Songs infos

Guyana

Jones, Jim, 1931-78, American religious leader, b. Lynn, Indiana. An influential Indianapolis preacher since the 1950s, Jones formed the People's Temple (1955), which he eventually moved to Ukiah, Calif. (1967) and then San Francisco (1971). After Jones became the subject of criminal investigations, particularly regarding his alleged diversion of cult members' donations for his personal use, he and about 1,000 followers relocated to Jonestown, Guyana (1977). In Nov., 1978, U.S. Congressman Leo J. Ryan was killed by cult members as he attempted to leave, after an investigatory visit. The following day, Jones orchestrated the mass suicide of 912 followers, who were compelled to drink cyanide-laced punch. Jones died the same day of a bullet wound in his head.

Valhalla

Old Norse Valholl, in Norse mythology, the hall of slain warriors, who live there blissfully under the leadership of the god Odin. Valhalla is depicted as a splendid palace, roofed with shields, where the warriors feast on the flesh of a boar slaughtered daily and made whole again each evening. They drink liquor that flows from the udders of a goat, and their sport is to fight one another every day.

Thor

Thor is a god of very different stamp. Place-names, personal names, poetry, and prose show that he was worshiped widely, especially toward the end of the pagan period. Thor is described as Odin's son, but his name derives from the Germanic term for “thunder.” Like Indra and other Indo-European thunder-gods, he is essentially the champion of the gods, being constantly involved in struggles with the giants. His main weapon is a short-handled hammer, Mjolnir, with which he smashes the skull of his antagonists. One of his best-known adventures describes his pulling the cosmic serpent Jormungand (Jormungandr), which surrounds the world, out of the ocean. As he fails to kill the monster then, he will have to face it again in a combat to the finish in which they both die, in the Ragnarok.
Thor is the god of the common man. As place-names in eastern Scandinavia and in England indicate, peasants worshiped him because he brought the rains that ensured good crops. Warriors trusted him, and he seems to have been popular with them everywhere. He was well known as Thunor in the Saxon and Jutish areas in England; the Saxons on the mainland venerated him as Thun?r. When the Vikings conquered Normandy and the Varangians settled in Russia, they called upon Thor to help them in their military enterprises.
On account of his association with thunder, the Germanic god ?unraz (Thor) was equated with Jupiter by the Romans; hence, the name of the day, Thursday (German Donnerstag), for Jovis dies (Italian giovedi). Thor traveled in a chariot drawn by goats, and later evidence suggested that thunder was thought of as the sound of his chariot.