As for the speculation of Ragnarök having happened in the past, it could be interpreted as a mythic, poetic memory of the extreme weather events of 532. Due to some volcanic eruptions or so, the sun was reported to have shone dimly in the Mediterranean. Surely then, things would have been way worse in Northern Europe. It could well have been described as a winter that lasted several years.
Yes, archaeology shows that many farmsteads in the mountains were abandoned and people moved toward the coast. Those event certainly could have inspired the Ragnarok story.
Neil Price has argued in 'Children of Ash and Elm' that Ragnarok was undoubtedly about the mythic future - the end of the world as the late iron age peoples of Scandinavia believed it would occur, but that it was a rendering of the actual past that occurred generations before. I.e. it is the story of what happened when the world as they had known it ended, passed down the generations and turned to the future. Since there is a circularity in the tale as you say, this makes sense. For Price, then, Ragnarok has its basis in a reality that is an archeologically sound account.
That seems like a good way of keeping a warning as a tradition for future generations. Things wont always be sunshine and rainbows and so telling the current generation that conflict might be on the horizon it helps to create a sense of preparedness.
I know you've went through a lot, you have been through struggles that most people cannot even fathom. Financially, emotionally on the basis of doing what you're doing for your job in presenting us this information. But I, as well as a lot of others truly appreciate what you do and the information you provide. It helps a lot of us. Thank you, I love your videos. As well as others too. You've helped pull me out of dark times and I know you've reached other people as well. Keep doin what you're doin sir. Everyone's meant to do somethin with their fate. You're doin extraordinary. Thank you & lookin forward to more of your videos Dr. Crawford
Random Anecdote: I once heard an economist argue that one of the reasons the English (world wide) are worse than everyone else at saving/overspending is that we treat past, present and future as distinctly separate things. It would seem every other language treats past, present and future more as one contiguous line, so that the future isn't some far-off 'other,' but an always approaching now. No idea if it holds water, but it sounds cool.
I've often thought that Ragnarok is something that has happened in the past but will happen again. It reminds me of the phrase "history repeats itself." I think it's because the human mind hasn't changed much since prehistoric times and so there's often conflicts like in Ragnarok. It's also a good mythological metaphor for the destructive and creative cycle of nature.
you, your writings, your videos have given me so much wisdom regarding and relating to old norse. I only began looking at it due to my dna findings. Sweden, finland etc. I became interested in it becaus emy grandfather mentioned mjolnir when he had dementia. To learn all of this is trruly amazing. However, it was YOUR brand of truth that made it beautiful and poetic. The truth of it all relating directly to the people, and the myths as well, is just astounding. I thank you endlessly Sir.
Maybe it's set in the future, but the future of the story in the text. Meaning, the future of the story could be our past. Just like in the Aeneid, Aeneas gets told that Augustus will reign on the world, in the future tense, but it is our past we're talking about.
I was going into the comments to point this out too, but you beat me to it. It was framed as the character at the time recounting something yet to happen relative to their current timeline. It makes sense to express that in the future tense.
The similarities of Ragnarok to Icelandic natural disasters is to be expected in my view. An Icelander imagining some future cataclysm, is going to think Iceland, magnified.
I pretty much take it at face value because there isn’t much there that gives incentive to look beyond that. It’s a tale about the world how it began, and how it will end. I think everyone wonders about how we exist in the first place, and stories about it get told.
Great video, as usual. I recently purchased and have started reading two of Jackson Crawford's books(Poetic Edda & Saga of the Volsungs) from Grimfrost and they're amazing. I also ordered the Sáreldr from Grimfrost and it's an unbelievable sword for the price. Many thanks, Jackson and Grimfrost.
One thing I've noticed is that there's a lot more detail on Ragnarok than the creation story. Perhaps this reflects a fixation of the time or the creation story (and the tree) didn't require a lot of poetry.
while the the verbs regarding Ragnarok in Voluspå is future tense. this might only apply to the point in time when Odin came to the vølva to learn about the future. that she talks about the creation as in past tense and Ragnarok in future tense in a present time that from our perspective have already happened. in other words, if i today write a note that i had a toothache yesterday and i will go to the dentist tomorrow, yet next week it will all be in the past.
