View Full Version : Fairy Ring Oracle - Wayland Smith - 16th card
Card: Wayland Smith
Court: Two, Summer
There is a well built Elvin blacksmith working at his forge. Behind him is a stone circle as the sun sets. The sword that he is working on is shinning brightly.
Divination: hard work, creation, skill, mastery
Reversed: rivalry, delays
purple_scorp
18-04-2005, 06:32
A tradesperson, craftily sharpening a sword on an anvil. This is a hardworking honest man whose ethics and morals are as strongfast and steady as those rocks in the picture in the background. I feel this man is more muscle than brain.
From the book: Well, I got the bits about him being hardworking but I didn't know all of that magic stuff associated with the anvil and his craft.
purple_scorp
This guy reminds me of Hephaestus, the blacksmith of the gods. I guess that Wayland Smith is the man who forges the magic swords that the Lady of the Lake distributes to chosen human kings. This sword Wayland Smith is forging would have to be magical -- it's gold, and gold is one of the softest metals in the world. A golden sword wouldn't do much good in battle unless it was infused with fairy magic.
I would guess the meaning of this card would be hard work, infusing your creations with love, the magical aspects of creativity??? Well, nothing in there about creativity, just hard work. I wonder why reversed means rivalry?
Kim
The saga about Wayland/Volund (Volundarkvitha) begins with his marriage to a swan-maiden, Hervor. Her two sisters are married to two of Wayland's companions. The three swan-maidens live with their husbands for 8 years, then they grow so homesick that they flee. Wayland's companions go charging off to find their brides, but Wayland stays at home, forging gold rings for Hervor as a gift of love. After laboring at this, he gets tired and sleeps.
As he sleeps, Wayland the Smith is betrayed, kidnapped, and forced into slavery by King Nidud of the Njars. Trapped alone at a forge on an island, Wayland (Volund in the Norse saga Volundarkvidha) plots his revenge on his captors:
Nidud the king gave his daughter,
Bodvild, the gold ring he had taken from the bast at Völund's.
And he himself wore the sword which had been Völund's.
(snipped for clarity)
He gnashes his teeth when he notices the sword,
And on Bodvild's arm beholds his ring,
His eyes glare, grim as a snake's:
With a knife they cut his knee-sinews,
Set him on the island of Saeverstod.
There he fashioned all sorts of precious things for the king.
And no man except the king dared to voyage thither.
18
'From Nidud's hip there hangs a sword,
The blade I sharpened with a sure eye,
The blade tempered with a true hand;
Now the shining steel is stolen from me:
Back to my smithy it shall be born yet.'
In the end, Wayland gets his revenge by luring Nidud's two young sons to his island smithy alone. He kills them and makes gifts for Nidud's family out of their skulls, eyes, and teeth, then hiding the rest of their remains underneath the forge.
Then he lures Bodvild, Nidud's daughter, out to the smithy. He gets her pregnant, then escapes, flying away on wings he forged himself (kinda like Daedalus).
In the saga, he goes from being a devoted husband to being a monster born out of despair. He starts out as human, just this guy, but his compassion is tortured out of him until nothing but pure skill remains. His first work was indeed infused with love for his wife, but his other works were infused with hatred and not a little bit of cruelty.
You can read the whole text at: www.angelfire.com/on/Wodensharrow/volund.html
purple_scorp
20-04-2005, 02:01
Hi Ulfdis,
It's great to see another contributor the Fairy Ring Oracle threads. Wow, that is an amazing story. Is there one like that for each of these cards?
purple_scorp
Hi Purple-Scorp,
I'm not sure about the characters from the other cards, but Wayland the Smith's name caught my eye because I had just read the Volundarkvitha last night. Right now I'm working my way through all the Norse lore I can get my grubby paws on for cheap. Thank the Gods for online versions!