D'Aulaires' Book of Norse Myths
Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • What's old is good
  • norse myths
  • THIS BOOK IS AWESOME
  • Wow our whole family loved this book!
  • D'Aulaires' Book of Norse Myths
D'Aulaires' Book of Norse Myths
Ingri D'Aulaire , and Edgar Parin D'Aulaire
Manufacturer: New York Review of Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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ASIN: 159017125X
Release Date: 2005-05-31

Product Description

The Norse myths are some of the greatest stories of all time. Weird monsters, thoroughly human gods, elves and sprites and gnomes, with grim giants nursing ancient grudges lurking behind—the mysterious and entrancing world of Norse myth comes alive in these pages thanks to the spellbinding storytelling and spectacular pictures of the incomparable d'Aulairse. In this classic book, the art of the Caldecott Award—winning authors of d'Aulaires' Book of Greek Myths, a longtime favorite of children and parent, reaches one of its pinnacles. It offers a way into a world of fantasy and struggle and charm that has served as inspiration for Marvel Comics and the Lord of the Rings.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars What's old is good.......2007-09-27

I frequently borrowed this book from the Harris Park Elementary library. It is as entertaining as an adult as it was as a youngster. Along with Edith Hamilton's book, these re-tellings are great for simply and concisely relating mythic tales to my high school students. The artwork is a bonus. D'Aulaires' book of Greek myths is also well done.

5 out of 5 stars norse myths.......2007-05-19

my children enjoyed this book very much. they were interested as they had heard that Tolkien had based Lord of the Rings on Norse myths and they wanted to read them. My teenagers and preteens were the age that enjoyed these stories.

5 out of 5 stars THIS BOOK IS AWESOME.......2007-03-25

Years ago, my elementary school had this book in its library. My brother and I had both checked it out, 4 years apart from each other. For years after I graduated high school, I always wondered if that book was still there.
This book is one of the best books I've ever seen about Norse Mythology. The Painting are sooo cool and it doesn't "baby down" the myths. It's all there in its gorey beauty.
I recently purchased a copy of this for my brothers 30th b-day. he loved it. it was like seeing an old friend after so many years.

5 out of 5 stars Wow our whole family loved this book!.......2007-03-16

We didn't know much about Norse myths when we bought this book but we sure do now! We've been reading this book, one story every night, together and it is not only well written but the illustrations are very cool too. I had D'Aulaires' book of greek myths when I was a young girl and LOVED it, continued looking at the illustrations long after I read the stories, so I took a chance on buying this one. We're all glad we did!

5 out of 5 stars D'Aulaires' Book of Norse Myths.......2007-03-01

I first knew & loved this book as D'Aulaires' Norse Gods & Giants, checked out of a local library many times while homeschooling years ago. While this title is a most worthy companion to D'Aulaires' Greek Myths, it mystifyingly remained out-of-print, & any used copies were extremely high-priced. Now, happily, it is back in print. I ordered my family's copy through Amazon & while I would rather have it than none, it was very disappointing to see the poorer quality of this edition, both in paper & printing: the text annoyingly fades in & out throughout the book. The illustrations do not seem to have suffered too badly, but still are not as sharp or vibrant as in my old copy of their Greek Myths. I suspect that if I had both an earlier & a present edition in front of me now, disappointment in the later would escalate. I will continue my search for an affordable copy of one of the earlier editions.
Gods and Myths of Northern Europe
Average customer rating: 4.5 out of 5 stars
  • Essential, Thorough, Superbly Written
  • The Passing of the Old Gods
  • An excellent light introduction to the world of our ancestors
  • Gods and Myths
  • Excellent little intro to Northern myth!
Gods and Myths of Northern Europe
H.R. Ellis Davidson
Manufacturer: Penguin (Non-Classics)
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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  5. Exploring The Northern Tradition: A Guide To The Gods, Lore, Rites And Celebrations From The Norse, German And Anglo-saxon Traditions (Exploring Series) Exploring The Northern Tradition: A Guide To The Gods, Lore, Rites And Celebrations From The Norse, German And Anglo-saxon Traditions (Exploring Series)

ASIN: 0140136274

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Essential, Thorough, Superbly Written.......2007-07-30

If you're interested in Norse mythology, there are a few books you just have to have. Most important of all are the primary sources: Snorri's "Edda" (Faulkes seems to be the current favorite translation), the "Poetic Edda" (Larrington is a good translation there), maybe Saxo if you're really into it, possibly a few sagas...

