Myths and Magic in the Medieval Far North: Realities and Representations of a Region on the Edge of Europe ed. by Stefan Figenschow et al.

Abstract

Reviewed by: Myths and Magic in the Medieval Far North: Realities and Representations of a Region on the Edge of Europe ed. by Stefan Figenschow et al. Roderick McDonald Figenschow, Stefan, Richard Holt, and Miriam Tveit, eds, Myths and Magic in the Medieval Far North: Realities and Representations of a Region on the Edge of Europe (Acta Scandinavica, 10), Turnhout, Brepols, 2020; hardback; pp. 280; 1 b/w, 7 colour illustrations; R.R.P. €75.00; ISBN 9782503588230. This study of the medieval Far North examines the northerly regions of Hálogaland and Finnmǫrk, and the northerly peoples: the Finns, the Sámi, and the Bjarmians, and their social, political, geographic, and cultural articulation and interconnectedness with Norway to the south. Here the alterity of the medieval Far North is re-oriented, looking instead southwards to Norway and beyond to centralizing European authority. Established at the University of Trømso in 2010, the Creating the New North research group is concerned with these regions and peoples between 500 and 1800, from the earlier eras of open interaction between different groups and cultures, to the later periods as it became subject to emerging southern powers and national states. Miriam Tveit, in the volume's introductory chapter, discusses the ways in which the Far North has been marked as a place of alterity for its superstition, witchcraft, and mystery, and six chapters of the volume are grouped under the broad topics of myth, magic, and ritual. The remaining four chapters appear under the rubric of political consolidation, and they deal with the ways in which representation of the Far North has been configured in terms of wider national and international politics, both secular and religious. In the first section of the book, 'Myth, Magic and Rituals in the Nordic World', are six markedly divergent chapters. Lars Ivar Hansen opens with a solid ethnographic examination of the construction and reception of Sámi/Norwegian differentiation in the anonymous twelfth-century Historia Norvegie, and this work is noteworthy for the use of the sociology of Zygmunt Baumann in grounding discussion of 'the Other'. Next, Eleanor Rosamund Barraclough looks to mythic geography, exploring divergent representations of the various lands of giants in Old Norse fornaldarsögur, as uninhabitable periphery to the habitable core of human life and settlement. She reveals the lack of a consistent typology, other than being, in one way or another, northerly, and speculates on both literary and folkloric importance of wilderness for delineating human existence. Third in the section, Petter Snekkestad takes a comparative approach to reading Grímnismál, challenging received views through admitting an alternative role of the Vanir, arising from his examination of the maritime 'Utrøst Complex' of northern folklore. Marte Spangen then turns to archaeological evidence for Sámi culture, assessing medieval realities around 'stallo' houses, reindeer traps, and offering sites in the context of modern stereotypes. She sounds a timely warning about modernist assumptions that oral tradition preserves and reflects ancient practice, arguing instead that indigenous folklore is better understood as dynamic, contextual, and functioning within the present. Then follows a summary of research into the fourteenth-century northern witch-trial of Ragnild Tregagaas, [End Page 211] in which Rune Blix Hagen presents an account of the actual church court case and applies a comparative view of other like trials in Europe, revealing marked social differences. The final chapter in the section is devoted to Karoline Kjesrud's thorough re-assessment of ale as a cultural institution, in which she draws upon literary, linguistic, and runic/archaeological evidence to support her view that ale is best viewed not just as a drink, but in terms of ritualistic performance that asserts and reinforces social and institutional values and authority. The second section of the book, 'Myths and Representations in the Political Consolidation of the North', opens with Yassin Nyang Karoliussen arguing for scholarship that avoids ethnic labelling for the northern regions of Hálogaland, Finnmǫrk, and Omð. Rather, a better understanding of both ethnicity and social conditions would be to embrace models of hybridization, and culture can be seen expressed through comparative symbolic activities. The examples she uses, such as grave mounds and courtyard...