Frithcast

Frithcast Extra: Freya sex beauty death love magic

Presenting our third gift on the occasion of our 100th episode of Frithcast, a repeating chant for Freya: a goddess with so many overlapping aspects, including sex, beauty, death, love and magic.  

Accompanying sound effects, as always sourced from Freesound under a creative commons licence. Kate and I hope you enjoy it.

Frithcast Extra: Names of the Allfather

Our second release on the occasion of our 100th episode of Frithcast:

 

Frithcast Extra: The Names of the Allfather (originally released in 2018)

Drum and chanting track: ‘Jagadamba – Shaman frame drum with Om chanting’ from Freesound.org

We had sudden want to create a piece, reciting the names of the Allfather over layers of Elder Futhark rune names and drums. As usual when you get a sudden instinct, it generally proves longer to actually do the thing than having the thought in the first place.

The names of the Allfather are many – this isn’t a definitive list, we may have unintentionally missed one or two. Generally the list comes from the Gylfanning, which lists about 200 names. You may know the Allfather as the Wanderer, First Husband of Frigg, One-Eyed or The Raven God, but he has many more titles and spheres of influence. You can find a listing of most of his names here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_names_of_Odin

We leave you with a quote from Neil Gaiman’s American Gods, Kate and I hope you enjoy this.

“This is what they call me. I’m called Glad of War, Grim, Raider and Third. I am One-Eyed. I am called Highest and True Guesser. I am Grimnir and I am the Hooded One. I am Allfather, Gondlir Wand Bearer. I have as many names as there are winds, as many titles as there are ways to die.”

(American Gods, Neil Gaiman (2001) Ch6.)

 

PS We had a little help from the Thargoids… just sayin’ #cantstopthesignal

Frithcast Episode 100 - The Long One

Episode 100: The Long One

Things we talk about in this episode:

Opening Music:

'Ancient Whispers I' by P C III, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence.

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/P_C_III/Ad_Astra_Vol_1/03_Ancient_Whispers_I]

Closing Music:

'Round II - The Ancients' by Learning Music, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Learning_Music/An_End_Like_This/32_Round_II_-_The_Ancients]

Background fire ambience by inchadney from freesound.org

 

We made it to episode 100! Woo! Time for celebratory cake :) Here’s an extra long episode for you, lovely listeners, with some favourite clips and memories from past episodes, some random side quests and a good dollop of the queer geek heathenry that you’ve come to know. We also talk a little bit about what topics we’re thinking of covering in the future, let us know if you’ve got any ideas :)

To say thank you for listening, and some of you have been sat with us around the virtual campfire for a very long time, this is the first part of our celebratory celebrations for today. Keep your eyes (and ears) peeled for a few more goodies from us through today, as a thank you for all our lovely listeners around Midgard :)

 

Suzanne and Kate

Frithcast Episode 99 - Storytime -A Moderately Bloody Love Story

Episode 99 Storytime: A Moderately Bloody Love Story

Things we talk about in this episode:

Opening Music:

'Ancient Whispers I' by P C III, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence.

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/P_C_III/Ad_Astra_Vol_1/03_Ancient_Whispers_I]

Closing Music:

'Round II - The Ancients' by Learning Music, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Learning_Music/An_End_Like_This/32_Round_II_-_The_Ancients]

Background fire ambience by inchadney from freesound.org

 

“It’s the same thing we do every night” Pinky and the Brain TV cartoon series (1995 - 98) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0112123/

Oar fish http://www.seasky.org/deep-sea/oarfish.html

TARDIS: https://tardis.fandom.com/wiki/TARDIS

“These are small, those are far away” Father Ted https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hell_(Father_Ted)

Baby Yoda – Grogu, from The Mandalorian https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Grogu

“For me, it was Tuesday” Bison, Street Fighter film 1994 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVzAMmpMra8

Gomez and Morticia from the Addams Family (especially the 1991 film https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0101272/)

