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Wayland the Smith

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"Weyland Smith" redirects here. For the Vertigo comics character, seeList of Fables characters.
Wayland in Fredrik Sander's 1893 Swedish edition of thePoetic Edda

InGermanic mythology,Wayland the Smith(Old English:Wēland;Old Norse:Vǫlundr[ˈvɔlundr̩],Velent[ˈvelent];Old Frisian:Wela(n)du;German:Wieland der Schmied;Old High German:Wiolant;Galans(Galant) inOld French;[1]Proto-Germanic:*Wēlandazfrom*Wilą-ndz,lit. "crafting one"[2]) is a master blacksmith originating inGermanic heroic legend,described byJessie Westonas "the weird and malicious craftsman, Weyland".[3]

Wayland's story is most clearly told in the Old Norse sourcesVölundarkviða(a poem in thePoetic Edda) andÞiðreks saga.[4]In them, Wayland is a smith who is enslaved by a king. Wayland takes revenge by killing the king's sons and then escapes by crafting a winged cloak and flying away. A number of other visual and textual sources clearly allude to similar stories, most prominently the Old English poemDeorand theFranks Casket.

Wayland is also mentioned in passing in a wide range of texts, such as the Old EnglishWaldereandBeowulf,as the maker of weapons and armour. He is mentioned in theGerman poems about Theoderic the Greatas the father ofWitige.[3]He is also attributed to have made various swords forCharlemagneand hispaladins,namelyCurtana,DurendalandJoyeuse.[5]

Attestations[edit]

Earliest evidence[edit]

Gold solidius dated AD 575−625;wela(n)duin runes of theElder Futhark.Found nearSchweindorf,East Frisia,Germany.

The oldest reference known to Wayland the Smith is possibly a goldsoliduswith a Frisian runic inscription ᚹᛖᛚᚪᛞᚢ wela[n]du 'wayland'.[6]It is not certain whether the coin depicts the legendary smith or bears the name of a moneyer who happened to be called Wayland (perhaps because he had taken the name of the legendary smith as an epithet). The coin was found nearSchweindorf,in the regionOstfrieslandin north-west Germany, and is dated AD 575–625.[7]

Scandinavian[edit]

Völund's smithy in the centre, Niðhad's daughter to the left, and Niðhad's dead sons hidden to the right of the smithy. Between the girl and the smithy, Völund can be seen in afjaðrhamrflying away. From theArdre image stone VIII.

Visual[edit]

Wayland's legend is depicted onArdre image stone VIII,[8][9]and probably on a tenth-century copper mount found in Uppåkra in 2011.[10][9]A number of other possible visual representations exist in early medieval Scandinavia, but are harder to verify as they do not contain enough distinctive features corresponding to the story of Wayland found in textual sources.[11]

Völundarkviða[edit]

According toVölundarkviða,the king of theFinns(the Old Norse term for theSámi)[12][13][14]had three sons: Völundr (Wayland) and his two brothersEgilandSlagfiðr.In one version of the myth, the three brothers lived with threeValkyries:Ölrún,Hervör alvitrandHlaðguðr svanhvít.After nine years, the Valkyries left their lovers. Egil and Slagfiðr followed, never to return. In another version, Völundr married theswan maidenHervör, and they had a son, Heime, but Hervör later left Völundr. In both versions, his love left him with aring.In the former myth, he forged seven hundred duplicates of this ring.

Later, KingNiðhadcaptured Völundr in his sleep inNerikeand ordered himhamstrungand imprisoned on the island of Sævarstöð. There Völundr was forced to forge items for the king. Völundr's wife's ring was given to the king's daughter,Böðvildr.Niðhad wore Völundr'ssword.

In revenge, Völundr killed the king's sons when they visited him in secret, and fashionedgobletsfrom their skulls, jewels from their eyes, and abroochfrom their teeth. He sent the goblets to the king, the jewels to the queen and the brooch to the king's daughter. When Böðvild takes her ring to Völundr for mending, he tricks and seduces her, and gets her pregnant. Later, he flies to Niðhad's hall where he explains how he has murdered the king's sons, fashioned jewelry from their bodies and fathered a child with Böðvild. The crying king laments that his archers and horsemen can't reach Völundr, as the smith flies away never to be seen again. Niðhad summons his daughter, asking her if Völundr's story was true. The poem ends with Böðvild stating that she was unable to protect herself from Völundr as he was too strong for her.

