In Norse mythology, the Vanir are a group of gods associated with fertility,
wisdom, nature, magic, and the ability to see the future. The Vanir are one of
two groups of gods and are the namesake of the location Vanaheimr. After the
Æsir–Vanir War, the Vanir became a subgroup of the Æsir. Subsequently,
members of the Vanir are sometimes also referred to as members of the Æsir.
The Vanir are attested in the Poetic Edda, compiled in the 13th century from
earlier traditional sources; the Prose Edda and Heimskringla, both written in
the 13th century by Snorri Sturluson; and in the poetry of skalds. The Vanir
are only attested in these Old Norse sources. Vanir is sometimes anglicized
to Wanes. All sources describe the deities Njörðr,
Freyr and Freyja as members of the Vanir. A euhemerized prose account in
Heimskringla adds that Njörðr's sister—whose name is not provided—and
Kvasir were Vanir. In addition, Heimskringla reports a tale involving
king Sveigðir's visit to Vanaheimr, where he meets a woman by the name of
Vana and the two produce a child named Vanlandi.
While not attested as Vanir, the gods Heimdallr and Ullr have been theorized
as potential members of the group. In the Prose Edda, a name listed for boars
is "Van-child". Scholars have theorized that the Vanir may be connected to small
pieces of gold foil found in Scandinavia at some building sites from the
Migration Period to the Viking Age and occasionally in graves. They have
speculated whether the Vanir originally represented pre-Indo-European deities or
Indo-European fertility gods, and have theorized a form of the gods as
venerated by the pagan Anglo-Saxons. Etymology
Numerous theories have been proposed for the etymology of Vanir. Scholar R. I.
Page says that, while there are no shortages of etymologies for the word,
it is tempting to link the word with "Old Norse vinr, 'friend', and Latin
Venus, 'goddess of physical love.'" Attestations
= Poetic Edda= In the Poetic Edda, the Vanir, as a
group, are specifically referenced in the poems Völuspá, Vafþrúðnismál,
Skírnismál, Þrymskviða, Alvíssmál and Sigrdrífumál. In Völuspá, a stanza
describes the events of the Æsir–Vanir War, noting that during the war the
Vanir broke the walls of the stronghold of the Æsir, and that the Vanir were
"indomitable, trampling the plain." In Vafþrúðnismál, Gagnráðr engages in a
game of wits with the jötunn Vafþrúðnir. Gagnráðr asks Vafþrúðnir where the Van
god Njörðr came from, for though he rules over many hofs and hörgrs, Njörðr
was not raised among the Æsir. Vafþrúðnir responds that Njörðr was
created in Vanaheimr by "wise powers" and details that during the Æsir–Vanir
War, Njörðr was exchanged as a hostage. In addition, when the world ends, Njörðr
"will return to the wise Vanir." Alvíssmál consists of question and
answer exchanges between the dwarf Alvíss and the god Thor. In the poem,
Alvíss supplies terms that various groups, including the Vanir, use to
refer to various subjects. Alvíss attributes nine terms to the Vanir; one
for Earth, Heaven, clouds, calm, the sea, fire, wood, seed, and ale.
The poem Þrymskviða states that the god Heimdallr possesses foreknowledge, "as
the Vanir also can." Sigrdrífumál records that the Vanir are in possession
of a "sacred mead". In the poem, the valkyrie Sigrdrífa provides mystical
lore about runes to the hero Sigurd. Sigrdrífa notes that runes were once
carved on to various creatures, deities and other figures, and then shaved off
and mixed with a "sacred mead." This mead is possessed by the Æsir, the
elves, mankind, and the Vanir. In Skírnismál, the beautiful jötunn
Gerðr first encounters the god Freyr's messenger Skírnir, and asks him if he is
of the elves, of the Æsir, or of the "wise Vanir." Skírnir responds that he
is not of any of the three groups. Later in the poem, Skírnir is successful in
his threats against Gerðr, and Gerðr offers Skírnir a crystal cup full of
mead, noting that she never thought that she would love one of the Vanir.
