Norse Mythology

By Blaga Andrei „The Mihnea“ Mihnea

THE CREATION OF THE COSMOS

• Before there was soil, or sky, or any green thing, there was only the gaping abyss of Ginnungagap. This chaos
of perfect silence and darkness lay between the homeland of elemental fire, Muspelheim, and the
homeland of elemental ice, Niflheim.
• Frost from Niflheim and billowing flames from Muspelheim crept toward each other until they met in
Ginnungagap. Amid the hissing and sputtering, the fire melted the ice, and the drops formed themselves
into Ymir, the first of the godlike giants. Ymir was a hermaphrodite and could reproduce asexually; when he
sweated, more giants were born.
• As the frost continued to melt, a cow, Audhumbla, emerged from it. She nourished Ymir with her milk, and
she, in turn, was nourished by salt-licks in the ice. Her licks slowly uncovered Buri, the first of the Aesir tribe
of gods. Buri had a son named Bor, who married Bestla, the daughter of the giant Bolthorn. The half-god,
half-giant children of Bor and Bestla were Odin, who became the chief of the Aesir gods, and his two
brothers, Vili and Ve.
• Odin and his brothers slew Ymir and set about constructing the world from his corpse. They fashioned the
oceans from his blood, the soil from his skin and muscles, vegetation from his hair, clouds from his brains,
and the sky from his skull. Four dwarves, corresponding to the four cardinal points, held Ymir’s skull aloft
above the earth.
• The gods eventually formed the first man and woman, Ask and Embla, from two tree trunks, and built a
fence around their dwelling-place, Midgard, to protect them from the giants.
THE AESIR

• The Aesir were one of the two main tribes of deities venerated by the
pre-Christian Norse and other Germanic peoples.
• Most of the best-known Norse gods and goddesses belong to the
Aesir, including Odin, Thor, Frigg, Tyr, Loki, Baldur, Heimdall, Idun,
and Bragi.
• Their home is Asgard, one of the Nine Worlds, which is located in the
highest, sunniest branches of the world-tree Yggdrasil. In the
Norse sources, Odin, the “Allfather,” is their chief.
Odin
• One of the most complex and enigmatic characters in Norse
mythology, and perhaps in all of world literature. He’s
the ruler of the Aesir tribe of deities, yet he often ventures
far from their kingdom, Asgard, on long, solitary wanderings
throughout the cosmos on purely self-interested quests.
• He’s a relentless seeker after and giver of wisdom, but he
has little regard for communal values such as justice,
fairness, or respect for law and convention.
• He’s the divine patron of rulers, and also of outcasts. He’s a
war-god, but also a poetry-god, and he has prominent
“effeminate” qualities that would have brought unspeakable
shame to any historical Norse/Germanic warrior.
• He’s worshiped by those in search of prestige, honor, and
nobility, yet he’s often cursed for being a fickle trickster.
Thor
• One of the most prominent figures in Norse mythology. He was a major god of all branches
of the Germanic peoples before their conversion to Christianity, although he reached the
height of his popularity among the Scandinavians of the late Viking Age.
• Thor, the brawny thunder god, is the archetype of a loyal and honorable warrior, the ideal
toward which the average human warrior aspired. He’s the indefatigable defender of
the Aesir gods and their fortress, Asgard, from the encroachments of the giants, who are
usually (although far from invariably) the enemies of the gods.
• No one is better suited for this task than Thor. His courage and sense of duty are
unshakeable, and his physical strength is virtually unmatched. He even owns an unnamed
belt of strength (Old Norse megingjarðar) that makes his power doubly formidable when
he wears the belt. His most famous possession, however, is his hammer, Mjöllnir
(“Lightning”[2]). Only rarely does he go anywhere without it. For the heathen Scandinavians,
just as thunder was the embodiment of Thor, lightning was the embodiment of his hammer
slaying giants as he rode across the sky in his goat-drawn chariot.
• Thor’s particular enemy is Jormungand, the enormous sea serpent who encircles Midgard,
the world of human civilization. At one point in the mythical cycle, he tries to pull
Jormungand out of the ocean while on a fishing trip, and is stopped only when his giant
companion cuts the fishing line out of fear. Thor and Jormungand finally face each other
during Ragnarok, however, when the two put an end to each other.
Frigg
• The highest-ranking of the Aesir goddesses.
She’s the wife of Odin, the leader of the gods,
and the mother of Baldur.
TYR