And then there are the secondary sources--that is to say, sources written with the purpose of interpreting and understanding the primary sources. You'll want at least one of the dictionaries: Lindow to start out with, then either Simek or Orchard (or both), maybe a good general-purpose Viking book like Roesdahl's "The Vikings"...

...And you'll want this book. You simply must have this book, if you're any kind of fan of Norse Mythology at all. It's a classic. It's not even half as big as my Lindow dictionary, but somehow it seems to contain five times the information. It's superbly written. It hits on most of the major characters, stories and phenomenon and describes them thoroughly, but it also digs up obscure tidbits of archaeological information, tying one thread of this myth to another, fitting in tiny pieces of the puzzle that you didn't even know existed.

For this book Davidson drew on what must have been her staggering and far-reaching knowledge of mythology and folklore, not simply Norse mythology but mythologies from far and wide, as far away as India. She takes you far, far back into the primordial days in which the roots of these myths took hold, trying to understand the hows and wheres and whys of their origins. She makes no outlandish assumptions, draws no unfounded conclusions: she simply presents what is known and what is, unfortunately, unknown, and points out what might have been.

Can you tell that I'm a fan? Did I mention that it's superbly written? This is it; this is the desert-island-book of Norse Mythology. Read it. Unless I grossly overestimate your fascination with Norse mythology, you won't be disappointed.

5 out of 5 stars The Passing of the Old Gods.......2007-05-29

Hilda Roderick Ellis Davidson was born at Bebington, Cheshire, in 1914. She was educated at Park High School for Girls, Birkenhead, and Newnham College, Cambridge, where she took Firsts in English and Archaeology. She received her Ph.D in 1940 after three years of research under Professor and Mrs. Chadwick into the pagan beliefs of Scandinavia. In my opinion, her works rank amongst the best that have ever been penned by a female scholar of Northern Myths despite the fact that this particular submission was originally written in 1964, some 40 years ago!

Gods and Myths of Northern Europe by HRE Davidson is broken down into Eight Chapters:

Introduction
1) The Myth Makers
2) The Sources of our Knowledge
3) New Light on the Myths

Chapter One
The World of the Northern Gods
1) The Prose Edda
2) The Gods and their World
3) Thor and the Giants
4) The Doom of the Gods
5) The Giants and the Dwarfs
6) Myths outside the Prose Edda

Chapter Two
The Gods of Battle
1) Odin, Lord of Hosts
2) The Germanic War Gods
3) The Valkyries of Odin
4) The Beserks of Odin
5) The Worship of the War God

Chapter Three
The Thunder God
1) Thor in the Myths
2) The Temples of Thor
3) The Hammer of Thor
4) The God of the Sky
5) Thor and his adversaries

Chapter Four
The Gods of Peace and Plenty
1) The Deity in the Wagon
2) Freyr, God of Plenty
3) Companions of Freyr
4) The Mother Goddess
5) The Goddess Freyja
6) The Power of the Vanir

Chapter Five
The Gods of the Sea
1) Ægir and Ran
2) Njord, God of Ships
3) The Depths of the sea

Chapter Six
The Gods of the Dead
1) Odin and Mercury
2) Odin as a Shaman
3) The Realm of Odin
4) The Burial Mound
5) Thor and the Dead
6) The Dragon and the Dead

Chapter Seven
The Enigmatic Gods
1) Bragi and Idun
2) Mimir and Hoenir
3) The Twin Gods
4) Forseti
5) Heimdall
6) Loki
7) Balder

Chapter Eight
The Beginning and the End
1) The World Tree
2) The Creation of the World
3) The End of the World

Conclusion: The Passing of the Old Gods
Works of References
Names and Sources
Index

On page 9 the author says:

"We cannot return to the mythological thinking of an earlier age; it is beyond our reach, like the vanished world of childhood. Even if we feel a nostalgic longing for the past, like that of John Keats for Ancient Greece or William Morris for medieval England, there is no way of entry. The Nazis tried to revive the myths of ancient Germany in their ideology, but such an attempt can only lead to sterility and moral suicide. We cannot deny the demands of our age, but this need not prevent us turning to the faith of another age with sympathetic understanding, and recapturing imaginatively some of its vanished power."

