THE
HEROES OF ASGARD
_TALES FROM SCANDINAVIAN MYTHOLOGY_
BY A. & E. KEARY
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY HUARD
New York
THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
LONDON: MACMILLAN & CO., LTD.
1909
_All rights reserved_
New edition September, 1906. Reprinted July, 1909.
Norwood Press:
Berwick & Smith Co., Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.
PREFACE.
In preparing the Second Edition of this little volume of tales from
the Northern Mythology for the press, the Authors have thought it
advisable to omit the conversations at the beginning and end of the
chapters, which had been objected to as breaking the course of the
narrative. They have carefully revised the whole, corrected many
inaccuracies and added fresh information drawn from sources they had
not had an opportunity of consulting when the volume first appeared.
The writers to whose works the Authors have been most indebted, are
Simrock, Mallet, Laing, Thorpe, Howitt and Dasent.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
INTRODUCTION, 9
CHAPTER I. THE ÆSIR.
PART I.--A GIANT--A COW--AND A HERO, 41
II.--AIR THRONE, THE DWARFS, AND THE LIGHT ELVES, 51
III.--NIFLHEIM, 59
IV.--THE CHILDREN OF LOKI, 67
V.--BIFRÖST, URDA, AND THE NORNS, 72
VI.--ODHÆRIR, 81
CHAPTER II. HOW THOR WENT TO JÖTUNHEIM.
PART I.--FROM ASGARD TO UTGARD, 109
II.--THE SERPENT AND THE KETTLE, 130
CHAPTER III. FREY.
PART I.--ON TIPTOE IN AIR THRONE, 147
II.--THE GIFT, 152
III.--FAIREST GERD, 157
IV.--THE WOOD BARRI, 163
CHAPTER IV. THE WANDERINGS OF FREYJA.
PART I.--THE NECKLACE BRISINGAMEN, 169
II.--LOKI--THE IRON WOOD--A BOUNDLESS WASTE, 177
III.--THE KING OF THE SEA AND HIS DAUGHTERS, 185
CHAPTER V. IDŪNA'S APPLES.
PART I.--REFLECTIONS IN THE WATER, 191
II.--THE WINGED-GIANT, 198
III.--HELA, 212
IV.--THROUGH FLOOD AND FIRE, 218
CHAPTER VI. BALDUR.
PART I.--THE DREAM, 231
II.--THE PEACESTEAD, 240
III.--BALDUR DEAD, 247
IV.--HELHEIM, 250
V.--WEEPING, 256
CHAPTER VII. THE BINDING OF FENRIR.
PART I.--THE MIGHT OF ASGARD, 263
II.--THE SECRET OF SVARTHEIM, 272
III.--HONOUR, 279
CHAPTER VIII. THE PUNISHMENT OF LOKI, 285
CHAPTER IX. RAGNARÖK.
OR, THE TWILIGHT OF THE GODS, 295
INDEX OF NAMES, WITH MEANINGS, 315
List of Illustrations.
PAGE
GIANT SUTTUNG AND THE DWARFS, 86
GIANT SKRYMIR AND THOR, 115
FREYJA IN THE DWARFS' CAVE, 172
IDUNA GIVING THE MAGIC APPLES, 195
SKADI CHOOSING HER HUSBAND, 227
TYR FEEDING FENRIR, 265
THE PUNISHMENT OF LOKI, 292
THE HEROES OF ASGARD.
INTRODUCTION.
If we would understand the religion of the ancient Scandinavians, we
ought to study at the same time the myths of all Teutonic nations. A
drawing together of these, and a comparison of one with another, has
been most beautifully effected by Simrock, in his _Handbuch der
Deutschen Mythologie_, where he tells us that whilst the Scandinavian
records are richer and more definite, they are also younger than
those of Germany, which latter may be compared to ancient half
choked-up streams from which the fuller river flows, but which, it is
to be remarked, that river has mingled in its flowing. Grimm says
that both religions--the German and the Northern--were in the main
identical, though in details they varied; and as heathenism lingered
longer in Scandinavia than in any other part of Europe, it is not
surprising that there, rather than anywhere else, we should find the
old world wants and hopes and fears, dark guesses, crude imaginings,
childlike poetic expressions, crystallised into a pretty definite
system of belief and worship. Yes, we can walk through the glittering
ice halls of the old frozen faith, and count its gems and wonder at
its fearful images; but the warm heart-reachings from which they
alike once flowed, we can only darkly feel, at best but narrowly pry
into here and there. Ah! if we could but break up the poem again into
the syllables of the far off years.
