E

EARENDEL: In Old English this is the name of the morning star.

AURVANDILL

ECHO: In Old Norse, echo is called “dwarves speech” (dvergmál), which falls under the headings of beliefs such as those of the Hupeux, the Howlers, and other Hemänner, the calling spirits.

ECKART, THE LOYAL: In the Middle Ages this was the weapons master of the Harlungen (HARLUNGEN), and, later, the figure who preceded the Infernal Hunt while yelling to people to beware. This is the source for a German proverbial expression, “to be a loyal Eckart” (meaning “to be a trusted friend”), which is known to have been in use since 1529. Eckart has appeared in the legend of Tannhäuser since 1453. In 1813, Goethe wrote a ballad of a moralistic nature titled Der getreue Eckart (The Loyal Eckart).

Grimm, Deutsche Sagen, nos. 7, 313.

ECKEREN: Name of a household spirit said to have existed in the region of Cleves in the sixteenth century. He helped with the housework, fed the horses, and punished lazy or careless servants. Most of the time he was invisible, but sometimes his hand could be seen. This figure bears some similarity to another kobold named Hütchen (Hugen).

Weyer, De praestigiis daemonum, Frankfurt, 1586; Grimm, Deutsche Sagen, no. 78 (the Grimms’ interpretation of Eckerken as derived from Eidechse, “lizard,” is no longer considered correct).

EGGÞÉR (“Sword Guardian”): Giant who guards a giantess in the Iron Forest (Járnviðr) while sitting on a mound playing the harp.

EGILL: While on his way to visit Hymir, Thor stops at the home of a giant with this name. He leaves the goats that pull his chariot there.

EIKIN (“Vehement”): One of the thirty-seven mythical rivers cited in a strophe of the Grímnismál (Poetic Edda) that are reputed to surround the dwellings of the gods.

MYTHICAL RIVERS

EIKÞYRNIR (“Oak-thorny”): This is the stag that stands on the roof of Valhalla (Valhöll), feeding on the leaves of the tree called Læraðr, which is perhaps identical to the cosmic tree, Yggdrasill. Water from its antlers streams into the spring called Hvergelmir, from which all the world’s rivers take their course.

EIMNIR (“Burner”): The name of a giant found in the þulur lists. Her name may be an allusion to the end of the world when the giants of Surtr (“The Black One”) set fire to everything.

EINHERI (“Solitary Warrior”): One of the god Thor’s titles.

EINHERJAR (“Single Fighters”): These are Odin’s warriors who live in Valhalla (Vahöll) and spend their days fighting together. Regardless of whether they are wounded or slain during these daily battles, they are fully restored to life and vigor each evening to feast joyfully on the flesh of the boar Sæhrímnir and drink the mead that flows from the udders of the goat Heiðrun and which is served by the valkyries. When the time for the final battle arrives, they will march out in rows of 800 at a time through each of the 540 doors of Valhalla, simultaneously, to confront the forces of evil (the wolf Fenrir, the fire giants, and so on). Only the men who have fallen in combat or who are marked by the sign of Odin—a wound made with a spear—are part of the einherjar.

EINRIÐI (“Solitary Horseman”): One of the titles of the god Thor. In Snorri’s Edda, Einriði is described as the son of Lóriði and the father of Vingþor, but these names are also cognomina of Thor. The name has been confirmed to exist on the rune stone of Rimsø (Jutland, Denmark, tenth century) and on that of Grinda (Sweden, eleventh century).

EIR (“Peace,” “Mercy”): This is an Ásynja reputed to be the best of physicians; she would be the personification of the concept of assistance, succor, and grace. It is also the name of one of Menglöð’s servants and also that of a valkyrie.

EISMANNDLE, EISMÄNNLEIN (“Little Man of the Ice”): Name of a type of dwarf that lives on the snow-covered peaks and glaciers of the Tyrolean Alps. They protect the innocent and punish the sacrilegious. In this same region we find the Gletschmann, “the man of the glacier,” a kind of wild man.

Alpenburg, Mythen und Sagen Tirols, 86–88, 103.

EISTLA: Name of one of the nine mothers of Heimdallr.