On the point of value for money, this book more than fulfils the requirement as a user friendly and reasonably priced reference paperback to the Old Gods and their passing into what is Christianity. Some might argue that there are themes of comparative mythology in this work but when you consider that it was based on the academia of the early 60s, surely this is to be expected.

5 out of 5 stars An excellent light introduction to the world of our ancestors.......2007-03-10

This book by HR Ellis Davidson wasn't exactly written yesterday, but it is still a solid piece of scholarship. There's very little to say about the book, apart from the obvious content judging by the title. It is what it promises to be; a quick overview of the myths and Gods of the Germanic peoples (and of course, short looks at the various other Aryan people's mythology too, since it all intertwines). The book is a short read, and I'd say that is a good thing, since I'm unsure of how much you learn about this piece of our history in foreign schools. Unusually enough she deals with the myths full of respect and obvious love for them, and this makes the book quite a lot easier to enjoy.

Of course, it's no deep or penetrating book, it merely touches lightly on all subjects, before moving on to the next, but it serves as an excellent introduction, and that was indeed the intention, I gather. I kind of wish she had included a bit more about the symbolism and metaphysics of this religion and these myths, so she would have been able to show the depth of it all, but that might be a bit outside the scopes of the book.

This is anyways highly recommended, both to the "dummies" and the ones with more knowledge about the subject, because this book is simply a delight to read. Get to know the souls of your ancestors in about 200 pages, I can promise you it will be well-spent time.

(I read a different edition)

4 out of 5 stars Gods and Myths.......2007-01-29

Excellent information, well organized and very informative to have in your library.

5 out of 5 stars Excellent little intro to Northern myth!.......2006-08-27

I liked this book- I found it easy to read and understand, and it was not as "dated" as one would think. Really covered a lot of area about Norse myth, and I would definitely recommend it to those interested in the subject! Lots of focus on the deities and the roles they served as well, which is sometimes overlooked in books like these.
Gods and Myths of Northern Europe
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • An excellent light introduction to the world of our ancestors
Gods and Myths of Northern Europe
H. R. Ellis Davidson
Manufacturer: Penguin Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Mass Market Paperback
ASIN: B0000CMAH9

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars An excellent light introduction to the world of our ancestors.......2007-03-10

This book by HR Ellis Davidson wasn't exactly written yesterday, but it is still a solid piece of scholarship. There's very little to say about the book, apart from the obvious content judging by the title. It is what it promises to be; a quick overview of the myths and Gods of the Germanic peoples (and of course, short looks at the various other Aryan people's mythology too, since it all intertwines). The book is a short read, and I'd say that is a good thing, since I'm unsure of how much you learn about this piece of our history in foreign schools. Unusually enough she deals with the myths full of respect and obvious love for them, and this makes the book quite a lot easier to enjoy.

Of course, it's no deep or penetrating book, it merely touches lightly on all subjects, before moving on to the next, but it serves as an excellent introduction, and that was indeed the intention, I gather. I kind of wish she had included a bit more about the symbolism and metaphysics of this religion and these myths, so she would have been able to show the depth of it all, but that might be a bit outside the scopes of the book.

This is anyways highly recommended, both to the "dummies" and the ones with more knowledge about the subject, because this book is simply a delight to read. Get to know the souls of your ancestors in about 200 pages, I can promise you it will be well-spent time.

(I read a different edition)
Gods and Myths of  Northern Europe
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • An excellent light introduction to the world of our ancestors
Gods and Myths of Northern Europe
H. R. Ellis Davidson
Manufacturer: Penguin Books
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback
ASIN: B000KOVSH0

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars An excellent light introduction to the world of our ancestors.......2007-03-10

This book by HR Ellis Davidson wasn't exactly written yesterday, but it is still a solid piece of scholarship. There's very little to say about the book, apart from the obvious content judging by the title. It is what it promises to be; a quick overview of the myths and Gods of the Germanic peoples (and of course, short looks at the various other Aryan people's mythology too, since it all intertwines). The book is a short read, and I'd say that is a good thing, since I'm unsure of how much you learn about this piece of our history in foreign schools. Unusually enough she deals with the myths full of respect and obvious love for them, and this makes the book quite a lot easier to enjoy.