The expert: We have no evidence that the Norse birth of the world, destruction of the world, and rebirth of the world is cyclical. We only know that they think it happens once. The comments: This sounds cyclical and makes me think of "history repeats itself," and maybe we're just in the middle of the next cycle, and..... No, stop. We don't know. The people who believed in and spoke of this stuff are gone. Your fanfiction doesn't matter. Let the scholars do their job, and then learn from them. Don't insert your own beliefs or desires.
Thanks for this new perspective. Though it makes me now view it as in the future of the writer/story teller/poet. That future would have been their future, so something that was happening to them. Our past. Of course that means the story outside of that meta context would always be a future that never comes as long as the story can be told.
I have a vague recollection of someone suggesting that the new man and woman after Ragnarok are Adam and Eve, as if to say "see, all the old ways are now done with and you can embrace Christianity".
A major reason some will want to put it in the past is the specificity of some of the events being actually known to have happened in previking eras. Mostly the theme of fimbul winter. I personally see it as a post Christian influence of apocalypse being dramatized into a norse version and using old styles of catastrophe and prophecy. It would be really weird if norse tradition as one of the only ones in the world to already have a linear time thinking with beginning and end in the same way as the judeo-christian. So the cyclical world view makes a lot more sense, but those traditions would have been changing and adapting to Christian world view.
Nice video, thanks. I guess as well it wouldn't really make sense to be practicing a religion of gods who were already dead, followers would have expected to join their gods in Asgard.
I would say Ragnerök has yet to happen, and one reason would the fact that in the Ragnar Saga, Óðinn after Ragnar is killed by Ælla appears to his sons. Since Ragnar invaded Northumbria in 793, I would say it has yet to happen still.
In "Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel" the author Ignatius Donnelly argues that similarities with other disaster myths show that Ragnarok is based on a real event of destruction such as the Deluge in the Bible. I'd assume that motifs in the story of what is to come are borrowed from stories of destruction that has already happened in either a real or mythic past.
In the context of Christianity surpassing norse paganism is Iceland, the events of Ragnarok *might* have already happened in human history; Perhaps the sara takes place in the mythic time before Christianity was brought to Iceland-when the old gods still existed-the seeër is pretelling the events of future events Ragnarok, but to the people writing the sagas, these “future events” had already occurred. Maybe this is why it seems so much like an Icelandic volcano. I don’t know off the top of my head, but it’s possible a single great eruption was attributed as the death of the gods and was tied into the narrative of the preëxisting story of Ragnarok. As a way to tell the pagans “look, see, your gods are dead now, this is the sign of Ragnarok and the beginning of a new age”. So the seeër is telling of the events of Ragnarok when the pagan gods will die in order for Christianity to grip Iceland, as it had by the time these story were written down. Just a though
Ragnarok already happened… for _real?_ Isn’t it supposed to start with wolves eating the sun and moon, and then the sky splits open and fire giants break their way through? I feel like people would have noticed that… 🤨 Definitely going to check out the Signs of Ragnarok vids mentioned!
I have never run into anyone who thought of Ragnarok as an event in the past. Now I wonder if, in that view, Lif and Lifthrasir who are supposed to survive are equated with Adam and Eve, or if this view is really entirely unrelated to Christianity.
@@Matt-Hurin There is a story about two rival East Anglian solicitor firms: Norfolk and Chance Suffolk and Watt (writing from Herts, which is neutral, or at least far enough away)
So when you say that Ragnarok has not happened yet, are you saying that from them perspective of our time or from the time that the poems were written? What if it is future tense, but from our perspective 1,000 years after the writing, maybe it has happened? It would be future tense within the poem, but in the past from 2023. As you said, it is unlikely that they would be able to see 1,000+ years into the future.
I think the belief of Ragnarök being cyclical comes from the fact that Baldur is revived and that if his death is a sign of Ragnarök, then if he died again, the assumption could be made that Ragnarök could happen again. At least that’s my guess as to why
@@blakewinter1657 Always thought that line was an addition created by the Christian author. Always thought the text was never an attempt to codify the Norse Religion and stories.
A premonition of bad things to come? Well who'da thunk 'o that? Bad things happen now so bad things happen in the future, well ain't that unheard of.... That would be merely projection of current events to not change, I'd call that hardly premonition.