“Prepare to die” Inigo Montoya, The Princess Bride https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0093779/characters/nm0001597

Tome of Set Dungeon in Diablo III: https://diablo.fandom.com/wiki/Set_Dungeon

Text Scroll, most notably used in the Star Wars films: https://starwars.fandom.com/wiki/Opening_crawl

The theory that Jar Jar Binks is a Sith Lord https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/star-wars-darth-jar-jar-binks-theory-partially-true-says-actor-a6923351.html

Smurfs https://www.smurf.com/

“Three dwarves in a trenchcoat” – paraphrased from ‘Three Coins in a Fountain’ (1954) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047580/

Tolkien’s dwarves: https://lotr.fandom.com/wiki/Dwarves

The Dread Pirate Roberts – from The Princess Bride https://princessbride.fandom.com/wiki/Dread_Pirate_Roberts

Klingon love stories https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Klingon_mating_rituals

“A Dothraki wedding without at least three deaths is considered a dull affair.” Game of Thrones, episode 1, season 1, Illyrio Mopatis https://scatteredquotes.com/dothraki-wedding-without-least/

 

Grongu-Hrolf is a fairly unique name, and there is someone historical who shares it. The author of this saga is at pains to point out that his story is fiction, and not related to the historical person: https://core.ac.uk/reader/233573430

Grongu-Hrolfs Saga has a lot of powerful men in. A lot. It’s been proposed that this saga is about men and for men, so that they can see power and vulnerability through gender. You can read a summary of a book about it here: https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/masculinities-in-old-norse-literature/vulnerable-masculinities-and-the-vicissitudes-of-power-in-gonguhrolfs-saga/2D67FA8905CD0E46211094189B14FABC

And that whole feet off, then back on again bit? There’s a paper here that looks at defensiveness in narrators in Icelandic sagas: https://www.abdn.ac.uk/staffpages/uploads/his221/history-or-fiction.pdf

If you’d like to hear this saga/ Suicide Squad mash up, you can head here: https://deadideas.net/2018/08/19/berserkers-viii-finale-suicide-swords-suicide-squad-gongu-hrolfs-saga-mashup-viking-history/

 

How to find us online

Frithcast Episode 98 - Content vs Creator

Episode 98 Ethics: Content vs Creator

Things we talk about in this episode:

Opening Music:

'Ancient Whispers I' by P C III, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence.

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/P_C_III/Ad_Astra_Vol_1/03_Ancient_Whispers_I]

Closing Music:

'Round II - The Ancients' by Learning Music, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Learning_Music/An_End_Like_This/32_Round_II_-_The_Ancients]

Background fire ambience by inchadney from freesound.org

 

New York State of Mind – song by Billy Joel: https://www.youtu.be/LnGMcxWmtRA

“An intelligent guard…” - Quote from Titan A.E. (movie, 2000): https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0120913/characters/nm0001447

CERN – Conseil Européen pour la Recherche Nucléaire – The European Organisation for Nuclear Research – maintains six particle accelerators, including the high-energy Large Hadron Collider, the world’s largest piece of machinery, near Geneva, Switzerland: https://home.cern/

Twenty Past the Hour – A phenomenon popularly associated with, among other claimed causes, the alleged time of death of President Lincoln: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/sudden-silences/

Cognitive Bias – Any of a number of perceptional errors that occur due to the tendency of the Human mind to look for patterns and focus more reliably on expected or predicted events than those that don’t conform to expectations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_bias

The Trolley Problem – A thought experiment in the study of ethics: https://theconversation.com/the-trolley-dilemma-would-you-kill-one-person-to-save-five-57111

Bombs on the Ferries – The Dark Knight (movie, 2008): https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0468569/

The Prisoner’s Dilemma - https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/prisoner-dilemma/

Content Versus Creator – Video essayist Lindsay Ellis produced two videos addressing the concept of “Death of the Author”, which is the idea that, once a work is released to the public, the author no longer has any authority over its meaning or interpretation. Lindsay subsequently created a follow-up video addressing the different but related question of whether a troublesome creator can truly be separated from their work: https://youtu.be/NViZYL-U8s0

