Búri is licked out of a salty ice-block by the cowAuðumbla in this illustration from an 18th-century Icelandic manuscript.
InNorse mythology,Búri (Old Norse:[ˈbuːre]) is a god and 'producer, father' of all other gods.[1] An early ancestor of theÆsir gods, the principal pantheon inOld Norse religion. Búri was licked free from salty rime stones by the primeval cowAuðumbla over the course of three days. Búri's background beyond this point is unattested and he had a son,Borr, by way of an unknown process. Búri is attested in theProse Edda, composed in the 13th century by IcelanderSnorri Sturluson. TheProse Edda includes a quote from a 12th-century poem byskald Þórvaldr Blönduskáld that mentions the figure. Búri's mysterious origins are the subject of scholarly commentary and interpretation.
The nameBúri, like the name of his sonBurr, is derived from theProto-Germanic *buriz "son, born".[2] Thus, both names basically mean the same thing.[3] In research, Buri's name is translated as "begotten, father" and Burr as "begotten, son"[4][5] - probably because of the generational sequence. However, how he fathered his son is not explained; either by himself or through sexual reproduction.[6]
Búri receives mention twice in theProse Edda—once inGylfaginning and again in a skaldic poem quoted inSkáldskaparmál. TheGylfaginning section reads as follows:
Hon sleikti hrímsteinana er saltir váru. Ok hinn fyrsta <dag> er hon sleikti steina, kom ór steininum at kveldi manns hár, annan dag manns höfuð, þriðja dag var þar allrmaðr. Sá er nefndr Búri. Hann var fagr álitum, mikill ok máttugr. Hann gat son þann er Borr hét.[7]
She licked the ice-blocks, which were salty; and the first day that she licked the blocks, there came forth from the blocks in the evening a man's hair; the second day, a man's head; the third day the whole man was there. He is named Búri: he was fair of feature, great and mighty. He begat a son called Borr[.]
—Brodeur's translation
Búri is mentioned nowhere in thePoetic Edda and only once in theskaldic corpus. InSkáldskaparmál Snorri quotes the following verse by the 12th centuryskald Þórvaldr blönduskáld:
Nú hefk mart í miði greipat burar Bors, Búra arfa.[8]
Now have I snatched much of the mead [made a lot of poetry] of Buri's heir Bor's son [Odin]
^Urgermanisch*buri- wird unter anderem rekonstruiert aus gotischbaur ‚Geborener‘, altenglischbyre ‚Sohn, Jüngling‘ und altnordischburr ‚Sohn‘, siehe Robert Nedoma:Altgermanische Anthroponyme. In:Dieter Geuenich,Wolfgang Haubrichs,Jörg Jarnut (Hrsg.):Ergänzungsband Nr. 32 zum Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde – Person und Name. 2. Auflage. Verlag Walter de Gruyter, Berlin − New York 2001, S. 111.
^Wolfgang Meid:Die germanische Religion im Zeugnis der Sprache. In: Heinrich Beck, Detlev Ellmers, Kurt Schier (Hrsg.):Germanische Religionsgeschichte – Quellen und Quellenprobleme – Ergänzungsband Nr. 5 zum Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde. 2. Auflage. Verlag Walter de Gruyter, Berlin − New York 1999, ISBN 978-3-11-012872-7, S. 495.Online.
^Jan de Vries:Altgermanische Religionsgeschichte – Bd. 2: Religion der Nordgermanen. Verlag Walter de Gruyter & Co., Berlin/Leipzig 1937, S. 395.
^Rudolf Simek:Lexikon der germanischen Mythologie (=Kröners Taschenausgabe. Band 368). 3., völlig überarbeitete Auflage. Kröner, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3-520-36803-X, S. 64.
^Rudolf Simek:Lexikon der germanischen Mythologie (=Kröners Taschenausgabe. Band 368). 3., völlig überarbeitete Auflage. Kröner, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3-520-36803-X, S. 64 entscheidet sich nicht für eine von beiden Möglichkeiten – John Lindow:Handbook of Norse Mythology. USA 2001, ISBN 1-57607-217-7, S. 90 sagt, die Forschung gehe mehrheitlich von sexueller Fortpflanzung aus, ohne dass er eine Begründung mitteilt.
