Úlenfang es baren;-)-úlenfang is born

 Nu es et sao wiet: De Úlenfang es baren. Un ek hebb lang simulaiert, bu ek dat dingen namen sull. Was et béo-chaoineadh? Ne, dat kan ik nümmes utspreken, met dise snaaksche spraoke Gälsch, un denne maakt de Wickerske;-) wider ökel van mi.. Sao bin ek to de sprake van mine hiäme kommen un nenn dat dingen nu Úlenfang. Nu kan man fraogen, bat dat allt sull, un seggen: Bat dem ein sine Úl es dem annern sine nachtegall. Hat dat aber allt auk en vordel: Goldemaar het mik dat eisen gebben un kan mik darbi auk verstaon;-), un dan kan hiä auk op platt den Namn verstaon.

Un borümmes de Úle? Kan ik iu ein döneken vertellen. Als ik nu latse mandag in steingarten was om mid de bekloppten dat Flitzepeed - Training te maken, hebb ik de Uhu saien in de wand, un hiät hiä ein bussard in de klaven! Un ik will ennit un nümmes kenn mid deze klaven maken... un de kneip es en dorstig lemmel, sao vil kann ek seggen. Maot ik nog ne Úl binnen tellichen, dann es et daon.

Translation: Now it´s done: Úlenfang is born. And long have I thought how I should name that thingy. Was it béo chaoineadh? Now, that, I cannot pronounce, with this funny language Gaelic;-), and then the magic trolll will make fun of me again;-). Thus I took the language of my home and have taken to call it Úlenfang (Owl´s fang). Now you ask, what the fuss is about that name, and say: One man´s owl is the other´s nightingale. But there´s one advantage (in the bargain): Goldemar had given me the iron, and while he can understand me ;-), now he can understand the language, too.

And why the owl? There is a story. When I was at the rock garden last Monday, I saw the eagle owl nesting there, and it had a bussard in its claws! And while I would not want to make any further acquaintance with these claws, this knive has a thirsty blade, that much I can safely say (it already cut me twice..). Now I still have to do the owl carving in the handle, and it is done.

Note: This is the language native to my homeland, which dates back to the old saxon language and is still spoken in many villages of the Sauerland region. By the way, the "Sauer" in the name has nothing to do with being sour, but with *Dhiudha, Theudo->People, reduced to "Siuer- / Suer - land", i.e. the "land of the people". Some have the theory that by the "people" the "niflungar" / "Nibelungen" are meant, the "little folk" native of the region, dwarfs and elves of a very ambivalent character. There are many tales giving them credit as skilled and stealthy helpers of blacksmiths, but also warning of the imminent danger in having contact with them. If you have ever stood atop a Sauerland mountain after the rain and you see the mists arise from the green hills around you, you can feel their presence still. They live in the deep woods, their plants are oak, holly and yew, deer and fox and hare, owl and raven do not shun their step.

Concerning the language again, if you look closely you will notice many similarities to modern English, and the similarities are even more obvious when you compare it to Anglo - Saxon (the language e.g. of the Béowulf epic poem of the early medieval ages). vertellen->to tell maaken->to make was->was and so forth. It also shares many characteristics with the Dutch language.

Now to business: Blade is ancient crucible steel I found in the woods, as you can see it shows a pattern and a strange hamón. Blade is 12 cm long and has a distal taper from 8 mm to the tip.

 The tang is riveted against a flower out of mokume gane that has to be polished and etched still. When I filed it, file dust gathered in the epoxy leftover around the tang, and, following an impulse, I put some more on.

Here you can see the taper of the blade. The handle is reindeer antler.

It´s still a work in progress, and I am taking my time with it. It has a kind of spiritual aspect as well making it. It is for me as well as for the Niflungar, for I have changed sides long ago;-).

