Amleth, Prince of Denmark From the Gesta Danorum of Saxo Grammaticus

by Saxo Grammaticus

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Genres: Mythology, History, Medieval, Classics

24 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 1983

About the author

born perhaps 1150
died perhaps 1220

Gesta Danorum , a chronicle of legendary and historical Danish kings, of Saxo Grammaticus contains the story of Hamlet. See Hamlet .

Saxo Grammaticus served as secular clerk or secretary to Absalon, archbishop of Lund and foremost advisor to Valdemar I, or so people also know or think. He authored the first full book.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saxo_Gr...

Reviews

[Diego Aragão · Rating 4 out of 5]

Temos neste livreto um fragmento da Gesta Danorum, obra escrita no século XII por Saxo Grammaticus com o intuito de narrar os feitos dos dinamarqueses ao longo da história. Amleth, rei da Jutlândia (reino vassalo da Dinamarca) que inspirou o personagem Hamlet na famosa peça de Shakespeare, tem sua história narrada entre os livros III e IV da Gesta (que consiste de um total de 16 livros). Portanto, temos nessa edição exatamente o conteúdo desde o Livro III, capítulo 6, parágrafo 1, até o Livro IV, capítulo 2, parágrafo 4.

Como um fã de textos medievais, achei a leitura deste livreto muito boa. A tradução é bem tranquila também e parece ser bem "direta", sem muito rodeios, de forma a simular o estilo de escrever de Saxo Grammaticus. Talvez o fã de Hamlet mais atento à filosofia e à poesia da peça de Shakespeare não ache este Amleth muito interessante, uma vez que essas característica estão ausentes na história de Saxo, que se limita quase que inteiramente à narração dos fatos. No entanto, o leitor pode se surpreender, pois embora a primeira metade da história tenha pontos em comum com a história de Shakespeare, a segunda metade é completamente distinta. Dessa forma, a história do Rei Amleth servirá como um bom complemento à história de Hamlet narrada pelo Bardo de Avon.

[Rachel Jackson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Read online here: http://www.pitt.edu/~dash/amleth.html

Some highlights of Saxo Grammaticus's "Amleth, Prince of Denmark":
- Uncanny telepathic communication with friends who warn of treachery
- People riding horses backwards
- The cutting up of a dead body and throwing it into the sewer for pigs to eat
- Questionable royal ancestry
- Badass lines like "not idly do I wear the mask of folly" and "the messenger of his death was likewise its author"
- An army of the dead
- Somehow more death than Shakespeare's version

I thoroughly enjoyed the story of "Amleth, Prince of Denmark," the story that is widely viewed as one of the sources of inspiration for Shakespeare's Hamlet. Naturally, it's quite a different story than the more well-known stage version we are familiar with today, but there were of course striking parallels as I was reading. In Saxo Grammaticus's version of the story, Amleth does not die alongside his uncle but goes on to marry (two women at the same time; player) and get involved in battles, before finally succumbing later. I liked this tale quite a lot because of both its straightforward telling, predictable to this type of saga, and because of its creativity and suspense. I didn't find myself too held back by my understanding of the Shakespeare play to enjoy this version. Plus there was an epic speech that Amleth gives to the assembly, presumably the governing body of the country, that I wish I were skilled enough to memorize, because it blew me away and I would recite it everywhere.

[Bruce · Rating 3 out of 5]

There are two versions of the "The revenge of Amelth" contained in this book. The first is taken from the Gesta Danorum (Deeds of the Danes) by Saxo Grammaticus translated from the Latin original into modern English by Søren Filipski who also wrote an informative introduction to this volume.

The second is a translation of a selection of the Histoires Tragiques by François de Belleforest; it's a retelling in French of Saxo's 12th century work in the late 16th century. Belleforest added a good bit of moralizing to the story and a few bits of his own, enough to make it twice as long as Saxo's original. His version was translated into English anonymously and published in 1608 as "The Hystorie of Hamblet." This 17th century translation is included after Filipski's 21st century one of Saxo's original. It's date of publication, a few years after Shakespeare's play was already in performance, so strictly speaking, this translation is not a source of Shakespeare's Hamlet.

