Skepticism

Keep the Thor in Thursday

Are you sick and tired of heathens pretending as though Thursday is just another day of the week? Do you want to smash your coworkers with a hammer every week that they fail to pay respect to Thor while thanking "god" for Friday? It may not be "politically correct," but this shirt is perfect for telling the world the true meaning of Thursday.

Rebecca Watson

Rebecca is a writer, speaker, YouTube personality, and unrepentant science nerd. In addition to founding and continuing to run Skepchick, she hosts Quiz-o-Tron, a monthly science-themed quiz show and podcast that pits comedians against nerds. There is an asteroid named in her honor. Twitter @rebeccawatson Mastodon mstdn.social/@rebeccawatson Instagram @actuallyrebeccawatson TikTok @actuallyrebeccawatson YouTube @rebeccawatson BlueSky @rebeccawatson.bsky.social

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21 Comments

  1. Vikings didn't have horned helmets, dammit! You're helping spread a misconception!
    You're only forgiven since it's Thor, who technically wasn't a viking and was probably worshipped in the pre-viking iron-age when some ceremonial helmets did have horns. :)

    1. I'm really glad you mentioned the pre-Viking thing! Going into this I assumed the horns were all wrong but I like the art so much I went with it. Now I can gleefully out-pedant the pedants!

    2. What? Yes, Thor was worshipped in the viking age. The Thor's hammer emblem is most likely an appropriation of the Christian cross by the remaining pagans who were increasingly marginalized after the conversions to Christianity in the north.
       
      It also doesn't really make any sense to say Thor "wasn't a viking" since viking is an occupation, and not a people. Even in sagas, only a scattered few characters are referred to as "vikings", and usually this isn't a kind sentiment. Viking is most analogous to pirate. 

      1.  
        My point was that worship of Thor likely didn't arise in the Viking age, but was a continuation of Iron age religious practice. Thus depictions of him don't need to adhere to archeological knowledge about helmets in the Viking age.
        I find it makes perfect sense to say Thor wasn't a Viking. He was neither a “Scandinavian from the Viking age” (a common colloquial use of the word) or “tradesman/explorer/pirate/plunderer” (the dictionary definition).
        Besides, as someone living in the land of Vikings and with 70-80% Norse ancestry I get to arbitrarily decide what's allowed and not allowed in depictions of Norse iconography.

  2. While I know that we're supposed to avoid indoctrinating children and all that… I really want to buy two infant sized shirts for my nieces.

  3. We, Dutch Lower Saxon heathens, who have resisted christianity until the bitter end, we call him Donar, god van de Donder (Thunder). Thursday in Dutch is donderdag.
    Nice T-shirt, but if you've seen the New Zealand series The Almighty Johnsons, you might want to think twice before wearing it in public. ;-)

    1. Yeah, the last thing you want is for Oliver Driver (affecting a bad Norweigan accent) to break down your door and wreck the place.

  4. Wait a minute. What's with this preference for the masculine Thor? What's wrong with saying "thank the gods it's Frigg's day?" She's at least as awesome as Thor.

    1. Frigg is indeed awesome. But her handmaiden Fulla is even more awesome.
      She's very fast on a bike.
      Are Freya and Frigg the same goddess?
      I always thought they were two different goddesses.

  5. Do you know the other days?

    * Tuesday is Tyr's (or teiwaz, a fifth century name, i.e. pre viking) day, the son of Odin (Oden, Wutan) and the god of war (almost identical to Mars, probably related somehow in the mists of pre-historical times). Tyr is actually a word for "god" in Icelandic!

    * Wednesday is Wutan-day of course! Yay! Go Odin, all-father! He was once described by "a bit girly and gay" by the other asar, but he was all like "that's how I roll" like it was nobodys buisiness. He invented writing on earth and was wisest of all. CLEARLY the skeptic amongst the norse gods, nuff said.

    * Friday is Frigg's day, the most important female of the "asar" gods, related (IMHO) to Venus, being as she is the "pure love"-godess, as oposed to the more "slutty" (IMO cooler!) sex-love-godess Freja. Frigg is both the world's mother, a fair queen, and the earth. (if it sounds familiar, boring and patriarchal it's because it is).

    That's all for Norse Mythology-day, folks! Tune in next week, where I'll talk about transgender norse gods!

    1. The remaining days are pretty obvious, I guess.  Monday for the moon, Sunday for the Sun, and Saturday for Saturn (Roman mythology, bastardized from Chronus in Greek mythology).  The names of the days were a little  more obvious in Old English.

  6. "It also doesn't really make any sense to say Thor "wasn't a viking" since viking is an occupation, and not a people."

    Well, that's a debated issue. First, that's not how the word viking is used normaly, in common speech. Even historians sometimes use the common meaning of the word "viking" to describe someone who was related to the old norse or scandinavian people from scandinavia and their descendants (in Rus, the baltic countries, Normandie etc.)

    One actual, alternate historical theory (although not widely held, but plausible) is that the word viking comes from the latin vicus (village, trade port) to describe the people that the latin speaking population knew mostly through trade, which would make viking a word describing a people AND a trade.

     

    Going wildely off topic here, but responding to an earlier, undeleted comment, if I may.
     

     

    1. Sure, people do it, but it's not correct. Generally we refer to the viking age which is the period of raids and conquests by Nordic peoples beyond their borders. We don't have much in the way of records from that era, so we rely (too) heavily on later Icelandic accounts where there is clear distinction between a regular old Nordic person speaking the dönsk tunga, and your nasty viking ala Egill Skallagrímsson. The point is that regardless of where the name originates, in the 12th – 14th century Icelandic literary/historical accounts viking is used to basically meaning pirate.
      The "alternate theory" seems totally implausible. Why fall to latin when the Norse-Icelandic word for bay is vík. I'm not a linguist however, and cannot comment on the etymology further.

  7. This is awesome. I have a Friday shirt, now I'll have a Thursday shirt. Five more days to go and I'll be this close to just wearing a collection of Days of the Week shirts. Geek uniform here I come!

  8. Snap! I was watching the Marvel Movies DVD just last night!
    Now there was a body to excite lust in just about anybody of any gender!
    Also…..
    Ozzie Ozzie Ozzie!

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