02

Appendix 2

The father of Saxo’s Amlethus was Horvandillus, written also Orendel, Erentel, Earendel, Oervandill, Aurvandil, whom the appendix to the Heldenbuch pronounces the first of all heroes that were ever born. The few data known about him are summarized by Jacob Grimm: [1]

He suffers shipwreck on a voyage, takes shelter with a master fisherman Eisen, [2] earns the seamless coat of his master, and afterwards wins frau Breide, the fairest of women: king Eigel of Trier was his father’s name. The whole tissue of the fable puts one in mind of the Odyssey: the shipwrecked man clings to a plank, digs himself a hole, holds a bough before him; even the seamless coat may be compared to Ino’s veil, and the fisher to the swineheard, dame Breide’s templars would be Penelope’s suitors, and angels are sent often, like Zeus’s messengers. Yet many things take a different turn, more in German fashion, and incidents are added, such as the laying of a naked sword between the newly married couple, which the Greek story knows nothing of. The hero’s name is found even in OHG. documents: Orendil . . . Orentil . . . a village Orendelsal, now Orendensall, in Hohenlohe . . . But the Edda has another myth, which was alluded to in speaking of the stone in Thor’s head. Groa is busy conning her magic spell, when Thorr, to requite her for the approaching cure, imparts the welcome news, that in coming from Jötunheim in the North he has carried her husband the bold Örvandill in a basket on his back, and he is sure to be home soon; he adds by way of token, that as Örvandil’s toe had stuck out of the basket and got frozen, he broke it off and flung it at the sky, and made a star of it, which is called Örvandils-tâ. But Groa in her joy at the tidings forgot her spell, so the stone in the god’s head never got loose (Snorri’s Skaldskap. 17).

Powell, [3] in his turn, compares the hero to Orion in his keen interpretation:

The story of Orwandel (the analogue of Orion the Hunter) must be gathered chiefly from the prose Edda. He was a huntsman, big enough and brave enough to cope with giants. He was the friend of Thor, the husband of Groa, the father of Swipdag, the enemy of the giant Coller and the monster Sela. The story of his birth, and of his being blinded, are most apparently in the Teutonic stories, unless we may suppose that the bleeding of Robin Hood till he could not see, by the traitorous prioress, is the last remains of the story of the great archer’s death. Dr. Rydberg regards him and his kinsfolk as doublets of those three men of feats, Egil the archer, Weyland the smith, and Finn the harper, and these again doublets of the three primeval artists, the sons of Iwaldi, whose story is told in the prose Edda.

It is not known which star, or constellation, Örvandils-tâ was supposed to be. Apart from such wild notions as that the whole of Orion represented his toe [4] — to identify it with Rigel, i.e., beta Orionis, would be worth discussing — even Reuter tries to convince himself that Corona borealis “looks like a toe,” [5] because he could not free himself from the fetters of seasonal interpretation of myth, nor dared he attack the Romantic authority of Ludwig Uhland who had coined the dogma that Thor carried the sign for spring in his basket; accordingly a constellation had to be found which could announce springtime, and Reuter, choosing between Arcturus and Corona, elected the latter.

It is not his toe alone, however, which grants to Hamlet’s father his cosmic background: some lines of Cynewulf’s Christ dedicate to the hero the following words:

*Hail, Earendel, brightest of angels thou,
**sent to men upon this middle-earth!
**Thou art the true refulgence of the sun,
*radiant above the stars, and from thyself illuminest for ever all the tides of time. [6]

The experts disagree whether Earendel, here, points to Christ, or to Mary, and whether or not Venus as morning star is meant, an identification which offers itself, since ancient glosses render Earendel with " Jubar," [7] and Jubar is generally accepted for Venus on the presupposition that “morning star” stands every single time for Venus, which is certainly misleading: any star, constellation or planet rising heliacally may act as morning star. With respect to juba, i.e., literally “the mane of any animal,” jubar, “a beaming light, radiance," we have, however, Varro’s clear statement: “iuba dicitur stella Lucifer." [8] Nonetheless, several experts are against the equation Orendel/Earendel = Venus. [9] Gollancz abstains from precise identifications, but he procures the one more existing piece of evidence concerning the word Earendel:

In Anglo-Saxon glosses “earendel” . . . or “oerendil” is interpreted jubar, but “dawn” or “morning star” would probably be a better rendering, as in the only other passage known in old English literature, viz. the Blickling Homilies (p. 163, 1. 3): “Nu seo Cristes gebyrd at his aeriste, se niwa eorendel Sanctus Johannes; and nu se leoma thaere sothan sunnan God selfa cuman wille”; i.e., And now the birth of Christ (was) at his appearing, and the new day-spring (or dawn) was John the Baptist. And now the gleam of the true Sun, God himself, shall come. [10]

Orendel/Earendel, then, seems to be the foremost among those which announce some “advent,” not unlike the passage in the Odyssey (13.93f.) dealing with Odysseus’ arrival in Ithaca: “When that brightest of stars (astēr phaantatos) rose which comes to tell us that the dawn is near, the travelling ship was drawing close to an island.” That might point, again, to Venus, but there are reasons to think of Sirius, the brightest of all fixed stars, as will come out later.

