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Yggdrasil - Etymology and alternative names

Yggdrasil - Etymology and alternative names: Encyclopedia II - Yggdrasil - Etymology and alternative names

The most commonly accepted etymology of the name is ygg "terrible" + drasil "steed". Yggr is taken to be an epithet of Odin, giving a meaning of "Odin's steed", taken to refer to the nine nights Odin is said to have spent hanging from the tree in order find the runes. The gallows are sometimes described in Old Norse poetry as the "horse of the hanged." Another interpretation of the name is "terrible horse", i. e. the association with Odin may be secondary. A third interpretation, with etymological difficulties, is "yew-c ...

Yggdrasil: Encyclopedia II - Yggdrasil - Etymology and alternative names

Yggdrasil - Etymology and alternative names

The most commonly accepted etymology of the name is ygg "terrible" + drasil "steed". Yggr is taken to be an epithet of Odin, giving a meaning of "Odin's steed", taken to refer to the nine nights Odin is said to have spent hanging from the tree in order find the runes. The gallows are sometimes described in Old Norse poetry as the "horse of the hanged." Another interpretation of the name is "terrible horse", i. e. the association with Odin may be secondary. A third interpretation, with etymological difficulties, is "yew-column", associating the tree with the Eihwaz rune ᛇ.

Fjölsvinnsmál, a poem in the Poetic Edda, refers to the World Tree as Mimameid (ON: Mímameiðr, "Mimir's tree" ). Most probably, the tree is also identical to Lerad (ON: Læraðr) a tree whose leaves and twigs reach down to the roof of Valhalla and provide food for the goat Heiðrún and the stag Eikþyrnir that both live on the roof.

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Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Etymology and alternative names", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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