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The Poetic Edda is from the 13th century, some 200 years after most of the north converted to Christianity. There's plenty of examples where Christianity might potentially have influenced the Poetic Edda - for example it seems like strange coincidence that the first humans Ask and Embla have names quite closely resembling Adam and Eve.

In Völuspá from the Poetic Edda, Ragnarök is described in great detail. Supposedly the origin of it is a völva (seer) named Heiðr who supposedly foretells the end of the world while visiting Odin.

Was this völva Heiðr and the story of Ragnarök actually part of the Norse mythology at the time when it was a religion? It seems strange to me that the prophesied death of all prominent Gods worshiped would be part of any religion. Is Heiðr part of the mythology or is this all rather a separate, potentially newer story? The völva herself does not appear in any other myth(?) and isn't a prominent figure, unlike most other characters who tend to frequently re-appear.

There seems to be historical artifacts representing Odin getting devoured by Fenrir and the like, but these may be dated to Christian time. And it seems the death of the old Gods would be all too convenient to suit the Christian missionaries' narrative.

Lundin
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Vedic Parallels

Jaan Puhvel pointed out in Comparative Mythology that the Mahabharata has evidence of Indo-European origin. (I don't have the book with me, and I'm not terribly familiar with Vedic mythology, but I do remember he lays out an example of The King and the Virgin motif in the Mahabharata, among other evidence).

The central, pivotal, event in the Mahabharata is the Kurushetra War, a battle to the death between two massive armies - which seems fairly apocalyptic.

The story ends with the death of Krishna, the end of the (then) current Age, and the start of the Age of Darkness.

The best dating for the Mahabharata pre-dates Christianity by ~4 centuries, and any Indo-European elements would have arrived in the India sub-continent ~1,800 BC during the Indo-Iranian migrations.

Binding of Evil

Tyr's binding of Fenrir and the loss of his hand is mirrored in the Iranian Jamshid's binding of Ahriman and the loss of his hand. Wikipedia notes that Jamshid was eventually killed by agents of Ahriman and "humanity descended from the heights of civilization back into a Dark Age" - while Tyr is killed by Garmr during Ragnarök.

The Avesten texts also pre-date Christianity, and any Indo-European elements would have likely arrived in Persia during the same Indo-Iranian migrations mentioned above.

End of the Age

So it's seems plausible that there's an old Indo-European motif of "a major god/ruler dies and precipitates the End of the Age."

codeMonkey
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