Editing Auðumbla

{{Short description|Primeval cow of Norse mythology}}
[[File:SÁM 66, 74r, Auðumbla and Búri.jpg|thumb|Auðumbla licks free [[Búri]] as she produces  rivers of milk from her udders in an illustration from an Icelandic 18th century manuscript of the ''Prose Edda'']]
[[File:Audhumbla - Auðumbla - Audumbla - Adumbla - Milk-Stockholm-1908.jpg|thumb|Audumbla milk company in [[Stockholm]] 1908. 
This house was also [[Alfred Nobel]]'s birthplace.]]

In [[Norse mythology]], '''Auðumbla''' ({{IPA|non|ˈɔuðˌumblɑ}}; also Auðhumla {{IPA|non|ˈɔuðˌhumlɑ|}} and Auðumla {{IPA|non|ˈɔuðˌumlɑ|}}) is a primeval [[cow]]. The primordial frost [[jötunn]] [[Ymir]] fed upon her milk, and over the course of three days she [[Mineral lick#Mythology|licked away]] the salty rime rocks and revealed [[Búri]], grandfather of the gods and brothers [[Odin]], [[Vili and Vé]]. The creature is attested solely in the ''[[Prose Edda]]'', composed in the 13th century by Icelander [[Snorri Sturluson]]. Scholars identify her as stemming from a very early stratum of [[Germanic mythology]], and ultimately belonging to [[Proto-Indo-European mythology#Interpretations|larger complex]] of [[Sacred bull|primordial bovine]]s or [[Horned deity|cow-associated goddess]]es.

==Name==
The cow's name variously appears in ''[[Prose Edda]]'' manuscripts as {{lang|non|Auðumbla}} {{IPA|non|ˈɔuðˌumblɑ|}}, {{lang|non|Auðhumla}} {{IPA|non|ˈɔuðˌhumlɑ|}}, and {{lang|non|Auðumla}} {{IPA|non|ˈɔuðˌumlɑ|}}, and is generally accepted as meaning 'hornless cow rich in milk' (from [[Old Norse]] {{lang|non|auðr}} 'riches' and {{lang|non|humala|proto=yes}} 'hornless').<ref name="NAME">See discussion in both Lindow 2001:63 and Simek 2007:22.</ref>

The compound presents some level of [[semantic ambiguity]]. A parallel occurs in [[Scottish English]] ''humble-cow'' 'hornless cow', and Northern Europeans have bred hornless cows since prehistoric times. As highlighted above, {{Lang|non|auð-}} may mean 'rich' and in turn 'rich hornless cow' remains generally accepted among scholars as a gloss of the Old Icelandic animal name. However, {{lang|non|auðr}} can also mean 'fate' and 'desolate; desert', and so {{lang|non|Auðhum(b)la}} may also have been understood as the 'destroyer of the desert'. This semantic ambiguity may have been intentional.<ref name="LIBERMAN-347–352">Liberman (2016:347–352).</ref>

==Attestations==
Auðumbla's sole attested narrative occurs in the ''[[Gylfaginning]]'' section of the ''Prose Edda'', and her name appears among ways to refer to cows later in the ''[[Nafnaþulur]]'' section of the book. In ''Gylfaginning'', Gangleri (described earlier in ''Gylfaginning'' as king [[Gylfi]] in disguise) asks where, in the distant past, Ymir lived and what he ate. [[High, Just-as-High, and Third|High]] says that the cow Auðumbla's teats produced four rivers of milk, from which Ymir fed. Gylfi asks what Auðumbla ate, and High says that she licked salty rime stones for sustenance. He recounts that Auðumbla once licked salts for three days, revealing [[Búri]]: The first day she licked free his hair, the second day his head, and the third day his entire body.<ref name="FAULKES-1995-11">Faulkes (1995 [1987]:11).</ref>

