REH Word of the Week – Mythical Beings: troll
Monday, May 31, 2010
posted by Barbara Barrett
troll
noun
1. a dwarf or giant in Scandinavian folklore inhabiting caves or hills.
According to a 1908 encyclopedia: “Trolls are dwarfs of Northern mythology, living in hills or mounds; they are represented as stumpy, misshapen, and humpbacked, inclined to thieving, and fond of carrying off children or substituting one of their own offspring for that of a human child. They are called hill-people, and are especially averse to noise, from a recollection of the time when Thor used to fling his hammer at them.”
[origin: 1616; Norwegian troll and Dan trold, from Old Norse troll giant, demon; probably akin to Middle High German trolle lout]
HOWARD’S USAGE:
There’s a bell that hangs in a hidden cave
Under the heathered hills
That knew the tramp of the Roman feet
And the clash of the Pictish bills.It has not rung for a thousand years,
To waken the sleeping trolls,
But God defend the sons of men
When the bell of the Morni tolls.
[from “Bell of Morni”; for the complete poem see The Collected Poetry of Robert E. Howard, p. 193]
