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Merseburg charms article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
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Merseburg charms was one of the Philosophy and religion good articles, but it has been removed from the list. There are suggestions below for improving the article to meet the good article criteria. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake. | |||||||||||||
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Shouldn't Sunna be the same as Sol (goddess)?-- Wiglaf 22:52, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
What bugs me is whether the spells were invented in 10th century, or had existed before and only written down in 10th century. If the former was the case it was already Christian era, and its "purer pagan religiosity" will be difficult to be claimed, no? I think this issue should be stated clearer in the article. Anyone willing to assist? -- BorgQueen 20:58, 20 October 2005 (UTC)
India texts, so possibly this type of spell goes back to ancient aryan/indo-european times. Sorry I can't be more specific. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 213.122.23.174 ( talk) 17:16, 20 March 2007 (UTC).
I have put an external link to it ( http://uweb.cas.usf.edu/~clopez/CAL/AV/DIS/ch1a.htm)
This is an extremely good article, but the English was a little out of focus at some points. I have left the content entirely alone, as I have nothing to add to it, but have re-worked the English to try to do justice to it (I have at some points gone back to the original German and re-translated). Staffelde 14:52, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
the caption reads "Scandinavian Bracteate from the time of the migrations. Odin riding his horse." Is it? The image has no source at all. The inscription appears to be (mirrored) Elder Futhark, which may support the "time of the migrations" claim, but not the necessarily the "Scandinavian" one. Is it Odin? Can anybody decipher the inscription for us, or how can we check if this is true? I can only make out gibu alna at the end, which sounds more German than Norse to me. dab (ᛏ) 17:03, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
http://www.nordic-life.org/nmh/InEnglish/2eng.pdf
There is an image here:
http://www.yale.edu/german/whobrey/runepics.html
Staffelde 11:01, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
Still with the bracteate, the English caption says that this is Odin riding a horse, whereas the German caption says that it shows Odin healing a horse, as is also mentioned in the intro text to the second spell. Which? Staffelde 21:21, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
Seeing that Image:Vadstena_bracteate.jpg also has mirrored runes, I am thinking I may have been too hasty in mirroring the image. Is it possible that these bracteates inscriptions are mirrored because they were made from a mould or something? If so, that should be noted on bracteate! Any help? dab (ᛏ) 15:32, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
I've been adjusting links to the Epic disambiguation page. I know nothing of The Incantations (except what I've read here!), but wonder if someone could help me out with the word "epic" used here. Usually, an epic story would be very long with many characters, etc. so I'm wonder if "epic" is appropriate and whether to have a link to Epic poetry or not. Could someone enlighten me and/or edit the page as appopriate? John 20:08, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
This article did not go through the current GA nomination process. Looking at the article as is, it fails on criteria 2b of the GA quality standards in that it does not cite any sources. Most Good Articles use inline citations. I would recommend that this be fixed, to reexamine the article against the GA quality standards, and to submit the article through the nomination process. -- RelHistBuff 09:18, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
Citations fixed, relisted GA Atom 00:36, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
Proofread. Added additional inlince citations, enlarged document image. Will review later for second pass at proofing. Atom 23:17, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
I've passed this article, yet I'd like to encourage further improvements and more citations. The line translations are somewhat difficult to follow in three column format. Perhaps the example at Beowulf could improve the presentation here. I agree this is GA material, but doubt it will advance to FA in the near future due to length. Is there no more that can be said about such a culturally significant find? Durova 20:39, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
I am doing the GA Reassessment on this article as part of the GA Sweeps project. H1nkles ( talk) 15:09, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
My main concern with the article is a lack of citations in certain areas. The citations in the article are credible and well-formatted. I put a couple of citation needed templates in where I felt that citations needed to be added. There are a couple of citation needed templates on the article since March of 2008, those have not been removed but I have a feeling that they have been addressed. I will put the article on hold for a week pending work on the citations. Other than that the article is fine. Please contact me on my talk page if you have any questions. H1nkles ( talk) 15:26, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
