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No Sense of Humour? ‘Humour’ Words in Old Norse

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The Palgrave Handbook of Humour, History, and Methodology

Abstract

The Old Norse language, dialects of which were spoken across Scandinavia in the Middle Ages, has no equivalent of the Modern English umbrella term ‘humour’. (Of course, neither do many languages, dead or living: Old Norse acts as a case study here for a methodology that could be applied to multiple other instances.) One way, then, to approach a culture’s sense of what for Modern English speakers falls under ‘humour’, is to examine its own vocabulary of terms relating to phenomena like amusement, entertainment, jokes, and so on, and the contexts in which they appear. This allows for a culturally specific mapping of what forms of ‘humour’ were prevalent, appropriate, prized, or otherwise. The chapter offers contextual discussion of Old Norse terms like gaman (amusement), skemmtun (entertainment), leikr (game, play), hlægi (ridicule), glens (jesting), háð (mockery), and others. In doing so it aims to highlight the problems and complexities of translation and interpretation from a linguistic and cultural context in which there are often no easy one-on-one correspondences with Modern English vocabulary and terminology, as well as to show where continuities with Modern English can be found.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    See especially Condren, this volume. I am grateful to Ralph O’Connor for his helpful comments on a draft of this chapter.

  2. 2.

    See, for example Dixon, ‘“Emotion”’. See also Tierney-Hynes, this volume.

  3. 3.

    For example, Rosenwein, ‘Emotion Words’, 96–97.

  4. 4.

    Rosenwein, ‘Emotion Words’, 101; Wierzbicka, Emotions.

  5. 5.

    Halliwell, Greek Laughter, ix.

  6. 6.

    ONP, User’s Guide, § I.D.i.

  7. 7.

    Ibid.

  8. 8.

    Items are presented with semantic considerations in mind, rather than in alphabetical order.

  9. 9.

    A revised edition, supplemented by W. A. Craigie, was produced in 1957, but I have been unable to access this work during the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020. In any case, since it is online, the older edition is the more widely accessible.

  10. 10.

    Such literary-critical studies for Old Norse specifically, which generally utilise modern terms for humour or subtypes of it, include: Abram, ‘Trolling’; Anderson, ‘Form’; Ashurst, ‘Elements of Satire’; Ármann Jakobsson, ‘Young Love’; Bartusik, ‘Sarð’; Classen, ‘Sarcasm’; Clover, ‘Hárbarðsljóð’; van Dijk, ‘Amused’; Durrenberger and Wilcox, ‘Humor’; Grønlie, ‘Preaching’; Jóhanna Katrín Friðriksdóttir, ‘Gender’; Meulengracht Sørensen, ‘On Humour’; McKinnell, ‘Þórr as Comic Hero’; North, ‘goð geyja’; Vésteinn Ólason, ‘List og tvísæ’; Willson, ‘Parody’.

  11. 11.

    See, for example Stewart, ‘Laughter and the Greek Philosophers’, 29.

  12. 12.

    Sif Rikhardsdottir, Emotions, 118.

  13. 13.

    Wolf, ‘Laughter’, 94.

  14. 14.

    Steblin-Kamenskij, ‘On the History’, 154. A division along similar lines is common; for other contexts cf. Burde, ‘The parodia’, 215; Halliwell, ‘The Uses’, 280.

  15. 15.

    Steblin-Kamenskij, ‘On the History’, 157, 160.

  16. 16.

    Magennis, ‘Images of Laughter’, 196.

  17. 17.

    Wolf, ‘Laughter’.

  18. 18.

    Ibid., 98.

  19. 19.

    See, for example Burde, ‘The parodia’, 215.

  20. 20.

    Finsen, Grágás: Islændernes Lovbog, Ib, 182 (K §237).

  21. 21.

    Finnur Jónsson, ed. Brennu-Njálssaga, 264. All translations are my own unless explicitly stated otherwise in text.

  22. 22.

    Unger, Heilagra, II, 438.

  23. 23.

    Ranisch, Die Gautrekssaga, 26–27.

  24. 24.

    Bjarni Einarsson, Ágrip-Fagrskinna, 135.

  25. 25.

    Finlay, Fagrskinna, 107.

  26. 26.

    The story is told differently in Jómsvíkinga saga, where the narratorial comment is absent and the executioner is not amused, calling the Jomsviking ‘manna armastr’ [most wretched man] and putting him to death. Blake, The Saga of the Jomsvikings, 31.

  27. 27.

    Finlay, Fagrskinna, 107.

  28. 28.

    Guðbrandr Vigfússon and Unger, Flateyjarbok, 291.

  29. 29.

    Wolf, ‘Laughter’, 94; cf. Le Goff, ‘Laughter’, 162.

  30. 30.

    Low, ‘The Mirthless’.

  31. 31.

    Loth, Karlamagnús saga, 288.

  32. 32.

    Page, Gibbons saga, 26.

  33. 33.

    Ibid. The late date of AM 585c 4to does not necessarily imply language change; modern Icelandic glotta means ‘sneer, grin, smirk’ (Sverrir Hólmarsson et al., Íslensk-ensk orðabók: glotta).

  34. 34.

    Low, ‘The Mirthless’, 102.

  35. 35.

    Bjarni Aðalbjarnarson, Heimskringla III, 154.

  36. 36.

    Ibid., 155.

  37. 37.

    Ibid.

  38. 38.

    Gering, Islendzk æventyri, 178.

  39. 39.

    Einar Ólafur Sveinsson, Brennu-Njáls saga, 61.

  40. 40.

