Download or read book Two Sagas of Mythical Heroes written by Jackson Crawford and published by Hackett Publishing. This book was released on 2021-10-19 with total page 194 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Inherited through the line of the berserker Angantýr and his war-loving daughter Hervor, the ever-lethal, shining sword Tyrfing and its changes of hands frame the uncanny story of The Saga of Hervor and Heiđrek. A second heroic saga, Hrólf Kraki and His Champions, recounts the daring deeds of the members and entourage of the ancient Danish house of Skjoldung. Passed down orally in pre-Christian Norse times, transmitted in writing in medieval Iceland, and here wielded by the hand of Jackson Crawford, the tales told in this volume retain their sharp edges and flashes of glory that never fail to slay.
Download or read book Viking Myths and Sagas written by Rosalind Kerven and published by Chartwell Books. This book was released on 2017-09-15 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written in consultation with leading academics.
Download or read book The Saga of King Hrolf Kraki written by Jesse Byock and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2005-06-30 with total page 180 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Composed in medieval Iceland, Hrolf's Saga is one of the greatest of all mythic-legendary sagas, relating half-fantastical events that were said to have occurred in fifth-century Denmark. It tells of the exploits of King Hrolf and of his famous champions, including Bodvar Bjarki, the 'bear-warrior': a powerful figure whose might and bear-like nature are inspired by the same legendary heritage as Beowulf. Depicting a world of wizards, sorceresses and 'berserker' fighters - originally members of a cult of Odin - this is a compelling tale of ancient magic. A work of timeless power and beauty, it offers both a treasury of Icelandic prose and a masterful gathering of epic, cultic memory, traditional folk tale and myths from the Viking age and far earlier.
Download or read book Heroic Sagas and Ballads written by Stephen A. Mitchell and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2018-10-18 with total page 259 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In Heroic Sagas and Ballads, Stephen A. Mitchell examines the world of the medieval Icelandic legendary sagas and their legacy in Scandinavia. Central to his argument is the view that these heroic texts should be studied in the light of the later Icelandic Middle Ages rather than that of the Viking age, although the stories, the tellers, and the audiences are clearly concerned with exactly this period of Scandinavian history. Viewing these sagas as the products of highly diverse forms of inspiration and creation—some oral, some written—Mitchell explores their aesthetic and social dimensions, demonstrating their function both as entertainment and as a literature with a more serious purpose, one with deep roots in Nordic literary consciousness. The traditions that these sagas relate possessed an importance beyond the temporal and geographical confines of medieval Iceland, and Heroic Sagas and Ballads considers the process by which these heroic materials were subsequently recast as metrical romances in Iceland and as ballads throughout the rest of Scandinavia. It is ultimately concerned with much more than just those stories that inspired such modern writers as Richard Wagner and H. Rider Haggard; its anthropological and folkloric approach to the legendary sagas shows how the extraliterary dimensions of medieval texts can be explored. Heroic Sagas and Ballads addresses issues of central importance to medievalists, folklorists, comparatists, Scandinavianists, and students of the ballad.
Download or read book Hrolf Kraki s Saga written by Poul Anderson and published by Open Road Media. This book was released on 2015-11-24 with total page 340 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the British Fantasy Award: The ancient legend of the Danish Viking king is retold in a tale of vengeance, battles, magic, and monsters. In the court of the Anglo-Saxon king, a visiting storyteller regales the assembled nobles with the enthralling tale of her faraway land’s most revered hero: the Viking Hrolf Kraki. Born of an incestuous union into a royal family with a history of violence, jealousy, usurpation, and murder, Hrolf assembled a loyal band of the mightiest champions in the realm and expanded his small kingdom through wisdom, courage, and conquest. Unbeaten on the battlefield, his great deeds and victories became legends throughout the North as he ushered in an era of peace and prosperity. But Hrolf’s desire for vengeance was ever the warrior-king’s driving force, as he sought the truth about his father’s murder. This obsession would threaten Hrolf’s life and his rule—and ultimately bring his great kingdom to ruin. Poul Anderson, one of the acknowledged giants of twentieth-century fantasy, employs his unparalleled storytelling talents to bring Denmark’s great Viking king to life. A saga that predates the stories of King Arthur and his knights and Shakespeare’s Hamlet, while echoing the Oedipus and Beowulf myths, the Norse legend of Hrolf Kraki takes on a new and breathtaking richness in this classic novel the Guardian described as “full of thrills.”