Hm. Well, let's see about getting those tags fixed. As far as I can tell, there are four:
I'm not pushing for this article to get GA status, so I'm not going to make any changes to the article itself. But if this is all that's holding the article up, then the involved parties should spend 2 minutes and get this done. Thanks. Aryaman (talk) 10:42, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
Why is there a 'citation needed' on each of the original language versions of the spells, when you can clearly read every word of it on the picture of the original handwritten spells that is included in this article? I have references for the exact wording in books I own but those are secondary sources compared to that photograph of the original handwriting! -- Feuerrabe ( talk) 22:02, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
The text is also taken, word for word, from the printed reference already given at the end of the paragraph (Jeep 2001). This was just an example of improper use of the tag. This happens sometimes, either because people just go about randomly tagging sentences without bothering to consult the references already given, or sometimes deliberately to push some sort of agenda. What was actually lacking a citation was the insertion of "(so did)" suggesting that four goddesses rather than just two were involved. This was inserted with no basis in the reference cited, but it was not tagged because the paragraph had a footnote. This is an example of how "checking references" on Wikipedia too often means "check if there is a little number attached". In reality, it is ambiguous whether two or four goddesses are involved. Opinions to either effect can be cited, of course, but with attribution. -- dab (𒁳) 13:11, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
in fact, there seem to be variant readings. The text as given is indeed referenced, it is as given by Jeeps 2001. But looking at the manuscript, I find it hard to make out if it is "thu biguol en friia" or thu biguol en frua". And indeed Simrock read "frua". This is significant, as Frua is cognate with Old Norse Freyja, and Frija is cognate with Old Norse Frigg. Simrock like Jeeps gives "Freya". This seems to be a mistake, as Simrock bases his "Freya" on his reading "frua", while Jeeps persists in translating "Freya" even though he opts for the reading "friia".
The reading "frua" appears to be obsolete in recent publications, but it is certainly well represented in 19th century literature. This needs elaboration. In the meantime, it is perhaps wise to take the translation by Fortson (2004) [2] as it is more literal. -- dab (𒁳) 13:35, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
The friia reading is the most widespread today. In fact, I only find the frua reading in 19th century sources. But since most recent sources seem to ignore the fact that there even was a variant reading in the past, I am not sure what its status is.
As for 'idisi', it means "ladies" ( disir), and could be applied as a honorific to supernatural as well as to mortal women. -- dab (𒁳) 14:25, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
Look at the actual Mereseburg manuscript - actual manuscript unretouched and closeup of "frija" section - the alleged mention of "frija" is almost obliterated and looks like rrua. To be generous maybe frua. Maybe it said frija, doesn't look like it though. Whose authority are we taking that this does not read "frua" or "rrua"? Who retouched the copy of the manuscript we have on wikipedia which still shows "rrua"? In fact if you look at either version of the manuscript photo we do not have an accurate transcription of it on wikipedia (there are a number of places that are not accurately transcribed in OHG). Where is Frija coming from? Obotlig ( talk) 04:05, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
I suggest the following in all humility to trained philologists who I greatly hope might have have more scientific means of testing this hypothesis than I can think of. Couldn't the Merseburg Incantations actually have been a part of a marriage ceremony? With a little imagination, I could go line by line and describe a reason these words might have been affirmations of the new role of the bride. The final lines, variations on joining, make this theory most tempting. Further, in a land that had been converted to Christianity for centuries, would not such an invocation of ancient symbols be most tenaciously preserved in something as universal and necessary as a marriage litany? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.64.161.30 ( talk) 18:11, 16 August 2012 (UTC)
Balder and Phol are applied to same character so how about Lord Apollo? 19 November 2012 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.22.186.133 ( talk) 23:12, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
I worked on the /*Parallels*/ section in a series of edits, but I feel it has become somewhat inflated, partly because of the numerous citations that deal with parallels, but may not be all that much of interest to people strictly interested in the OHG interpretations. (Since all of the Scandinavian and Scottish parallels are modern or near-modern). It might make sense to then spin off an article on the "Second Merseburg charm type" of spells.