It makes much more sense if Ragnarök was inspired by christianity. If this was a performed art and not really a religion like christianity or paganism it could make the edda writers eyewitnesses. Snorre wanted to preserve the artform and the culture but didn't realize that a tradition that had gone on for hundreds of years needed to be explained to future readers. So he only wrote down the result. How they performed it could be the missing piece. A simple logical explanation.
@@mercianthane2503 What is it you don't understand with simple and logical? What other similar events in what other PIE culture? If you make that sort of statement you have to provide a reason why and a specific objection to explain why it doesn't hold up. Are you trying to tell me that you don't believe Ragnarök was inspired by christianity because other cultures have similar stories? I never claimed that it was a christian thing. I said inspired by because there is no afterlife in the old Norse culture. And the examples you didn't present could be inspired by chrisianity as well. I believe that over the centuries before and during the Viking age the old Norse culture became quite unique. Instead of understanding that a lot of people have reverted to Roman paganism to explain it and that's a sloppy approach. Then again we have "Norse pagans" who refuse to see any kind of christian influence because they desperately want it to be a religion for fallen christians and they want the eddas to be their new bible. What they don't get is that christianity is a religion for slaves by slaves and so was paganism because at no time in history have slavery been so widely used as during the Roman empire. When emperor Constantin turned christian he just removed the old gods and replaced them with Christ. That means the origin of the catholic church is paganism. I would stick my neck out and say that the reason Scandinavia could be christianed was the fact that they kept slaves. You see, no slaves, no need for a religion for slaves, right? Again a simple and logical explanation more believable than a few missionaries forcing the old Norse to become christian using violence.
But are we _absolutely_ sure that Colorado still being GREEN in the middle of June (as opposed to a tan/yellow tinderbox waiting for the first spark to set it off...) isn't a sign of Ragnarok? You have to admit it's just... weird! :-p take care all of ye all...
His variety of American English hasn't gone through the whine-wine merger. Dr. Crawford is even mentioned as an example at the end of this Wikipedia article: en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronunciation_of_English_%E2%9F%A8wh%E2%9F%A9#:~:text=The%20wine%E2%80%93whine%20merger%20is,%2Dvelar%20approximant%20%5Bw%5D.
@@waynemcauliffe-fv5yf I still do not think so. You can compare the Ragnarök to the Second Battle of Maighe Tuireadh in Irish Mythology, and you will find the same apocalyptic atmosphere; same with the Trojan War, the Kurukshetra War and the Battle of the Romans against Lars Porsena and the etruscans, plus the final branch of the Mabinogi where Lleu musters the armies of Gwynedd to pursue Gronw Pebr and Blodeuwedd.
As for the speculation of Ragnarök having happened in the past, it could be interpreted as a mythic, poetic memory of the extreme weather events of 532. Due to some volcanic eruptions or so, the sun was reported to have shone dimly in the Mediterranean. Surely then, things would have been way worse in Northern Europe. It could well have been described as a winter that lasted several years.
He adresses this at the end, saying the verbs indicate future tense...
Yes, archaeology shows that many farmsteads in the mountains were abandoned and people moved toward the coast. Those event certainly could have inspired the Ragnarok story.
It sounds to me like they took the bad things they knew - eruptions, nuclear winter, etc, and said "Ragnarok will be like all that but worse."
Very interesting,..cyclic..thats perhaps why the tenses are mixed . A warning from the past for today and for tomorrow. Greetings from Antwerp,Belgium
Neil Price has argued in 'Children of Ash and Elm' that Ragnarok was undoubtedly about the mythic future - the end of the world as the late iron age peoples of Scandinavia believed it would occur, but that it was a rendering of the actual past that occurred generations before. I.e. it is the story of what happened when the world as they had known it ended, passed down the generations and turned to the future. Since there is a circularity in the tale as you say, this makes sense. For Price, then, Ragnarok has its basis in a reality that is an archeologically sound account.
That seems like a good way of keeping a warning as a tradition for future generations. Things wont always be sunshine and rainbows and so telling the current generation that conflict might be on the horizon it helps to create a sense of preparedness.
