladiskur, made up of geisla- (rays) and diskur (disc). The story in the Faroes goes that it was a Faroese linguist that made the word and that Icelanders adopted it from us. We have also adopted many of their words, as they are fully compatible with both languages. But the Faroese word for CD is fløga. To my knowledge, it is related to the words flag and fláir, which both have meanings of "layers". It is an example of an old word that used to mean a layer in hay, but that now also has the new meaning of CD.
If one were to make the word "fløga" without it pre-existing, I suspect that one must know the mechanics of the language and sound change rules in order to discern whether it should have "a" or "ø", and "g" or not, what gender it should have, how it should be conjugated, etc, when you draw it from it's related words "flag" and "fláir". Perhaps you have to know some Germanic or Indo-European in order to do it well.
Btw, sími originally meant "rope, thread". It was first called talsími (speech thread), I believe, and has since been shortened to sími for the most part.
Have you ever explored Signum U as a way to both (a) make a living teaching what you love and (b) reach more people than a classroom ever could?
In case ya'll weren't aware Dr. Crawford was involved in the creation of the game Assassin's Creed: Valhalla. Props Doc!
This was very informative and fascinating in light of what little I know on South Asian literary culture, expecially in regards to Sanskrit. It also supports my notion of what the bifröst represents. Fun fact: the Sanskrit word "nīla" can mean "blue" or "black", which probably expresses a similar concept as deities of dark complexion are often depicted as blue.
Seems like you are getting a bit of exhaustion dealing with ignorant people. Anyway thanks for video man. I love Ravens and their feathers are beautiful. They have more colour under uv too
The concept of Red, Green and Blue as primary colors is still used today in the RGB color model.
I am glad to see Ornithology can provide such a positive contribution to Linguistics.
I'd be really interested in reading your dissertation if it's posted anywhere public. It sounds really interesting.
I have a strong suspicion that this notion is further perpetuated by people having heard a fact about the ancient Greeks lacking a word to describe blue, remembering only half of this fact and then misapplying it to the old Norse, and/or sloppily applying it to all cultures from "the old times", because they're simpletons.
Many pigments and dyes were probably rare and valuable in northern Europe but one color they did have was dyer's woad and it was clearly blue.
5:13 now that makes me wonder, I’ll have to keep an eye out for any others
Just want to say I love your videos. They are very informative and interesting, and I like hearing the pronunciations. I’ve watched a few of your videos as I’m learning Icelandic and they helped correct a few difficulties I was having. However, I struggle with the pronunciation of the word two, the ‘tv’ sound is not clear for me. Do you have videos with this in it? Thanks again, I hope you will keep making videos!
This video makes me think of a Swedish Christmas song lyric, where the night sky is referred to as "djupblå", i.e. "deep blue". The notion that "blár" in old Norse would simply mean black seems way more unlikely to me, than it being used in similar ways back then as well.
Adding a comment a bit late, I know.
The nordic countries are at a latitude where in summer it never becomes really dark. Twilight is divided into three types: civilian, nautical, and astronomical (darkest), and in the summer months, there is no true night darkness, meaning the sky remains a dark blue even at midnight. (In Aarhus, where I am, it is at most nautical twilight from 31. May to 12. June, and at most astronomical twilight from 6. May to 6. August.) This of course becomes more pronounced when approaching the polar circle. I suppose it makes a lot of sense to call the sky blue at all hours all year long, even if the winter nights are black.
Do you think that with someone like Sigurd Snake-in-the-eye, they might have been talking about a unique or unusual eye colour (Like yellowish, or a very light green, like those of a snake) but not a a specific word for that colour? I'm wondering if sometimes poetic allusion could make up for a nonspecific categorization of a colour. It would be the opposite of generalizing the colour to one we do have (The sea is very rarely actually blue, but we often call it that anyways) and instead finding something so specific, you wanted to get that across, but weren't going to invent a new colour over it. I know he's supposed to have had an Ouroboros in his eye (there's a couple conditions that could cause this) but I was wondering if something like a strange colour might be handled that way.
I’d love if you did a class for Signum University!
1:28 Favorite part!
Can relate. It bugs me to no end when I hear someone claim "there is no distinction between blue and green in the Japanese language."
When I heard you speak about the need to make money and the absence of Old Norse (Mythology) programs, it brought to mind the online courses in Regenerative Agriculture that Richard Perkins has designed in Sweden. He's a farmer, with very little time for anything during the growing season, but he is also an intermittent TH-cam creator, wrote a book, and designed this course of which I speak. You might take a peek at his channel to see how he is supplementing his income. There is a video called "An Online Training affordable for ALL" that announces the roll out.
I may be whistling in the wind, but who knows?
FWIW,there are several accounts of Napoleonic cavalry and even some infantry officers who would carry their best uniforms only to wear for parade or battle. Given limited storage and the weight and bulk of the heavy cloth,perhaps that seems odd to modern eyes,but the French in particular kept this up. Courage and èlan and pride win battles.