Of course, it's no deep or penetrating book, it merely touches lightly on all subjects, before moving on to the next, but it serves as an excellent introduction, and that was indeed the intention, I gather. I kind of wish she had included a bit more about the symbolism and metaphysics of this religion and these myths, so she would have been able to show the depth of it all, but that might be a bit outside the scopes of the book.

This is anyways highly recommended, both to the "dummies" and the ones with more knowledge about the subject, because this book is simply a delight to read. Get to know the souls of your ancestors in about 200 pages, I can promise you it will be well-spent time.

(I read a different edition)
Roles of the Northern Goddess
Average customer rating: 3.5 out of 5 stars
  • A pretty decent book
  • Faulty premise leads to faulty conclusions
  • Long and winding evidence to support goddess worship
  • Comparative Study Yields Solid Information
  • Excellent Book
Roles of the Northern Goddess
Dr Hil Davidson
Manufacturer: Routledge
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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  5. Our Troth: Volume 1: History and Lore Our Troth: Volume 1: History and Lore

ASIN: 0415136113

Book Description

Roles of the Northern Goddess presents a highly readable study of the worship of the pre-Christian, Northern goddesses. With its use of evidence from early literature, popular tradition, legend and archaeology, this book investigates the role of the early hunting goddess and the local goddesses who were involved in all aspects of the household and the farm. What emerges is that the goddess was both benevolent and destructive, a powerful figure closely concerned with birth and death and with the destiny of individuals.

Download Description

By investigating women's special skills related to goddess cults together with legends and popular traditions, the author explores the importance of the goddess as a subject for study today.

Customer Reviews:

4 out of 5 stars A pretty decent book.......2007-01-06

The other reviewers have already listed the books downfalls but it's still a much better work than "Goddess of the North" by Linda Welch.

I recommend it!

2 out of 5 stars Faulty premise leads to faulty conclusions.......2002-12-25

This is quite likely the worst book HRED has written. That said, there is still much of value. To find it though, one must wade through the author's agenda- she was in her One Great Goddess phase- and incomplete as well as unconnected examples of, well, sometimes one can't be quite sure just what she is trying to say or prove.

If your starting point is the premise that there was One Great Goddess, fine, you will love this book. If you want a scholarly evalution of Germanic goddesses, you will need to go elsewhere.

3 out of 5 stars Long and winding evidence to support goddess worship.......2001-07-17

The tenor of this book is one of attempting to peer through centuries of Christian influence to show what the religion of the goddess may have been like. But in almost every of its presentations often is too loose in character to be truly fulfilling and abounds in conditional statements. It probably fails most in how it presents the subject in categories and then presents examples from the observations and works of others in an attempt to bring things to light. In doing so it tends to lose your appreciateion of variation in perceptions over time and place, which is understandable due to the scarcity of hard and sure information. But then it is this lack of certainty that makes it a book of possitbilites rather than information. However, if it were not for the obvious continuation of goddess worship into the Christian age with the Virgin Mary, I might doubt that there were any widespread goddess cults simply from the arguments this book provides.

It might have been better to have divided the book up by region, rather as History of Pagan Europe does. Instead the dearth of hard evidence is supplemented by comparisons to notions of goddess worship much further south of north. At best it is a collection of what can be said in a scholarly manner, but is rather too dull of a presentation to be an exceptional read.

4 out of 5 stars Comparative Study Yields Solid Information.......2001-06-22

Davidson has produced a useful book on Northern European Goddess history and tradition. She draws on early literature, legend, folk traditions (and records of now extinct folk traditions), and archaelogy to construct several categories of functioning for the Goddesses. She discovers Goddesses who are both nurturing and demanding, healing and destructive, revered and feared. Davidson includes Celtic, Norse, Finnish, and Latvian Goddesses, and frequently compares them to Mediterranean and Near Eastern Goddess roles.

She first considers the Goddess as Mistress of the animals, examining her roles as Hunting Goddess, Ruler of the Wild, Guardian of the diary [sic] herds, as Dog and Horse Goddess.

