http://www.asatru.org/voluspa.html
excerpt:
When Ymir lived long ago
Was no sand or sea, no surging waves.
Nowhere was there earth nor heaven above.
Bur a grinning gap and grass nowhere.
The sons of Bur then built up the lands.
Moulded in magnificence middle-Earth:
Sun stared from the south on the stones of their hall,
From the ground there sprouted green leeks.
Sun turned from the south, sister of Moon,
Her right arm rested on the rim of Heaven;
She had no inkling where her hall was,
Nor Moon a notion of what might he had,
The planets knew not where their places were.
The high gods gathered in council
In their hall of judgement. all the rulers:
To Night and to Nightfall their names gave,
The Morning they named and the Mid-Day,
Mid-Winter, Mid-Summer, for the assigning of years.
At Ida’s Field the Aesir met:
Temple and altar they timbered and raised,
Set up a forge to smithy treasures,
Tongs they fashioned and tools wrought;
Played chess in the court and cheerful were;
Gold they lacked not, the gleaming metal
Then came three, the Thurs maidens,
Rejoicing in their strength, from Giant-home.
The high Gods gathered in council.
In their hall of judgement: Who of the dwarves
Should mould man by master craft
From Brimir’s blood and Blain’ s limbs?
Motsognir was their mighty ruler,
Greatest of dwarves, and Durin after him :
The dwarves did as Durin directed,
Many man forms made from the earth.
Thanks,
A beautiful bit of writing.
Ping for later.
Looked like the Elder (verse) Edda, and that last paragraph clinched it. The next paragraph (if memory serves, but it’s definitely not far along after it) continues to name dwarves, and those are the names Tolkien used in “The Hobbit” and also lifted a few for the passages of Balin’s diary, the one the Company found in Moria.
Thanks Fred!
My memory didn’t let me down. :’) Durin, Dvalin, Bivor, Bavor, Bombur, Nori, [non-dwarf] Gandalf, Thorin, Thror, Thrain, Fili, Kili, Fundin (father of Balin and Dwalin in Tolkien), Nali Hefti (Nali from Balin’s diary), Frar (Balin’s diary), Loni (Balin’s diary), Gloi[n], Dori, Ori, and I probably missed some. :’)
The 13 dwarves in “The Hobbit” are Balin and Dwalin, Fili and Kili, Bifur, Bofur, and Bombur, Dori, Nori, Ori, O’in and Glo’in, and Thorin (Thorin Oakenshield, son of Thror, son of Thrain). Durin was the father of all the dwarves (the ones detailed in the Hobbit and the trilogy anyway) and founder of Khazad-dum / Moria. And that’s my geekin’ for the night. ;’)