Hymn of the Northmen

Ok, it's advertising, so I apologize for that, but- wow!  It's perhaps the best 'commercial' I've ever watched, and the advertising is of things I'd very much like (though can't afford, alas)- things made with the wisdom of tradition and the care of the fine craftsman.  I actually got led to this through a video on timber framing (and I think my dream vacation just changed because of it).  It happens rarely, but sometimes the algorithms get one or two right.

16 comments:

Assistant Village Idiot said...

Lots of fun to watch, but I disliked his leaving the skis lying up against the cabin when he left to hunt, then trudged through deep snow all that way. Snow like that is a tough slog, so that's not realistic. You'd double back to get the skis after a hundred yards.

So bursting through the ice shouldn't have been that surprising, actually.

Elise said...

It's pretty low-key advertising and the scenery is gorgeous. Thanks.

The white oak bowls and elm trays are lovely. So is the sword but I have a sneaking suspicion I couldn't even lift it.

The building course sounds fascinating. My husband and I are building a home. I wonder if he'd go for a turf roof. :+)

raven said...

Lovely craftwork- love the Damascus pretties. Tongue in cheek, this was a hypothermia instruction class?

Grim said...

At first I was trying to figure out if this was meant to be set in an earlier time: a long way from any other building, but then the cabin has glass windows. Of course, they're ripply glass; but then the fireplace has an aluminum hood. So, modern day, but then why so badly insulated?

Hmm. He goes to some trouble to build a big fire, and then leaves the cabin. I think to myself: "Well, maybe he banked the coals and is planning to return tonight." But no, he builds a fire out in the woods and camps out. Why did he build the big fire back home if he was just going to leave for a day or more?

AVI talked about the skis already.

I notice they're marketing to hunters, but they make sure not to kill anything; to woodsmen, but they make sure the only tree that gets cut is plainly dead. Interesting way of walking the line.

Does anyone take a wristwatch out in the wild? The last thing I want is a wristwatch out there. Not that you need one, as a rule. I've heard some people use them as a substitute for a compass in navigation, but why not just take a compass if you think you'll need the help?

Grim said...

Tongue in cheek, this was a hypothermia instruction class?

I'm guessing the time one spends becoming a master craftsman cuts down on the time one has for learning wilderness survival. There were some nice pieces, though.

Christopher B said...

kewl sound track and visuals but I'm glad I wasn't the only one who thought the script/plot was done by someone whose only exposure to Scandinavia has been a stroll through IKEA.

Pull-ups on a tree branch, bare chested, in the snow. I think somebody's being objectified or some such.

raven said...

There are times that life in a remote cabin is very appealing. The aesthetics of a stone and timber structure are pleasing.
But the connectivity of the modern world is addictive, I would likely go nuts without it. Gonna do that, best to have a lot of consuming hobbies. I saw a Lee Enfield .303 rifle in a museum in Alaska once- the guy filed it out by hand, over a winter. Yikes. A place in Kaktovik had every issue of National geographic, back to day one- took up most of a wall- that was pre internet and staying sane in winter involved a lot of reading.

As far as northern constructions goes, this is a nice pioece of work-
http://www.medievalists.net/2013/08/dragon-harald-fairhair-the-construction-of-a-viking-dragon-ship/
And the videos of it close hauled in big seas are something probably not witnessed for a thousand years.

douglas said...

Some fair critiques to be sure. obviously the particular guy they featured is remarkably resistant to the cold (to say the least), and seems to revel in it- to each their own. I don't know for sure about the guy in the video, but the center of the group seems to be Latvia, so I don't think they'd be totally ignorant of the nature of cold. Even in urban living there, you have to have some decent awareness.
The fire was the thing I didn't understand- why would he sleep without banked coals, in a cold cabin? But then we're talking about a guy who is apparently impervious to cold.

"I notice they're marketing to hunters, but they make sure not to kill anything; to woodsmen, but they make sure the only tree that gets cut is plainly dead. Interesting way of walking the line."

The shot would clearly have been a bad shot to take- but ok, it's fair to say they were 'careful' about not offending. As for the tree, if he's cutting it to burn immediately, as he is, a dead tree is the right choice. It's also fair to say that dry wood is a better demonstration of the quality of the blade, being harder to chop.

"Does anyone take a wristwatch out in the wild?"
I didn't see one on the guy in the video. One isn't always out in the wild, right? Well, at least for most of us.

I think though that we can honestly say that even most professional woodsmen aren't looking to buy a Damascus axe that's so expensive (even though some Gransfors are close in price), so they're really marketing to people that have more money and some desire to buy the totem that might have a little of the 'Northmen' rub off on them. They're still beautiful pieces. I wouldn't say that if I thought they wouldn't perform.