The little tales which follow, drawn from the most striking and
picturesque of the Northern myths, are put together in the simplest
possible form, and were written only with a design to make the
subject interesting to children. By-and-bye, however, as we through
their means become in a slight degree acquainted with the characters
belonging to, and the parts played by, the various deities of this
mythology, it will not be uninteresting to consider what their
meaning may be, and to try if we can trace the connection of one with
another. At present it seems best, as an introduction to them--and
without it they would be scarcely intelligible--to give a very slight
sketch of the Northern mythology, as it is gathered from the earliest
Scandinavian sources, as well as a short account of the sources from
which it is gathered.
Laing, in the introduction to his Translation of the Heimskringla
Saga, says,--"A nation's literature is its breath of life, without
which a nation has no existence, is but a congregation of
individuals. During the five centuries in which the Northmen were
riding over the seas, and conquering wheresoever they landed, the
literature of the people they overcame was locked up in a dead
language, and within the walls of monasteries. But the Northmen had a
literature of their own, rude as it was." Songs and sagas, mythical
and heroic, were the staple of this literature of the north; and
these appear to have been handed down by word of mouth from skald to
skald until about the beginning of the twelfth century. Then Sæmund
the Learned, and others, began to commit them to writing. Sæmund the
Learned was born in Iceland about the year 1057, fifty years after
Christianity had been positively established in that island. He
passed his youth in Germany, France, and Italy, studying at one time
with a famous master, "by whom he was instructed in every kind of
lore." So full, indeed, did Sæmund's head become of all that he had
learnt, that he frequently "forgot the commonest things," even his
own name and identity, so that when asked who he was, he would give
the name of any one he had been reading about. He was also said to be
an astrologer, and a charming little anecdote is related of him in
this capacity, which, however, would be out of place here. When he
went back to Iceland, he became priest of Oddi, instructed the people
about him, studied the old religion, and, besides writing a history
of Norway and Iceland, which has been lost, transcribed several of
the mythic and heroic songs of the North, which together form a
collection known by the name of the _Poetic_, _Elder_, or _Sæmund's
Edda_. The songs themselves are supposed to date from about the
eighth century; Sæmund wrote them down in the twelfth. The oldest
copy of his original MS. is of the fourteenth century, and this copy
is now in the Royal Library of Copenhagen. A few years ago they were
translated into English by B. Thorpe. So much for the history of the
_Elder Edda_--great-grandmother the name is said to mean, but after
all she scarcely seems old enough to be called a great-grandmother.
We have traced her growing up, and seen how she has dressed herself,
and we begin to think of her almost as a modern young lady. When we
listen to the odd jumble of tales she tells us, too, we are more than
half inclined to quarrel with her, though without exactly knowing
whether it is with her youth or her age that we find fault. You are
too young to know what you are talking about, great-grandmother, we
complain; but, oh dear! you mumble so and make use of such odd
old-fashioned words we can scarcely understand you. Sæmund was not
the only man who wrote down songs and sagas; he had some
contemporaries, many successors; and, about fifty years after his
death, we hear of Snorro Sturleson, a rich man, twice Supreme
Magistrate of the Icelandic Republic, who also lived for some time at
Oddi, and who has left many valuable additions to the stock of
Icelandic written lore. Laing says of him--"Snorro Sturleson has done
for the history of the Northmen, what Livy did for the history of the
Romans." Amongst other things, he wrote a sort of commentary or
enlargement of Sæmund's _Edda_, probably drawn from MSS. of Sæmund
and of others, which were preserved at Oddi. This is called the
_Prose_, _Younger_, or _Snorro's Edda_, and was translated many years
ago by M. Mallet into French. Added to these two sources of
information respecting the Scandinavian mythology, there are many
allusions to the myths scattered through the heroic lays with which
Northern literature abounds.
The _Poetic Edda_ consists of two parts--the mythological and the
heroic. The mythological songs contain an account of the formation
and destruction of the world, of the origin, genealogies, adventures,
journeys, conversations of the gods, magic incantations, and one lay
which may be called ethical. This portion of the _Edda_ concludes
with a song called "The Song of the Sun," of which it is supposed
Sæmund himself was the author. Thorpe, the English translator, says,
"It exhibits a strange mixture of Christianity and heathenism, whence
it would seem that the poet's own religion was in a transition state.
