NorsePlay.

  NorsePlay has previously posted illustrations & photos of Viking Era grave reconstructions and about my awesome American Bully, Buddy Guillermosson. Buddy passed away this week, and much like the Viking Era arrangements of grave goods, I've decided to honor his life by including items with him for use in the afterworlds. As pictured above, I've included nine bully sticks, which were his favourite chews, his treat ball & bone, a stack of cheddar cheese slices, a huge greasy cow's knucklebone, a small Viking ship, and two finely carved & painted Swedish Dala horses. When representations or miniatures are interred or cremated, these items are thought to manifest full size in the afterworlds , and their bearer can use or barter them as needed. Horses in burials are huge prestige items, usually reserved for rulers or warriors of great stature. Once he's cremated, given my intentional funerary arrangement, Buddy Guillermosson will very likely show up to his d...

The Vikingverse  series is a NorsePlay of stellar proportions, epic in scope & reframing, written in two books and one graphic novel by Ian Stuart Sharpe. [Marines at Iwo Jima? No,  Space Vikings  raising the Raven Banner!] The narrative involves alternative history , a few Stormpunk points-of-deviation, quantum physics, parallel timelines, entanglement, consciousness, intelligent design, imperial ambition, magic, and the endless Odinic search for knowledge. The only thing I can literarily compare this to is Kim Newman's Anno Dracula series, where a certain event changes the landscape of history to the present day, except instead vampires becoming societally dominant, it's Vikings instead. [Empress Trumba is based on a certain president ... !] The in-use of the Norse Lore is deep, and feels like it's been written for the Norse Lore hound by a Norse Lore hound , and at times I marveled at how much was drawn & woven into the Vikingverse by this, and conve...

NorsePlay would just like to put it out into the subcultural water that if someone were to make a music video of Phil Collins' In the Air Tonight  with scenes from The Northman  instead, I'd be rather pleased. [fan art print by user Pasan-hpmm, which feels like some sort of situation specific Father's Day card.] And if someone were to cover the song in an Old Norse version for said video, well, that would be above & beyond. [Amleth's rowing song oath.] A notable amount of the sagas are driven by vengeance . And if we look at Odin, right after the death of Baldr, the All-Father pointedly sires both Váli, to avenge his dead son, and Víðarr , to avenge himself against Fenrir . So thematically having what is arguably the best revenge song ever made scoring one of the best Viking films yet made would be a desirable NorsePlay retrofit. [because Amleth definitely feels it in the Icelandic air tonight.] And on that rather grim drum breaking note, Happy (All-)Father's...

NorsePlay would like to blast our own Gjallarhorn about the praise & applause we received from the attending Southwest Heathen community over our auction donations to support this year's Southwest Frith Moot : [Zoomorphic terminal'd brass neck torc, unattributed Níu Heimar painting, and Járngreipr oath ring gripping necklace (combo collab item with an American Heathen hammer).]  [Because NorsePlay loves books ! Note that sweet library cover vintage hardback of Padraic Colum's The Children Of Odin , a Brit coffeetable 1968 CE edition of H.R. Ellis Davidson's Scandinavian Mythology , and Nancy Marie Brown 's Ivory Vikings !] Southwest Frith Moot is the longstanding annual regional event hosted by Arizona's Wanderer Kindred's Chieftain Vince & Gythia Dani, which is held at a varying campsite, and was up in Pinedale, AZ, a couple weekends ago. [Why yes, that is a NorsePlay logo 'd banner hanging at the center of the main tent.] Featuring two days o...

From previously commenting on Iðunn 's apples of immortality, NorsePlay reads that it's the goddess who makes the apples work and not the orchard or trees themselves that are left behind during her abduction by Þjazi where the Gods age in her absence, otherwise they would just go pluck the apples themselves. The question this raises in terms of NorsePlay is thusly:  If the crucial factor is how Iðunn keeps the apples, then can this preparatory process be rediscovered & applied to make our very own apples of immortality? Is there a secret agricultural procedure or cooking recipe that would make any apple a key to limitless youth & longevity? Or is the fruit's conversion within the  specific  construction of a special storage cask for altering apples? If so, can an apple a day forever keep old Elli & deathly Hel away? [Iðunn  from the amazing Johan Egerkrans'  Norse Gods (2017 CE). Differently depicted as an older beauty with her sharply drawn...

