Sonargöltr

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The sonargǫltr or sónargǫltr was the

boar sacrificed as part of the celebration of Yule in Germanic paganism, on whose bristles solemn vows were made in some forms of a tradition known as heitstrenging
.

Attestations

Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks

Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks refers to the tradition of swearing oaths on Yule Eve by laying hands on the bristles of the boar, who was then sacrificed in the sonar-blót:

Helgakviða Hjörvarðssonar

One of the prose segments in "Helgakviða Hjörvarðssonar" adds that the oaths were sworn while drinking the bragarfull toast:

Ynglinga saga

In Ynglinga saga the sonarblót is used for divination (til frettar).[4][5]

Scholarly reception

The association with the Yule blót and with the ceremonial bragarfull gives the vows great solemnity, so that they have the force of oaths. This becomes a recurring topos in later sagas,[6] although we have only these two saga mentions attesting to the custom of making vows on the sacrificial animal.[7]

The choice of a boar indicates a connection with Freyr,[8] whose mount is the gold-bristled boar Gullinbursti,[4][9] and the continuing Swedish tradition of eating pig-shaped cakes at Christmas recalls the early custom.[5][10][11][12] According to Olaus Verelius's notes in his 1672 edition of Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks, part of this jula-galt would then be saved for mixing with the seed-corn and giving to the plough-horses and ploughmen at spring planting.[13] As Jacob Grimm pointed out, the serving of a boar's head at banquets and particularly at The Queen's College, Oxford, may also be a reminiscence of the Yule boar-blót.[14][15][16] Gabriel Turville-Petre suggested that names for Freyr and his sister Freyja which equate them with a boar and a sow respectively implied that consumption of the sacrificed boar was believed to be consumption of the god's flesh and absorption of his power.[17]

It was formerly usual to spell the word sónargǫltr and to interpret it as "atonement-boar" (the rare element sónar- can also mean "sacrifice").[10][18] However, following Eduard Sievers, it is usually now spelled with a short o and taken as meaning "herd boar, leading boar", as Lombardic sonarþair is defined in the Edictus Rothari as the boar "which fights and beats all other boars in the herd".[4][5][15]

See also

References

  1. ^ Saga Heiðreks konungs ins vitra, H-text of Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks, chapter 10, from Heimskringla.no. Note that this text uses the sónar spelling.
  2. ISBN 978-0-521-55183-0, p. 74
    .
  3. ^ "Helgakviða Hjörvarðssonar", prose before verse 31, Old Norse and Henry Adams Bellows' translation from voluspa.org. Again the sónar spelling is used.
  4. ^
    ISBN 978-0-85991-369-0
    , p. 298.
  5. ^
    OCLC 747429
    , p. 367 (in German).
  6. ^ de Vries, p. 504.
  7. ISBN 9789189116795, p. 43
    (in Swedish).
  8. ^ Hannon, W. B. “Christmas and Its Folk-Lore.” The Irish Monthly, vol. 52, no. 607, 1924, pp. 20–27. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20517297. Accessed 2 Jan. 2024.
  9. ISBN 978-3-11-013255-7, pp. 249–62, pp. 256–57
    (in German).
  10. ^ a b Jacob Grimm, Teutonic Mythology, tr. James Steven Stallybrass, Volume 1, London: Bell, 1882, p. 51.
  11. ^ H. F. Feilberg, Jul, volume 2, Copenhagen: Schuboth, 1904, pp. 313–14 (in Danish).
  12. ^ Helge Rosén, "Freykult och Djurkult", Fornvännen 1913, pp. 213–44, pp. 214–15, pdf (in Swedish).
  13. ^ Grimm, Volume 3, 1883, p. 1240.
  14. ^ Grimm, Volume 1, p. 215; Volume 4, 1883, p. 1355.
  15. ^ a b Rosén, p. 214.
  16. ^ Ernst Anton Quitzmann, Die heidnische Religion der Baiwaren: erster faktischer Beweis für die Abstammung dieses Volkes, Leipzig: Winter, 1860, OCLC 252676776, p. 86 (in German) notes that Bavarian farmers feasted on a slaughtered pig at Yule.
  17. OCLC 645398380
    , p. 255; Habbe wrongly sees this as referring to a bear sacrifice.
  18. ISBN 978-0-19-863103-3, p. 580, online at Germanic Lexicon Project
    .

Sources

  • Eduard Sievers. "Sonargǫltr". PBB 16 (1892) 540–44. (in German)
  • Anne Holtsmark. "Sonargǫltr". Kulturhistorisk Leksikon for Nordisk Middelalder Volume 16, 1971. p. 433 (in Norwegian)
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