In September 2009 during Symbel at Midwest Thing in Minnesota, Mark Stinson of Jotun’s Bane Kindred recited the Eddic Poem, the Voluspa from memory in fulfillment of an oath. Our ancestors had an oral story-telling tradition, and it is something worth reviving… The music in the video was used with permission from Kari Tauring…please visit www.karitauring.com and purchase an album of her beautiful music. A big thanks to Jason Grothe for shooting the video, and to my kindred for their encouragement. This is Part 1 of 2.

(Source: wn.com)

I have managed to get myself a glass drinking horn for Bragafull / Symbel.

This is not the one however, this is a 7:th century English one (British Museum ).

Skål!

I like that:

A:A man, in modern times, can show the world the importance of myths.

B:That he was very inspired by Norse culture, history and mythology to do so.

C:That people are encuouraging what is in many ways an extension of the Germanic Symbel/Bragafull ritual to honour him.

Let us mention him among the great Skalds and ancestors of importance (as they all are).

Raven Drinking Hornby =lakotawolf116

Are you proud to be an individual?

Are taking pride in your own accomplishments regardless of how others deem them.

Do you claim the right to be who you are?

I salute you!

Are you granting these rights to all others?

Are you trying to see beyond?

Are you forgiving your own short comings?

I salute you!

Will you be just and true and not strike a brother or sister lest they betray you?

Will you make your kin feel their worth?

Will you take advice, but trust yourself first?

I will brag of being your friend!

Thus i rise the horn and drink to your success, health, bravery and dreams before the Gods!

[and i physically rise, not a horn but a glass, and drink]

The Norse ritual of Symbel or Bragafull is a bit like this, this is MY drink.

Symbel (OE) and sumbl (ON) are Germanic terms for “feast, banquet”.

Paul C. Bauschatz in 1976 suggested that the term reflects a pagan ritual which had a “great religious significance in the culture of the early Germanic people”.Bauschatz’ lead is followed only sporadically in modern scholarship, but his interpretation has inspired such solemn drinking-rituals in Germanic neopaganism.

The ritual according to Bauschatz was always conducted indoors, usually in a chieftain’s mead hall. Symbel involved a formulaic ritual which was more solemn and serious than mere drinking or celebration. The primary elements of symbel are drinking ale or mead from a drinking horn, speech making (which often included formulaic boasting and oaths), and gift giving. Eating and feasting were specifically excluded from symbel, and no alcohol was set aside for the gods or other deities in the form of a sacrifice.

Accounts of the symbel are preserved in the Anglo-Saxon Beowulf (lines 489-675 and 1491–1500), Dream of the Rood and Judith, Old Saxon Heliand, and the Old NorseLokasenna as well as other Eddic and Saga texts, such as in the Heimskringla account of the funeral ale held by King Sweyn, or in the Fagrskinna.

The bragarfull ”promise-cup” or bragafull ”best cup” or “chieftain’s cup” (compare Bragi) was in Norse culture a particular drinking from a cup or drinking horn on ceremonial occasions, often involving the swearing of oaths when the cup or horn was drunk by a chieftain or passed around and drunk by those assembled. The names are sometimes anglicized as bragarful and bragaful respectively.

That the name appears in two forms with two meanings makes it difficult to determine the literal meaning. The word bragr ’best, foremost’ is a source for its first element. The form bragafull (but not bragarfull) can also be interpreted as ‘Bragi’s cup’, referring to the Bragi, god of poetry, though no special connection to Bragi appears in any of the sources.

(Source: )

A drinking horn is the horn of a bovid used as a drinking vessel. Drinking horns are known from Classical Antiquityespecially in Thrace and the Balkans, and remained in use for ceremonial purposes throughout the Middle Ages and the Early Modern period in some parts of Europe, notably in Germanic Europe, and also in traditions of the Caucasus. Drinking horns remain an important accessory in the culture of ritual toasting in Georgia in particular, where they are known as khantsi

Symbel / Bragafull - Acknowledging ourselves and our acomplishments

In Christian thinking “boasting” is seen as something to be avoided, not so in pre Christian Norse culture.

Or i should correct myself, boasting in this case is not the empty claims and exagerations we normally associate with the word, but an acknowledging of our own acomplishments AND the help of the Gods and ancestors.

In other words a thanksgiving of sorts ,notice that there is no sacrifice in Symbel, since it is not a prayer for something but a thanks for what is allready given.

We acknowledge our own part in the acomplishment and thus strenghten ourselves.

The Gods are not doing everything for us since they´re not our servants. Gods and men co exist.

Thus WE have a place in the equation.

At the end of Symbel / Bragafull oaths are often taken, thus further empowering us. These vows are BINDING and taken very seriously.

Symbel involved a formulaic ritual which was more solemn and serious than mere drinking or celebration. The primary elements of symbel are drinking ale or mead from a drinking horn, speech making (which often included formulaic boasting and oaths), and gift giving. Eating and feasting were specifically excluded from symbel, and no alcohol was set aside for the gods or other deities in the form of a sacrifice.

Accounts of the symbel are preserved in the Anglo-Saxon Beowulf (lines 489-675 and 1491–1500), Dream of the Rood and Judith, Old Saxon Heliand, and the Old NorseLokasenna as well as other Eddic and Saga texts, such as in the Heimskringla account of the funeral ale held by King Sweyn, or in the Fagrskinna.

The bragarfull ”promise-cup” or bragafull ”best cup” or “chieftain’s cup” (compare Bragi) was in Norse culture a particular drinking from a cup or drinking horn on ceremonial occasions, often involving the swearing of oaths when the cup or horn was drunk by a chieftain or passed around and drunk by those assembled. The names are sometimes anglicized as bragarful and bragaful respectively.

That the name appears in two forms with two meanings makes it difficult to determine the literal meaning. The word bragr ’best, foremost’ is a source for its first element. The form bragafull (but not bragarfull) can also be interpreted as ‘Bragi’s cup’, referring to the Bragi, god of poetry, though no special connection to Bragi appears in any of the sources.