The name of the bear in Old Norse (often björn), is derived from the Germanic *beran- m., which means "the brown one". This is often referred to as a "noa-word" or noa-name. Such a word replaces the true word, and, in the case of björn simply becomes the word itself - for example, the term for polar bear hvítabjörn can be read as "white bear" not "white-brown-one".
A name for an animal is considered taboo among cultures with a fear of that animal, and the belief in the power of true names to summon the animal – Nedoma highlights that words are tabooed when anxiety or adversity are expected as a result of using the true word.[1]
With regards to bears in Old Norse, björn and its compounds are the predominant word type used to refer to bear. The exception to this is the term húnn (bear cub), which as Nedoma points out, is sometimes used figuratively to mean “boy”, although presumably this derives from its use for bear cub.
Very interestingly, húnn also means "knob" or shapeless thing, and, while this is probably unrelated (not my field of expertise), I can't help but be reminded of the medieval traditions that tell of bear cubs being born as shapeless lumps that need to by licked into shape by their mothers. [2]
However a range of poetic names, or heiti are recorded for bears (only some of these attested elsewhere in skaldic poetry). I have included a list below (along with the terms found in prose), because these heiti seem to show a range of key features of bears in the cultural mindset: strength, hunger, fierceness, but also recognition of their environments (forest or ice), and their unique skills (hibernation/surviving the winter). There seems to be much in these names that signals knowledge of bears, or at least experience of living near them. Unlike the names for boars, there are no bear-heiti that give martial connotations, or at least explicit reference to battle. The impression is of strong, fierce, unfriendly animals, who will act defensively if threatened (snarling and roaring), but are otherwise focussed on their food and their sleep.
Names for bears in prose
björn (bear)
hvítabjörn (white-bear)
skögbjörn (forest-bear)
híðbjörn (grim-bear)
viðbjörn (wood-bear, black bear)
bera (she-bear)
bersi (bear)
alibjörn (tame bear)
bjarnhúnn / húnn (young bear/bear cub)
rauðkinni / rauðkinnr (red-cheek, a kind of savage bear)
Poetic names for bears from the lists in Skáldskaparmál (translations from Faulkes 1995/the Skaldic poetry project)
For a discussion of the use of these heiti in kennings (metaphorical circumlocutions), see: Lombardi, Maria Cristina. ‘Bears, Kennings and Skaldic Poetry’. In Bear and Human: Facets of a Multi-Layered Relationship from Past to Recent Times, with Emphasis on Northern Europe, edited by Oliver Grimm, 827–38. Turnhout: Brepols, 2024.
[1] Robert Nedoma, ‘Germanic “Bear” and Germanic Personal Names before c. AD 1000 with Elements Referring to “Bear”’, in Bear and Human: Facets of a Multi-Layered Relationship from Past to Recent Times, with Emphasis on Northern Europe, ed. Oliver Grimm (Turnhout: Brepols, 2024), 921–32.
[2] Richard Barber, Bestiary: Being an English Version of the Bodleian Library, Oxford M.S. Bodley 764 : With All the Original Miniatures Reproduced in Facsimile (Boydell Press, 1993), 58.
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