ELBST: A spirit that shows itself in a mountain lake near Seelisberg (Switzerland) in the form of a moss-covered log or a drifting island; he lures careless people into the depths. In moonlight he coils around the lake in the form of a serpent. At night he comes ashore in the form of a dragon or reptile with talons and kills livestock. He is also known to take on the form of a black sow. His appearance is a herald of bad weather.

ELDHRÍMNIR (“Covered with Soot from the Fire”): Cauldron in which the boar Sæhrímnir is cooked to serve as food for the warriors of Valhalla (Vahöll). The cook’s name is Andhrímnir.

ELDIR (“Fire-starter”): A servant of the sea god Ægir.

ELDR (“Fire”): The brother of Ægir and Vindr, thus a son of Fornjótr.

ELEMENTAL SPIRITS (German Elementargeister): Their name comes from Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim, known as Paracelsus (died 1541), who, in Liber de Nymphis, sylphis, pygmaeis et salamandris et de caeteris spiritibus (Book of Nymphs, Sylphs, Pygmies, and Salamanders and Other Spirits), organized the beliefs of his day and assigned a specific element to the creatures of folk mythology. Sirens and nymphs live in water; the sylphs live in the air; pygmies (i.e., dwarves and gnomes) live in the earth; and the salamanders (masculine!)—also called Vulcani, which should not be confused with the animal that shares their name—live in fire. Paracelsus developed his theory further in describing their bodies, which are more subtle than those of humans. This allows them “to cross through walls, rocks, stones, like spirits,” and Paracelsus peppers his presentation with remarks like “water is the air of the fish” to explain how sirens and nymphs can live underwater. These beings have the same needs as we do: they eat and drink, they dress in clothing, and they exist in a hierarchy.

Holbek and Piø, Fabeldyr og sagnfolk, 51–54; Lutz Röhrich, “Elementargeister,” in Enzyklopädie des Märchens, vol. III, col. 1316–26.

ELF-LOCKS: There is a belief found throughout the whole of Europe concerning horse manes: when the inhabitants of a farm discover their horses’ manes to be tangled or plaited, they know that their home houses a spirit. The ancient names given to these braids show that their manufacture was attributed to supernatural beings. In Germany they were referred to as a “dwarf or imp plait” (Wichtelzopf, Weichselzopf), “elf plait” (Alpzopf), or “nightmare plait” (Drutenzopf, Drudenzopf); in Low German as “nightmare locks” (mahrenlocke, mahrklatte) or “elf plaits” (elfklatte, alpklatte). Similar terms include Danish marelok, Swedish martoswa, and Polish skrzot. In England they are referred to as elflocks and also elvihkrots. During Shakespeare’s time (cf. King Lear, II, 3), the verb “to elf” meant “to muffle” [as if with felt —Trans.]; in Norway the terms nisseflette (“nisse-plait”) or tusseflette (“tusse-plait”) were used, words coined from two names for spirits. In human beings an elflock can in fact be caused by a medical condition called “Polish plait” (plica polonica or coma caesarea), which causes the hair to become an irreversibly tangled, sticky mass! The oldest account of elflocks comes from William of Auvergne (1180–1249), who lists the deeds and actions of diabolical spirits: “Evil spirits indulge in other mystifications . . . sometimes in the stables as well . . . the manes of the horses are meticulously braided” (De universo, II, 3, 24).

Haavio, Suomalaiset kodinhaltiat, 400ff; Lecouteux, The Tradition of Household Spirits, 139–41; Carl W. von Sydow, “Övernaturliga väsen,” Folketro 19 (1935): 124.

ÉLIVÁGAR (“Stormy Seas”): This is the name for the eleven rivers that flow out of the spring Hvergelmir into the primordial abyss Ginnungagap. The ice they transport fills this abyss. The eleven rivers that make up this sea are called Svöl (“Chilly”), Gunnþrá (“Arrogant”), Fjörm (“Fast One”), Fimbulþul (“Great Prophet”), Slíðr (“Perilous”), Hríð (“Gust”), Ylgr (“She-Wolf ”), Sylgr (“Gulf ”), Víð (“Wide”), Leiptr (“Lightning”), and Gjöll (“Tumult”).

ÉLJÚÐNIR (“Rain-dampened”): Name of the hall of the goddess of the dead, Hel.

ELLEFOLK: The name for elves in Denmark who are believed to be a people who live in the hills and mounds. They correspond to the Norwegian huldrer and the Icelandic huldufólk.

