Syrdon

THE CLOSEST KNOWN INDO-EUROPEAN PARALLEL TO LOKI, on Dumézil's 1948 identification, and the corpus did not hold him. He is also the reason the Ossetian harp exists: the twelve-stringed fændyr is strung with the sinews of his murdered sons. Demigod is the COMPUTED tier here, not an assertion — Gætæg is a water-spirit (numen, 1.0) and Dzerassæ a demigod (0.5), which the registry averages to 0.75.

Parentage

• paternal: Gætæg
• maternal: Dzerassae

Domains

• trickery
• invention of the fændyr
• mischief among the narts
• contrivance of heroes deaths

Relations

• enemy: SoslanReciprocated within this batch.Reference treatment of Soslan (Encyclopaedia Iranica, s.v. ŠOŠLAN; Ossetian Nart sagas): one of the leading figures of the Ossetian Nart epic, called Soslan in the Ossetian tradition and Sosruko or Sozyryko in other versions; he was born in a miraculous way from a stone, his father being a shepherd whose identity varies between regional traditions, and Satana cut the glowing-hot child out of the stone nine months after the shepherd's seed reached it; the divine smith Kurdalægon then tempered his body in wolf's milk, leaving it invulnerable except at the knees, which the milk did not cover; in the Ossetian version the Sun's daughter Acyruhs becomes his wife, and Bedukha, also Vedukha, was the first wife of the widower Soslan; he is portrayed in an especially unseemly light in the episode of his fight with Totraz son of Albeg, resorting to trickery and cunning against powerful enemies while being stern and pitiless with the weakest and defeated; he was finally defeated by the jealous Syrdon, who, aware of the hero's weakness, incited the devils to fire their arrows from below ground into his horse's hooves and then called upon the Wheel of Balsæg, which sliced through his knees and left him for dead; the Narts buried him as he died, and his last act from the grave was the impalement of Syrdon; Dumézil considered the death of the Nart hero by an iron wheel an echo of the solar cult, the wheel symbolising the sun. (secondary)
• sons slain by: KhæmytsNon-symmetric, written from this end only; ossetian_khaemyts is a pre-existing record and this batch mutates none. The killing of his sons is what produces the fændyr.Reference treatment of Syrdon (Encyclopaedia Iranica, s.v. ŠḲRDON; Ossetian Nart sagas): the trickster of the Ossetian Nart sagas, the son of Gætæg and Dzerassæ, of whom it is said that the Narts can neither live with him nor live without him; he is the inventor of the Ossetian fændyr, a miraculous twelve-stringed harp he made from the bones, hair and veins of his beloved sons after they were treacherously killed by Xämiţ; Georges Dumézil identified him, in his 1948 monograph Loki, as the closest known Indo-European parallel to the Norse Loki; jealous of Soslan, he brought about the hero's death by inciting the devils to shoot his horse's hooves and by calling on the Wheel of Balsæg. (secondary)
• son of: GætægGenealogy carried by parentIds.Reference treatment of Gætæg: a water spirit in Ossetian mythology and the father of Syrdon in the Nart epics, the meaning of whose name is unknown; he is described as a water spirit who forced one of the Nart beauties to cohabit with him by blackmailing her, and Syrdon was the child of Dzerassæ with him. (secondary)
• son of: DzerassaeGenealogy carried by parentIds; ossetian_dzerassae is a pre-existing record and is not mutated by this batch.Reference treatment of Syrdon (Encyclopaedia Iranica, s.v. ŠḲRDON; Ossetian Nart sagas): the trickster of the Ossetian Nart sagas, the son of Gætæg and Dzerassæ, of whom it is said that the Narts can neither live with him nor live without him; he is the inventor of the Ossetian fændyr, a miraculous twelve-stringed harp he made from the bones, hair and veins of his beloved sons after they were treacherously killed by Xämiţ; Georges Dumézil identified him, in his 1948 monograph Loki, as the closest known Indo-European parallel to the Norse Loki; jealous of Soslan, he brought about the hero's death by inciting the devils to shoot his horse's hooves and by calling on the Wheel of Balsæg. (secondary)

Sources

• The trickster of the Ossetian Nart sagas, son of Gætæg and Dzerassæ, of whom it is said that the Narts can neither live with him nor live without him; inventor of the twelve-stringed fændyr, which he made from the bones, hair and veins of his murdered sons; and the contriver of Soslan's death.: Reference treatment of Syrdon (Encyclopaedia Iranica, s.v. ŠḲRDON; Ossetian Nart sagas): the trickster of the Ossetian Nart sagas, the son of Gætæg and Dzerassæ, of whom it is said that the Narts can neither live with him nor live without him; he is the inventor of the Ossetian fændyr, a miraculous twelve-stringed harp he made from the bones, hair and veins of his beloved sons after they were treacherously killed by Xämiţ; Georges Dumézil identified him, in his 1948 monograph Loki, as the closest known Indo-European parallel to the Norse Loki; jealous of Soslan, he brought about the hero's death by inciting the devils to shoot his horse's hooves and by calling on the Wheel of Balsæg. (secondary)