Filipski writes that the most likely source for Shakespeare is a play that no longer exists, probably by Thomas Kyd. There are a few references to it in diaries kept at the time and an essay published in 1589, about three years before Shakespeare's production. The experts call it "Ur-Hamlet," and it included a very scary ghost that shouts, "Hamlet, revenge!"

[Maitê · Rating 3 out of 5]

Different from what I was imagining, Shakespeare did manage to keep the core of this in Hamlet, so it's very familiar. But it's still an ancient medieval text that feels very real.

[Shinldk69 · Rating 3 out of 5]

c'est ok j'ai bien aimé le soliloque et la fin ça s'arrete là

[Nelson · Rating 2 out of 5]

A review of the main Latin source for the Danish story forming the background for Shakespeare's Hamlet. The book has almost nothing to do with Shakespeare (not that it pretends to, either). Rather, it discusses Saxo Grammaticus' Danish history which provided Shakespeare and (probably) Thomas Kyd with the skeleton of the play. Hansen operates from a folklore standpoint, so his work is mainly concerned with tracing variants on the Ambleth story (as it is called) in Scandinavian and even earlier sources. Reasonably written, albeit a bit on the dry side. Pretty much for Hamlet fanboys and fangirls exclusively.

[Erich Cavalcanti · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Pois quem se entrega a uma infâmia está mais propenso a cair rapidamente em outra, sendo uma o incitamento da outra"

Gostei de ler Hamlet de Shakespeare, mas agora que conheci o Rei Amleth, gostei muito mais deste. A trama ficou bem mais forte sem a melancolia do Hamlet. A loucura do Amleth é bem direcionada, inteligente, e feita de modo bem mais cômico. Além disso, neste romance original existem bem menos pudores em descrever as coisas. Ao invés de ficar no terreno do amor distante (como Hamlet e Ofélia), Amleth realiza o ato sexual. Os assassinatos são também mais brutais, sem perder a capacidade de comicidade. E temos mais mortes aqui do que temos na peça.

A sagacidade de Amleth é explorada no seu discurso após a morte do tio. E realmente é um bom discurso, deixo aqui uma extração que gostei:
"Pois não pensava dever sobrecarregar os ombros de outros com o peso que cria poder sustentar os meus próprios".

Um outro aspecto que chama atenção é o tom quase mágico que vemos em Amleth, da sua percepção absurda das coisas, como vemos no jantar que participa na Bretanha. Shakespeare irá depois humanizar mais o personagem, despindo ele de suas capacidades e de sua determinação. Aqui vemos um homem forte que graças a paciência e estrategia consegue conscientemente mudar seu caminho.

[AURORA RU · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oho, pēkšņi izrādās, ka dāņu prinča Amleta/Hamleta māte ir no Rūrika dinastijas, bet onkulim (tēva brālim) ir cita māte, ne no karaļu dzimtas, tamdēļ viņš tiek saukts par bastardu... Hamleta onkulis nogalina savu brāli un sākumā izvaro, pēc tam apprecas ar Hamleta māti... Hamletam ir jābēg. Oj, un kā uz burvju mājienu tas sižets šķiet tik ļoti pazīstams!! (ar hronoloģiskam nobīdēm vai kādām radu rakstu nesakritībām, bet tā jau pierasta lieta latīņu saķīmiķotajās hronikās, vēl jo vairāk - šis rakstīts 2 gadsimtus pēc tiem notikumiem):
"Horwendil, King of Denmark, married Gurutha, the daughter of Rorik, and she bore him a son, whom they named Amleth. Horwendil's good fortune stung his brother Feng with jealousy, so that the latter resolved treacherously to waylay his brother, thus showing that goodness is not safe even from those of a man's own house. And behold when a chance came to murder him, his bloody hand sated the deadly passion of his soul.
Then he took the wife of the brother he had butchered, capping unnatural murder with incest. For whoso yields to one iniquity, speedily falls an easier victim to the next, the first being an incentive to the second. Also the man veiled the monstrosity of his deed with such hardihood of cunning, that he made up a mock pretense of goodwill to excuse his crime, and glossed over fratricide with a show of righteousness."
Papildus grāmatai (vai grāmatas vietā) varu ieteikt arī brutālo filmu The Northman pēc šīs leģendas motīviem.