We may as well remark here that the only allusion to Christianity in
the _Elder Edda_, with the exception of this last song, which stands
quite alone, is a single strophe in an incantation:--
"An eighth I will sing to thee,
If night overtake thee,
When out on the misty way,
That the dead Christian woman
No power may have to do thee harm."
Which savours curiously of the horror which these heathens then
evidently felt of the new faith.
The _Younger Edda_ is a very queer old lady indeed. She begins by
telling a sort of story. She says "there was once a King called
Gylfi, renowned for his wisdom and skill in magic;" he being seized
with a desire to know all about the gods, and wishing also to get his
information first-hand, sets off on a journey to Asgard itself, the
gods' own abode. When he gets there he finds a mysterious Three
seated upon three thrones--the High, the Equally High, and the Third.
The story-teller is supposed to have taken this picture from a temple
at Upsal, where the thrones of Odin, Thor, and Frey were placed in
the same manner, one above another. Gylfi introduces himself as
Gangler, a name for traveller (connected with the present Scotch word
gang), and proceeded to question the Three upon the origin of the
world, the nature and adventures of the gods, &c., &c. Gangler's
questions, and the answers which he receives, will, with reference to
the _Elder Edda_ tales, help us to get just the short summary we want
of the Scandinavian mythology--the mythology grown up and old, and
frozen tight, as we find it in the _Eddas_.
"What was the beginning of things?" asks Gangler; and Har (the
highest of the Three), replying in the words of an ancient poem,
says,--
"Once was the age
When all was not--
No sand, nor sea,
No salt waves,
No earth was found,
Nor over-skies,
But yawning precipice
And nowhere grass."
This nothingness was called Ginnungagap, the gap of gaps, the gaping
of the chasms: and Har goes on to relate what took place in it. On
the north side of Ginnungagap, he says, lay Niflheim, the shadowy
nebulous home of freezing cold and gathering gloom; but on the south
lay the glowing region of Muspellheim. There was besides a roaring
cauldron called Hvergelmir, which seethed in the middle of Niflheim,
and sent forth twelve rivers called the strange waves; these flowed
into the gap and froze there, and so filled the gap with ice: but
sparks and flakes of fire from Muspellheim fell upon the ice.
Ginnungagap on the north side was now filled with ice and vapour and
fleeting mists and whirlwinds, but southwards with glowing radiancy,
with calm and light and wind--still air; and so, continues Har, the
heat met the frost, the frost melted into drops, the drops quickened
into life, and there was a human form called Ymir, a giant. "Was he a
god?" asks Gangler. "Oh! dear no," answers Har; "we are very far
indeed from believing him to have been a god; he was wicked and the
father of all the Frost Giants." "I wonder what he ate?" said
Gangler. "There was a cow," Har went on to explain; "she was made out
of the drops, too, and the giant fed upon her milk." "Good," answered
Gangler; "but what fed the cow?" "She licked the stones of
Ginnungagap, which were covered with salt hoar frost;" and then Har
goes on to relate how by degrees a man, Bur, grew up out of the
stones as the cow licked them, good, not like Ymir, but the father of
the gods; and here we may remark that the giant and the god equally
were the sole progenitors of their immediate descendants. Ymir was
the father of the first giant, Bur had a son called Bör. But after
that the races mix to a certain extent, for Bör married a giantess
and became the father of three sons, Odin, Vili and Ve.
"Was there any degree of good understanding between these two races?"
asks Gangler. "Far from it," replies Har; and then he tells how the
sons of the god slew all the frost giants but one, dragged the body
of old Ymir into the middle of Ginnungagap, made the earth out of
it,--"from his blood the seas, from his flesh the land, from his
bones the mountains, of his hair the trees, of his skull the heavens
and of his brains the clouds. Then they took wandering flakes from
Muspellheim, and placed them in the heavens." Until this time, says
the _Völuspá_.
"The sun knew not
Where she a dwelling had,
The moon knew not
What power he possessed,
The stars knew not
Where they had a station."
About this time it happened that the sons of the god took a walk
along the sea-beach, and there found two stems of wood which they
fashioned into the first man and woman:--
"Spirit gave them Odin
Sense gave Hœnir
Blood gave Lodin (Loki)
And goodly colour."