Sometime in 2017 CE, NorsePlay left a plus-tagged Google+ comment that directed the educational company The Great Courses to Old Norse Philologist Jackson Crawford, and I suggested that they commission him to do a course for them. Now in 2022 CE, that very course has materialized, and I'd like to think that NorsePlay's comment as a cultural actor was responsible for making that happen. Pretty much within the first few weeks of release, I ponied up my $75 (yes, I know they often have $35 sales, but we wanted to review it now. [And that talking squirrel running up & down that World Tree, All-Daddy, I want that squirrel NOW!]) [ No, no you really don't want that talking squirrel. ] So the pre-buying bottom line question would be: Can I get the same information from the same source by watching his YT channel's 400+ videos? Mostly. Yet, like a university course, the level of organization in these 24 half-hour lectures partitions things in an orderly fashion that hitting ...

  When we think of Norse Mythology we think of the "nor-" prefix for the North, that these colder climes specifically inspired or fostered the Norse Lore. And yet, as we look at the Norse Cosmology with its whole fiery world of  Múspellsheimr , the raging volcanos of Iceland's Midgard ian landscape, the lava tube cavern of  Surtshellir, the geysirs & hot spring pools, we find many heat-centric constructs. Add the Viking explorations of the Mediterranean into arid Northern Africa & the Middle East, such encounters had to open up hotter climates to be contextualized within their Heathen Worldview. To NorsePlay: When Odin, Vili, & Vé create the Nine Worlds, this accounts for all Midgard's landscapes and attendant weathers, which includes the deserts. These same areas would also have attendant Landvættir, the spirits that occupy that land, plus  Álfar , Hulderfolk, D vergar, all as forces that support & interact with most portions of Midgard . ...

Listening to Gifts of the Wyrd podcast, Heathen urban planner Paul Mercutio of the North River Kindred recontextualizes the city as just as much a landvættir  connective space. To paraphrase Mercutio's thoughts: In the wild there are trees, rivers, lakes, mountains, and all of that is majestic and obvious in terms of connecting with nature. And going outside's all well & good, but in the intervening 1000+ years, man has gone from agricultural to urban and is unlikely to perform any sort of radical reversal on a large scale, so we have to find connective praxis in the modern context of the city's environment. If we look at the materials of the city we find that concrete was once air, water, sand, gravel, and eight other bits of earth cemented to make that concrete. Glass is just a sheet of heated sand. Steel is iron and carbon. These are all natural elements reformed into what makes a city. Also, your utilities are tubed, piped, and wired in what resembles a root syst...

This sweet 1,000-years of Icelandic Parliament  stamp set minted in 1939 CE reminds me of the interior art adorning The Viking Village's hotel restaurant Fjörugarðurinn from my trip to Iceland , with their awesome Höfðaletur (head letter)  font. The images, mostly historical & some modern, are done in a matching style that bridges a millennium to look as though they belong together. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact h...

The question we're confronted with is: Is The Northman the best Viking visual media yet made? Despite all the previous internet objections (for whatever that noise is worth), the bar for this is History Channel's inarguably successful  Vikings (2013-2020 CE). Director Robert Eggers mixes the supernatural moments of magical realism from  Vikings with the pastoral setting from  Prince Of Jutland (1994 CE), while screenwriter Sjón pulls from the Icelandic tropes of When the Raven Flies (1984 CE), using Saxo Grammaticus' Amleth legend from  Gesta Danorum: Deeds of the Danes as a baseline point and The Sagas of Icelanders as building blocks, all which make for a  necessarily brutal & beautiful film. [model Ineta Sliuzaite rages through the sky as a  valkyrie  with her line-filed teeth!] [Note: Spoilers are about to occur ... but you read Hamlet in high school like everyone else, right?] For Heathens coming to this film, there...

  This promotional poster series appeared last week in anticipation of this week's release of The Northman . Read our previous in-depth Norse Lore salient dagger point commentary on the preview . And the closeup here of Björk's elaborate headdress is just the evocative NorsePlay material we're looking for. See you this Thursday night at the theaters, NorsePlayers! #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact him .