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The Norrœna Society

04 Jan 2025 06:01

The Aurr and Blót
We have made quite an interesting discovery revolving around what could be a sacred ceremonial practice. In looking at our lore there seems to be a substance that our ancestors held to be extremely sacred, so much that many entities in the lore are named after it. This is the Aurr, which means “clay,” “mud,” “gravel,” or “loam.” It is a primordial substance that has its origin in our creation myth, and develops from the rime (hrimr) that poured into Ginnungagap. The interesting thing is that the names themselves seem to play out the story, as I will demonstrate.
After the rime creates the first world, Audhumla licks the primal ice of creation, which is so saturated with fertile power a God grew out of the ice just by her licking. This rime then fills her with this creative force and she thus becomes the AURochs (Aurr-Ox). After this, Ymir drinks from her milk and he becomes so filled with the creative force that he sweats beings from his body. The three brothers Odin, Hoenir, and Lodur then kill Ymir and from his flesh make the soil of the land. This was the first soil and was saturated with Audhumla’s milk, thus making it fertile. Ymir is then called AURgelmir (Aurr-roarer). The land in the Underworld first created and fertilized using his flesh is called AURvangr or AURvangaland (Fields of the Aurr, or Land of the Fields of Aurr).
Hoenir, as a God of fertility who helps in the delivery of children through the Manna Mjotudr (Yggdrasil’s Fruits), rules over this land and is thus called AURkonung (Aurr-King).
Then, we see the Norns pour a substance upon Yggdrasil which is called Hvita Aurr or “White Aurr.” We are told in the Prose Edda that “these Norns who dwell by the Well of Urdr take water of the well every day, and with it that clay (Aurr) which lies about the well, and sprinkle it over the Ash, to the end that its limbs shall not wither nor rot; for that water is so holy that all things which come there into the well become as white as the film which lies within the egg-shell.” (Gylfaginning 16) This is then related to Völuspá 19, which states: “An ash I know, | Yggdrasil its name,
With white Aurr (Hvíta Aurr) | is the great tree wet; Thence come the dews | that fall in the dales,
Green by Urth's well | does it ever grow.“ This tells us that the substance, especially when mixed with Urd’s mead, is incredibly sacred and important. Once the tree becomes doused with the liquid, it’s change of color makes it radiant, and by the above example, possibly explaining it as invisible. Because of this it is called AURglasir (Aurr-Resplendent). In Volundarkvida Sinmara is called Eir Aurglasir, the Eir (Healer) of the tree. This either makes her identical to Urd or gives her a duty that is the same.

Now, if this substance of Aurr originated as Audhumla’s milk and the Hrimr within it, it justifies milk
as a sacred element within the rite. We know that there are Indo-European elements that are shared here, as well as the notion of the sacred cow.

One of the more difficult names to
understand in this is that of AURboda, whose name means “Aurr-offerer.” She is identical to Gullveig, but this name may refer to her when she lived among the Goddesses and brought fertility, as we see her do in Volsungasaga ch. 2. Here she is called “The Daughter of Hrimnir,” whom we know is Gullveig-Heid-Aurboda. What we see here is that the chaotic element of the rime (hrimr) stays alive through her and her father (Hrimnir). When the Gods burn her and Loki eats her heart it is called ursvöl or “primeval cold.” This element is what would allow her to regenerate and may be the same element the Gods use with Saehrimnir the regenerating boar whose name means “Sea-Rime.” Hvergelmir, the Underworld well also has the name Svalkaldur Sær, which means “Cool-Cold Sea.” The sval- being identical to the -svöl in ursvöl and the Sær being the same as in Sæhrimnir.