In Norse mythology, Hug'Inn (Thought, Mind) and Mun'Inn (Memory), are a pair of ravens that fly all over the world named Mid'Gard, and bring information to the highest god Odin.
According to its legend it is said, "Two ravens sit on Odin's shoulders, and bring to his ears all that they hear and see. Their names are Thought and Mind. At dawn he sends them out to fly over the world, and they come back at breakfast time. Thus he gets information about many things, and hence he is called the "Raven god."
Scholars have linked Odin's relation to Hug'Inn (Thought, Idea) and Mun'Inn (Memory, Mind) to shamanic practice, since Odin's ability to send his 'thought' and 'mind' was performed when he entered into the trance-state journey of the shamans, facing the shaman's danger of the possibility of loosing one of both of them. Others attested that Odin's ravens were the personification of the god's intellectual powers, assumed from the names of the ravens themselves which were Odin' companions.
The two ravens have a wider symbolism in the Germanic world, including the Raven Banner, a flag, totemic in nature. It is said that the flag was woven in a method that allowed it, when fluttering in the wind, to appear as if the raven depicted upon it was beating its wings. The raven flag was treated as a symbol of Odin, often accompanied by the 2 ravens.
It was flown by various Viking chieftains and other Scandinavian rulers during the 9th, 10th, and 11th centuries. The Viking warlords were regarded in Norse tradition as the sons of the Danish Ragnar Lodbrok. The first mention of a Viking force carrying a raven banner is in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle,
878. It relates: "And in the winter of this same year the brother of Ivar and Half-Dan landed in Wessex, in Devon-Shire, with 23 ships, and there was he slain, and 800 men with him, and 40 of his army. There also was taken the war-flag, which they called "Raven."
In the 10th century, the raven banner was adopted by Norse-Gaelic kings Dublin and North-Umbria.
Many of the Norse-Gaelic dynasts in Britain and Ireland were of the Ui'Imair clan, a royal Norse dynasty, who claimed descent from Ragnar Lodbrok through his son Ivar.
The flag was roughly triangular (right isosceles) standard, with 2 equilateral sides situated at the top and staff, respectively, with a rounded outside edge along the hypotenuse, on the which there hung a series of 5 tabs or tassels. It bore a resemblance to ornately carved "weather-vanes" used aboard Viking long-ships. Its intent was to invoke Odin's power over the Thought and Mind and made his enemies to strike themselves in fear.
The raven banner was also a standard used by the Norse Jarls of Orkney. According to the 'Orkneyinga Saga,' the banner was made for Sigurd the Stout by his mother, a 'volva' or shamanic seeress. She told him that the banner would bring victory to the man it's carried before, but death to the one who carries it. The saga describes the flag as "a finely made banner, very cleverly embroidered with the figure of a raven, and when the banner fluttered in the breeze, the raven seemed to be flying ahead." Sigurd's mother prediction came true when, all of the bearers of the standard met ultimately ends. The curse of the banner ultimately fell on Jarl Sigurd hijmself at the Battle of Clon-Tarf:
"Earl Sigurd had a hard battle against Kerthi'Alfad, he came on so fast that he laid low all who were in front rank, and he broke the array of Earl Sigurd right up to his banner-bearer. Then he got another man to bear the banner, and there was again a hard fight. Kerthi'Alfad smote this man too, his death blow at once, and so on one after the other all who stood near him. Then Earl Sigurd called on Thor-Stein the son of Hall of Sida, to bear the banner, and Thor-Stein was just about to lift the banner, but then As-Mund the White said, 'Don't bear the banner! For all they who bear it get their death.' H'Rafn the Red! called out Sigurd, 'bear you the banner.' 'Bear your own evil yourself,' answered H'Rafn. Then Sigurd said, 'Tis fittest that the beggar should bear the bag;' and with that he took the banner from the staff and put it under his cloak. A little after As-Mund the White was slain, and then Sigurd was pierced through with a spear.
The 12th-century 'Annals of St Neots,' a Latin chronicle written in the English county of Suf-Folk between 1120- 1140 CE, covering the history of Britain, claims that the raven banner was present with the Great Heathen Army and adds insight into its spirit, influenced creation and totemic and oracular nature: "It is said that 3 sisters of Ivar and Ubbe, the daughters of Ragnar Lodbrok, had woven that banner and gotten it ready during one single midday's time. Further it is said that if they were going to win a battle in which they followed that sign, there was to be seen, in the center of the sign, a raven, gaily flapping its wings. But if they were going to be defeated, the raven dropped motionless. And this always proved true.
Odin was also closely linked to ravens because in Norse myths he received the fallen warriors at Valhalla, and ravens, due to their predilection for carrion, were linked with death, blood. corpses, and battle. Consequently the ravens were regarded as manifestations of the Valkyries, goddesses who chose the valiant dead for military service in Valhalla. Battle and harsh justice were viewed favorable in Norse culture. A further connection between ravens and Valkyries was indicated in the shape-shifting abilities of goddesses and valkyries, who used the birds as transporters of their spirits.
Other researchers connect the two ravens to the Norse concepts of the 'Fyl'Gja -a concept with three characteristics: shape-shifting abilities, good fortune, and the guardian spirit- and Hamin'Gja - the ghostly double of a person that may appear in the form of an animal. The shaman's journey through the different parts of the cosmos is symbolized by the Hamin'Gja concept of shape-shifting soul, and in the account of Odin's ravens, Thoughts and Mind.
The word 'fyl'dja' means 'to accompany' or 'after birth of a child.' In some instances, the fyl'gja can take the form of the animal that shows itself when a baby is born or as a creature that eats the afterbirth. The fyl'gja can take the form of mice, dogs, foxes, cats, birds of prey, or carrion eaters because these were animals that would typically eat such afterbirths. Other ideas are that the animals reflect the character of the person of communities they represent. Men who were viewed as a leader would often have fyl-gja to show their true character. This means that if they had a 'tame nature,' their fylgja would typically be an ox, goat, or boar. If they had an 'untamed nature' they would have fylgja such as a fox, wolf, deer, bear, eagle, falcon, leopard, lion, or a serpent.
Some others theorizes that the two ravens, along with Odin and his wolves Geri and Freki, reflect a symbiosis, often a long-term interaction between two different biological species, observed in the natural world among ravens, wolves, and humans. One organism typically shores up some weakness or deficiency of the other(s). As in such a symbiosis, Odin the father of all humans and gods, though in human form was imperfect by himself. As a separate entity he lacked depth perception (being one-eyed) and he was apparently also uninformed and forgetful, or didn't have the organs in control of it fully developed or activated in his human form. But his weakness were compensated by his ravens, Hug'Inn (Mind) and Mun'Inn (Memory) who were part of him. They perched on his shoulders and reconnoitered to the ends of the earth each day to return in the evening and tell him the news. He also have two wolves at his side, and the man/god-raven-wolf association was like one single organism in which the ravens were the eyes, mind, and memory, and the wolves the providers of meat and nourishment, all together acting in the frequency of the human world. As god, Odin was the ethereal part -he only drank wine, as energy coming from the earth, and spoke only in poetry, as a way of communication between worlds.
Odin myth is a metaphor that playfully and poetically encapsulates ancient knowledge of our past in association with the ethereal world to produce a powerful alliance in the human world. It reflects a past that we have long forgotten and whose meaning has been obscured and badly frayed as we abandoned our heritage to become what we are now in our 'fantasy world.'
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