After this it is said that the all-holy gods, the Æsir, the Lords,
went to their judgment seats, held council, and gave names to the
"night and to the waning moon, morn, midday, afternoon, and eve
whereby to reckon years." Then they built a city called Asgard in the
middle of the earth, altars and temples, "made furnaces, forged tongs
and fabricated tools and precious things;" after which they stayed at
home and played joyously with tables. This was the golden age of the
gods; they were happy. "To them," says the old song, "was naught the
want of gold, until there came three maids all powerful from the
giants."
In some mysterious way it appears that a desire for gold seized upon
the gods in the midst of their innocent golden play. Then they formed
the dwarfs, in order that these might get gold for them out of the
earth. The dwarfs till then had been just like maggots in Ymir's dead
flesh, but now received human likeness. A shadow begins to creep over
the earth, the golden age is past. At the same time three things
happen. The gods discover the use or want of gold; the first war
breaks out, as it is said, "Odin hurled his spear amid the people,
and then was the first war;" and the three all-powerful giant maids
appear. "Gold," says the old song (and calls her by a name as if she
were a person), "they pierced with lances,--
"And in the High one's Hall
Burnt her once,
Burnt her thrice,
Oft not seldom,
Yet she still lives.
Wolves she tamed,
Magic arts she knew, she practised,
Ever was she the joy
Of evil people."
The three giant maidens are the three Fates--the sisters,--Past,
Present and Future. They came from giant land, which in this place
typifies the first mixed cause of all things; they came at the moment
when the golden age was disappearing; they stand upon the very edge
of its existence, at once the bringers and the avengers of evil. "The
golden age ceased when gold was invented," is an old saying. "After
the golden age, time begins," is another, or, in the words of a
German proverb, "To the happy no hour strikes." And now let us see
what sort of looking world these giants, gods, men, dwarfs and
fateful maids whom Har has been talking about were living in.
"Round without," Har says so; but a _flat_ round. The outmost circle
a frozen region full of frost giants; inside that circle, the sea; in
the middle of the sea, the earth in which men live, called Midgard,
and made out of Ymir's eyebrows; in the midst of the earth Asgard,
the city of the gods. It seems to be rather a disputed point whether
or not Asgard was on the top of a hill. Heavenly mountains are
mentioned in the _Edda_, but they are placed at the edge of heaven
under one end of the rainbow, not at all near Asgard, if Asgard was
in the middle of the earth. However, to make the city more
conspicuous we have placed it on the summit of a hill in the picture
of the Scandinavian World which stands at the beginning of this
chapter, and here remark that this picture must not be looked at
exactly in a geographical light even from a Scandinavian point of
view. It is rather an expression of ideas than of places, for we have
tried to figure by it what is said about the great World Tree
Yggdrassil and its three roots. "That ash," says Har, which was
indeed the earth-bearer, "is the greatest and best of all trees." Its
branches spread over the whole world and even reach above heaven. It
has three roots, very wide asunder. One of them goes down to
Ginnungagap. The frost giants live over it, and over this root is a
deep well which we shall hear more of by-and-bye. In the picture this
root could not be shown, but the branches which encircle the ice
region are supposed to spring from it. Another root extends to
Niflheim, the old roaring cauldron lies under it, a great snake
called Nidhögg gnaws it night and day as the old lay says.
"Yggdrasil's ash suffers greater hardship than men know of. Nidhögg
tears it." Under this root also lies Helheim, a home of the dead. The
third root is in heaven: gods and men live under it, in Asgard and
Midgard; the giant fate-sisters also live under it, at the top of the
Rainbow's arch in their palace very beauteous, which stands by the
Holy Urda Fount. They water the tree every day with the holy water,
so that ever "it stands green over Urda's Fount."
These maidens are called Norns;--they fix the destinies of men, Har
says; "but besides them," he adds, "there are a great many other
norns--indeed, for each man that is born there is a norn to decide
his fate."
"Methinks, then," says Gangler, "that these Norns were born far
asunder; they are not of the same race." "Some belong to the Æsir,
some come from the Elves, and some are dwarfs' daughters." Besides
these wonders, we are told that an eagle perched amongst the highest
branches of Yggdrasil with a hawk between his eyes, four harts ran
amongst the branches and bit off the buds, and a squirrel called
Ratatösk or branch borer ran up and down, carrying messages between
the Eagle and Nidhögg, as one account says, causing strife between
them--a kind of typical busybody, in fact.