I know you've went through a lot, you have been through struggles that most people cannot even fathom. Financially, emotionally on the basis of doing what you're doing for your job in presenting us this information. But I, as well as a lot of others truly appreciate what you do and the information you provide. It helps a lot of us. Thank you, I love your videos. As well as others too. You've helped pull me out of dark times and I know you've reached other people as well. Keep doin what you're doin sir. Everyone's meant to do somethin with their fate. You're doin extraordinary. Thank you & lookin forward to more of your videos Dr. Crawford
Random Anecdote: I once heard an economist argue that one of the reasons the English (world wide) are worse than everyone else at saving/overspending is that we treat past, present and future as distinctly separate things. It would seem every other language treats past, present and future more as one contiguous line, so that the future isn't some far-off 'other,' but an always approaching now. No idea if it holds water, but it sounds cool.
Did he give any specific examples?
I've often thought that Ragnarok is something that has happened in the past but will happen again. It reminds me of the phrase "history repeats itself." I think it's because the human mind hasn't changed much since prehistoric times and so there's often conflicts like in Ragnarok. It's also a good mythological metaphor for the destructive and creative cycle of nature.
you, your writings, your videos have given me so much wisdom regarding and relating to old norse. I only began looking at it due to my dna findings. Sweden, finland etc. I became interested in it becaus emy grandfather mentioned mjolnir when he had dementia. To learn all of this is trruly amazing.
However, it was YOUR brand of truth that made it beautiful and poetic. The truth of it all relating directly to the people, and the myths as well, is just astounding.
I thank you endlessly Sir.
Maybe it's set in the future, but the future of the story in the text. Meaning, the future of the story could be our past. Just like in the Aeneid, Aeneas gets told that Augustus will reign on the world, in the future tense, but it is our past we're talking about.
I was going into the comments to point this out too, but you beat me to it. It was framed as the character at the time recounting something yet to happen relative to their current timeline. It makes sense to express that in the future tense.
There does seem to be a direct influence from Virgil's Fourth Eclogue. Especially the post-apocalyptic scenes.
The similarities of Ragnarok to Icelandic natural disasters is to be expected in my view. An Icelander imagining some future cataclysm, is going to think Iceland, magnified.
I pretty much take it at face value because there isn’t much there that gives incentive to look beyond that. It’s a tale about the world how it began, and how it will end. I think everyone wonders about how we exist in the first place, and stories about it get told.
Great video, as usual. I recently purchased and have started reading two of Jackson Crawford's books(Poetic Edda & Saga of the Volsungs) from Grimfrost and they're amazing. I also ordered the Sáreldr from Grimfrost and it's an unbelievable sword for the price. Many thanks, Jackson and Grimfrost.
Maybe the real Ragnarök was the ale we drank along the way.
One thing I've noticed is that there's a lot more detail on Ragnarok than the creation story. Perhaps this reflects a fixation of the time or the creation story (and the tree) didn't require a lot of poetry.
Ragnarok is a cycle, the ouroborous and has happened and always will happen.
'Wthy' is why I watch you and have contributed in the past ;)
while the the verbs regarding Ragnarok in Voluspå is future tense. this might only apply to the point in time when Odin came to the vølva to learn about the future. that she talks about the creation as in past tense and Ragnarok in future tense in a present time that from our perspective have already happened.
in other words, if i today write a note that i had a toothache yesterday and i will go to the dentist tomorrow, yet next week it will all be in the past.
Then why did the Norsemen worship Othinn? If Ragnarok happened, Othinn would be dead and there would be no point in worshipping him and Thor and Freyr
The expert: We have no evidence that the Norse birth of the world, destruction of the world, and rebirth of the world is cyclical. We only know that they think it happens once.
The comments: This sounds cyclical and makes me think of "history repeats itself," and maybe we're just in the middle of the next cycle, and.....
No, stop. We don't know. The people who believed in and spoke of this stuff are gone. Your fanfiction doesn't matter. Let the scholars do their job, and then learn from them. Don't insert your own beliefs or desires.
Thanks for this new perspective. Though it makes me now view it as in the future of the writer/story teller/poet. That future would have been their future, so something that was happening to them. Our past.
Of course that means the story outside of that meta context would always be a future that never comes as long as the story can be told.
I'm still in the beginning of this video but I believe the same thing that's it's in the future. This just made me very happy
Thanks!
Appreciate your well-wishes, actually, so keep on keeping on.
Prophecies do tend to want to be about future events.
I have a vague recollection of someone suggesting that the new man and woman after Ragnarok are Adam and Eve, as if to say "see, all the old ways are now done with and you can embrace Christianity".
