(twinkling music)
- Whosoever holds this hammer, if he be worthy,
shall possess the power of Thor.
Bet you can't guess what we're gonna talk about?
Thor's hammer is easily
one of the most iconic weapons around,
both in real world mythology
and in modern fantasy.
It is the symbol of Thor's power,
and the ban of frost giants everywhere.
Let's talk about everyone's favorite hammer, Mjolnir,
and how it wasn't always known by the name it is today.
This story starts with the man named Larry Leiber.
He is the younger brother of Stan Lee Leiber,
and at the foundation of Marvel Comics,
co-created a number of our favorite super heroes,
one of which happens to be the Asgardian himself,
at least Marvel's version of him.
We'll get to that later.
Of course Thor is nothing without his famous Uru Hammer,
uh, I mean Mjolnir.
- Meh meh, what's meh meh?
- Or what was and what would become again, Mjolnir.
Yep, as Thor was first being born
as Marvel's god of thunder,
his hammer was given a different name,
but why, and where did this name even come from?
Well it turns out good ol Leiber made it up himself,
and by his own explanation,
he chose the name because it was short,
(laughter)
and thus easier on the letterer,
the person that writes the text in the speech bubble
in text in comics,
because we all know having a simple name
is much more important than having an impactful one, right?
Though as it turns out Uru does actually happen to have
some pretty solid Thor like meanings,
most originating from Sanskrit,
such as great and large,
so it's got that going for it.
This invented name was then first used
in Journey Into Mystery number 83,
printed in December of 1962,
of which Larry Leiber is the sole author.
Uru Hammer even stuck around for a few issues
as Roy Thomas, then writer and editor for Marvel,
had to find a way to work the second name
into Thor's legend.
You see originally, to Thomas's understanding,
Uru must have been the actual
mythological name for the hammer,
I mean why else would Leiber have called it that, right?
So after poring through many historical texts,
trying to find it and failing,
and learning in the process
of the hammer's true name, Mjolnir.
- Mjolnir.
- He brought the inconsistencies to the attention of Leiber.
It was then that Leiber revealed his favorite naming method,
which didn't involve mythology at all, no.
This is one where he would flip to the back of a dictionary
to find some foreign names,
and then just combine them
until he came up with something that he liked.
Well then.
With this knowledge Thomas elected to make Uru
the name of the metal Mjolnir was forged from,
effectively rendering Uru Hammer
a description of Mjolnir rather than a name.
This was a nice way to tie up the confusion
caused by the second name,
and also add a little more richness
to Marvel's Asgardian lore.
Real quick to why I specified
Marvel's version of Thor earlier.
As it turns out DC Comics
had created their own version of Thor
and his hammer Mjolnir, 20 years prior.
He made appearances in both Adventure Comics number 75,
The Strange Case Of The Luckless Liars,
and the Sandman story
The Villain From Valhalla.
That villain being Thor.
Very different from the Marvel hero we know and love.
Now back to Marvel story,
what exactly is Uru anyway?
What did Thomas create with his adaptation of this name?
Well in short, it is a highly durable metallic substance
with an affinity to magic,
and the ability to maintain a symbiotic relationship
with it's wielder,
both enhancing their abilities,
and allowing them to enhance it.
It's pretty incredible stuff right?
Yep, what is quite the possibly the greatest substance
in the Marvel universe only exists as it is,
because Mister Lieber felt creative with naming a weapon,
that all ready had a name.
All right, so I'm curious.
What do you think of the Uru Hammer?
Would you have named Thor's weapon
something different like Lieber did,
or stuck to the tried and true Nordic mythos,
and what kind of origin story
do you think Mjolnir might have had
if Marvel had not retconned into their lore
the way that they did.
Be sure to let us know in the comments.
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behind our famous comics.
Once again guys, this is DK,
thank you so much for joining us for Alter Ego,
and I will see you next time.