War Is A Bloody Thing
The only example given by Snorri of the intrepidity of the god is anything but a battle scene. It is the deliberate sacrifice he makes of his right hand in the wolf Fenrir’s mouth. Finally, epigraphy and place-names attest to an important link between “Mars”- Tyr and the thing, the popular assembly where legal cases are tried and juridical difficulties heard. “Mars” is actually called Thingsus on an inscription carved by Frisians at the beginning of the third century in Great Britain. In Zealand in Denmark, Tislund was certainly a place of assembly. Furthermore, the translation of Martis dies, which is, for example tysdagr “Tyr’s day” in Old Norse (cf. Eng. Tuesday), is dingesdach in Middle Low German, Middle Dutch dinxendach “Ding’s day” (Dutchdinsdag). The first element, altered, is perhaps found in German Dienstag. These facts—except the last, which he does not accept—have inspired the thoughtful comments of Jan de Vries:
“In general, too much emphasis has been placed on the warlike aspects of Tyr, and his significance for Germanic law has not been sufficiently recognized. It should be noted that, from the Germanic point of view, there is no contradiction between the concepts “god of War” and “god of Law.” War is in fact not only the bloody mingling of combat, but no less a decision obtained between the two combatants and secured by precise rules of law. That is why the day and place of battle are frequently fixed in advance; in provoking Marius, Boiorix offers him the choice of place and time (Plutarch, Marius, 25, 3). So is explained, also, how combat between two armies can be replaced by a legal duel, in which the gods grant victory to the party whose right they recognize. Words like Schwertding [“the meeting of swords,” a kenning for battle], or Old Norse vapndomr [“judgment of arms”] are not poetic figures, but correspond exactly to ancient practice.”
Inverse reasons can be added to the above to make the gap even smaller. While war is a bloody thing, the thing of peacetime also evokes war: people deliberating have the appearance and ways of a battling army. Tacitus described these assemblies: considunt armati . . . nihil neque publicae neque privatae rei nisi armati agunt. . . and, for approval, they shake their spears, the most honorable sign of assent being armis laudare. A few centuries later, Scandinavia offers the same sight: whatever may be the sanctity and the “peace” of the thing—as presented in the texts chosen by W. Baetke—men gather there, armed, and in approval they brandish swords or hatchets or even strike their shields with their swords. And it is not only scene and protocol which recall war: the thing is a test of strength and prestige between families or groups, the more numerous or more menacing attempting to impose their will on the others. Despite the famous, noble, fearless jurists, the procedure itself is only an arsenal of forms on which one may draw, which one may divert from their destination, turning right to wrong. Properly used, law assures the equivalent of a victory, eliminating the poorly protected or weaker adversary. The luckless Grettir, and a good many others, had this experience.
That is, furthermore, the lesson to be learned from the one mythic episode of which Tyr is the hero, that in which Snorri shows Tyr’s bravery. It is linked to the very character of the god, because, says Snorri, after this adventure Tyr “is one-handed and he is not called a peace-maker.” This legend has stimulated more extensive reflections, which I can only briefly summarize here. We have seen above that Odin is voluntarily mutilated, that he obtained his knowledge of the invisible, the basis of his power, through the loss of one of his eyes. Tyr, too, is mutilated voluntarily, or at least with his tacit consent. At the beginning of time, Snorri recounts, when the wolf Fenrir was born, the gods, who knew that he was to devour them, decided to tie him up. Odin had a magic cord made, so thin that it was invisible, but strong enough to resist all tests. Then they proposed to the young Fenrir that he let himself be bound by this harmless fetter, in sport, to give him the pleasure of breaking it. More distrustful than youth usually is, the wolf accepted only on the condition that one of the gods put a hand in his mouth while this operation was going on, at vedi “as a pledge,” so that all should transpire without deceit. None of the gods was willing to pledge his hand, until Tyr stretched forth his right hand into the wolf’s mouth. Naturally the wolf could not free himself: the harder he tried, the tighter the magic fetter became—and so he stays until the end of time, those gloomy days when all the forces of evil will be liberated to destroy the world and the gods with it. The gods, according to Snorri, “all laughed except Tyr; he lost his hand.”
The function of the god of the thing and his mutilation thus agree closely with the function of clairvoyance and the mutilation of Odin. It is the loss of his right hand, in a fraudulent procedure of guarantee, as a pledge, which qualifies Tyr as the “god of law”—in a pessimistic view of the law, directed not toward reconciliation among the parties, but toward the crushing of some by the others. Tyr “is not called a peacemaker.”
-excerpted from “Gods of the Ancient Northmen” by Georges Dumezil (1959)