• Norse war god, but also the god who, more

than any other, presides over matters of law
and justice.
• His role in the surviving Viking Age myths is
relatively slight, and his status in the later
part of the Viking Age may have been
correspondingly minor. But this wasn’t
always the case. Other kinds of evidence
show us that Tyr was once one of the most
important gods to the Norse and other
Germanic peoples.
Loki
• The wily trickster god of Norse mythology.
• While treated as a nominal member of the gods, Loki occupies a highly ambivalent and
ultimately unique position among the gods, giants, and the other kinds of spiritual beings that
populate the pre-Christian Norse religion.
• Loki is the father, by the giantess Angrboda, of Hel, the goddess of the
underworld; Jormungand, the great serpent who slays Thor during Ragnarok; and Fenrir, the
wolf who bites off one of the hands of Tyr and who kills Odin during Ragnarok – hardly a
reputable brood, to say the least. As we’ll see below, Loki demonstrates a complete lack of
concern for the well-being of his fellow gods, a trait which could be discerned, in vague
outline, merely by considering these offspring of his.
• Loki often runs afoul not only of societal expectations, but also of what we might call “the laws
of nature.” In addition to the progeny listed above, Loki is also the mother – yes, the mother –
of Sleipnir, Odin’s shamanic horse, whom Loki gave birth to after shapeshifting into a mare and
courting the stallion Svadilfari, as is recounted in the tale of The Fortification of Asgard.
• In the tales, Loki is portrayed as a scheming coward who cares only for shallow pleasures and
self-preservation. He’s by turns playful, malicious, and helpful, but he’s always irreverent and
nihilistic.
Baldur
• He’s the son of Odin and Frigg, the husband of the obscure goddess Nanna, and the father
of the god Forseti.
• He’s loved by all the gods, goddesses, and beings of a more physical nature. So handsome,
gracious, and cheerful is he that he actually gives off light.
• Loki, the guileful trickster of the gods, sensed an opportunity for mischief. He inquired of
Frigg whether she had overlooked anything whatsoever in her quest to obtain oaths. She
casually answered that she had thought the mistletoe to be too small and harmless a
thing to bother asking for such a promise. Loki straightaway made a spear from the
mistletoe and convinced the blind god Hodr to throw it at Baldur. The projectile pierced
the god, and he fell down dead.
• The anguished gods then ordained that one of them should go to the underworld to see if
there was any way Baldur could be retrieved from the clutches of the death
goddess, Hel. Hermod, another one of Odin’s many sons, agreed to make this journey,
and, mounting Odin’s steed, Sleipnir, he rode down the world-tree until he came to its
dark and damp roots, wherein lies Hel’s abode. When he arrived, he found his brother,
pale and grim, sitting in the seat of honor next to Hel. Hermod implored the dreadful
goddess to release Baldur, and after much persuasion, she replied that she would give him
up if and only if everything in the world would weep for Baldur – to prove, in other words,
that he was as universally beloved as Hermod claimed.
• The whole world did indeed weep for the generous son of Odin – all, that is, save one
creature. The giantess Þökk (“Thanks”), generally assumed to be Loki in disguise, callously
refused to perform the act that would secure Baldur’s return.
Heimdall
• One of the Aesir gods and the ever-vigilant guardian of the gods’
stronghold, Asgard.
• His dwelling is called Himinbjörg (“Sky Cliffs,” connoting a high
place ideal for a fortress), which sits at the top of Bifrost, the
rainbow bridge that leads to Asgard. He requires less sleep than a
bird. His eyesight is so keen that he can see for hundreds of miles
by day or by night, and his hearing is so acute that he can hear
grass growing on the ground and wool growing on sheep.Here he
watches and listens, holding at the ready the
horn Gjallarhorn (“Resounding Horn”), which he sounds when
intruders are approaching.
• During Ragnarok, the gods know that their doom is at hand when
they hear the dire call of Gjallarhorn signaling the imminent arrival
of the giants, who cross the rainbow bridge to storm Asgard and
kill the gods. The disloyal Loki, the particular nemesis of the
unwaveringly dutiful Heimdall, is with them. Loki and Heimdall slay
each other as the world burns and sinks into the sea.
RAGNAROK
• The name the pre-Christian Norse gave to the end of their mythical cycle, during which the cosmos is destroyed and is subsequently re-created.
“Ragnarok” is something of a play on words; an alternate form, which sounds almost identical when spoken, is Ragnarøkkr, “The Twilight of the
Gods.”
• In Midgard, the realm of human civilization, people abandoned their traditional ways, disregarded the bonds of kinship, and sank into a wayward,
listless nihilism.
• Three winters came in a row with no summer in between, a plodding, devastating season of darkness and frigidity which the prophecies had called
the Fimbulwinter (“The Great Winter”).
• At last, the pseudo-god Loki and his son, the dreaded wolf Fenrir, who had both been chained up to prevent them from wreaking further destruction
in the Nine Worlds, broke free of their fetters and set about doing precisely what the gods who had imprisoned them had feared. Yggdrasil, the great
world-tree that holds the Nine Worlds in its branches and roots, began to tremble.
• The far-seeing Heimdall, the watchman of the gods’ fortress, Asgard, was the first to spy a vast army of giants headed for the celestial stronghold.
Among the gruesome mass was the gods’ fickle friend, Loki, at the helm of the ship Naglfar (“Ship of the Dead”). Heimdall sounded his
horn Gjallarhorn (“Resounding Horn”) to alert the gods, who were no doubt alarmed and despairing.
• The giants set about destroying the abode of the gods and the entire cosmos along with it. Fenrir, the great wolf, ran across the land with his lower
jaw on the ground and his upper jaw in the sky, consuming everything in between. Even the sun itself was dragged from its height and into the beast’s
stomach. Surt, a giant bearing a flaming sword, swept across the earth and left nothing but an inferno in his wake.
• But, like the heroes of a Greek tragedy, the gods fought valiantly to the end. Thor and the sea serpent Jormungand slew each other, as did Surt and
the god Freyr, and likewise Heimdall and Loki. Odin and Tyr both fell to Fenrir (also called “Garmr” in some texts), who was then killed by Vidar, Odin’s
son and avenger.
• At last, in the ultimate reversal of the original process of creation, the ravaged land sank back into the sea and vanished below the waves. The perfect
darkness and silence of the anti-cosmic void, Ginnungagap, reigned once more.