I suppose it is all right to spin-off such a child article, since it is done all the time. Though I have my reservation on this because this categorization may not have gained general acceptance. There is apparently a "Charm Indexes" project in the works, along the lines of Stith Thompson (Aarne-Thompson) folktale motif indices and the TSB Scandinavian ballad index, this is still in the works and hasn't gained a foothold (general familiarity). The "Second Merseburg charm" type is one of fourteen(?) categories established by Ebermann (Ebermann, Oskar (1903). Blut- und Wundsegen in ihrer Entwicklung dargestellt. Palaestra:Untersuchungen und Texte aus der deutscehen und englischen Philologie. Vol. XXIV. Berlin: Mayer & Müller.) and is discussed in English in the following aritcle: Tatiana Agapkina, Andrei Toporkov (Moscow), "Charm Indexes: Problems and Perspectives" (pdf) -- Kiyoweap ( talk) 00:44, 5 February 2013 (UTC)
The result of the move request was: MOVED to "Merseburg charms" ( non-admin closure) Galobtter ( pingó mió) 12:09, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Merseburg Incantations → Merseburg Charms – "Merseburg Charms" is the normal name for these texts in English-language scholarship. A free-text search of JStor finds 42 hits for "Merseburg charms" and not a single one for "Merseburg incantations". As far as I can see, "charms" is the only term used in the standard handbooks and reference works on German language and Old High German literature:
The only occurrence I can find of "Merseburg incantations" in a peer-reviewed print publication is Stefan Jänicke's "On the Impact of the Merseburg Incantations", though no doubt there are a few more. Google, of course, finds lots, but as far as I can see the majority of these are just mirrors and adaptations of the WP article, and in any case there are still more hits for "charms" Pfold ( talk) 11:13, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
Well, rather a lot, in my view. I think the German article is clearly superior and some of it could usefully be incorporated here.
I'm happy to make a start on some of this, and I will add some more recent publications to provide pointers for further development, but there's a lot to do, and the question of a child article for the parallels could do with some discussion. -- Pfold ( talk) 07:13, 21 April 2019 (UTC)
I propose that the Parallels section should be split off and put in a new page called Germanic healing spells or something similar. As it stands, this section is much too long for this page, considering that it's not the main topic (the current Norwegian section is longer than all the material on the Merseburg charms). The suggested new page would allow the incorporation of material on other relevant spells, as well as more general material on this type of spell. It would, of course, need a new lead and a new section with a summary of the material on second charm. As far as I can see, almost all of the items listed in the "General" section of the references are relevant only for the to-be-split-off material. -- Pfold ( talk) 12:24, 23 April 2019 (UTC)
Comment: - I will concede that inserting a full quote (or a quote in extenso) for each parallel is not mandatory, only rather convenient. These full quotes (and bibliographical fine details) might be abbreviated here, if it is given in 1) a separate article that exists, or in 2) German incantations, Scandinavian healing spells, Anglo-Saxon metrical charms or whatever. -- Kiyoweap ( talk) 13:28, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
Info on parallels in Slavic folklore considered as fringe and reverted by Ermenrich. So ancient India parallels seem not fringe, while nearby nations' data do. Why so? Lapchenko ( talk) 05:21, 29 November 2020 (UTC)
Comment on content, not on the contributor.The Merseburg charms are in Old High German. Any relevant scholarship on them should be published in German, English, or (unlikely) French. It is in these languages that scholarly discussion of them is conducted, this isn't a topic like The Song of Igor's Campaign where relevant scholarship would be in Russian and not translated into a different language. As we summarize the according to wp:WEIGHT, any parallels only discussed in Russian should not get much (or potentially any) weight, particularly when the fact that wp:AGEMATTERS is factored in and one of your sources is from 1909.-- Ermenrich ( talk) 13:43, 7 December 2020 (UTC)
Just serves to confirm my conviction that a lot of this stuff (not just the Slavic) doesn't really belong in this article, but would be much better served with its own page elsewhere on WP. -- Pfold ( talk) 17:34, 7 December 2020 (UTC)