Another subject of discussion has been the etymology of the name, and since the identity of Orendel might depend on its etymology, we have to look into the matter, at least superficially. Jacob Grimm admitted freely:

I am only in doubt as to the right spelling and interpretation of the word: an OHG. ôrentil implies AS. eárendel, and the two would demand ON. aurvendill, eyrvendill; but if we start with ON. örvendill, then AS. earendel, OHG. erentil would seem preferable. The latter part of the compound certainly contains entil = wentil. [11] The first part should be either ôra, eáre (auris), or else ON. ör, gen. örval (sagitta). Now, as there occurs in a tale in Saxo Grammaticus . . . a Horvendilus filius Gervendili, and in OHG. a name Kêrwentil . . . and Gêrentil . . . and geir (hasta) agrees better with ö**r than with eyra (auris), the second interpretation may command our assent; a sight of the complete legend would explain the reason of the name. I think Orentil’s father deserves attention too: Eigil is another old and obscure name . . . Can the story of Orentil’s wanderings possibly be so old amongst us, that in Orentil and Eigil of Trier we are to look for that Ulysses and Laertes whom Tacitus places on our Rhine? The names show nothing in common.

Scherer (p. 179) states shortly: “Earendel does not belong to âusôs ‘dawn,’ nor to OE. éar ’ear’ (Ähre), but to OE. ae, éar m. ‘wave, sea,’ ON. aurr ‘humidity’.” Gollancz, who is inclined to connect Earendel with Eastern (ushas, eos, aurora, etc.), mentions more current derivations, among which is that from aurr “moisture,” and from the root signifying “to burn” in Greek, euo, Latin uro, Ves-uvius, etc. Decisive seems to us the derivation from ör = arrow, suggested by Grimm, and by Uhland, who explained Orendel as the one “who operates with the arrow” (in contrast to his grandfather, Gerentil, who worked with the ger = spear), and Simrock gives the opinion that the very gloss “Earendel Jubar” designates Earendel explicitly as “beam” (or “ray”), “which still in MHG. and Italian means ‘arrow’. " [12]

Simrock did more Taking into consideration that in the Heldenbuch Orendel is spelled Erendelle, and at some other place Ernthelle, he thinks it probable that “Ern” was dropped as epitheton ornans, [13] and he concludes from there that the story of Tell shooting the apple from the head of his son was once told of Orendel himself. That the historical (?) Tell was not the inventor of this famous shot, or even performed it, seems rather certain. As Grimm aptly stated:

The legend of Tell relates no real event, yet, without fabrication or lying, as a genuine myth it has shot up anew in the bosom of Switzerland, to embellish a transaction that took hold of the nation’s inmost being. [14]

Now there is no arrow to be found that could contest with Sirius in mythical significance. We know mulKAK.SI.DI, the “Arrow-Star” from Sumer, as well as “Tishtriya,” the arrow from Ancient Iran — it is shot from a bow built up by stars of Argo and Canis Major (Sumerian: mulBAN). The very same bow is to be found in the Chinese sphere, but there the arrow is shorter and aims at Sirius, the celestial Jackal, whereas the same Egyptian arrow is aimed at the star on the head of the Sothis Cow, as depicted in the so-called “Round Zodiac” of Dendera — Sirius again. In India, Sirius is the archer himself (Tishiya), and his arrow is represented by the stars of Orion’s Belt. And about all of them manifold legends are told. Thus, “Earendel, brightest of angels thou,” might well point to the brightest among the fixed stars, Sirius.

But even the derivation from the root aurr = moisture, ear = sea, would not exclude Sirius. Quite the contrary. The Babylonian New Year’s ritual says: “Arrow Star, who measures the depth of the sea”; the Avesta states: “Tishtriya, by whom the waters count.” And as Tishtriya, “the Arrow,” watches Lake Vurukasha (see p. 215), so Teutonic Egil is the guardian of Hvergelmer, the whirlpool, and of Elivagar, south of which “the gods have an ‘outgard,’ a ‘saeter’ which is inhabited by valiant watchers — snotrir vikinger they are called in Thorsdrapa, 8 — who are bound by oaths to serve the gods. Their chief is Egil, the most famous archer in the mythology. As such he is also called Orvendel (the one busy with the arrow).” [15]

We had better stop getting diffuse concerning Sirius the Arrow and his role as guardian and as “measurer of the depth of the sea”; the few hints that were given here must suffice to show the level at which to look for the father of Hamlet.