Þiðreks saga[edit]
Böðvild in Wayland's forge

Þiðreks sagaalso includes a version of the story of Wayland (Old Norse:Velent).[15]This part of the saga is sometimes calledVelents þáttr smiðs.

The events described at KingNiðung's court (identifiable with Niðhad in the Eddic lay) broadly follow the version in the Poetic Edda (though in the saga his brother, Egil the archer, is present to help him to make his wings and to help Velent escape[16]). However, the rest of the story is different. It tells of how Wayland was the son of a giant namedWade(Old Norse:Vadi), and how he was taught to smith by two dwarfs.[17]It also tells of how he came to be with King Nidung, crossing the sea in a hollow log, and how he forged the swordMimungas part of a bet with the king's smith.[18]And it also tells about the argument that led to Nidung's hamstringing of Wayland, and ultimately to Wayland's revenge: Nidung had promised to give Wayland his daughter in marriage and also half his kingdom, and then went back on this promise.[19]

The saga elaborates on the flying contraption he builds using feathers collected by Egil; the contraption was called theflygilwhich suggests it was a pair of wings (German:Flügel[20]) in the original German version, but conceived of as afjaðrhamr(feather cloak) by the saga-writers. Wayland here also wears a blood-filled bladder as a prop, instructing Egil to aim his arrow at this bag, thus feigning injury and deceiving the king.[21][16][22]

The saga also tells of the birth of a son,Wideke(Old Norse:Viðga), to Wayland and Nidung's daughter. While he was still in captivity, the couple have a conversation, and they vow each other's love; the smith also reveals he has fashioned a weapon and hidden it in the forge for his unborn son.[23]He settles in his native Sjoland and eventually marries the princess with the blessing of her brother who became the next king after Niðung's death.[24]

This son inherits the sword Mimung, and goes on to become one of Thidrek/Didrik's warriors.[25]

Other[edit]

In Icelandic manuscripts from the fourteenth century onwards, the termsLabyrinthandDomus Daedali('home ofDaedalus') are renderedVǫlundarhús('house of Vǫlundr'). This shows that Völundr was seen as equivalent to, or even identical with, the classical hero Daedalus.[26]

InÞorsteins saga Víkingssonar,Völundr is the manufacturer of themagic swordGram(also namedBalmungandNothung) and themagic ringthat Þorsteinn retrieves.

English[edit]

Visual[edit]

The smith Wayland from the front of the eighth-century NorthumbrianFranks Casketin theBritish Museum.

TheFranks Casketis one of a number of other early English references to Wayland, whose story was evidently well known and popular, although no extended version in Old English has survived. In the front panel of the Franks Casket, incongruously paired with anAdoration of the Magi,Wayland stands at the extreme left in the forge where he is held as a slave by KingNiðhad,who has had hishamstringscut to hobble him. Below the forge is the headless body of Niðhad's son, whom Wayland has killed, making a goblet from his skull; his head is probably the object held in the tongs in Wayland's hand. With his other hand Wayland offers the goblet to Böðvildr, Niðhad's daughter. Another female figure is shown in the centre; perhaps Wayland's helper, brother Egil, or Böðvildr again. To the right of the scene his brother) catches birds, which he then makes wings from with their feathers, so he is able to escape.[27][28]

During theViking Ageinnorthern England,Wayland is depicted in his smithy, surrounded by his tools, atHalton, Lancashire,and fleeing from his royal captor by clinging to a flying bird, on crosses atLeeds,West Yorkshire,and atSherburn-in-ElmetandBedale,both inNorth Yorkshire.[29]

English local tradition placed Wayland's forge in a Neolithic long barrow mound known asWayland's Smithy,close to theUffington White Horsein Oxfordshire. If a horse to be shod, or any broken tool, were left with asixpenny pieceat the entrance of the barrow the repairs would be executed.[4]

Textual[edit]

Panel Civ (south face, lowest panel) of the c. tenth-centuryLeeds Crossfound inLeeds Minster,depicting Wayland (below) holding Beaduhild/Bǫðvildr above his head, at a right angle. Wayland's head has been lost, but his wings are visible to the left and right, and his tools at the bottom of the panel.