You forgot to mention Hindu in your list of relevant languages to discuss since Ancient Indian parallels are ok to be taken into account Lapchenko ( talk) 18:24, 7 December 2020 (UTC)
@ Mårtensås: It is absurd to claim that language from the 1629 is "pure Danish" when Danish has changed considerably since this time. Moreover, according to Kungälv, the city was originally Norwegian and was destroyed and then only it was rebuilt in 1612. We don't know when the Dombok was written or what time period it represents. Without a reliable source we can't say whether it is "Danish" or not, and saying something is "pure x-ethnicity" has some very problematic associations we want to avoid. It's not encyclopedic.-- Ermenrich ( talk) 14:08, 16 September 2021 (UTC)
A lot of the parallels have only very old sources such as Grimm and Viktor Rydberg. Bloodofox, do you know if they continue to be discussed in more recent material? I'm not sure we should include things that are only cited to 19th century scholars, who often had raging cases of parallelomania. This was also an issue when someone tried to add some Slavic parallels last year. Austronesier, you were able to find some better sources for the Indic parallels, what do you think about the various Scandinavian and "Germanic" ones?-- Ermenrich ( talk) 14:23, 16 September 2021 (UTC)
This is the
talk page for discussing improvements to the
Merseburg charms article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject. |
Article policies
|
Find sources: Google ( books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL |
Merseburg charms was one of the Philosophy and religion good articles, but it has been removed from the list. There are suggestions below for improving the article to meet the good article criteria. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake. | |||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||
Current status: Delisted good article |
This article is rated B-class on Wikipedia's
content assessment scale. It is of interest to the following WikiProjects: | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
Shouldn't Sunna be the same as Sol (goddess)?-- Wiglaf 22:52, 25 September 2005 (UTC)
What bugs me is whether the spells were invented in 10th century, or had existed before and only written down in 10th century. If the former was the case it was already Christian era, and its "purer pagan religiosity" will be difficult to be claimed, no? I think this issue should be stated clearer in the article. Anyone willing to assist? -- BorgQueen 20:58, 20 October 2005 (UTC)
India texts, so possibly this type of spell goes back to ancient aryan/indo-european times. Sorry I can't be more specific. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 213.122.23.174 ( talk) 17:16, 20 March 2007 (UTC).
I have put an external link to it ( http://uweb.cas.usf.edu/~clopez/CAL/AV/DIS/ch1a.htm)
This is an extremely good article, but the English was a little out of focus at some points. I have left the content entirely alone, as I have nothing to add to it, but have re-worked the English to try to do justice to it (I have at some points gone back to the original German and re-translated). Staffelde 14:52, 4 December 2005 (UTC)
the caption reads "Scandinavian Bracteate from the time of the migrations. Odin riding his horse." Is it? The image has no source at all. The inscription appears to be (mirrored) Elder Futhark, which may support the "time of the migrations" claim, but not the necessarily the "Scandinavian" one. Is it Odin? Can anybody decipher the inscription for us, or how can we check if this is true? I can only make out gibu alna at the end, which sounds more German than Norse to me. dab (ᛏ) 17:03, 5 December 2005 (UTC)
http://www.nordic-life.org/nmh/InEnglish/2eng.pdf
There is an image here:
http://www.yale.edu/german/whobrey/runepics.html
Staffelde 11:01, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
Still with the bracteate, the English caption says that this is Odin riding a horse, whereas the German caption says that it shows Odin healing a horse, as is also mentioned in the intro text to the second spell. Which? Staffelde 21:21, 6 December 2005 (UTC)
Seeing that Image:Vadstena_bracteate.jpg also has mirrored runes, I am thinking I may have been too hasty in mirroring the image. Is it possible that these bracteates inscriptions are mirrored because they were made from a mould or something? If so, that should be noted on bracteate! Any help? dab (ᛏ) 15:32, 7 December 2005 (UTC)