Following the tawny owl-The book of Fimbulmyrk opens up a new page

Through the silken darkness of the deeper night I walk, a shadow amongst shadows. Time has been when I was feeling an alien in those woods of my wandering, in the enchanted underbrush of the world of my fantasy  - and is it mine, or is it mine to share? The steps of the starchild guide me well, and the sheen of his lantern led me to the abyss of the deep, once and for all I was changed. In disguise I walked amongst the grey masses not to terrify them in their wake, for something different have I become on the road to the hills, over and yonder and far beyond to the land of dreams - and back. I muse about those time when ther was no time, and I dream of a different region of the world, when the separation of the races of the Dhiudha took place. For it was in that time of the Great war of the Myriad planes that the grey veil fell down onto the plane of Aardeanna. Alas, the Oreamm did wake and rise, and many of the sages have taken them for creatures of the ursurper, who is the maggot of grey, but disciples to the maggot they were not. Not indeed were they, for savage were their wanderings, and their deeds, black as they were, were just their way of life. On I will wander, and maybe tell the story, how the Oreamm - some of them-were altered, but this I must keep for now for a later time. But grey they were not, for violently burned the fire of their dream and the force of their virility inside of their hearts.

The stars come out, and brightly shining does the moon cast silvery schemes and shadows upon the treetops and that clearing, embedded into a dale of ancient rock, and, there, by the ancient waystones, those towering menhirs, engraved with patterns so old that time is but a word to them, there burns a fire, foolishly glaring into the dark. I hear...

I hear the cry of the tawny owl returning on her path through the mild spring air, circling above the clearing three times, to and fro she flies. I hear a song, lovely, vibrating in the still air... and peace descends into my heart, and deep fulfilment. And yet, mercilessly and brightly burning are the stars above, and tehy remind me of that ancient dale in those ancient mountainsides long ground to dust, far, far away in the East.

For it was thence that it happened. Before, the tribes of the Dhiudha slowly formed their ranks against the attacks and the rapture of the Oreamm, and slowly started to defend themselves, but to no avail. For savagely fought the Oreamm, as ants might bite off the leg of their foe, with deadly determination, even if they are facing certain death. And as the Oreamm acquired more and more of the weapons of the accursed and blessed steel, they learned the art of making weapons themselves, and more fiercely their attacks bore down upon the beautiful folk. Thus, faced with certain doom and the rout of their race, the wild Dhiudha tribes of the Northeast gathered in a high valley in a hidden range of the mountains for one last and desperate effort, and began to chant. Nine days and nine nights did they chant, and the brilliant stars above them burned a bitter, piercing light to the ebb and flow of the alien melody, vibrant and deathly. And it was there, in the high valley, that they begot the seed of avange, the philosophical stone of the corr dicinn, as it was called in a later language. Great was their effort, and there their enchanters died from exhaustion, and their souls fed the stone with a bitter, searing power. Few of their most elite warriors were chosen, and they were called the Dhiudha na nDhuodhai. Clad in silver mist and black garments, in armour made from strange and alien metalwork, they walked the stair of moonlight and mist, of time and tale and space and along the planes of possibility to carry the seed of avenge. Later on they learned that not the Oreamm were their deadly foes, but they set out to forge weapons out of steel and grinding tathlums that would pass as gemstones with other races, of making the great war axes and spears, and clubs and fighting implements their race was famed for and feared for in those wars and in the wars to come. In stealth they bore upon their foes like the hatchet drives through the fruits of the field-ten thousand Oreamm to the left and ten thousand to their right did fall, like wheat before the scythe. A harvest of heads and a winepressing of blood it were, as they walked amongst the hosts of the Oreamm like the wind shakes the barley. On and on they fought, and bitter were their battles, and they fought with grief in their hearts, for it was the rout of all truth, the end of all beauty, and plague and pestilence followed in the path of this war. The guardians of the seed, however, went away in stealth. Nine were they, and they went on missions stranger than even that of the main host of Dhuodhai, Horoidw and the wild tribes of Dhiudha, missions that led them yonder star and moon, on pathways yonder mist and time.

Still the stars are glaring bright, but there´s also the moon, smiling upon that clearing, and brightly and foolishly the fire burns its eternal dance. And as I step out of the darkness into its warm and radiant light, I smile. Warmly-coloured mead I carry in my pack, and food and drink for a long night of storytelling, and in my heart there are still many tales of terror and beauty, of love, of gain and loss, and I see the weary figure by the fireside  stop her chanting and turn towards me, with a knowing smile mirroring mine.

And it feels like home.