TheOld EnglishpoemDeor,which recounts the famous sufferings of various figures before turning to those of Deor, its author, begins with "Welund":

Welund tasted misery among snakes.
The stout-hearted hero endured troubles
had sorrow and longing as his companions
cruelty cold as winter - he often found woe
OnceNithadlaid restraints on him,
supple sinew-bonds on the better man.
That went by; so can this.
ToBeadohilde,her brothers' death was not
so painful to her heart as her own problem
which she had readily perceived
that she was pregnant; nor could she ever
foresee without fear how things would turn out.
That went by, so can this.[30]

Weland had fashioned themail shirtworn byBeowulfaccording to lines 450–455 of theepic poemof thesame name:

No need then
to lament for long or lay out my body.
If the battle takes me, send back
this breast-webbing that Weland fashioned
andHrethelgave me, to LordHygelac.
Fategoes ever as fate must.
(Heaneytrans.)

The reference inWaldereis similar to that in Beowulf – the hero's sword was made by Weland[31]– whileAlfred the Greatin his translation ofBoethiusasks plaintively: "What now are the bones of Wayland, the goldsmith preeminently wise?"[32]: p. 29 

Swords fashioned by Wayland are regular properties of medievalromance.KingRhydderch Haelgave one toMerlin,and Rimenhild made a similar gift toChild Horn.English literature was also aware of the characterWade,whose name is similar to that of Vaði, the father of Wayland inÞiðreks saga.[3]

Continental Germanic[edit]

Wayland is known by the nameWielandin line 965 of the Latin epicWaltharius,a literary composition based onOld High Germanoral tradition, as the smith who made the poem's eponymous protagonist's armor:

Toponyms and folklore[edit]

The entrance to the Neolithic long barrow ofWayland's Smithy

Wayland is associated withWayland's Smithy,aburial moundin theBerkshire Downs.[32]: p. 109 This was named by the English, but themegalithicmound significantly predates them. It is from this association that the folk belief came about that ahorseleft there overnight with a small silver coin (groat) would beshodby morning.

This belief is mentioned in the first episode ofPuck of Pook's HillbyRudyard Kipling,"Weland's Sword", which narrates the rise and fall of the god.[32]: p. 351 

In modern culture[edit]

Sir Walter Scottincludes Wayland Smith as a character in his novelKenilworthset in 1575.[citation needed]

Both the AustriancomposerSiegmund von Hausegger(1904) and the Russian composerLeopold van der Pals(1913) used the Wayland saga as inspiration for symphonic poems.[citation needed]

In theITVSeriesRobin of Sherwood,Wayland the Smith was credited for creating the Seven Swords that were charged with "the Power of Light and Darkness". "Morax, Solas, Orias, Albion, Elidor, Beleth, Flauros. On each of them, words of high magic unspoken since they were made. Wayland knew the danger. Oh yes, he knew. That’s why he scattered them, and for hundreds of years they remained apart. Two of them were buried. Others lost in battle, and some so cunningly hidden that none had knowledge of them, except the Cauldron of Lucifer. They knew. The search took many years, many lives. - Morgwyn of Ravenscar" Of the seven, the protagonist Robin of Loxley is gifted Albion byHerne the Hunterat the beginning of the series.

See also[edit]

References[edit]