A major reason some will want to put it in the past is the specificity of some of the events being actually known to have happened in previking eras. Mostly the theme of fimbul winter. I personally see it as a post Christian influence of apocalypse being dramatized into a norse version and using old styles of catastrophe and prophecy. It would be really weird if norse tradition as one of the only ones in the world to already have a linear time thinking with beginning and end in the same way as the judeo-christian. So the cyclical world view makes a lot more sense, but those traditions would have been changing and adapting to Christian world view.
Nice video, thanks. I guess as well it wouldn't really make sense to be practicing a religion of gods who were already dead, followers would have expected to join their gods in Asgard.
I would say Ragnerök has yet to happen, and one reason would the fact that in the Ragnar Saga, Óðinn after Ragnar is killed by Ælla appears to his sons.
Since Ragnar invaded Northumbria in 793, I would say it has yet to happen still.
Interesting video!
In "Ragnarok: The Age of Fire and Gravel" the author Ignatius Donnelly argues that similarities with other disaster myths show that Ragnarok is based on a real event of destruction such as the Deluge in the Bible. I'd assume that motifs in the story of what is to come are borrowed from stories of destruction that has already happened in either a real or mythic past.
In the context of Christianity surpassing norse paganism is Iceland, the events of Ragnarok *might* have already happened in human history; Perhaps the sara takes place in the mythic time before Christianity was brought to Iceland-when the old gods still existed-the seeër is pretelling the events of future events Ragnarok, but to the people writing the sagas, these “future events” had already occurred. Maybe this is why it seems so much like an Icelandic volcano. I don’t know off the top of my head, but it’s possible a single great eruption was attributed as the death of the gods and was tied into the narrative of the preëxisting story of Ragnarok. As a way to tell the pagans “look, see, your gods are dead now, this is the sign of Ragnarok and the beginning of a new age”. So the seeër is telling of the events of Ragnarok when the pagan gods will die in order for Christianity to grip Iceland, as it had by the time these story were written down.
Just a though
Ragnarok already happened… for _real?_ Isn’t it supposed to start with wolves eating the sun and moon, and then the sky splits open and fire giants break their way through? I feel like people would have noticed that… 🤨 Definitely going to check out the Signs of Ragnarok vids mentioned!
The sun and the moon get replacements after Ragnarok
Im the poorest of the poor. I just gglenuinely cant afford it. Youre kinda...satisfying the my intense desire to finish the degree i cant afford...
Infer is the key word. Yes, I believe it to be cyclical, but I have substantial proof.
Merci :)
I have never run into anyone who thought of Ragnarok as an event in the past. Now I wonder if, in that view, Lif and Lifthrasir who are supposed to survive are equated with Adam and Eve, or if this view is really entirely unrelated to Christianity.
Interesting 😎👍
Oooh it's norse by south west. I've just been reading it as gibberish lol
Skol from Ipswich, Suffolk, East Anglia 🤘🏼
Funny, my app wants to translate your comment to English 😆
@@jesperlindstrom4613 🤣 it doesn't surprise me, my suffolk accent is pretty thick, sounds like a farmer mumbling
Skål fra Trøndelag, Norge :)
Hail, from King's Lynn, Norfolk, East Anglia!
@@Matt-Hurin There is a story about two rival East Anglian solicitor firms:
Norfolk and Chance
Suffolk and Watt
(writing from Herts, which is neutral, or at least far enough away)
I was wondering if you could help me with the pronunciation of the Old Norse word aldrþing?
So when you say that Ragnarok has not happened yet, are you saying that from them perspective of our time or from the time that the poems were written? What if it is future tense, but from our perspective 1,000 years after the writing, maybe it has happened? It would be future tense within the poem, but in the past from 2023. As you said, it is unlikely that they would be able to see 1,000+ years into the future.
I think the belief of Ragnarök being cyclical comes from the fact that Baldur is revived and that if his death is a sign of Ragnarök, then if he died again, the assumption could be made that Ragnarök could happen again. At least that’s my guess as to why
Also because of the line about a dragon coming after paradise is restored at the end of Voluspá.
@@blakewinter1657 Always thought that line was an addition created by the Christian author. Always thought the text was never an attempt to codify the Norse Religion and stories.