Holbek and Piø, Fabeldyr og sagnfolk, 127–34.

ELLI (“Age”): The wet nurse for the giant Útgarðaloki. When Thor visits Útgarðaloki he has to wrestle Elli, and she bests him. Elli is the personification of the old age that none can resist.

ELLIKEN, ÖLLERKEN: The name of dwarves in the Mark (the boundary lands of Germany northeast of Berlin). They are about a foot high, wear red caps and robes, and live in the forests and under the ground.

DWARVES, UNDERGROUND DWELLERS

Lohre, Märkische Sagen, no. 68.

ELS: A female spirit that haunts the region northwest of the Taunus mountains (Hesse, Germany).

ELVES (Old Norse sg. álfr; German Elbe, Alp; Old English ælf): These are creatures of great antiquity, so much so that they were almost fossils by the time the mythological texts were set down in writing. The elf is found in all the Germanic countries. The study of human names shows us that elves were revered and feared; in Anglo-Saxon England, for example, we find thirty-five proper names that contain the word ælf. Originally elves were benevolent beings, and the word álfr can be traced back to an Indo-European root meaning “white, clear, luminous.” It probably did not take long before elves became conflated with the malevolent dwarves. In the Scandinavian north, the elves inhabit Álfheimr, one of the heavenly dwellings owned by the god Freyr, and in the tripartite theory of Georges Dumézil they would correspond to the third function (that of fertility and fecundity). Norse triads suggest that at one time they were gods in their own right, just like the Æsir and Vanir.

According to the alliterative charms that have been preserved in Old English, elves possessed the wisdom of magic and enchantment, and the Old High German name of the mandrake plant, albrûna, tends to confirm this point. Albrûna in fact means “elf-secret,” and this name is also that of a priestess mentioned by Tacitus in his Germania. People genuinely believed in elves and offered sacrifices to them (ÁLFABLÓT). Around the year 1018, the skald Sigvatr Þórðarson was refused hospitality in a house owned by a peasant who was performing sacrifices to the elves.

As pure beings elves cannot tolerate vileness, and the Norse expression ganga álfreka, “to relieve oneself, to urinate,” literally means “to drive away the elves,” which can be compared to a fifteenth-century belief in the Picardy region of France that urinating would send the sprites fleeing. Elves are also the good dead elevated to the status of guardian spirits. Olaf Gudrødsson was nicknamed “Olaf Geirstad-Elf ” after being buried in Geirstad, and Hálfdan Hvítbeinn was mourned as the “Elf with the Breastplate.” In this sense, elves would be the spirits of the dead as opposed to the physical dead represented by dwarves. Less clear is the relationship between Völundr (WAYLAND THE SMITH) and the elves, although he is referred to as the “prince of elves” three times in the Poetic Edda. Likewise obscure is the link between Thor and these beings; the evidence for this appears only in proper names like Þórálfr (“Thor’s Elf”) or with the plant known as “Jupiter’s Beard” (barba Jovis), whose German folk names include “Elf Rod” (Alpruthe), “Thunder Broom” (Donnerbesen), and “Thor’s Beard” (Donarbart).

Fig. 24. Elves. Olaus Magnus, Historia de gentibus septentrionalibus, Rome, 1555.

Once they had been demonized, elves became dwarves (Zwerge) and nightmares (Alp, Mahr, Trude).

Lecouteux, Les Nains et les Elfes au Moyen Âge; Lecouteux, “Trois hypothèses sur nos voisins invisibles,” in Lecouteux and Gouchet, eds., Hugur: mélanges d’histoire, de littérature et de mythologie offerts à Régis Boyer pour son 65e anniversaire, 289–97; Hermann Moses, “Die deutschen Pflanzennamen in ihrer Bedeutung für die Geschichts- und Altertumskunde,” Mittheilungen aus dem Archive des Voigtländischen Alterthumsforschenden Vereins, ed. Ferdinand Metzner (Weida: Voigtländischer Alterthumsforschender Verein, 1871): 90–93; Lutz Röhrich, “Eva,” in Enzyklopädie des Märchens, vol. IV, col. 569–77.

EMBLA: The first woman.