So that raises the question- is the pursuit of aesthetics in functional objects, beyond that which serves their strictly functional end, legitimate or valuable in some way? Does an axe need only the level of sesthetic beauty that serves it's end- a good form, a carefully sharpened edge of perfect geometry, a handle whose curves give proper leverage and retention and has asurface that's good in the hand without being slippery? Or can some aesthetics go beyond that- either in pursuit of beauty for it's own sake, or to make the argument that the axe is more than just a tool to cut down a tree. Perhaps to indicate that it has value beyond it's utility to the person who made it, or the one who commissioned or bought it. Human nature seems to desire things that are nicer than they need to be, so why is that?

I'll give these questions some more thought before I go further.

douglas said...

Actually, I'm surprised no one commented on the danger from falling ice at the waterfall shower. Frankly, I was more concerned about that danger, as he seemed fine with the cold.

Elise said...

So...

In my former life, I was a computer programmer/analyst and worked with others of the same species. A guy I worked with went to see the first Jurassic Park movie. When I asked him what he though of it, he said it was totally unbelievable. Why? Because no ten-year old could possibly understand UNIX.

I'm not prepared to offer a philosophical justification for "the pursuit of aesthetics in functional objects, beyond that which serves their strictly functional end" but it seems to be a fairly widespread human need/desire/drive. We paint our cars and homes; dye our clothes; eat our food off attractive pottery rather than plywood planks. Yes, the ad sells the sizzle and not the steak but humans pay attention to the sizzle. So, to me, the, um, anomalies are simply essential to the sizzle. The steak behind it - the bowls, the course - look pretty appetizing but I would never have seen them without the sizzle of the ad.

Grim said...

...is the pursuit of aesthetics in functional objects, beyond that which serves their strictly functional end, legitimate or valuable in some way?

If you want to argue that it isn't, you'll be taking a position that is much at odds with the Western tradition -- but rather in line with the 20th century shift away from aesthetics, as you well know from architecture.

If you want a philosophical defense, here's a simple one. I believe that the first division of the Good -- in the Platonic or Neoplatonic sense -- is into the True and the Beautiful. You might disagree that it is the very first division, but it is obvious that they come apart. We all know that it is easy to build true things that are ugly, and false things that are beautiful.

Yet they both must participate in the Good if 'the good is what all things desire,' because all things that have desires desire truth (not only I but squirrels and trees want to find nourishment in truth, and not merely as an illusion) and, insofar as we can tell, beauty (even birds strive to be beautiful to potential mates; Arendt argues that all of creation is more beautiful on the outside than the inside, suggesting a basic attempt to present beauty to observation). So both are good, but they aren't necessarily intertwined beyond that.

To attain the fullness of the Good, then, insofar as it can be done in this world, you need to strive for the perfection of both.

Tom said...

They have some interesting craft videos. Here's one I posted at the Hall some time ago that goes through the making of a longbow:

https://grimbeorn.blogspot.com/2016/07/a-handmade-longbow.html

E Hines said...

Does anyone take a wristwatch out in the wild?

The folks in the woods in northern Minnesota benefit from that sort of work-around, if not watches specifically. The iron ore in the ground causes a 30deg magnetic variation from north, and the effect reaches at least to 50k feet. Our interceptors had to be careful.

Nor is northern Minnesota unique in such phenomena.

Eric Hines

Grim said...

Douglas: I think the watch was in the Wild because of the reflected firelight in the display.

If you want to do the watch-finds-north trick, there's a brief on it here:

https://www.wikihow.com/Find-True-North-Without-a-Compass

raven said...

"...is the pursuit of aesthetics in functional objects, beyond that which serves their strictly functional end, legitimate or valuable in some way?"

Ancient tradition would hold it so. Look at a arrow point, flaked from beautifully grained petrified wood, or a stone axe head with marbled figuring, a basket with intricate motifs woven into the design, aboriginal arrows with tiny braid binding bone barbs to the shaft in a decorative pattern, we have been adorning our tools , utensils and weapons for a very long time. The oldest carpet ever found, in an ice filled Scythian grave, is a tour de force of decorative art.

douglas said...

Oh, I am fully in line with the idea that both function and beauty are necessary but not sufficient in and of themselves.

I've also been curious about how we define "function". Given all the evidence provided just here that beauty seems to be something we strive for and desire to the point of needing, it seems, then perhaps beauty is a function. Perhaps also symbolic meaning that relates object to other things, or that connect it's owner to something can in some cases be functional, in a sense. Religious relics would be an example.

I was getting at when I said this- "so they're really marketing to people that have more money and some desire to buy the totem that might have a little of the 'Northmen' rub off on them."

So the function of that video wasn't to be an instructional in wilderness survival, but to reach out to people who have the money and the desire to own such a thing, and it does that well. And as Grim noted, "there were some nice pieces".