I've been adjusting links to the Epic disambiguation page. I know nothing of The Incantations (except what I've read here!), but wonder if someone could help me out with the word "epic" used here. Usually, an epic story would be very long with many characters, etc. so I'm wonder if "epic" is appropriate and whether to have a link to Epic poetry or not. Could someone enlighten me and/or edit the page as appopriate? John 20:08, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
This article did not go through the current GA nomination process. Looking at the article as is, it fails on criteria 2b of the GA quality standards in that it does not cite any sources. Most Good Articles use inline citations. I would recommend that this be fixed, to reexamine the article against the GA quality standards, and to submit the article through the nomination process. -- RelHistBuff 09:18, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
Citations fixed, relisted GA Atom 00:36, 25 August 2006 (UTC)
Proofread. Added additional inlince citations, enlarged document image. Will review later for second pass at proofing. Atom 23:17, 19 August 2006 (UTC)
I've passed this article, yet I'd like to encourage further improvements and more citations. The line translations are somewhat difficult to follow in three column format. Perhaps the example at Beowulf could improve the presentation here. I agree this is GA material, but doubt it will advance to FA in the near future due to length. Is there no more that can be said about such a culturally significant find? Durova 20:39, 5 September 2006 (UTC)
I am doing the GA Reassessment on this article as part of the GA Sweeps project. H1nkles ( talk) 15:09, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
My main concern with the article is a lack of citations in certain areas. The citations in the article are credible and well-formatted. I put a couple of citation needed templates in where I felt that citations needed to be added. There are a couple of citation needed templates on the article since March of 2008, those have not been removed but I have a feeling that they have been addressed. I will put the article on hold for a week pending work on the citations. Other than that the article is fine. Please contact me on my talk page if you have any questions. H1nkles ( talk) 15:26, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
Hm. Well, let's see about getting those tags fixed. As far as I can tell, there are four:
I'm not pushing for this article to get GA status, so I'm not going to make any changes to the article itself. But if this is all that's holding the article up, then the involved parties should spend 2 minutes and get this done. Thanks. Aryaman (talk) 10:42, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
Why is there a 'citation needed' on each of the original language versions of the spells, when you can clearly read every word of it on the picture of the original handwritten spells that is included in this article? I have references for the exact wording in books I own but those are secondary sources compared to that photograph of the original handwriting! -- Feuerrabe ( talk) 22:02, 7 September 2010 (UTC)
The text is also taken, word for word, from the printed reference already given at the end of the paragraph (Jeep 2001). This was just an example of improper use of the tag. This happens sometimes, either because people just go about randomly tagging sentences without bothering to consult the references already given, or sometimes deliberately to push some sort of agenda. What was actually lacking a citation was the insertion of "(so did)" suggesting that four goddesses rather than just two were involved. This was inserted with no basis in the reference cited, but it was not tagged because the paragraph had a footnote. This is an example of how "checking references" on Wikipedia too often means "check if there is a little number attached". In reality, it is ambiguous whether two or four goddesses are involved. Opinions to either effect can be cited, of course, but with attribution. -- dab (𒁳) 13:11, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
in fact, there seem to be variant readings. The text as given is indeed referenced, it is as given by Jeeps 2001. But looking at the manuscript, I find it hard to make out if it is "thu biguol en friia" or thu biguol en frua". And indeed Simrock read "frua". This is significant, as Frua is cognate with Old Norse Freyja, and Frija is cognate with Old Norse Frigg. Simrock like Jeeps gives "Freya". This seems to be a mistake, as Simrock bases his "Freya" on his reading "frua", while Jeeps persists in translating "Freya" even though he opts for the reading "friia".