Lindsay created the above video in relation to the JK Rowling Transgender Comments Controversy, as broken down here by, and from the view of, Glamour: https://www.glamour.com/story/a-complete-breakdown-of-the-jk-rowling-transgender-comments-controversy

The Ship of Theseus – an ancient thought experiment that asks whether and for how long a thing (in the case of the experiment, a ship) remains the same item if all its component parts are progressively replaced: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship_of_Theseus

Graham Linehan – co-writer of TV series Father Ted and dedicated social media campaigner against transgender people: https://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Graham_Linehan

How to find us online

Frithcast Episode 97 - First Steps in Studying Runes

Episode 97: First Steps in Studying Runes

 

Things we talk about in this episode:

Opening Music:

'Ancient Whispers I' by P C III, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence.

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/P_C_III/Ad_Astra_Vol_1/03_Ancient_Whispers_I]

Closing Music:

'Round II - The Ancients' by Learning Music, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Learning_Music/An_End_Like_This/32_Round_II_-_The_Ancients]

Background fire ambience by inchadney from freesound.org

 

“Land on it, sit on it” RSC with Prince Charles and Benedict Cumberbatch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEs8rK5Cqt8

Seven of Nine, from Star Trek: Voyager https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Seven_of_Nine

“It’s goodnight from her, and...” paraphrased from The Two Ronnies

The Runic Alphabets: https://omniglot.com/writing/runic.htm

The Rune Poems https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Rune_poems

The Thames Scramseax: https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/H_1857-0623-1

The Kylver Runestone (G88): http://www.worldtreeproject.org/document/1321

Vampires and poppy seeds: http://dracula.cc/vampires_traits/

Segway: https://www.segway.com/

Some co-opted runes used by far-right organisations, white supremacists and exclusionary heathens can be found here: https://www.hatecrimescotland.org/wp/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Hate-Signs-and-Symbols-guide-for-European-football_2016-.pdf

“The minor fall and the major lift” Hallelujah, Leonard Cohen

This episode has a lot of Suzanne’s own experience in learning about runes. Use what is useful to you in your own practice. When you study runes, they are introspective and you’ll end up looking long and hard at your own self. Be kind to yourself as you learn, take time you need to process or reprocess things as they come up.

How to find us online

Frithcast Episode 96 - The Random Reel: Four Years

Episode 96 – Random Reel IV

Things we talk about in this episode:

Opening Music:

'Ancient Whispers I' by P C III, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence.

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/P_C_III/Ad_Astra_Vol_1/03_Ancient_Whispers_I]

Closing Music:

'Round II - The Ancients' by Learning Music, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Learning_Music/An_End_Like_This/32_Round_II_-_The_Ancients]

Background fire ambience by inchadney from freesound.org

 

Four Years. We’ve been doing Frithcast for four whole years. You’ve been listening to a Heathen and a coffee-powered Druid chatter on about modern heathenry with a good sprinkling of queer and geekery for four years. And you, lovely listeners, are the reason that we have. So, we’d like to say thank you, in the only way that we can: to celebrate our fourth birthday, we’d like to present you with a very special episode. As last years random reel, we present clips of some of the funny moments, randomness and bloopers that didn’t quite make it to the episodes. No shownotes this time, you’ve earned a break.

 

A Shortage of Stormtroopers

Angelina Duck

Click

Crinkle Shaming

Dancing with Charles

Disturbia

Einstein in Tights

Forgot the Thing

Kate is a total lush

Kate’s two things

Morn Norm

Polished Garnets Shine

Symposiorgy

That Trailer Thing

The Knights of Mouse

Tribble Highlanders

 

Thank you from us to you, we hope you enjoy, and carry on listening :)

 

Suzanne and Kate

 

Frithcast Episode 95 - The Wild Hunt

Episode 95 – The Wild Hunt

Things we talk about in this episode:

Opening Music:

'Ancient Whispers I' by P C III, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence.