ASKR

ENERBANSKE, ONNERBÄNKISSEN: UNDERGROUND DWELLERS

ENNILANGR (“Broad-browed”): One of Thor’s bynames.

EOTEN (pl. eotenas): Old English name for a race of giants; it corresponds to the Scandinavian jötnar, and in both cases the name derives from a verbal root meaning “to eat, to devour.” Tenth-century clerics claimed these giants were the descendants of Cain.

GIANTS

ERDMENDLE: Spirits that are among the company of fallen angels whose downfall preceded the sin of Adam. They did not commit serious crimes against the Lord but were cast down to Earth with the other wicked and evil angels. In contrast to the other spirits, they were given solid and unblemished bodies on Earth, and because of this they still hope to receive grace and salvation. This is why they perform good deeds.

Barack, ed., Zimmerische Chronik, vol. IV, 228–29.

ERLKING (“Alder King”; German Erlkönig): In 1779, J. G. Herder translated the Danish ballad Hr. Oluf han rider (Sir Olaf He Rides), which tells the story of Olaf ’s meeting with the daughter of the elf king. She wants to dance with him and offers him expensive gifts, but he refuses because it is the eve of his wedding. She exacts her vengeance by striking such a solid blow to his heart that he keels over dead when he reaches home. His mother and his bride die of grief. The substitution in the name of “elf ” with “alder” is due, it seems, to a translation error: in Danish “king of the elves” is ellerkonge, but in Low German eller means “alder” (Erle in High German). In 1781, Goethe was inspired by Herder’s work and wrote his own ballad, Erlkönig, on this theme.

Nielsen, ed., Danske Folkeviser, vol. II, 140–45 (Danish ballad).

Fig. 25. The Alder King

ERMANARIC: King of the Ostrogoths, of the Amal dynasty, who founded a powerful empire in southern Russia in the fourth century. It collapsed in 376 under the incursions of the Huns. Ermanaric became a figure of legend quite quickly and holds a prominent place in Germanic epics. These tell us his wife was named Suanhilda, but he had her drawn and quartered for misconduct. Suanhilda’s two brothers, Amnius and Sarus, avenged her death. Jordanes was the first to tell this story, which can also be found in the Hamðismál (Poetic Edda); there are texts in Old English that also allude to it. In the German Middle Ages, Ermanaric was depicted as the sworn enemy of Dietrich von Bern, Ermanaric’s nephew, who was portrayed in the thirteenth century as a model of German virtues. Ermanaric is famous for slaying the Harlungen, two other of his nephews, Hamðir and Sörli, the brothers of Svanhildr.

Zink, Les Légendes héroïques de Dietrich et d’Ermrich dans les littératures germaniques.

ESCHATOLOGICAL BATTLE: RAGNARÖK

ESCHATOLOGY: RAGNARÖK

ETERNAL BATTLE: HJAÐNINGAVÍG

EUGEL: A helpful dwarf who appears in Das Lied vom hürnen Seyfrid (The Lay of Horn-skinned Siegfried). He is the son of King Nyblinc and, together with his two brothers, possesses his father’s treasure. After many hesitations, he grants his aid to Seyfrid (Siegfried) who has set off in search of Kriemhild after she is abducted by a man transformed into a flying dragon.

Fig. 26. The abduction of Kriemhild

Eugel rides a horse that is black as coal, dresses in furs accented with gold, and wears a crown. He reveals to Seyfrid his origins and predicts his murder. When the hero is wounded by the giant Kuperan, Eugel covers him with his cloak of invisibility (Tarnkappe) and hides him from the monster until he regains his senses.

EUHEMERISM: In the third century BCE the Greek writer Euhemerus created a skilled synthesis of religion and history and claimed that the gods of mythology were originally humans who had been deified following their deaths, in recognition of the great services they had provided humanity. The pantheon is reduced to a simple human expression, and mythology is relegated to the prosaic realities of history. In the mythological chapters of Heimskringla, Snorri Sturluson applies a euhemeristic interpretation to the gods of the Germanic-Scandinavian pantheon, and Saxo Grammaticus does the same in his History of the Danes.

EYRGJAFA: One of Heimdallr’s nine mothers. The names of the other eight are Gjálp, Greip, Eistla, Ulfrún, Angeyja, Imð, Atla, and Járnsaxa.