Download or read book Gods Heroes Kings written by Christopher R. Fee and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2004-03-18 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The islands of Britain have been a crossroads of gods, heroes, and kings-those of flesh as well as those of myth-for thousands of years. Successive waves of invasion brought distinctive legends, rites, and beliefs. The ancient Celts displaced earlier indigenous peoples, only to find themselves displaced in turn by the Romans, who then abandoned the islands to Germanic tribes, a people themselves nearly overcome in time by an influx of Scandinavians. With each wave of invaders came a battle for the mythic mind of the Isles as the newcomer's belief system met with the existing systems of gods, legends, and myths. In Gods, Heroes, and Kings, medievalist Christopher Fee and veteran myth scholar David Leeming unearth the layers of the British Isles' unique folkloric tradition to discover how this body of seemingly disparate tales developed. The authors find a virtual battlefield of myths in which pagan and Judeo-Christian beliefs fought for dominance, and classical, Anglo-Saxon, Germanic, and Celtic narrative threads became tangled together. The resulting body of legends became a strange but coherent hybrid, so that by the time Chaucer wrote "The Wife of Bath's Tale" in the fourteenth century, a Christian theme of redemption fought for prominence with a tripartite Celtic goddess and the Arthurian legends of Sir Gawain-itself a hybrid mythology. Without a guide, the corpus of British mythology can seem impenetrable. Taking advantage of the latest research, Fee and Leeming employ a unique comparative approach to map the origins and development of one of the richest folkloric traditions. Copiously illustrated with excerpts in translation from the original sources,Gods, Heroes, and Kings provides a fascinating and accessible new perspective on the history of British mythology.
Download or read book Old Norse Icelandic Literature written by Carol J. Clover and published by Cornell University Press. This book was released on 2019-06-30 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The current revival of interest in the rich and varied literature of early Scandinavia has prompted a corresponding interest in its background: its origins, social and historical context, and relationship to other medieval literatures. Even readers with a knowledge of Old Norse and Icelandic have found these subjects difficult to pursue, however, for up-to-date reference works in any language are few and none exist in English. To fill the gap, six distinguished scholars have contributed ambitious new essays to this volume. The contributors summarize and comment on scholarly work in the major branches of the field: Eddie and skaldic poetry, family and kings' sagas, courtly writing, and mythology. Taken together, their judicious and attractively written essays-each with a full bibliography-make up the first book-length survey of Old Norse literature in English and a basic reference work that will stimulate research in these areas and help to open up the field to a wider academic readership.
Download or read book King Harald s Saga written by Snorri Sturluson and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2005-04-28 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This compelling Icelandic history describes the life of King Harald Hardradi, from his battles across Europe and Russia to his final assault on England in 1066, less than three weeks before the invasion of William the Conqueror. It was a battle that led to his death and marked the end of an era in which Europe had been dominated by the threat of Scandinavian forces. Despite England's triumph, it also played a crucial part in fatally weakening the English army immediately prior to the Norman Conquest, changing the course of history. Taken from the Heimskringla - Snorri Sturluson's complete account of Norway from prehistoric times to 1177 - this is a brilliantly human depiction of the turbulent life and savage death of the last great Norse warrior-king.
Download or read book Icelandic Poetry written by and published by . This book was released on 1797 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book The Heimskringla written by Snorri Sturluson and published by . This book was released on 1906 with total page 396 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A collection of sagas about the Norwegian kings.
Download or read book V lsunga Saga written by and published by . This book was released on 1888 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Sagas of Warrior poets written by Leifur Eiricksson and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2002-08-29 with total page 430 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kormak's Saga, The Saga of Hallfred Troublesome-Poet, The Saga of Gunnlaug Serpent-Tongue, The Saga of Bjorn, Champion of the Hitardal People, Viglund's Saga Set in the farmsteads of Viking age Iceland at a time when the old ethos of honour and heroic adventure merged with new ideas of romantic infatuation, each of these sagas features poet heroes, complex love triangles, and travels to foreign lands.
