Quote:
The gods, too, have a precious token in which blood is involved, and its operation too is quite complex: the mead of poetry. Originally a symbol of the unity of the aesir and vanir, it began and ended as liquid: first as spittle, then as mead fermented from the blood of Kvasir. The intermediate part of the story is well known; as Snorri puts it, the gods created or fashioned Kvasir because “they did not wish that token of the settlement to perish” (Jónsson 1931, 82). While he is traveling the world dispensing wisdom — he can answer any question — Kvasir is slain by the dwarfs Fjalarr and Galarr. When this murderous pair dispatches the giant Gillingr and his wife, a feud is set in motion. The giant Suttungr transports the dwarfs to a tidal island — as dwarfs they would be particularly vulnerable to the rising waters — and extracts from them the mead as compensation for his father. He then delivers the mead into the safekeeping of his daughter Gunnlođ, and, in a
complex series of events in Snorri’s recounting, Odin later succeeds in sleeping three nights with Gunnlođ and thus obtaining three sips of the mead, with which he escapes in the form of an eagle, pursued by Suttungr in like form. As we all know, Odin gets most of the mead home to the gods, and Suttungr goes down in flames.
Kvasir’s blood is a red flag, indicating the presence of feud. The mead was a wergild passed from one group to another, and in this instance it terminates the feud before the Middle Game can get going, as is in accordance with any model of feuding. Gillingr’s wife doesn’t count for much in this scheme (as would be appropriate if giants and gods relied on an agnatic system; see below). So much is obvious. What is perhaps less clear is that the gods have a claim on the dwarfs too. Although Kvasir cannot be traced agnatically to them in any ordinary way,he was their creation, he dispenses wisdom, which is their possession, and, quite simply, he was a member of their household and therefore, like the Norwegian merchant Orn in Hśnsa-Ţóris saga, a symbolic member of their kin group for the purposes of feuding.
Duality is an age-old philosophical argument. There is no getting around it. But, for the study of the folks in question, how did they take it..?? What was their stance and what did they get out of it is the question..?? I reckon the mythology can be a reflection of the society..??