    Normalised from af Petersens, Jómsvíkinga saga, 125.

  41. 41.

    Kålund, Laxdœla saga, 261.

  42. 42.

    See Meulengracht Sørensen, The Unmanly Man, especially 17–20.

  43. 43.

    Kålund, Sturlunga, II, 170–71.

  44. 44.

    Indrebø, Gamal norsk Homiliebok, 38.

  45. 45.

    Faulkes, Prologue and Gylfaginning, 34.

  46. 46.

    Ibid.

  47. 47.

    Kålund, Sturlunga, I, 23.

  48. 48.

    Ibid.

  49. 49.

    Jiriczek, Die Bósa-Saga, 7.

  50. 50.

    Guðbrandr Vigfússon, Barðarsaga, 28.

  51. 51.

    Anderson, ‘Bard’s Saga’, 254.

  52. 52.

    Björn K. Þórólfsson, Fóstbrœðra saga, 93.

  53. 53.

    Regal, ‘The Saga of the Sworn Brothers’, 360.

  54. 54.

    Kålund, Heiðarvíga saga, 107.

  55. 55.

    Ólafur Halldórsson, Óláfs saga, 233.

  56. 56.

    Guðbrandr Vigfússon and Unger, Flateyjarbók, 397.

  57. 57.

    Kålund, Sturlunga, I, 355.

  58. 58.

    Guðrún Nordal, Ethics, 78.

  59. 59.

    Kålund, Laxdœla saga, 180.

  60. 60.

    Bjarni Aðalbjarnarson, Heimskringla, I, 5.

  61. 61.

    Ólsen, Den tredje, 113–14.

  62. 62.

    Finsen, Grágás: Islændernes Lovbog, Ib, 183 (K §238).

  63. 63.

    Sverrir Hólmarson et al., Íslensk-ensk orðabók: háð.

  64. 64.

    Finnur Jónsson, Gunnlaugs saga, 52.

  65. 65.

    On the borrowing of ON gabb into Old French and its development there, see Grigsby, The Gab, especially 7–29.

  66. 66.

    Finsen, Grágás: Islændernes Lovbog, Ib, 182 (K §237).

  67. 67.

    Finsen, Grágás: Efter, 380–81 (St §361).

  68. 68.

    Finsen, Grágás: Islændernes Lovbog, Ib, 183 (K §238).

  69. 69.

    Ibid.

  70. 70.

    Ibid.

  71. 71.

    On níð see especially Ström, Níð; Meulengracht Sørensen, The Unmanly Man.

  72. 72.

    Sverrir Hólmarson et al., Íslensk-ensk orðabók: spott.

  73. 73.

    Ólafur Halldórsson, Óláfs saga, I, 15.

  74. 74.

    Björn K. Þórólfsson, Fóstbrœðra saga, 169.

  75. 75.

    Ibid.

  76. 76.

    Kålund, Sturlunga, I, 51.

  77. 77.

    Ibid., 342.

  78. 78.

    Marold, ‘Mansǫngr’. On later Nordic comic ballads see Hansen, this volume.

  79. 79.

    Guðrún Nordal, Ethics, 172.

  80. 80.

    Sverrir Hólmarson et al., Íslensk-ensk orðabók: skop.

  81. 81.

    Finnur Jónsson, Vatsdælasaga, 100.

  82. 82.

    For discussion of the requirement of an element of humour in the definition of satire, see Marshall, The Practice of Satire, 2.

  83. 83.

    Cf. Derrin’s introduction to this volume.

  84. 84.

    Einar Ólafur Sveinsson, Brennu-Njáls saga, 87.

  85. 85.

    Ibid., 89.

  86. 86.

    Ibid.

  87. 87.

    Jón Helgason, Heiðreks saga, 37.

  88. 88.

    Tolkien, Saga Heiðreks konungs, xvi.

  89. 89.

    Kålund, Sturlunga, I, 19–20.

  90. 90.

    Ibid., 20.

  91. 91.

    Ibid., 21.

  92. 92.

    Even if mockery (brigzli) were true it was subject to lesser outlawry in Grágás. See Finsen, Grágás: Islændernes Lovbog, Ib, 182 (K §237).

  93. 93.

    On the senna see, for example Abram, ‘Trolling’; Swenson, ‘Performing Definitions’; Harris, ‘The senna’.

  94. 94.

    See, for example Krupnik and Müller-Wille, ‘Franz Boas’.

  95. 95.

    See for instance Blake, ‘Taboo Language’.

  96. 96.

    On the honour culture of early Scandinavia, see, for example Meulengracht Sørensen, Fortælling og ære.

  97. 97.

    Halliwell, Greek Laughter, 25.

  98. 98.

    Ólafur Halldórsson, Óláfs saga, 233.

  99. 99.

    Finsen, Grágás: Islændernes Lovbog, Ib, 182 (K §237).

  100. 100.

    Bremmer and Roodenburg, A Cultural History, 1.

  101. 101.

    Halliwell, Greek Laughter, 10–11.

  102. 102.

    Kålund, Sturlunga, I, 19.

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  1. Department of English Studies, Durham University, Durham, UK

    Daniel Derrin

  2. Department of History, University of Aberdeen, Aberdeen, UK

    Hannah Burrows

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© 2020 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG

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Burrows, H. (2020). No Sense of Humour? ‘Humour’ Words in Old Norse. In: Derrin, D., Burrows, H. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Humour, History, and Methodology. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-56646-3_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-56646-3_3

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  • Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-56645-6

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-56646-3

  • eBook Packages: HistoryHistory (R0)

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