Next, she examines the Goddess as Mistress of the Grain, considering the most ancient roots associating Goddesses with fertility of the earth, the connection between Goddess and plough, the possibility of Goddess as Corn Spirit, and how the Grain Goddess of the North differed from Grain Goddesses of more temperate regions.

Davidson then takes up the Goddess as Mistress of the Distaff and Loom, looking both the context of Goddess and weaving in the ancient world as well as the differences in Northern Europe. She considers the Oseberg wall-hagnings, retrieved from a burial site, and illuminates Goddess figures found there. She also examines the interplay between weaving and destiny, the Goddess as Weaver of Fate.

In addition, she considers the domestic role of the Goddess as Mistress of the Household. She discusses Guardians of the home, the association between Goddess and fire and water, and the role of the Goddes in the birth and nurturing of children.

Finally, she examines the Goddess as Mistress of Life and Death, writing of her role as healer and in the realm of death. She also considers Northern European funeral rites and how they help us understand the roles of the Goddess.

Davidson points out that when we sentimentalize the Goddess, as so many white-light-bunny-fluff-goddess-of-the-week books do, we lose a great deal. She draws on Jung in her synthesis that the Goddess is both attractive and nurturing as well as repulsive and frightening. In her conclusion she points out that the Goddess was much more than simply the "Great Mother."

The book has a useful index and an excellent bibliography. It was poorly copy edited, however, with several typos. I also wish that Davidson had done a better job of separating out the layers of history through which she excavates. The meaning of stone-age evidence is poorly differentiated from the meanings of myths recorded in the middle ages or folk practices recorded in the 17th century. This is a significant problem which the book poorly addresses.

Five stars for depth and breadth, but knocked down to four stars for the failure to explicitly consider the impact of various historical contexts on the available evidence and on her interpetation of it.

(If you'd like to discuss this book or review, click on the "about me" link above and drop me an email. Thanks!)

5 out of 5 stars Excellent Book.......2001-01-30

Hail! I highly recommend this book to those whom walk the Way of the Lady(Freya). Freya is a goddess of witchcraft(called seithr in Old Norse), love, and nature(lets also remember that the word witch is Anglo Saxon, thus Teutonic). I suggest reading this book next to Witchdom of the True by Edred Thorsson. For Frith and Kinfolk, Isenwulf Wodheart
Tales of the Norse Gods (Oxford Myths and Legends)
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • Fun to read
Tales of the Norse Gods (Oxford Myths and Legends)
Barbara Leonie Picard
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Paperback

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ASIN: 0192741675

Book Description

The Vikings told many stories of their gods: mighty Odin; Thor the god of thunder; gentle Freya; and Loki the mischief-maker and the tricks he played. In the stories, the gods are forced to always strive against the hated giants, who symbolize the pitiless northern snows and the grim
mountains. These exciting and dramatic tales open with the beginning of all things, and follow the story through to the gods' final battle against the forces of winter.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Fun to read.......2007-05-12

After reading the mythos of several different countries, to include Egypt, China, and Japan, I've come to the conclusion that the Mythos of the Norsemen is perhaps, the most fun and enjoyable to read. I especially enjoyed the tale of why there are so many bad poets in the world. Irony, you got it. Symbolism, that too. Recommend to anyone who is just interested or who is interested in myth. The stories have a life on to themselves.

Cheers!


Dictionary of Northern Mythology
Average customer rating: 5 out of 5 stars
  • Great Overview of Germanic Mythology
  • The finest encyclopedia
  • Essential for any serious student of the subject
  • Ian Myles Slater on: A Welcome Reference
  • The Last Word...
Dictionary of Northern Mythology
Rudolf Simek
Manufacturer: Boydell & Brewer Inc
ProductGroup: Book
Binding: Hardcover

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  5. Gods and Myths of Northern Europe Gods and Myths of Northern Europe