@@blakewinter1657 I knew Níðhǫggr was a sign too but to be honest, I don’t understand why
fantastico
It's just like Battlestar Galactica!
Is munu related to moon?
😊
Maybe ww1 and ww2 was ragnarok? Has anyone thought that?
A premonition of bad things to come? Well who'da thunk 'o that? Bad things happen now so bad things happen in the future, well ain't that unheard of....
That would be merely projection of current events to not change, I'd call that hardly premonition.
If it supported my life, I would 😅
It makes much more sense if Ragnarök was inspired by christianity. If this was a performed art and not really a religion like christianity or paganism it could make the edda writers eyewitnesses. Snorre wanted to preserve the artform and the culture but didn't realize that a tradition that had gone on for hundreds of years needed to be explained to future readers. So he only wrote down the result. How they performed it could be the missing piece. A simple logical explanation.
That simple and logical explanation still does not hold up when you compare the Ragnarök event to other similar events in different PIE traditions.
@@mercianthane2503 What is it you don't understand with simple and logical? What other similar events in what other PIE culture? If you make that sort of statement you have to provide a reason why and a specific objection to explain why it doesn't hold up. Are you trying to tell me that you don't believe Ragnarök was inspired by christianity because other cultures have similar stories? I never claimed that it was a christian thing. I said inspired by because there is no afterlife in the old Norse culture. And the examples you didn't present could be inspired by chrisianity as well. I believe that over the centuries before and during the Viking age the old Norse culture became quite unique. Instead of understanding that a lot of people have reverted to Roman paganism to explain it and that's a sloppy approach. Then again we have "Norse pagans" who refuse to see any kind of christian influence because they desperately want it to be a religion for fallen christians and they want the eddas to be their new bible. What they don't get is that christianity is a religion for slaves by slaves and so was paganism because at no time in history have slavery been so widely used as during the Roman empire. When emperor Constantin turned christian he just removed the old gods and replaced them with Christ. That means the origin of the catholic church is paganism. I would stick my neck out and say that the reason Scandinavia could be christianed was the fact that they kept slaves. You see, no slaves, no need for a religion for slaves, right? Again a simple and logical explanation more believable than a few missionaries forcing the old Norse to become christian using violence.
But are we _absolutely_ sure that Colorado still being GREEN in the middle of June (as opposed to a tan/yellow tinderbox waiting for the first spark to set it off...) isn't a sign of Ragnarok? You have to admit it's just... weird! :-p take care all of ye all...
@@cdineaglecollapsecenter4672 fair.. I vaguely remember hauling my backside home from school with tornado sirens going off lol
It is my opinion that “Ragnarok” is cyclical. Like most other things in the ancient beliefs. Something must die for something else to live.
Ole Norse = fornnordiska, Øl-Norsk = Danish (of course, it couldn't be Swedish, because svenskt öl smakar som pissvatten).
Why do you emphasize the H in your words ? It's driving me crazy.
It’s his native accent. That used to be a much more common feature of American western and southern accents, but is not so much anymore
His variety of American English hasn't gone through the whine-wine merger. Dr. Crawford is even mentioned as an example at the end of this Wikipedia article: en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pronunciation_of_English_%E2%9F%A8wh%E2%9F%A9#:~:text=The%20wine%E2%80%93whine%20merger%20is,%2Dvelar%20approximant%20%5Bw%5D.
There's an H in all of those words for a reason. It used to be actually pronounced and still is in some regions.
Didn`t they copy a lot off Revealation and the Christians end of the World?
Nop
@@mercianthane2503 A few similarities mate
@@waynemcauliffe-fv5yf
I still do not think so. You can compare the Ragnarök to the Second Battle of Maighe Tuireadh in Irish Mythology, and you will find the same apocalyptic atmosphere; same with the Trojan War, the Kurukshetra War and the Battle of the Romans against Lars Porsena and the etruscans, plus the final branch of the Mabinogi where Lleu musters the armies of Gwynedd to pursue Gronw Pebr and Blodeuwedd.
@@mercianthane2503 Believe what you want mate i`m a atheist i`ve got no dog in the fight. Just how i read it. People always borrow
@@waynemcauliffe-fv5yf
Not always.
Maybe we are going through Ragnarok as we speak!?
Thanks!