Gripla - 01.01.1975, Page 159

PAGANISM AND LITERATURE 155
called God’s skjaldmcer (a typical heiti for the valkyries) in Jóns Saga
Helga I, ch. 48.
One curious element has also to be mentioned: it concems the
phenomenon of herjjöturr, this uncouth and sudden paralysis which
strikes a man, in a battle for instance, or at the very moment when
it is most important for him to spring into action: incapable of taking
flight or of defending himself, he is killed on the spot. There are very
few instances of this in the whole of Icelandic literature, except in
Sturlunga, where one finds several cases of it (Islendinga Saga, ch.
144, Sturlunga Saga II, p. 288; those two examples using the word
herfjöturr itself). There is a valkyrie who is named Herfjöturr: she is
mentioned in Grímnismál (strophe 36), a poem which is recorded in
Snorri’s Edda. The problem is that of knowing whether or not this
notion—which may well be founded on quite normal or physiological
features—is Germanic or Northem at all. We have instances of simi-
lar occurrences in Homer’s works (Odyssey XXII 297 seq. and Iliad
XII 358-360 or XXII 5 seq.) or even in Atharva Veda (VIII.8 or XI.9)
and two miracles at least in the jarteinabœkr remind us of it: Odda-
verja Þáttr, ch. 6, and Jarteinábók Þorláks Byskups II, ch. 1. Identical
remarks would apply to a similar phenomenon, Þeim var bilt, in re-
lation to the goddess Bil and are illustrated, in connection with the
god Þórr himself, once more in the Gylfaginning (ch. 44). It occurs
several times in Sturlunga, for example in íslendinga Saga, ch. 98.
These are all the instances I could find of references to gods and
myths in the samtíðarsögur. They call for an important and very signi-
ficant remark: practically all the details which have just been listed
above, scanty as they are, could have come from Snorri Sturluson’s
works (all of them written before 1241, and some of them some
twenty years earlier), especially Gylfaginning. This possibility is parti-
cularly convincing for the Fölski episode in íslendinga Saga. It is as
if Sturla Þórðarson and other authors of samtíðarsögur had tried to
apply in their works what they had leamed in Snorri’s works—and we
do know that Snorri did not compose his Edda out of regret at the
passing of the old faith, but on pedagogical and so-called historical