Yggdrasil · Gods and Their Allies
What the Elves Call Things (Alvíssmál)
Words the elves use for earth, sky and sea in the poem Alvíssmál, where a dwarf answers Thor.
In Thorpe’s translation
The elves’ words, as Thorpe prints them in each answer:
11. …the Alfar groandi…
13. …the Alfar fagraræfr…
15. …the Alfar name it artali…
17. …the Alfar fagrahvel…
19. …the Alfar vedrmegin…
21. …the Alfar dynfari…
23. …the Alfar dagsevi…
25. …the Alfar lagastafr…
29. …the Alfar fagrlimi…
31. …the Alfar svefngaman…
33. …the Alfar lagastafr…
- Benjamin Thorpe (translator), The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson (the Poetic Edda) (opens in a new tab) (19th c.; Norroena ed. 1906), Alvíssmál, stanzas 11, 13, 15, 17, 19, 21, 23, 25, 29, 31 and 33 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ) Rights: Public domain. Nineteenth-century translation, in the public domain. Text as published online by Project Gutenberg (ebook #14726).
What the sources say
Alvíssmál is a dialogue. The dwarf Alvíss comes to claim a bride promised to him, and Vingþórr (Thor, under a byname) says he may have her if he can answer what he wants to know. Each question asks what something is called “in every world”, and Alvíss gives the word used by men, the gods (Æsir), the Vanir, the giants, the elves (Alfar), the dwarfs, and in some stanzas by the dead in Hel. The questioning goes on until the sun shines into the hall in stanza 36, where Thor says the dwarf has been deluded by great wiles.
Thorpe’s text gives an elven word for earth, heaven, moon, sun, clouds, wind, calm, sea, forest, night and seed. Fire and beer have none. The word “lagastafr” is used for both the sea and the seed. Thorpe leaves the words untranslated.
- Benjamin Thorpe (translator), The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson (the Poetic Edda) (opens in a new tab) (19th c.; Norroena ed. 1906), Alvíssmál, stanzas 1–36 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ) Rights: Public domain. Nineteenth-century translation, in the public domain. Text as published online by Project Gutenberg (ebook #14726).
Names and background
The elven words are not places and do not locate the elves anywhere, Álfheimr included. They belong to a poetic list in which each group has its own vocabulary, a way of showing the dwarf’s learning.
The poem sets the groups side by side: gods, Vanir, giants, elves, dwarfs. That is a statement about vocabulary, not about shared land. The site’s page on Álfheimr gives what the sources say of the realm itself.
- Benjamin Thorpe (translator), The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson (the Poetic Edda) (opens in a new tab) (19th c.; Norroena ed. 1906), Alvíssmál, stanzas 9–35 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ) Rights: Public domain. Nineteenth-century translation, in the public domain. Text as published online by Project Gutenberg (ebook #14726).
Where the sources attest it
Alvíssmál (the Lay of the Dwarf Alvis in Thorpe) is a poem of the Poetic Edda. The stanza numbers here are Thorpe’s, who prints 36 stanzas; other editions divide it differently. Thorpe’s note on the first stanza says the bride is Thor’s daughter Þrúðr, citing Skáldskaparmál.
No archaeological or pictorial evidence for these words is known.
- Benjamin Thorpe (translator), The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson (the Poetic Edda) (opens in a new tab) (19th c.; Norroena ed. 1906), Alvíssmál, stanzas 1–36 and Thorpe’s note on stanza 1 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ) Rights: Public domain. Nineteenth-century translation, in the public domain. Text as published online by Project Gutenberg (ebook #14726).