[Bianca · Rating 4 out of 5]

Esse historia foi escrita como parte do terceiro livro da obra do autor de nome “Gesta Danorum” onde vemos a historia de Amleth se safar de ciladas e usar da sua inteligência para conseguir alcanças seu objetivo de vingar seu pai que foi morto por seu tio.

A principio esse livreto do clube foi feito para ser lido como apoio para o livro do Shakespeare mas foi uma boa leitura por eu não ter tido contato ainda com a peça e agora vou poder ir para o livro já com essa base de conhecimento prévio.

A escrita foi muito boa em conjunto com a boa tradução, me deu muita vontade de saber ler em latin só para ter o prazer de conseguir ler o original que acompanha nessa versão.

Por ser uma historia baseada em fatos o final me foi meio triste mas já esperado, é importante notar que quando se vai ler esse tipo de livro deve-se manter a mente preparada para alguns fatos que podem ser muito incriveis e fantasiosos seguindo pelo fato de que eles foram escritos as muito anos atras e que aconteceram a mais tempo ainda.

Esse livro vale a leitura e essa e a tradução mais completa que se tem dele no momento e é um investimento da caixa que eu faria novamente.

[Abhyuday · Rating 4 out of 5]

Read an abridged version at the back of my edition of Hamlet and holy cow it is quite amazing even in its shortened form
I recently watched a video about The Northman which is based on the Amleth tale and I think they should make this Amleth into a movie especially given the super detailed origin story of why Amleth's uncle kills his daddy

[Max Cannon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Move the H and it’s Shakespeare. One wonders why The Bard would take such a wonderful story and change minor elements here and there to only leave confusion and frustration. Obviously he transubstantiates the language and characters into pure genius...neither a borrower nor a lender be amiright?

[A · Rating 3 out of 5]

A curious “origin story” to Hamlet.

[Wilbur · Rating 3 out of 5]

Saxo a better writer than Belleforest. Fillipski an awkward translator of Belleforest.

[Mikay · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5

[Klaus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Short and sweet. Great story of revenge

[Miriam Holubkova · Rating 2 out of 5]

Sometimes I really hate myself for choosing to study literature

[lauren :) · Rating 3 out of 5]

bold claim that had Amleth been lucky he would’ve been better than hercules but whatever i’ll allow it in the name of twelfth century egotism

[Zim · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5

[Frank M. · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a quick bloody read.
Yes, it is 1 of the stories in Gesta Danorum. Written sometime between 1202 and 1220.
Yes, it is what inspired Shakespeare to write Hamelet between 1599 and 1601.

[Bruce · Rating 4 out of 5]

Hansen traces the story of Hamlet back through the written account Latin by early mediaeval Danish historian Saxo Grammaticus, who died about 1204, to what he argues are its roots in the folklore of Scandinavia and Rome, and even points out a similar story from Persia. He also refers to the to the work in French by François de Belleforest and the English play referred to by scholars as the “Ur-Hamlet,” the now lost predecessor to Shakespeare’s play. It’s the consensus that that this earlier play, “usually thought to be the work of Thomas Kyd,” is the source for Shakespeare’s version. Hansen notes the numerous changes Shakespeare made to the story first written down by Saxo about four centuries earlier to make it a far more compelling work of literature and includes his own English translation of Saxo’s Latin text. It makes for a very interesting history behind a long and complex play.

[Grazia Hernández távara · Rating 5 out of 5]

La historia de Hamblet es ya muy conocida, las tragedias de Shakespeare siempre han sido mis preferidas en cuestión de clásicos. Simplemente diría que se nota la genialidad del autor en cada diálogo y mayormente en los monólogos de Hamblet. La venganza se consuma pero como es de espera no tiene un final feliz.

[Aneth Pita Barrios · Rating 3 out of 5]

Hamblet es el heredero de un reino cuyo padre acababa de morir y se enfrenta a una crisis existencial antes el fantasma de la su padre pide venganza por que no muerte natural su muerte como se pensaba así también muere la que se puede considerar su novia y hay un complot por parte de su tío para matarlo al el asumir al trono

[Marilyn · Rating 3 out of 5]

2.5* -
Read for a class on Hamlet. I liked reading about various versions of Hamlet/Amleth, however, I found this book a bit tedious. Good for Hamlet and Shakespeare fans or students, however.

[Ellen · Rating 3 out of 5]

um... dab