History

Laurence Austine Waddell - The british Edda


The British Edda is a 1930 English book written by Laurence Waddell about the adventures of El, Wodan and Loki forming an "Eden Triad" in the Garden of Eden. It also references Thor and King Arthur having adventures in Eden.

The title of the book, The British Edda, was chosen because of Waddell's belief that the work upon which his translation was based, the Elder Edda, was mistakenly believed by many to be written in Scandinavian. Waddell, meanwhile, objected to this, explaining that the language had been found to be from an Icelandic family that had originally come from Scotland. Due to this, Waddell used the word British in the title to emphasize where the Elder Edda had come from. Waddell also went on to state that many other Eddic poems had been written in the British Isles before and up to the 6th century, but that most of them had been eradicated in the 11th century by Christian missionaries, contributing to the confusion.

One of the subjects discussed in The British Edda is the "genesis of civilization", which, as stated by Waddell, was commonly believed in the "pagan days" in Britain to be in "Cappadocia and Eden", but was very broad due to the lack of knowledge about the region beyond mere stories and also no knowledge of specific place names. This oral tradition of stories was written down on "parchment by 'the Learned'", composed into what is known as the Elder Edda. Waddell also explained that other works that copied down the stories were made, but all of these had been destroyed by Christian missionaries in Britain, leaving only the one work. These stories returned to the common populace in the 12th century by being melded into the "Arthurian legends", while the original sources of Cappadocia, the Trojans, and Sumeria were lost.

Waddell's writings on the origins of civilization would soon after influence the poetry of Hugh MacDiarmid from 1937 on, impressing on him the belief that the "original impetus to civilization was an Ur-Gaelic initiative". This belief was later incorporated into his poems, such as in The Fingers of Baal Contract in the Communist Salute.

In two letters Charles Olson wrote to Frances Boldereff in July 1950, Olson discussed Waddell's works and specifically commented on The British Edda, stating that, in it, Waddell "dances all over this thing, like some damned witch doctor, trying to squeeze out the old and lost history", referring to the discussion in the book on how the Sumerians were the origination of civilization. The British Edda and one of Waddell's other works, The Makers of Civilization in Race and History, would go on to inspire Olson's essay titled "The Gate and the Center".


Edda - PDF
Graal - PDF
England - PDF
Mythology - PDF

Emanuele Arioli - Ségurant le chevalier au dragon - Documentaire
Le roman disparu de la Table Ronde


Le jeune médiéviste Emanuele Arioli a mis dix ans à recomposer un roman perdu de la légende arthurienne. Ce documentaire reconstitue en parallèle sa patiente quête du Graal et, en animation, les aventures arrachées à l’oubli du chevalier Ségurant.

C’est en 2010, à la bibliothèque de l’Arsenal, à Paris, que le médiéviste italien Emanuele Arioli découvre dans un manuscrit du XVe siècle, Les prophéties de Merlin, un épisode inconnu du cycle arthurien : les aventures du chevalier Ségurant, condamné par la fée Morgane à poursuivre un dragon imaginaire. S’agissait-il des vestiges d’un roman de la Table ronde ? Du pays de Galles à la Suède en passant par l’Italie, le jeune chercheur est parti sur les traces de ce héros oublié afin de percer le mystère de ses origines. Probablement inventé par un auteur du nord de l’Italie qui écrivait en français, Ségurant serait le fruit de la rencontre entre légendes celtes et sagas germaniques ou vikings, son personnage s’inspirant des chasseurs de dragons Siegfried et Sigurd. Obsédé par sa quête, Emanuele Arioli a par ailleurs arpenté les bibliothèques d’Europe dans l’espoir de mettre la main sur d’autres textes mentionnant Ségurant. Après dix ans d’inlassables recherches, il est parvenu à recomposer le roman du chevalier au dragon, qui sommeillait depuis sept siècles dans vingt-huit manuscrits dispersés à travers le continent.





Double épopée

C’est sa longue et minutieuse enquête littéraire - au cours de laquelle le chercheur a craint de poursuivre lui-même une chimère - que retrace ce documentaire. De Winchester, où certaines légendes situent Camelot, à la Bibliothèque nationale universitaire de Turin, où sont conservés de précieux manuscrits anciens endommagés par un incendie, Emanuele Arioli dialogue à chaque étape avec des spécialistes (médiévistes, archéologues, archivistes, philologues, sans oublier l’académicien Michel Zink), qui l’éclairent sur la part de réalité du mythe arthurien ou l’émergence du roman au Moyen Âge. Une double épopée fascinante, entre savoirs scientifiques et imaginaire médiéval.

Documentaire de Marie Thiry (France, 2022, 1h30mn)


Graal - PDF