Such is the myth of Yggdrasil, of which Jacob Grimm remarks "it bears
the stamp of a very high antiquity, but does not appear to be fully
unfolded." Of course, it was only the symbol of a thought, the
Scandinavians could not have believed that there was such a tree. But
of what thought was it the symbol? The editor of Mallet's _Northern
Antiquities_ says, "We are inclined to regard this mythic Tree as the
symbol of ever-enduring time, or rather of universal nature, ever
varying in its aspects but subsisting throughout eternity." It is
called somewhere "Time's hoary nurse," and we see the principles of
destruction and of renovation acting upon it. One root in the
formless elemental abyss, one in the formed ice-frozen-over
giant land, its branches spreading over the whole world; one
reaching up to the unseen. Its name means "Ygg"--terror, horror,
fear--"drasil"--horse or bearer--and the first syllable is one of the
names of Odin the chief god. We must not omit to mention that our
Maypoles and the German Christmas trees are offshoots of Yggdrasil,
"that ash, the greatest and best of trees."
"But who is the first and eldest of the gods?" Gangler asks. "We call
him Allfather," says Har, "but besides this he has twelve names."
Allfather, Odin or Woden, the eldest son of Bör by a giantess, is the
chief god of the _Eddas_, and it is quite true, as Har says, that he
has many names. He was called Allfather--the father of gods and men,
and Valfather or the chooser, because he chose which of the slain in
battle should come and live with him in heaven; he called himself by
many names when he travelled, he was known as Ygg, but generally,
chiefly, he was Odin. The meaning of the first syllable of this last
name is terror (like Ygg), or violent emotion. Simrock says that air
in calm or storm lies at the root of Odin's being; from this he grew
up to be a god of the spirit, a king of gods, "as in the simple ideas
of the people," he says, "nature and spirit are inseparable; he
became as much a commander of the spirits of men as of the forces of
nature." Air, widespread and most spiritual of the elements, how
naturally akin it seems to that wind, blowing where it listeth, which
moves in hidden ways the spirits of men. Inspiration, madness,
poetry, warrior-rage, the storm of wind, the storm of mind--we find
Odin in them all. Thor the thunder-god stood next in importance to
Odin. Odin was his father, and he had a giantess mother, Jörd (the
earth). Besides these Har enumerates Baldur, Tyr, Vidar, Vali, Hödur,
Bragi, all called sons of Odin;--we shall hear the stories that
belong to them by-and-bye.
All these were of the race of the Æsir or Asgard gods; there were
other deities counted amongst them, and yet kept a little
distinct--the Vanir gods and goddesses. These were of a different
race, and it is not clear how and when they became mixed with the
Æsir. What the _Eddas_ say about it is simply this, that the Æsir
made peace with the Vanir and exchanged hostages with them. Amongst
these we find Niörd a kind of sea-coast god, the original of Nipen
still known in Norway, his son and daughter Frey and Freyja,
"beauteous and mighty,"--Frey presiding over rain, sunshine, and the
fruits of the earth; Freyja goddess of the beautiful year and of
love, and Heimdall, a god who lived upon the heavenly hills at one
end of the rainbow. A sea-king called Ægir, whose nature is not
quite defined whether he belonged to the god or the giant is
occasionally mentioned in the _Edda_ tales, and also a wise giant
Mimer. But there is besides a mysterious being whom we name last
because he requires a little explanation. This is Loki. He was one of
the Æsir; we read of his being with Odin when that god took his
fateful walk along the seashore and made man, he helped Odin in the
work; we come upon him frequently travelling with the gods, sometimes
at least as a friend, and yet it is evident that Loki was looked upon
as an evil being. "Some call him the calumniator of the gods," says
Har, "the contriver of all fraud and mischief, the disgrace of gods
and men. Loki is handsome," he adds, "and well made, but of a very
fickle mood and most evil disposition. He surpasses all beings in
those arts called cunning and perfidy." Simrock says that fire lies
at the root of Loki's being as air lies in that of Odin,--fire which
has good and evil in it, but most outwardly _destructive_ power;
hence the beginning of the idea of his evil-heartedness. From simple
nature myths, it is quite easy to conceive that the moral principle,
as it grew up in a people, would develop spiritual ones, and the
character of the gods would materially alter with the growth of the
religion. Good and evil are scarcely conceptions which the wars of
the elements give birth to. By the law is the knowledge of sin. The
name of Loki, it is said, may mean the bright element.