The reading "frua" appears to be obsolete in recent publications, but it is certainly well represented in 19th century literature. This needs elaboration. In the meantime, it is perhaps wise to take the translation by Fortson (2004) [2] as it is more literal. -- dab (𒁳) 13:35, 15 September 2010 (UTC)
The friia reading is the most widespread today. In fact, I only find the frua reading in 19th century sources. But since most recent sources seem to ignore the fact that there even was a variant reading in the past, I am not sure what its status is.
As for 'idisi', it means "ladies" ( disir), and could be applied as a honorific to supernatural as well as to mortal women. -- dab (𒁳) 14:25, 17 September 2010 (UTC)
Look at the actual Mereseburg manuscript - actual manuscript unretouched and closeup of "frija" section - the alleged mention of "frija" is almost obliterated and looks like rrua. To be generous maybe frua. Maybe it said frija, doesn't look like it though. Whose authority are we taking that this does not read "frua" or "rrua"? Who retouched the copy of the manuscript we have on wikipedia which still shows "rrua"? In fact if you look at either version of the manuscript photo we do not have an accurate transcription of it on wikipedia (there are a number of places that are not accurately transcribed in OHG). Where is Frija coming from? Obotlig ( talk) 04:05, 25 February 2012 (UTC)
I suggest the following in all humility to trained philologists who I greatly hope might have have more scientific means of testing this hypothesis than I can think of. Couldn't the Merseburg Incantations actually have been a part of a marriage ceremony? With a little imagination, I could go line by line and describe a reason these words might have been affirmations of the new role of the bride. The final lines, variations on joining, make this theory most tempting. Further, in a land that had been converted to Christianity for centuries, would not such an invocation of ancient symbols be most tenaciously preserved in something as universal and necessary as a marriage litany? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.64.161.30 ( talk) 18:11, 16 August 2012 (UTC)
Balder and Phol are applied to same character so how about Lord Apollo? 19 November 2012 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.22.186.133 ( talk) 23:12, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
I worked on the /*Parallels*/ section in a series of edits, but I feel it has become somewhat inflated, partly because of the numerous citations that deal with parallels, but may not be all that much of interest to people strictly interested in the OHG interpretations. (Since all of the Scandinavian and Scottish parallels are modern or near-modern). It might make sense to then spin off an article on the "Second Merseburg charm type" of spells.
I suppose it is all right to spin-off such a child article, since it is done all the time. Though I have my reservation on this because this categorization may not have gained general acceptance. There is apparently a "Charm Indexes" project in the works, along the lines of Stith Thompson (Aarne-Thompson) folktale motif indices and the TSB Scandinavian ballad index, this is still in the works and hasn't gained a foothold (general familiarity). The "Second Merseburg charm" type is one of fourteen(?) categories established by Ebermann (Ebermann, Oskar (1903). Blut- und Wundsegen in ihrer Entwicklung dargestellt. Palaestra:Untersuchungen und Texte aus der deutscehen und englischen Philologie. Vol. XXIV. Berlin: Mayer & Müller.) and is discussed in English in the following aritcle: Tatiana Agapkina, Andrei Toporkov (Moscow), "Charm Indexes: Problems and Perspectives" (pdf) -- Kiyoweap ( talk) 00:44, 5 February 2013 (UTC)
The result of the move request was: MOVED to "Merseburg charms" ( non-admin closure) Galobtter ( pingó mió) 12:09, 21 January 2018 (UTC)
Merseburg Incantations → Merseburg Charms – "Merseburg Charms" is the normal name for these texts in English-language scholarship. A free-text search of JStor finds 42 hits for "Merseburg charms" and not a single one for "Merseburg incantations". As far as I can see, "charms" is the only term used in the standard handbooks and reference works on German language and Old High German literature:
The only occurrence I can find of "Merseburg incantations" in a peer-reviewed print publication is Stefan Jänicke's "On the Impact of the Merseburg Incantations", though no doubt there are a few more. Google, of course, finds lots, but as far as I can see the majority of these are just mirrors and adaptations of the WP article, and in any case there are still more hits for "charms" Pfold ( talk) 11:13, 14 January 2018 (UTC)
Well, rather a lot, in my view. I think the German article is clearly superior and some of it could usefully be incorporated here.
