Category Archives: Norse

Disposing of the Body: Kvasir, Mimir and Ymir

We’re all familiar with nose-to-tail eating, the idea that you should use all of an animal once it’s been slaughtered. Thanks to the taboo on cannibalism and various laws about indignity to dead bodies, we tend not to put human bodies to post-death use. Gods, however, are not so squeamish. The Norse gods in particular show thrift and ingenuity, as well as a strong stomach, in their use of their dead compatriots.

I should point out that the Norse gods could, on occasion, lay on a proper funeral: Baldr was buried with full honours. But the dead bodies of one giant and two gods were clearly too valuable to be left lying around.

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Divine Ancestors

While it’s part of Norse myth that the gods and giants are enemies, it seems that the giantesses were a different story. Odin clearly never met one he didn’t like, and he was far from being the only one to have a fling with one. Even Thor the giant-smasher had an affair with Jarnsaxa. These romances usually resulted in the second-generation gods, such as Thor’s son Magni.

Sometimes, however, the sons of these unions were mortals, or demi-mortals anyway. The Swedish ruling dynasty called the Ynglings and the Norwegian earls of Hladir traced themselves back to the giantesses/goddesses Gerdr and Skadi, respectively.

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The Golden Age: Njord and Saturn

The Norse sea-god – if he reminded you of anyone in the Graeco-Roman pantheon, wouldn’t it be Neptune/Poseidon? And yet, when the medieval Icelanders were copying out Greek myths, they explained the god Saturn/Kronos to their readers as “Njord”. What did the two have in common, that Njord would stand for Saturn to an Icelander?

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The Eye and the Well: Odin and Brigit

Odin and Brigit may not seem like the most similar deities, but they actually do have more in common than you might think. Both are patrons of poets, both give up an eye voluntarily, and both these losses are connected with water.

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Worshipping Giantesses (and possible castration)

In an earlier post, I discussed a possible magical formula for preserving and reviving dead body parts. This time I want to consider who these revived bits were being offered to: the giantesses.

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This is a post by a Roman polytheist about Freyja. It has a lot of insights into the nature of the Lady, and how similar she is to Odin. All the Vanir are travelling deities, in one way or another, but I think with Freyja this gets overlooked.

Helio's avatarGolden Trail

Last Sunday, May 1st, was the Dominalia, my annual feast to Freya. After ritually burning the usual offerings to Janus, Juno and my Lares, as is customary on the Calends, I prepared a new fire for the ritus aprinus. Practice makes perfect, so it went better then my first attempts, and I offered the Vanadís small portions of homemade caramel, barley, cinnamon and cherry liquor, plus libations of wine to Her and Her family. I also asked Her to bless a small bowl of flowers mixed with barley, which I took with me in the afternoon and casted on a farm field and a seaside hill top on my way to the beach. And then at some point, my mind produced a question I had not yet considered: is Freya a Lady of Roads or Travellers?

Freya 08

There’s certainly no obvious reference to it in the surviving lore, where She’s…

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Source: ‘No doubt’ Iceland’s elves exist: anthropologist certain the creatures live alongside regular folks | South China Morning Post

Mimir and Volsi: what were those herbs? 

There are two stories in Norse myth where part of a dead body is transformed by being rubbed with herbs. One of these is the mystical, cosmological story of Mimir’s head, which Odin revived by smearing with herbs and chanting over it. The other is a conversion narrative, in which a preserved horse’s penis is part of a house cult that St. Olaf brings to an end.

So these stories could not be more unalike. But the penis grows and “becomes lively” after the woman of the house covers it in herbs and wraps it in linen. So what herbs do you use to enliven a horse’s penis and a god’s head?

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Weeping Tears of Amber

Stories from around the world tell how even the messy things that deities produce are valuable and important. In Shinto myth the god Izanagi has two deities come out of his eyes and another from his nose. The ancient Egyptian deities Shu and Tefnut were born from Atum’s masturbation.

So it’s no surprise that a goddess’ tears would take the form of amber or gold. In fact, three different stories tell how valuable a weeping goddess could be.

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Woman vs. Woman: More Insults

There are many stories in which a heroic character penetrates the otherworld and is challenged by some sort of ogre or other strange being. This challenger may question the hero’s worthiness or ability.

Norse myth has two examples of a female quester who faces a challenge to her fitness and an attempt to thwart her in her aims. In Hyndluljod Freyja has to convince the far-from-agreeable Hyndla to help her protegé win a lawsuit, while in the poem Helreid Brynhildar Brynhild is challenged on her way to Hel by a giantess who questions her ethics and actions.

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