Amongst the goddesses who were called Asyniur, Frigga stands out
chief in the _Eddas_ as Odin's wife, but several others are named,
and also the Valkyrior, swayers of the battle and heavenly serving
maidens. The peace between the Æsir and the Vanir, and the
perceptible difference between these races of gods, points to an
amalgamation of the religions of two tribes of Teutons in very early
times: their faiths would be similar, drawn indeed from one source,
but would have been modified by the circumstances and requirements of
the divergent tribes. Simrock supposes that the Vanir worshippers may
have been dwellers by the sea, and have had a special reverence for
wind and water deities--mild, wide, beneficent airs. Their gods are a
little milder in nature than those of Asgard, they are also more
purely nature deities, with less of the moral element in their
characters, which looks as if the two faiths had joined at different
stages of development, at different levels one may say, so that the
line between them is still discernible. We have seen how Har explains
to Gangler the formation of the universe in Ginnungagap out of the
strange ice waves; primeval giant; beneficent might of the gods; its
endurance, rooted in the mighty Tree, that reached from depth to
height,--
"Laved with limpid water,
Gnawed by more serpents
Than any one would think
Of witless mortals."
He had also something to say concerning the future of the world.
"What hast thou to tell me about it?" said Gangler; and Har
replied,--"In the first place there will come a winter;" and then he
described the destruction of the world--flood and storm, and ice and
fire, and warfare, a supreme conflict; all the powers of evil, the
chaotic powers--primeval chaos surging again out of Niflheim and
Muspellheim--on one side, the gods, the forming orderly principle of
the course of the universe, on the other--all rage within, and
through the mighty ash, which itself trembles, "Groans that aged
tree." Monsters and gods alike fall, killing each other, and one
cannot say with whom the victory lies; for though the sun, moon, and
stars are made away with, and the earth sinks into the flood, it soon
emerges again, "beauteously green," destined, as it would seem, to
run a second course. Brighter, purer? The account is so mixed that
one cannot say, and why should we puzzle over it; perhaps they knew
as little what they thought and hoped as we know about them--those
old song-singers and myth-spinners of days gone by, as one of them
says,--
"Few may see
Further forth
Than when Odin
Meets the wolf."
Notwithstanding, we cannot help feeling, as we contemplate this myth,
that there was something noble, very grimly courageous in its
fatalism. Simrock says, "the course of Northern mythology is like a
drama." The world's beginning, the golden years, the first shadow of
evil, evil that came with times, evil fated to come, the troubles of
various kinds, all death shadows which fell upon the gods (we shall
trace them in the following tales); and above all, hanging over all,
crowning all, the twilight, the struggle, the end, the renewing; for
it is not, be it observed, the end of the world, of time, of
succession of events that is recorded in this myth (called the
Ragnarök Myth), but rather of the struggling powers that had been
brought by these, that had formed these. Looking through this drama
two things chiefly strike us, fatalism and combat. The two do not
contradict one another. The gods fight the giants from the earliest
times; they go on fighting them in a thousand ways, even though they
know that their own final defeat and destruction are fixed--they ward
off the evil day as far as possible, hoping through its shadow again
and again, dauntless to the end. It is impossible to help admiring
the impulses which led to the building up, and dictated the worship
of this idea,--the worship of the gods who were to die, who were, in
spite of most courageous defiance of it, after all but the servants
of the inevitable. Of course it was perfectly simple and natural that
this conception of unceasing strife, of the alternate victory and
defeat of light and darkness, cold and heat, should arise in the
minds of any worshippers of the natural world, but it must, one would
think, have acquired some moral significance to these heathen
Northmen by the time that Odin had come to be Allfather, even
Valfather, and Frigga, through the nourishing earth, the lady of
married love and of the hearth. A good deal of this courageous spirit
of conflict and self-surrender comes into the Scandinavian myths and
heroic tales. We read of one of the gods' messengers, who, when
implored to desist from an undertaking because danger threatened,
replied, "For one day was my age decreed and my whole life
determined." In a lay of Odin, it says, "We ourselves die, but the
fair fame never dies of him who has earned it;" and this reminds us
of the Scandinavian custom of engraving the records of their warlike
deeds upon their shields. "When a young warrior was at first
enlisted," it is said, "they gave him a white and smooth buckler,
which was called the 'shield of expectation,' which he carried until
he had earned its record." It is related of one of the celebrated
Jomsburg sea-rovers called Bui, that finding himself defeated in an
engagement, and seeing that all further resistance was fruitless, he
took his treasure--two chests full of gold--and, calling out
"Overboard all Bui's men," plunged into the sea and perished. But
better far is the following:--"A warrior having been thrown upon his
back in wrestling with his enemy, and the latter finding himself
without arms, the vanquished person promised to wait without changing
his posture while the other fetched a sword to kill him, and he
faithfully kept his word."
