Draugr
undead creature from Norse mythology
In Nordic folklore, the draugr, or draug (Old Norse: draugr; Icelandic: draugur; Faroese: dreygur; Norwegian: draug, drauv; Swedish: drög, dröger; Northern Sami: rávga), is an archaic term for a malevolent revenant with varying ambiguous traits. In modern times, they are often portrayed as Norse supernatural zombies, loosely based on the draugr as described in early medieval Icelandic sagas. However, in myth and folklore, they comprise several complex ideas which change from story to story, especially in surviving Norwegian folklore, where the draugr remains a staple – see § Norwegian folklore.
In the Icelandic sagas, from which most modern interest is garnered, draugs live in their graves or royal palaces, often guarding treasure buried in their burial mound. They are revenants, or animated corpses, rather than ghosts, which possess intangible spiritual bodies.
Etymology
Development
The Old Norse word draugr (initially draugʀ, see ʀ), in the sense of the undead creature, is hypothetically traced to an unrecorded Proto-Germanic: *draugaz, meaning "delusion, illusion, mirage" etc., from *dreuganą ("to mislead, deceive"), ultimately from a Proto-Indo European stem *dʰrowgʰos ("phantom"), from *dʰréwgʰ-s ~ dʰrugʰ-és ("deceive"), ultimately from the same root as 'dream', from a Proto-Indo European *dʰrowgʰ-mos ("deceit, illusion").
Cognates includes Swedish: bedraga ("to deceive"), Low German: drog ("impostor, scoundrel"), dregen ("to deceive"), Old High German: bitrog ("delusion"), gitrog ("illusion, mirage, ghost"), German: Trug ("deception, delusion, illusion"), Dutch: bedrog ("deceit, deception"), Old Saxon: gidrog ("delusion"), Welsh: drwg (/druug/, "bad, evil"), Irish: droch ("bad, evil"), drouk ("bad, evil"), Sanskrit: द्रुह्, drúh ("injury, harm, offence"), द्रोघ, drógha ("deceitful, untrue, misleading"), Old Persian: 𐎭𐎼𐎢𐎥, drauga ("deceit, deception"), 𐎭𐎼𐎢𐎩𐎴, draujana ("deceptive, deceitful, misleading").
Descendants
Recorded descendants of draugr include:
Faroese: dreygur
Icelandic: draugur
Norwegian: draug, drøg, drog, also the forms: drauv, drøv, drov, in 1741 recorded as: drau (cf. Insular Scots: drow)
Scanian: dråe, dråker, dråkel: "devil"; definite forms: drån, dronn, dröken: "the devil"
Swedish: drög, dröger, draugr
Descendants of draugr also exist in Shetlandic and Orcadian dialect, stemming from Insular Scots, which ultimately got it from an unrecorded Norn: *drau, or *drog (cf. 18th century Norwegian: drau → drov), but also being effected by Norn: trǫll ("troll") by linguistic and figurative convergence; Norn being the Old Norse descendant spoken in the Northern Isles and Caithness until the early modern period:
Insular Scots: drow, trow: "malignant spirit, troll, gnome"
Shetland dialect: drow, trow: "malignant spirit, ghost; troll, gnome, huldufólk"
Orcadian dialect: drow, trow: "malignant spirit, troll, gnome, the devil" (cf.
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