Download or read book The Wanderer s Havamal written by and published by Hackett Publishing. This book was released on 2019-11-15 with total page 219 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Wanderer's Hávamál features Jackson Crawford’s complete, carefully revised English translation of the Old Norse poem Hávamál, newly annotated for this volume, together with facing original Old Norse text sourced directly from the Codex Regius manuscript. Rounding out the volume are Crawford’s classic Cowboy Hávamál and translations of other related texts central to understanding the character, wisdom, and mysteries of Óðinn (Odin). Portable and reader-friendly, it makes an ideal companion for both lovers of Old Norse mythology and those new to the wisdom of this central Eddic poem wherever they may find themselves.
Download or read book The Saga of the Volsungs written by and published by Hackett Publishing. This book was released on 2017-07-31 with total page 183 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the translator of the bestselling Poetic Edda (Hackett, 2015) comes a gripping new rendering of two of the greatest sagas of Old Norse literature. Together the two sagas recount the story of seven generations of a single legendary heroic family and comprise our best source of traditional lore about its members—including, among others, the dragon-slayer Sigurd, Brynhild the Valkyrie, and the Viking chieftain Ragnar Lothbrok.
Download or read book The Icelandic Saga written by Peter Hallberg and published by U of Nebraska Press. This book was released on 1962-01-01 with total page 212 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this stimulating and reliable introduction to the Icelandic saga, Peter Hallberg correctly designates the genre as "Scandinavia's sole, collective original contribution to world literature." These prose narratives dating from the thirteenth century are characterized by a psychological realism which sets them apart from all other contemporary forms of European literature. Mr. Hallberg's emphasis is on the branch of saga literature which deals with the native heroes--with the settlement of Iceland by Norse chieftains and with the lives of these settlers and their descendants. After disposing of the controversial "free-prose" theory of the origin and transmission of these stories, the author treats such problems as style and character portrayal, dreams and destinies, values and ideals, humor and irony. Several of the major sagas are studied in some detail. The concluding discussion concerns the decline of saga writing and the role played by the Sagas in modern Scandinavian life and literature. Paul Schach's introduction and copious annotation furnish additional background material and bibliographical references to English translations of the individual sagas and to significant studies on the major problems of saga research. Although intended primarily for the layman, The Icelandic Saga is of value to the specialist since it judiciously evaluates and incorporates the revolutionary findings of the so-called "Icelandic school" of saga study.
Download or read book Laxdaela Saga written by Magnus Magnusson and published by Penguin. This book was released on 1969 with total page 276 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Written around 1245 by an unknown author, the Laxdaela Saga is an extraordinary tale of conflicting kinships and passionate love, and one of the most compelling works of Icelandic literature. Covering 150 years in the lives of the inhabitants of the community of Laxriverdale, the saga focuses primarily upon the story of Gudrun Osvif's-daughter: a proud, beautiful, vain and desirable figure, who is forced into an unhappy marriage and destroys the only man she has truly loved – her husband's best friend. A moving tale of murder and sacrifice, romance and regret, the Laxdaela Saga is also a fascinating insight into an era of radical change – a time when the Age of Chivalry was at its fullest flower in continental Europe, and the Christian faith was making its impact felt upon the Viking world.
Download or read book Early Irish Myths and Sagas written by and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 1981-09-17 with total page 321 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: First written down in the eighth century AD, these early Irish stories depict a far older world - part myth, part legend and part history. Rich with magic and achingly beautiful, they speak of a land of heroic battles, intense love and warrior ideals, in which the otherworld is explored and men mingle freely with the gods. From the vivid adventures of the great Celtic hero Cu Chulaind, to the stunning 'Exile of the Sons of Uisliu' - a tale of treachery, honour and romance - these are masterpieces of passion and vitality, and form the foundation for the Irish literary tradition: a mythic legacy that was a powerful influence on the work of Yeats, Synge and Joyce.