The second and final mention of Auðumbla occurs in the ''Nafnaþulur'', wherein the author provides a variety of ways to refer to cows. Auðumbla is the only cow mentioned by name, and the author adds that "she is the noblest of cows".<ref name="FAULKES-1995-75">Faulkes (1995 [1987]:163).</ref>

==Scholarly reception and interpretation==
[[File:Nicolai Abildgaard, Ymer dier koen Ødhumbla, , KMS3397, Statens Museum for Kunst.jpg|thumb|The primordial being [[Ymir]] suckles at the udder of Auðumbla as she licks Búri out of the ice in a painting by [[Nicolai Abildgaard]], 1790]]

On the topic of Auðumbla, [[John Lindow]] says that cows appear commonly in creation narratives around the world, yet "what is most striking about Audhumla is that she unites the two warring groups in the mythology, by nourishing Ymir, ancestor of all the giants, and bringing into the light Búri, progenitor of the æsir."<ref name="LINDOW-2001-63">Lindow (2001:63).</ref>

[[Rudolf Simek]] highlights that Roman senator [[Tacitus]]'s first century CE work ethnography of the [[Germanic peoples]] ''[[Germania (book)|Germania]]'' mentions that they maintained hornless cattle (see ''name'' section above), and notes that the ''Germania'' relates how an image of the Germanic goddess [[Nerthus]] was borne through the countryside in a wagon drawn by cattle. Simek compares the deity to a variety of cow-associated deities among non-Germanic peoples, such as the Egyptian goddess [[Hathor]] (depicted as cow-headed) and [[Isis]] (whose iconography contains references to cows), and the Ancient Greek [[Hera]] (described as 'the cow-eyed').<ref name="SIMEK-2007-22">Simek (2007: 22).</ref>

==See also==
* [[Amalthea (mythology)|Amalthea]], goat who raised [[Zeus]], who suckled on her breast milk, in Classical [[Greek mythology]]
* [[Bull of Heaven]], a celestial bull from [[Sumerian mythology]]
* [[El (deity)|El]], creator bull deity in [[Canaanite mythology]]
* [[Gavaevodata]], primordial cow in [[Zoroastrianism|Zoroastrian mythology]]
* [[Heiðrún]], a nanny goat in Norse mythology whose teats produce mead for the [[Einherjar]]
* [[Kamadhenu]], cow from [[Hindu mythology]]
* [[Hathor]], cow goddess from [[Egyptian mythology]]
* [[Mehet-Weret]], celestial cow from Egyptian mythology

==Notes and citations==
{{reflist}}

==References==
{{refbegin}}
* Faulkes, Anthony (1995 [1985]). Trans. ''Edda''. [[Everyman's Library|Everyman]]. {{ISBN|0-460-87616-3}}
* [[John Lindow|Lindow, John]] (2001). ''Norse Mythology: A Guide to the Gods, Heroes, Rituals, and Beliefs''. [[Oxford University Press]]. {{ISBN|0-19-515382-0}}
* [[Anatoly Liberman|Liberman, Anatoly]] (2016). ''In Prayer and Laughter. Essays on Medieval Scandinavian and Germanic Mythology, Literature, and Culture''. Paleograph Press. {{ISBN|9785895260272}}
* Simek, Rudolf (2007) translated by Angela Hall. ''Dictionary of Northern Mythology''. [[Boydell & Brewer|D.S. Brewer]]. {{ISBN|0-85991-513-1}}

{{refend}}

==External links==
{{commons category|Auðumbla}}
*[https://myndir.uvic.ca/AudHu01.html MyNDIR (My Norse Digital Image Repository)] Illustrations of Auðhumbla from manuscripts and early print books. 

{{Norse mythology}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Audumbla}}
[[Category:Fictional characters introduced in the 13th century]]
[[Category:Animals in Norse mythology]]
[[Category:Mythological bovines]]
[[Category:Ymir]]
[[Category:Female legendary creatures]]