ASIN: 0859913694

Book Description

For two and a half thousand years, from 1500 BC to 1000 AD, a culture as significant as the classical civilisation of the Mediterranean world settled an immense area in northern Europe that stretched from Iceland to the Black Sea.But whereas the stuff of classical mythology has been fully absorbed into the cultural history of the west, the mythology of northern Europe - Scandinavians, Goths, Angles and Saxons - is often enigmatic.
In compiling thisdictionary Rudolf Simek has made the fullest use of the information available -Christian accounts, Eddic lays, the Elder Edda, runic inscriptions, Roman authors (especially Tacitus), votive stones, place names and archaeologicaldiscoveries. He has adhered throughout to a broad definition of mythology which presents the beliefs of the heathen Germanic tribes in their entirety. Here are not only tales of the gods, but also of beings from lower levels of belief: elves, dwarfs and giants; the beginning and end of the world; the creation of man, death and the afterlife; cult, burial customs and magic - an entire history of Germanic religion.
RUDOLF SIMEKis professor in theScandinavian section of the German department at Vienna University.

Customer Reviews:

5 out of 5 stars Great Overview of Germanic Mythology.......2007-05-14

This is a great overview and reference for Germanic and Norse mythology. It is well-documented and very up to date.

4 out of 5 stars The finest encyclopedia.......2007-04-22

A must have. Vast, extensive, good etymologies.
There are certainly better overall works for exploring the Germano-Norse faith, but as far as encyclopedias go, it is top notch.

5 out of 5 stars Essential for any serious student of the subject.......2004-03-11

Dictionary of Norse Mythology by Rudolf Simek was originally published in German in 1984 and appeared in an English translation by Angela Hall in 1993, ISBN 0 85991 369 4. The publisher of the English translation is D. S. Brewer. 425 pages in length and in a usual-size format, this dictionary is extremely thorough. This work covers not only the relatively large corpus of Scandinavian materials, but also the much more sparse mythological remains from the other Germanic areas. The more lengthy entries have a bibliography at the end. There is also a very large bibliography at the end. Thus, it functions not only as a reference tool, but as a guide to in-depth reading.

5 out of 5 stars Ian Myles Slater on: A Welcome Reference.......2003-12-13

This is an extremely comprehensive presentation, mainly from the linguistic side, of Scandinavian divine mythology, and related material (literary and inscriptional) from other Germanic-speaking regions. It is a translation, somewhat revised by the author, of "Lexikon der germanischen Mythologie," originally published in 1984. Angela Hall's translation reads well, although the German sentence structure and vocabulary show through from time to time. (Works of literature "come into being.") There also some minor annoyances: Why use an unusual word like "descendancy" (as in "belief in the divine descendancy of the Germanic kings"), when "descent" is available?

The perspective throughout is continental and German, rather than, like most of the works currently available in English, Scandinavian or Anglo-American. Heroic legends are considered only where they unquestionably overlap with stories of the gods, or appear to preserve descriptions of rituals and beliefs. Scandinavian words and names are generally given in their original spelling, including special letters and accents, either as the main heading, or at least as an alternative to a familiar Anglicized spelling. (Some casual readers may find this annoying, but it is extremely useful.) Latin sources include not only the inevitable Caesar, Tacitus, and Pliny, but inscriptions with Germanic, or possibly Germanic, names, notably including dedications to the "Matronae," on which the readily available literature in English is rather small.

Three quarters of fairly serious study of Old English at UCLA, plus a lot of unsystematic reading, does not give me the background to pass an independent judgment on the etymologies, but the German edition seems to have been well-received by the professional community. The main secondary sources Simek cites are highly reputable. In the few instances in which I have studied the literature about a name or word, Simek's views are entirely reasonable (even if I don't always agree with the side he is on.) I expect to use Simek as a basic reference on these matters for years to come, along with two other recent reference volumes, Lindow's "Norse Mythology: A Guide to the Gods, Heroes, Rituals, and Beliefs" and Orchard's "Dictionary of Norse Myth & Legend."

The cumulative bibliography is impressive, and seems well-chosen; I expect to make considerable use of it. Given its length, there are only a few unexpected omissions. The nineteenth-century Stallybrass translation of Jakob Grimm's pioneering "Deutsche mythologie" (as "Teutonic Mythology"), long available from Dover Publications in paperbafck [and since re-issued by them is hardcover], is missing. One might presume that the German original is listed for its historical interest only, but in fact it is cited, by page numbers, as a basic reference in some articles. Adding or substituting the English version would have been a convenience; although added work for the industrious translator. Among recent titles, the English translation of P.V. Glob's "The Mound People" is included, but not that of his better-known account of Iron Age bodies preserved in peat, "The Bog People" -- it *is* obsolete, but so is the Danish original! Although there are probably other gaps, given the number of titles involved, and the variety of languages they represent, these are minor issues.