= Prose Edda= The Vanir are mentioned in the Prose
Edda books Gylfaginning and Skáldskaparmál. In chapter 23 of
Gylfaginning, the enthroned figure of High relates that Njörðr was raised in
Vanaheimr. High says that during the Æsir–Vanir War, the Vanir sent Njörðr as
a hostage to the Æsir, and the Æsir sent to the Vanir the god Hœnir. The sending
of Njörðr as a hostage resulted in a peace agreement between the Æsir and the
Vanir. Chapter 35 provides information
regarding the goddess Freyja, including that one of her names is "Dis of the
Vanir." In the same chapter, High tells that the goddess Gná rides the horse
Hófvarpnir, and that this horse has the ability to ride through the air and atop
the sea. High continues that "once some Vanir saw her path as she rode through
the air" and that an unnamed one of these Vanir says, in verse:
"What flies there? What fares there?
or moves through the air?" Gná responds:
"I fly not though I fare
and move through the air on Hofvarpnir
the one whom Hamskerpir got with Gardrofa."
In chapter 57 of Skáldskaparmál, the god Bragi explains the origin of poetry.
Bragi says the origin of poetry lies in the Æsir-Vanir War. During the peace
conference held to end the war both the Æsir and the Vanir formed a truce by
spitting into a vat. When they left, the gods decided that it shouldn't be poured
out, but rather kept as a symbol of their peace, and so from the contents
they made a man; Kvasir. Kvasir is later murdered by dwarves, and from his blood
the Mead of Poetry is made. In chapter 6, poetic names for Njörðr
are provided, including "descendant of Vanir or a Van". As reference, a poem by
the 11th century skald Þórðr Sjáreksson is provided where Njörðr is described as
a Vanr. In chapter 7, poetic names for Freyr are listed, including names that
reference his association with the Vanir; "Vanir god," "descendant of
Vanir," and "a Van." Freyja is also repeatedly cited as a Vanr. In chapter
20, some of Freyja's names are listed and include "Van-deity" and"Van-lady,"
and chapter 37 provides skaldic verse referring to Freyja as "Van-bride." In
chapter 75, names for pigs are provided, including "Van-child."
= Heimskringla= The Heimskringla book Ynglinga saga
provides an euhemerized account of the Æsir–Vanir War. As a peace agreement,
the two sides agreed to trade hostages. The Vanir sent Njörðr and Freyr to the
Æsir, and in turn the Æsir sent to the Vanir Hœnir and Mímir. Upon receiving
Mímir, the Vanir sent the "cleverest amongst them," Kvasir. In Vanaheimr, the
Vanir made Hœnir a chieftain. However, whenever Hœnir appeared at assemblies or
meetings where the Vanir asked him his opinion on difficult issues, his
response was "let others decide." The Vanir suspected that they had been
cheated by the Æsir in the hostage exchange, and so grabbed hold of Mímir,
cut off Mímir's head, and sent it to the Æsir.
The same chapter describes that while Njörðr lived among the Vanir, his wife
was his sister, and the couple had two children; Freyr and Freyja. However,
"among the Æsir it was forbidden to marry so near a kin." By Odin's
appointment, Njörðr and Freyr became priests over offerings of sacrifice, and
they were recognized as gods among the Æsir. Freyja was priestess at the
sacrifices, and "it was she who first taught the Æsir magic as was practiced
among the Vanir." In chapter 15, the king Sveigðir is
recorded as having married a woman named Vana in "Vanaland", located in Sweden.
The two produced a child, who they named Vanlandi.