Since, however, we can never resist the temptation to quote beautiful poems, we have still to confess our suspicion that the “Stella Maris” is Sirius too. Enough is known about Isis/Sirius as guardian-deity of navigators, to whom belongs the “carra navalis,” and was it not “Mary or Christ” who was addressed with “Hail, Earendel”? In the same manner, the hymn “In Annunciatione Beatae Mariae” begins with the verses:

Ave, maris stella

Dei mater alma

atque semper virgo

felix caeli porta

Sumens illud Ave

Gabrielis ore

funda nos in pace

mutans nomen Evae.

And there is another hymn which was sung, according to the Roman Breviary, after Compline during Advent and Christmastide, and which has been ascribed to Herimanus Contractus of Reichenau (d. 1054), who would appear to have lived and died a cripple in his monastery:

Alma redemptoris mater, quae pervia caeli

porta manes et stella maris, succurre cadenti,

surgere qui curat, populo, tu quae genuisti

(natura irante) tuum sanctum genitorem,

Virgo pius et posterius, Gabrielis ab ore

sumens illud Ave, peccatorem miserere.

“What I have been attempting to suggest,” says the interpreter of this hymn, [16] “is that the attraction of this charming mediaeval prayer and hymn would seem to form, in large measure, from the intentional ambiguity, the different levels of meaning, and the sunken imagery . . . The ’nourishing mother’ is perhaps pictured as a fixed constellation in the heavens, or perhaps as the morning star, guiding those on the sea. She is a celestial passage-way, always passable and ever accessible . . . The falling and rising has now (besides the constantly falling sinners) perhaps the further overtones of heavenly bodies rising and falling, perhaps of ships rising and falling on the sea, and lastly of tottering children who need their mother’s help to walk . . . The poem . . . is a very striking one, and its force derives, in my view, from the subtle imagery of the first three lines . . . They offer us a symbol, a verbal icon, of the entire situation of man on earth in his struggle to rise to the stars, of his need of an otherworldly force which is at once strong and loving.”

__________

1. TM, pp. 374f. See also K. Simrock, Der ungenähte Rock oder König Orendel (1845), p. ix.

2. Also written Ise or Eise, and derived from Isis, by Simrock; considering that the fisherman’s modest home has seven towers, with 800 fishermen as his servants, Ise/Eisen looks more like the Fisher King of Arthurian Romances.

3. In his introduction to Elton’s translation of Saxo, p. cxxiii.

4. R. H. Allen, Star Names (1963), p. 310.

5. Germanische Himmelkunde (1934), p. 255.

6. See TM, p. 375; I. Gollancz, Hamlet in Iceland (1898), p. xxxvii; Reuter, p.256.

7. O jubar, angelorum splendidissime . . . See R. Heinzel, Über das Gedicht von König Orendel (1892), p. 15.

8. See W. Gundel,De stellarum appellatione et religione Romana (1907), p. 106; Reuter, pp. 256, 295ff.

9. E.g., A. Scherer, Gestirnnamen (1953), pp. 79-81.

10. Gollancz, p. xxxviin.

11. In a footnote. Grimm asks (and we wish we knew the answer!): “Whence did Matthesius (in Frisch 2, 439a) get his ‘Pan is the heathens’ Wendel and head bag-piper?’ Can the word refer to the metamorphoses of the flute-playing demigod? In trials of witches, Wendel is a name for the devil, Mones anz. 8, 124.”

12. Handbuch der Deutschen Mythologie (1869), § 82, P. 233.

13. lbid. See also Simrock, Die Quellen des Shakespeare (1870), pp. 129f.: “Dies ward aber wohl in Tell gekürzt, weil man die erste Silbe für jenes vor Namen stehende ‘Ehren’ ansah, as nach dem d. Würterb, III 52 aus ‘Herr’ erwachsen, bald für ein Epitheton ornans angesehen wurde."

14. TM 3, p. xxxiv.

15. V. Rydberg, Teutonic Mythology (1907), pp. 424ff., 968ff.

16. H. Musurillo, S.J., “The Medieval Hymn, Alma Redemptoris,” Classical Journal 52 (1957), pp. 171-74.