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/P_C_III/Ad_Astra_Vol_1/03_Ancient_Whispers_I]

Closing Music:

'Round II - The Ancients' by Learning Music, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Learning_Music/An_End_Like_This/32_Round_II_-_The_Ancients]

Background fire ambience by inchadney from freesound.org

Additional sound effects from Ambient Mixer

 

Opening quote from Branston, Brian. 1974. The Lost Gods of England. p. 94. From the Peterborough Chronicle in 1127.

Manan Manan from the Muppets: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8N_tupPBtWQ

Ghost Riders in the Sky - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0Fhy8o7ufi8

Ghost Rider (2007) https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0259324/

“The first rule of…” From Fight Club (1999) https://lithub.com/everyone-misunderstands-the-point-of-fight-club/

The Wickerman remake https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0450345/

Covered in bees: Eddie Izzard

Flaming Queens - https://glosbe.com/en/en/flaming%20queen

Flaming Lips https://www.flaminglips.com/

The Battle of Stamford Bridge: https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryMagazine/DestinationsUK/The-Battle-of-Stamford-Bridge/

The Wild Hunt legends, https://www.ancient-origins.net/myths-legends-europe/omen-odin-wild-hunt-thundered-across-european-skies-bringing-calamity-and-doom-021618 here’s the ones from Orkney: http://www.orkneyjar.com/tradition/hunt.htm

Jacob Grimm – first defined it as a Germanic Pagan Tradition in 1835

Diana and Nemuralia: http://www.badwitch.co.uk/2010/08/nemoralia-festival-of-diana.html

“When I was younger, so much younger than today” Help, by the Beatles https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Q_ZzBGPdqE&list=PLdFVES8fU1kM1GZbA5bB4lIKLWQOAqHQM

Robin, the Hooded Man and Herne https://www.historyfiles.co.uk/Guide/RobinOfSherwood.htm

The painting – The Wild Hunt of Odin (1872) by Peter Arbo

The Prometheus School of Running Away from Things: https://cinemasins.fandom.com/wiki/Prometheus_School_of_Running_Away_from_Things

How to find us online

Closing reading: "When the winter winds blow and the Yule fires are lit, it is best to stay indoors, safely shut away from the dark paths and the wild heaths. Those who wander out by themselves during the Yule-nights may hear a sudden rustling through the tops of the trees - a rustling that might be the wind, though the rest of the wood is still.

"But then the barking of dogs fills the air, and the host of wild souls sweeps down, fire flashing from the eyes of the black hounds and the hooves of the black horses"
Kveldulf Hagen Gundarsson (Mountain Thunder)

Frithcast Episode 94 -Skathi

Episode 94 – Skathi

Things we talk about in this episode:

Opening Music:

'Ancient Whispers I' by P C III, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence.

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/P_C_III/Ad_Astra_Vol_1/03_Ancient_Whispers_I]

Closing Music:

'Round II - The Ancients' by Learning Music, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Learning_Music/An_End_Like_This/32_Round_II_-_The_Ancients]

Background fire ambience by inchadney from freesound.org

 

"I was nowhere near the cottage..." - 'The Black Adder', episode 1 "The Foretelling": https://blackadderquotes.com/blackadder-series-1-episode-1-full-script

Saturn's Norse group of Moons: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saturn%27s_Norse_group_of_satellites

Skadi Rowing Club, Rotterdam: https://www.skadi.nl/ (in Dutch - your browser may offer translation)

Shepherd Moon: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shepherd_moon

Clannad: https://www.clannad.ie/ ('Robin, the Hooded Man' is on their 1984 album 'Legend', which serves as the soundtrack for the ITV series 'Robin of Sherwood')

Enya: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enya (own website is at enya.com but as of November 2020 appears offline)

Lex Talionis: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eye_for_an_eye

Galileo: objects of different weight (assuming all other factors remain equal) will accelerate at the same rate when in freefall. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galileo%27s_Leaning_Tower_of_Pisa_experiment

"Hello. My name is Inigo Montoya / I want my father back" - Slightly different from how I remember it but the same basic principle: https://youtu.be/kRAI9_MkmBM

How to find us online

Frithcast Episode 93 - Your Move: Tafl and Chess

Episode 93 – Your Move: Tafl and Chess

 

Things we talk about in this episode:

Opening Music:

'Ancient Whispers I' by P C III, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence.