Archaeological record Small pieces of gold foil decorated with
pictures of figures dating from the Migration Period into the early Viking
Age have been discovered in various locations in Scandinavia, in one case
almost 2,500. The foil pieces have been found largely at sites of buildings,
only rarely in graves. The figures are sometimes single, occasionally an
animal, sometimes a man and a woman with a leafy bough between them, facing or
embracing one another. The human figures are almost always clothed and are
sometimes depicted with their knees bent. Scholar Hilda Ellis Davidson says
that it has been suggested that the figures are partaking in a dance, and
that they may have been connected with weddings and linked to the Vanir,
representing the notion of a divine marriage, such as in the Poetic Edda
poem Skírnismál; the coming together of the Vanir god Freyr and his love, Gerðr.
Scholarly theories Like the Vanr goddess Freyja, the Vanir
as a group are not attested outside Scandinavia. Traditionally, following
Völuspá and Snorri Sturluson's account in the Prose Edda, scholarship on the
Vanir has focused on the Æsir–Vanir War, its possible basis in a war between
tribes, and whether the Vanir originated as the deities of a distinct people.
Some scholars have doubted that they were known outside Scandinavia; however,
there is evidence that the god Freyr is the same god as the Germanic deity Ing,
and that, if so, he is attested as having been known among the Goths. More
recently, the view put forward by Georges Dumézil based on Indo-European
parallels has dominated, wherein the Vanir, like the Æsir, derive from the
pre-Germanic heritage of Germanic religion and embody the third of the
three "functions" in his trifunctional hypothesis: chthonic and fertility
deities. Hilda Ellis Davidson theorizes that all
of the wives of the gods may have originally been members of the Vanir,
noting that many of them appear to have originally been children of jötnar.
Davidson additionally notes that "it is the Vanir and Odin who seem to receive
the most hostile treatment in Christian stories about mythological personages."
Alaric Hall has equated the Vanir with the elves, and Joseph S. Hopkins and
Haukur Þorgeirsson, building on suggestions by archaeologist Ole
Crumlin-Pedersen and others, link the Vanir to ship burial customs among the
North Germanic peoples, proposing an early Germanic model of a ship in a
"field of the dead" that may be represented both by Freyja's afterlife
field Fólkvangr and by the Old English Neorxnawang.
Richard North theorizes that glossing Latin vanitates for "gods" in Old
English sources implies the existence of *uuani in Deiran dialect and hence that
the gods that Edwin of Northumbria and the northern Angles worshiped in
pre-Christian Anglo-Saxon England were likely to have been the *uuani. He
comments that they likely "shared not only the name but also the orgiastic
character of the [Old Icelandic] Vanir." In 2010 Rudolf Simek, building on an
analysis by Lotte Motz, argued that vanir was originally nothing more than a
general term for deities like æsir, and that its employment as a distinct group
of deities was Snorri's invention, and the Vanir are therefore "a figment of
imagination from the 13th to 20th centuries". Simek's argument is
supported by a statistical analysis in the same academic newsletter of the
small corpus of poetic usages, which suggests that the term Vanir was a
"suspended archaism" used as a metrical alternative to Æsir. In contrast, in a
concurrently published response, Clive Tolley argues that the term must have
originated in historical usage, and as such "it is something of a
misrepresentation of the evidence to suggest that Snorri is the main source
for the vanir." Returning to the Indo-European origins theory, he argues
that the Vanir strengthen the Æsir by contributing their relationality, their
ability to absorb the other and their receptivity to sacrifice. In contrast,
continuing the same journal thread, Leszek P. Słupecki argues that the Vanir
remained distinct from the Æsir—except for Freyja and Freyr, whom he follows
Snorri in seeing as having been born after Njörðr became a hostage among the
Æsir, and thus regards as Æsic—and therefore that Ragnarök "[has] no
importance for their world". Modern influence
The Vanir are featured in the poem Om vanerne in Nordens Guder by Adam Gottlob
Oehlenschläger. Some Germanic Neopagans refer to their beliefs as Vanatrú.
See also List of Germanic deities
Notes References
External links Media related to Vanir at Wikimedia
Commons