As I understand it, color words have an effect on color perception, just not in the direct sense that you actually have better or worse color vision. It's more about what differences you pay attention to.
E.g. anyone can tell that turquoise and aquamarine are different when you put them next to each other, but seen in isolation you probably won't know one from the other unless you're used to saying "that ones turquoise; that ones aquamarine"
I've heard the same rumor about ancient Greek - that it had no word for blue - because Homer supposedly never used the word and called the sea "wine dark." I'd be curious to know if the two rumors have anything to do with each other
Oh that's why your raiding party in Valhalla all wear blue. I thought they were just using the video game "blue ally, red enemy" code. It's cool to learn that it has a basis in history.
Interested in your thoughts on the name of Harald Bluetooth. His Wikipedia page even perpetrates the myth about blue meaning black, but personally I’m especially interested in what a literal blue tooth would mean
But if there was a top level category for green, why wouldn't they use that to describe eye colour?
Hopefully, some day, you'll have a look at the LITI VITI thing. Also, there is something about how "vikings" were calling Africans "blue men" that would seem to underpin the notion that black = blue ... however some maintain that "blue men" were referring to North African Tuaregs and their habitual blue dresscode, so the jury is still out on that one.
We here in the faroes call black ppl "blá menn"
"Hel er dóttir Loka og skessunar Angurboðu. Hún hefur ásjónu fallegrar ungrar stúlku á sér hálfri en hún er blá á hörund hinum megin" Description of Hel daughter of Loki and her face being of a beutiful young woman on one side and blue on the other side from Snorra Edda.
"take a damn look at ravens" 😂 I felt the frustration in that lol
Dr Crawford, thank you. The difference between a private murder and a public killing is really interesting! Have you written about this somewhere or can you recommend any literature on the topic?
What about Blámenn (Africans)?
This was also something I expected to be discussed in this video.
Some of the very dark-colored africans eg from Sudan or Niger, apperas to me as having a slight blue sheen. Blámenn properly refers to that, but I suspect that word is much later than the viking age.
From what I could find Blámenn (also Blámaðr) was actually used to refer to Moors and the translation for it is still blue men. The reason they might have referred to them as "blue men" could have been as simple as the color of clothes that they were wearing at the time. The root origins of the word black is completely separate from Old Norse as far as I can tell.
'Bláland' usually refers to Ethiopia.
Irish uses the same term for black people today
I never heard of this particular myth before. It could be that it doesn't survive very well in the Nordic countries, precisely because people would instantly see the link between blár/blå and svartr/svart.
Black people were called "blue men", by the way. If anything, it would be easier to convince people that the Norse didn't have a word for black. But that's silly too, of course.
Does old Norse have a word for light blue? Like icy blue, almost grey?
Very cool, thank you Doc.
As someone who grew up in Scandinavia it was the word black I heard we did have in our old tongue, which of cause is not true
Even to do this day, some of those same color interpretations are used by other cultures. The Japanese for example, refer to brown eyes as “black eyes”, because from far away they’re too dark to tell most of the time. And if you tell a Japanese person “No, they’re ‘brown’, not black.” They’ll look at you like you’re a crazy person who doesn’t know what he’s/she’s talking about.
I’m curious... What if the description of eyes as blue and black was meant for the iris and the pupil? Or were the references separate?
Can we be sure of that every word the Old Norse-speaking used was written down? Everyday launguage and poetry are maybe not the same. Same blue-word maybe existed. When I was child we used colour-words (Swedish) I never hear today . Two examples: "Skär" meaning "pink" and "brandgul" meaning "orange". Another example: A "black" horse in Swedish is not "svart"(black) but more brownish/grey with a black mane.
There is also an old norse male name Blainn, meaning dark, blue, black.
Coolest teacher ever!
So the designation for Draugr as "Hel-blàr" means blue death instead of black?
Well at least if I see somebody mention it I can link your video now. Hopefully that helps.
I think it owes something to the claim (pure crankery IMO) that people in the past were unable to see blue (ignoring the fascination of the earliest civilisations with lapis lazuli)
You need to sell a program of yours online, recorded program plus live zooms,.,. Maybe can make a lot of money out of it.. and of course more books,,.
That raven is Ođinn.
Also, bilberries are called blåbär. In Finnish, where it seems proto-finnic truly dodnt have a word for blue, they are called mustikka, meaning blackberry. Of course in reality they are more purple, especially the inside. - modern Finnish word for blue, sininen is a Russian loanword, from zini, dark blue.
As far as understand the vikings called the Africans they saw 'blue men', partly perhapd because 'svart' was already in use for a dark haired person, also maybe to underline how unusual they looked to the Nordic people encountering them the first time?
Do you think top level categories were fewer because they had no economic need to express other colors other than perhaps 'lighter' or 'darker' It seems that descriptive terms have been driven by economic need throughout history?
Blue and brown has been used interchangeably for a long time in Swedish, e.g. blåman.