Would

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Wurd or Wyrd is a Germanic term that describes general fate or fate, primarily that of people. In the high medieval, Icelandic, mythological poetry of the Edda , the term in the form Urðr is also applied to the fate of the gods.

imaginations

The model for the concrete use of the “Wurd motif” in the predominantly poetic sources of Germania that have been handed down to us in secular and sacred contexts ( Heliand , Beowulf ) were late antique philosophical-Christian clerical beliefs based on the theology of Boethius . His theological-philosophical views of a God ruling the world and destiny he substantiated with the key words fortuna and fatum . These are in the transfer of Boethischen Consolation of Philosophy by Alfred the Great in the Old English as wyrd reproduced, so aligned with a traditional vernacular lexeme.

That the concept of Wurd had meaning and use in the pre-Christian, pagan Germanic societies, becomes clear from the etymological meaning and from the comparison with pagan ideas of the Romans and Greeks. This is to be understood in the polytheistic world system, in which people like gods are subject to the developing course of the world and the gods can only act for a limited time and with certain functions.

In the older research of the Germanic philologies, false assumptions were constructed to an artificial and specific idea of ​​a concrete " Germanic belief in fate ". In the years of the Nazi dictatorship in particular, this had fertile ground for ideologues in terms of war and perseverance propaganda.

etymology

Old Saxon wurd , Old High German wurt , Anglo-Saxon wyrd and Old Norse urðr are based on the Germanic form * wurðiz . It belongs to the Indo-European root * uert for turn, turn and is an abstract formation of to be , related to the Latin vertere . In Old High German, wurd means or also stated as wurth (Germanic wurþi) to close, cover, protect, save, defend or repel.

literature

  • Wolfgang Meid: Aspects of the Germanic and Celtic religion in the testimony of language . In: Innsbruck Contributions to Linguistics - Lectures and Smaller Papers , Vol. 52. Innsbruck 1991.
  • Rudolf Simek : Lexicon of Germanic Mythology (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 368). 3rd, completely revised edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3-520-36803-X , pp. 451, 494.
  • Gerd Wolfgang Weber: Wyrd - studies on the concept of fate of the Old English and Old Norse nature. Publishing house Gehlen, Bad Homburg / Berlin / Zurich 1969.
  • http://www.koeblergerhard.de/ahd/ahd_w.html