So far, overwhelmingly to the good.

Unfortunately, coverage of narrative sources, particularly those from outside of Scandinavia, is oddly spotty. Some of it is quite good, but some is not. For example, the Venerable Bede (page 33) does indeed give the earliest extant (but not necessarily the earliest) version of the story of Hengest and Horsa, and the arrival of the Germanic tribes in Britain. But he has nothing to say of Scyld Scefing, who appears as such only in "Beowulf." Simek elsewhere gives the impression that Beowulf the Dane, son of Scyld, is the hero of the epic, instead of Beowulf the Geat. (It is generally, although not universally, accepted that the Danish Beowulf is a scribal error for Beow[a], son of Sceaf in other texts.)

Most of the factual errors I have spotted are easily corrected by consulting the (usually well-known) original sources, or just another reference book, but a lot of people probably won't bother, so their presence is disturbing. If they are carried over from the German edition, they should have been caught and corrected by the time the author revised the book for the present translation.

There are also some more purely typographical errors, such as "Nennius" for Ennius, an early Latin poet (page 75). (A Nennius is the author, according to some manuscripts, of a "British History" in which Hengest and Horsa appear, along with Vortigern and a version of Merlin ... and perhaps should have rated an entry.)

An immediately attractive feature of the book is the information on the modern "reception" of the character or story -- poems, plays, operas, art, etc. However, I hope that the information on German works is more accurate than that on English and French literature. For example, Simek correctly reports, as has long been recognized, that the Germanic dwarf Alberich entered French literature as Auberon (later Oberon), an undersized Fairy King in the story of "Huon of Bordeaux" -- but that is a Carolingian, not an Arthurian, romance (page 6). Elsewhere, "Huon de Bordeaux" is certainly *not* the author of an Elizabethan chapbook about Oberon (page 239)! The latter entry also confounds the characters of Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and Spenser's "The Faerie Queene." Of less literary moment, on page 323, "the cartoon series *Der maechtige Thor*" is probably the (unrecognized by the translator?) Marvel comic book "The Mighty Thor." Two novels are cited as "Literature" under "Werwolves" -- from other information, the titles of both appear to be metaphorical, and one (in German!) should read "Wehrwolf" not "Werwolf." (The science fiction and fantasy fan in me wants to replace them with James Blish's "There Shall Be No Darkness" and Jack Williamson's "Darker Than You Think," among other titles.)

In conclusion, this is a worthwhile work, which seems trustworthy in its area of main focus, and somewhat erratic when covering side issues, particularly modern literary works.

5 out of 5 stars The Last Word..........1999-12-25

I have been working on a novel regarding Nordic Mythology for 2 years and have found Simek's Dictionary to be the single, best resource for checking facts in a quick, orderly fashion. Though a translation, it is very readable whether for research or browsing. Simek melds Teutonic and Norse subjects with etymology, cross references and original sources, as well as insightful interpretations and bibliography under entries. No pictures, all images are verbal.
Gods & Myths of Northern Europe
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    Gods & Myths of Northern Europe
    H R Ellis Davidson
    Manufacturer: PELICAN BOOKS (ENGLAND)
    ProductGroup: Book
    Binding: Paperback
    ASIN: B000UDQWWC
    Gods and Goddesses of the Vikings and Northlands (Gods & Goddesses Of...)
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      Gods and Goddesses of the Vikings and Northlands (Gods & Goddesses Of...)
      Leon Ashworth
      Manufacturer: Cherrytree Books
      ProductGroup: Book
      Binding: Hardcover

      GeneralGeneral | Ages 4-8 | Children's Books | Subjects | Books
      ASIN: 1842340417
      GODS AND MYTHS OF NORTHERN EUROPE
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        GODS AND MYTHS OF NORTHERN EUROPE
        H.R ELLIS DAVIDSON
        Manufacturer: PENGUIN BOOKS
        ProductGroup: Book
        Binding: Paperback
        ASIN: B000UTI9M2

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