Description: The death of Vébjörg at the legendary Battle of Brávellir.
In Louis Moe's retelling of the story, Óðinn decides that
it is time for Vébjörg to become a Valkyrie so he commands a
young archer to shoot her during the battle. Óðinn finds her
body on the battlefield. Literal translation of the Danish text for page 90::
Óðinn approaches Vébjörg, lying among the dead as if asleep.
Bending towards her the tall man speaks: “Rise up, Vébjörg,
Valhöll awaits you!” While his horse paws impatiently, Vébjörg
rises up, wiping the sleep of death from her brow. Soon the
Valkyrie shall play the game of the eternally victorious with
her fighting sisters on the gleaming plains Iðavöllr. Editor's Note.
Source: Valkyrien: Romantisk Digtning i Billeder og
Tekst
Folio or Page: 90
Medium: Not known
Date: 1930
Dimensions (mm): 130 x 120
Provenance:
This copy of Valkyrien: Romantisk
Digtning i Billeder og Tekst was purchased by Trish Baer
from ABE Books.
Call number: PZ54.1 M65 1931
The University of Victoria Library photographed this copy of Valkyrien: Romantisk Digtning i Billeder
og Tekst at the request of Dr. P.A. Baer, Medieval
Studies, as 600 dpi tiffs with a Plustek OpticBook A300 (lrg book
scanner)
Rights:
Illustrations by Louis Moe in Valkyrien:
Romantisk Digtning i Billeder og Tekst came into the public
domain on January 1, 2017.
Bibliography:
Primary Sources
Moe,
Louis Maria Niels Peder
Halling. Valkyrien:
Romantisk Digtning. København:
Gyldendal, 1930.
Secondary Sources
Cleasby, Richard
and
Vigfússon
Guðbrandur
. An Icelandic-English Dictionary.
Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1957.
Saxo (Grammaticus). Danmarks krønike.
Edited by
Fr. Winkel
Horn,
Copenhagen: A. Christiansens
Kunstforlag, 1898.
―. The History of the Danes.
Translated by
Peter
Fisher,
Cambridge: D. S. Brewer,
1976.
The chief god of the Æsir in The Prose
Edda. However, in Heimskringla
he was a mortal who tricks the King of Sweden into believing that he
was a god.
Richard Wagner in The Ring of the Nibelung
based Wotan on Óðinn.
Events: Historical
Battle of Brávellir (non.)
Battle of Bravellir (en.)
A legendary battle described in Saxo's Gesta
Danorum and elsewhere in eddaic poetry and several
sagas.
Historical Persons, i.e. from Heimskringla, Saxo, sagas etc.
Vébjörg (non.)
Vebjorg (en.)
A shield maiden in Saxo's Gesta Danorum who
died at the Battle of Brávellir. She is the shield maiden in Louis Moe's
Valkyrien who becomes a
Valkyrie.
Supernatural female warriors who are closely associated with Óðinn
and decide the fate of warriors. They convey those who die in battle
to Valhöll to join the group known as einherjar who will fight on
the side of the Gods in the Battle of Ragnarök.
Árni Björnsson
notes in Wagner and the Volsungs: Icelandic Sources
of Der Ring des Nibelungen that
"the idea of the valkyries derives from the Eddas and other early
poetry. The German word Walküre is a nineteenth-century Germanistion
of the Icelandic valkyrja ('chooser of the slain') (155).
Source Materials:
Danmarks Kronike (da.)
Gesta Danorum (la.)
This edition of Saxo's Gesta Danorum was
translated and published by Fr. Winkel Horn and illustrated by Louis
Moe. Moe recycled some of his illustrations from Winkel Horn's edition
of Noreges konge-sagaer.
Gesta Danorum (la.)
Saxo Grammaticus's thirteenth century prose work concerning Danish
mythology and history.
Valkyrien: Romantisk Digtning (da.)
Valkyrie: An illustrated
romance (en.)
Louis Moe's illustrated retelling of the life and death of the
legendary Danish shield maiden Vébjörg.
Source Persons
Moe,
Louis (no.)
b. 1857
d. 1945
Nationality: Norwegian/Danish.
Occupation: illustrator
Residence: Copenhagen
Moe was an illustrator who was born in Norway but became a Danish
citizen in 1919.
Saxo
Grammaticus (la.)
b. 1150
d. 1220
Nationality: Danish
Occupation: cleric
Saxo wrote the Gesta Danorum, which is known
in English as The History of the Danes . His
account of mythological Norse gods and heroes is heavily
euhemerized.
