Ancestor Worship and the Elite in Late Iron Age Scandinavia: A Grave Matter

Description

Ancestor worship is often assumed by contemporary European audiences to be an outdated and primitive tradition with little relevance to our societies, past and present. This book questions that assumption and seeks to determine whether ancestor ideology was an integral part of religion in Viking Age and early medieval Scandinavia. The concept is examined from a broad socio-anthropological perspective, which is used to structure a set of case studies which analyse the cults of specific individuals in Old Norse literature. The situation of gods in Old Norse religion has been almost exclusively addressed in isolation from these socio-anthropological perspectives. The public grave mound cults of deceased rulers are discussed conventionally as cases of sacral kingship, and, more recently, religious ruler ideology; both are seen as having divine associations in Old Norse scholarship. Building on the anthropological framework, this study introduces the concept of ‘superior ancestors’, employed in social anthropology to denote a form of political ancestor worship used to regulate social structure deliberately. It suggests that Old Norse ruler ideology was based on conventional and widely recognised religious practices revolving around kinship and ancestors and that the gods were perceived as human ancestors belonging to elite families. Acknowledgements Abbreviations Introduction Part 1. Theoretical considerations Chapter 1. Old Norse religion: Approach, sources and method 1.1 Old Norse religion 1.1.1 What is ‘religion’? 1.1.2 What is ‘Old Norse’? 1.1.3 The non-static and heterogenous nature of Old Norse religion 1.1.4 Heterogenous conceptions of the afterlife in Old Norse religion 1.1.5 Gravemounds and ancestors in Old Norse religion 1.1.6 Folk vs. world religion 1.1.7 Paganism and Christianity 1.2 Primary sources 1.3 Method Notes Secondary sources Chapter 2. Research on ancestor worship 2.1 The development of ‘ancestor worship’ as an academic term 2.2 Ancestor worship in Old Norse research Notes Secondary sources Chapter 3. Ancestors in social anthropology: Definition and social use 3.1 ‘Ancestor worship’ – the problem with terminology 3.2 The role of ancestors in folk religions 3.3 Family, kinship and ‘superior ancestors’ 3.4 ‘Superior ancestor worship’ Notes Secondary sources Chapter 4. Kings and gods in Old Norse religion 4.1 The myth of ‘sacral kingship’ 4.2 Euhemerism – medieval propaganda or just history? Notes Secondary sources Part 2. Case studies Chapter 5. Introduction to the case studies Note Secondary sources Chapter 6. Erik of Birka Notes Secondary sources Chapter 7. The Ynglingar 7.1 Background on the Ynglingar 7.1.1 Sources 7.1.2 The Ynglingar and sacral kingship 7.1.3 Ynglingatal: authorial purpose 7.2 Freyr 7.2.1 Adam’s Templum 7.2.2 Adam’s account of human sacrifice 7.2.3 Icons and processions 7.3 Hálfdanr svarti 7.4 Óláfr Geirstaðaálfr Notes Secondary sources Chapter 8. The Háleygjar 8.1 The Háleygjar and sacral kingship 8.2 Þorgerðr hǫlgabrúðr Notes Secondary sources Chapter 9. The Settlers of Breiðafjǫrðr 9.1 Þórólfr Mostrarskegg 9.2 Auðr djúp(a)úðga Notes Secondary sources Chapter 10. General conclusion Primary sources Index