Citations
  1. ^Gillespie 1973,pp. 142–143.
  2. ^Gillespie, George T.A Catalogue of Persons Named in Germanic Heroic Literature,[full citation needed]
  3. ^abcWeston, J. (1929). 'Legendary Cycles of the Middle Age', in Tanner, J.R. (ed.),The Cambridge Medieval HistoryVol. VI, Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, p. 841f.
  4. ^abOne or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain:Chisholm, Hugh,ed. (1911). "Wayland the Smith".Encyclopædia Britannica.Vol. 28 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. pp. 431–432.
  5. ^Swords with Names
  6. ^Faber, Hans (Nov 16, 2019)."Weladu the flying blacksmith".frisia-coast-trail.RetrievedMay 26,2020.
  7. ^Düwel, K., Merkwürdiges zu Goldbraktaeten und anderen Inschriftenträgern (2018)
  8. ^Vandersall (1972),p. 18.
  9. ^abZachrisson, Torun, Hermann, Pernille; Mitchell, Stephen A.; Schjødt, Jens Peter (eds.),"Volund Was Here: A Myth Archaeologically Anchored in Viking Age Scania",Old Norse Mythology – Comparative Perspectives,Amber J. Rose, Cambridge, Mass.: Milman Parry Collection of Oral Literature, Harvard University, pp. 139–162
  10. ^Helmbrecht, Michaela (2012). "A Winged Figure from Uppåkra",Fornvännen,107;171-78.
  11. ^Sigmund Oehrl, 'Bildliche Darstellungen vom Schmied Wieland und ein unerwarteter Auftritt in Walhall', inGoldsmith Mysteries: Archaeological, Pictorial and Documentary Evidence from the 1st Millennium AD in Northern Europe,ed. by Alexandra Pesch and Ruth Blankenfeldt, Schriften des archäologischen Landemuseums, Ergänzungsreihe, 8 (Neumünster: Wachholtz, 2012), 297-32.
  12. ^Rygh, Oluf(1924).Norske gaardnavne: Finmarkens amt(in Norwegian) (18 ed.). Kristiania, Norge: W. C. Fabritius & sønners bogtrikkeri. pp. 1–7.
  13. ^Robertson, Isobel Rennie (2020).Wayland Smith: A cultural-historical biography(PhD thesis). University of Leeds. pp. 182–183.
  14. ^Aalto, Sirpa; Lehtola, Veli-Pekka (2017)."The Sami Representations Reflecting the Multi-Ethnic North of the Saga Literature".Journal of Northern Studies.11(2): 14.doi:10.36368/jns.v11i2.884.ISSN2004-4658.
  15. ^Þidriks sagaCh. 57–79: "Velents saga"Unger (1853),pp. 65–96; "The Story of Velent the Smith"Haymes tr. (1988),pp. 40–55
  16. ^abShröder, Franz Rolf (1977) "Der Name Wieland",BzN,new ser.4:53–62. Quoted by:Harris, Joseph(2005) [1985].Clover, Carol J.;Lindow, John(eds.).Eddic Poetry.Old Norse-Icelandic Literature: A Critical Guide. University of Toronto Press. p. 103.ISBN9780802038234.
  17. ^Þidriks sagaCh. 57–61,Unger (1853),pp. 65–70;Haymes tr. (1988),pp. 40–42)
  18. ^Þidriks sagaCh. 61–68,Unger (1853),pp. 70–82;Haymes tr. (1988),pp. 42–48)
  19. ^Þidriks sagaCh. 70–74,Unger (1853),pp. 82–90;Haymes tr. (1988),pp. 48–52)
  20. ^Cleasby & Vigfusson (1974),An Icelandic-English Dictionary,s.v. "flygil".
  21. ^Þidriks sagaCh. 75, 77–78,Unger (1853),pp. 90–96;Haymes tr. (1988),pp. 52–54)
  22. ^Wadstein (1900),pp. 19, 7.
  23. ^Þidriks sagaCh. 76,Unger (1853),p. 92;Haymes tr. (1988),p. 53, though translated as "armor".)
  24. ^Þidriks sagaCh. 78–79,Unger (1853),pp. 94–96;Haymes tr. (1988),pp. 54–55)
  25. ^Þidriks sagaCh. 80–81ff (to Ch. 95), "Vidgas förste Bedrifter",Unger (1853),pp. 96–98; "The Story of Vidga, son of Velent",Haymes tr. (1988),pp. 56–57ff)
  26. '^Rudolf Simek,Völundarhús -- Domus DaedaliLabyrinths in Old Norse Manuscripts',NOWELE: North-Western European Language Evolution,21-22 (1993), 323-68;doi:10.1075/nowele.21-22.23sim.
  27. ^Wadstein (1900),pp. 18–20.
  28. ^Henderson, George(1977) [1972].Early Medieval.London: Penguin, p. 157.
  29. ^All noted in Hall, Richard (1995).Viking Age Archaeology In Britain & Ireland,Shire Archaeology Series (60), (Shire: 1990) p. 40
  30. ^Pollington, Steve (Transl.) (1997)."deor".Wiðowinde.100:64. Archived fromthe originalon 10 April 1997.Retrieved18 March2017.The home page for this print journal can he foundhere.
  31. ^Gordon, R. K.(1954).Anglo-Saxon Poetry,London: Dent, p. 65. This is a partial text of theWalderfragments in modern English. See the start of fragment A for Wayland.
  32. ^abcShippey, Tom (2014).The Road to Middle-earth: Revised and Expanded Edition.Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.ISBN9780547524412.
Bibliography

External links[edit]

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