I'm happy to make a start on some of this, and I will add some more recent publications to provide pointers for further development, but there's a lot to do, and the question of a child article for the parallels could do with some discussion. -- Pfold ( talk) 07:13, 21 April 2019 (UTC)
I propose that the Parallels section should be split off and put in a new page called Germanic healing spells or something similar. As it stands, this section is much too long for this page, considering that it's not the main topic (the current Norwegian section is longer than all the material on the Merseburg charms). The suggested new page would allow the incorporation of material on other relevant spells, as well as more general material on this type of spell. It would, of course, need a new lead and a new section with a summary of the material on second charm. As far as I can see, almost all of the items listed in the "General" section of the references are relevant only for the to-be-split-off material. -- Pfold ( talk) 12:24, 23 April 2019 (UTC)
Comment: - I will concede that inserting a full quote (or a quote in extenso) for each parallel is not mandatory, only rather convenient. These full quotes (and bibliographical fine details) might be abbreviated here, if it is given in 1) a separate article that exists, or in 2) German incantations, Scandinavian healing spells, Anglo-Saxon metrical charms or whatever. -- Kiyoweap ( talk) 13:28, 6 September 2019 (UTC)
Info on parallels in Slavic folklore considered as fringe and reverted by Ermenrich. So ancient India parallels seem not fringe, while nearby nations' data do. Why so? Lapchenko ( talk) 05:21, 29 November 2020 (UTC)
Comment on content, not on the contributor.The Merseburg charms are in Old High German. Any relevant scholarship on them should be published in German, English, or (unlikely) French. It is in these languages that scholarly discussion of them is conducted, this isn't a topic like The Song of Igor's Campaign where relevant scholarship would be in Russian and not translated into a different language. As we summarize the according to wp:WEIGHT, any parallels only discussed in Russian should not get much (or potentially any) weight, particularly when the fact that wp:AGEMATTERS is factored in and one of your sources is from 1909.-- Ermenrich ( talk) 13:43, 7 December 2020 (UTC)
Just serves to confirm my conviction that a lot of this stuff (not just the Slavic) doesn't really belong in this article, but would be much better served with its own page elsewhere on WP. -- Pfold ( talk) 17:34, 7 December 2020 (UTC)
You forgot to mention Hindu in your list of relevant languages to discuss since Ancient Indian parallels are ok to be taken into account Lapchenko ( talk) 18:24, 7 December 2020 (UTC)
@ Mårtensås: It is absurd to claim that language from the 1629 is "pure Danish" when Danish has changed considerably since this time. Moreover, according to Kungälv, the city was originally Norwegian and was destroyed and then only it was rebuilt in 1612. We don't know when the Dombok was written or what time period it represents. Without a reliable source we can't say whether it is "Danish" or not, and saying something is "pure x-ethnicity" has some very problematic associations we want to avoid. It's not encyclopedic.-- Ermenrich ( talk) 14:08, 16 September 2021 (UTC)
A lot of the parallels have only very old sources such as Grimm and Viktor Rydberg. Bloodofox, do you know if they continue to be discussed in more recent material? I'm not sure we should include things that are only cited to 19th century scholars, who often had raging cases of parallelomania. This was also an issue when someone tried to add some Slavic parallels last year. Austronesier, you were able to find some better sources for the Indic parallels, what do you think about the various Scandinavian and "Germanic" ones?-- Ermenrich ( talk) 14:23, 16 September 2021 (UTC)