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/P_C_III/Ad_Astra_Vol_1/03_Ancient_Whispers_I]

Closing Music:

'Round II - The Ancients' by Learning Music, licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence

[http://freemusicarchive.org/music/Learning_Music/An_End_Like_This/32_Round_II_-_The_Ancients]

Background fire ambience by inchadney from freesound.org

 

Knightmare: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0193677/

Clan Lasombre https://whitewolf.fandom.com/wiki/Lasombra

300 Spartans at Thermopylae https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Thermopylae

Empire Total War https://www.totalwar.com/blog/the-empire/

Guild Wars 2 https://www.guildwars2.com/en-gb/the-game/

Risk https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/181/risk

Monopoly https://monopoly.hasbro.com/en-gb

Whalebone plaque from Scar Boat Burial http://www.orkneyjar.com/history/scarboat/plaqueimage.htm

Dwarf Bread https://wiki.lspace.org/mediawiki/Dwarf_Bread

“I believe that children are our future” Whitnet Houston The Greatest Love of All https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IYzlVDlE72w

‘I believe for every drop of rain that falls’- Mahalia Jackson https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uOXHvnSeoAo

I would like to take you on a journey – Rocky Horror Picture Show https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0073629/

Torshavn https://www.alongdustyroads.com/posts/things-to-do-in-torshavn-faroe-islands

Scottish Tablet https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/scottish-tablet

Linnaeus observing the rules and writing them down: https://www.bbvaopenmind.com/en/science/mathematics/viking-chess-a-game-we-know-thanks-to-linnaeus/

Fluxx https://www.looneylabs.com/games/fluxx

Cards Against Humanity https://cardsagainsthumanity.com/

Lunch Money https://www.atlas-games.com/product_tables/AG1100

Gother Than Thou https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/698/gother-thou

Munchkin https://munchkin.game/products/games/munchkin/

Tafl mentioned as the top boast of Earl Ragnvald of Orkney: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/R%C3%B6gnvald_Kali_Kolsson

Odin as the riddle setter Gestumblindi with some riddles set around Tafl: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gestumblindi

Ian McShane’s character arc in Game of Thrones https://gameofthrones.fandom.com/wiki/Ray

The complete set found in Torksey in Lincolnshire in September 2020 (found by a metal detectorist and sold at auction): https://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/27239/20200909/viking-chess-lincolnshire.htm

4 versions of the Tafl game: http://tafl.cyningstan.com/post/1276/four-schools-of-hnefatafl

Good PDF intro to the game: http://hem.bredband.net/b512479/Hnefatafl_by_Sten_Helmfrid.pdf

Birka grave 523 Tafl pieces: https://www.tillermanbeads.co.uk/onlineshop/prod_3846997-Hnefatafl-kingpiece-from-Birka-grave-523.html

List of Tafl pieces and boards:http://tafl.cyningstan.com/page/92/archaeological-finds

Board games of the Vikings: https://core.ac.uk/download/pdf/268146544.pdf

Isle of Lewis Chessmen https://blog.britishmuseum.org/check-it-out-the-lewis-chessmen/

Recent discovery of Isle of Lewis Chessman: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-48824712

World Quickplay Tafl Championships: https://www.fetlar.org/hnefatafl and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I2Zy-gIrU20

Thud by Sir Terry Pratchett https://discworld.fandom.com/wiki/Thud!

Tri-Dimensional chess from Star Trek https://www.chessvariants.com/3d.dir/startrek.html

How to find us online