Hamlet (legend)

Amleth (Latinized Amlethus, Old Icelandic Amlóði) is a figure in a medieval Scandinavian legend, the direct predecessor of the character of Prince Hamlet, the hero of William Shakespeare's tragedy Hamlet, Prince of Denmark.

The chief authority for the legend of Amleth is Saxo Grammaticus, who devotes to it parts of the third and fourth books of his Gesta Danorum, completed at the beginning of the 13th century. Saxo's version is similar to the one given in the 12th-century Chronicon Lethrense. In both versions, prince Amleth (Amblothæ) is the son of Horvendill (Orwendel), king of the Jutes. It has often been assumed that the story is ultimately derived from an Old Icelandic poem, but no such poem has survived; the extant Icelandic versions, known as the Ambales-saga, or Amloda-saga are considerably later than Saxo.

The Old Icelandic form Amlóði is recorded once in the Prose Edda. The 12th-century Amlethus, Amblothæ may easily be latinizations of the Old Norse name. The etymology of the name is unknown, and there are various suggestions.

Icelandic Amlóði is recorded as a term for a fool or simpleton in reference to the character of the early modern Icelandic romance or folk tale. One suggestion is based on the "fool" or "trickster" interpretation of the name, composing the name from Old Norse ama "to vex, annoy, molest" and óðr "fierceness, madness" (also in the theonym Odin).

A more recent suggestion is based on the Eddaic kenning associating Amlóði with the mythological mill grótti, and derives it from the Old Irish name Admlithi "great-grinding", attested in Togail Bruidne Dá Derga. Amlóða kvren ("Amlodi's quern" or "Hamlet's mill") is a kenning for the sea in the Skáldskaparmál section of the Prose Edda, attributed to a skald named Snæbjörn.

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