The Eyrarland Statue of Thor found in Iceland

The Eyrarland Statue is a bronze statue of a seated figure (6.7 cm[1][2]) from about AD 1000 that was recovered at the Eyrarland farm in the area of Akureyri, Iceland. The object is a featured item at the National Museum of Iceland. The statue may depict the Norse god Thor and/or may be a gaming-piece.

The statue was unearthed in 1815 or 1816 on one of two farms called Eyrarland in the vicinity of Akureyri.[2][3][4]

If the object is correctly identified as Thor, Thor is here holding his hammer Mjöllnir, sculpted in the typically Icelandic cross-like shape. It has been suggested that the statue is related to a scene from the Poetic Edda poem Þrymskviða where Thor recovers his hammer while seated by grasping it with both hands during the wedding ceremony.[5] Another suggestion comes from the archeologist Kristján Eldjárn, who has written that it could be the central piece from a set of hnefatafl, based on its similarities to a smaller whalebone figure discovered in Baldursheimur together with black and white gaming pieces and a die.[2]

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Notes

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  1. ^ Úr íslenzkri listsögu fyrri alda (in Icelandic). Birtingur. 1 June 1962. p. 5. Retrieved 5 November 2016.
  2. ^ a b c Eldjárn, Kristján (1981). "The bronze image from Eyrarland". In Dronke, Ursula; et al. (eds.). Specvlvm norroenvm: Norse studies in memory of Gabriel Turville-Petre. Odense University Press. p. 75. ISBN 978-87-7492-289-6.
  3. ^ Perkins, Richard (2001). Thor the wind-raiser and the Eyrarland image. London: Viking Society for Northern Research, University College London. p. 82. ISBN 978-0-903521-52-9.
  4. ^ Bertelsen, Lise Gjedssø (2000). "Some New Aspects of the Ringerike-Style Statuette from Eyrarland, Northern Iceland". In Ingi Sigurðsson; Jón Skaptason (eds.). Aspects of Arctic and sub-Arctic history: proceedings of the International Congress on the History of the Arctic and the Sub-Arctic Region, Reykjavík, 18-21 June 1998. Reykjavík: University of Iceland. p. 507. ISBN 978-9979-54-435-7.
  5. ^ Ross, Margaret Clunies (2002). "Reading Þrymskviða". In Acker, Paul; Larrington, Carolyne (eds.). The Poetic Edda: Essays on Old Norse Mythology. London: Routledge. pp. 188–189. ISBN 0-8153-1660-7.
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