Such traits as these lie on the light side of the Northern character,
pity that the other side is such a dark one. Craft, avarice,
cruelty--we cannot shut our eyes to them--cropping up everywhere, in
the stories of the gods, and still more frequently in the sagas whose
details are sometimes most revolting. Amongst other stories, we have
one of a young sea-rover, called Sigurd, by-the-bye, a son of that
very Bui mentioned above. Sigurd and his companions had been taken
prisoners, and were condemned to be beheaded. They were all seated on
a log of wood, and one after another had his head struck off, whilst
king Hakon their capturer looked on; the account says, that he came
out after breakfast to watch the execution. The sea-rovers all met
their fate with unflinching courage, and as the executioner asked
each one, before he struck the blow, what he thought of death, each
gave some fierce mocking answer; but when it came to Sigurd's turn,
and he was asked what he thought of death, he answered, "I fear not
death, since I have fulfilled the greatest duty of life, but I must
pray thee not to let my hair be touched by a slave, or stained with
my blood." The story tells us he had long fair hair, as fine as silk,
flowing in ringlets over his shoulders. One of the cruel king Hakon's
followers, being moved, it seems, either with pity for Sigurd's hair
or admiration of his courage, stept forward and held the ringlets
whilst the executioner struck, upon which Sigurd twitched his head
forward so strongly that the warrior who was holding his hair had
both his hands cut off, "and this practical joke so pleased the
king's son," continues the tale, "that he gave Sigurd his life."
"Thou tellest me many wonderful things," said Gangler; "what are the
names of the Homesteads in heaven?" In answer, Har tells him about
Odin's halls, and Thor's, and Baldur's, and Frigga's, and many
another bounteous, wide-spreading, golden-roofed mansion; amongst
them of Valhalla, which Odin had prepared especially for warriors who
fell in battle and who were thenceforth to be his sons, called
Einherjar, heroes, champions. "Methinks," said Gangler, "there must
be a great crowd in Valhalla, and often a great press at the door
among such a number of people constantly thronging in and out." "Why
not ask," says Har, "how many doors there are?--
"Five hundred doors
And forty eke
I think are in Valhall.
"But what does Odin give the warriors to eat?" asked Gangler. "The
flesh of the good boar Sæhrimnir, and this is more than enough
(though few know how much is required for heroes), for in spite of
its being eaten every day it becomes whole again every night; truly
it is the best of flesh." "And what have the heroes to drink?" asked
Gangler "for they must require a plentiful supply; do they drink only
water?" "A silly question that," replied Har; "dost thou imagine that
Allfather would invite kings and jarls and other great men and give
them nothing to drink but water? In that case the heroes would think
they had paid dearly to get to Valhall, enduring great hardships and
receiving deadly wounds; they would find they had paid too great a
price for water drink. No, no, the case is quite otherwise, in
Valhall there is a famous goat that supplies mead enough for all the
heroes and to spare." "Mighty things these," said Gangler; "but how
do the heroes amuse themselves when they are not drinking?" "Every
day they ride into the court and fight till they cut each other in
pieces, this is their pastime; but when meal-tide approaches they
return to drink in Valhall." "Odin is great and mighty," answered
Gangler, "as it is said in one of the Æsir's own poems,--
"The ash Yggdrasill
Is the first of Trees,
As Skidbladnir of ships,
Odin of Æsir
Sleipnir of steeds,
Bifrost of bridges,
Bragi of Bards,
Habrok of hawks
And Garm of hounds is."
"But do all the dead go to Valhalla?" No; down below in Niflheim
there was another home of the dead which was ruled over by the
underworld goddess Hela, and called after her Helheim. Coldness and
discomfort, according to one account, were rather its characteristics
than actual suffering; and as all the dead were said to go there who
died of sickness or old age, it was probably at one time regarded
more as a place of misfortune than of punishment. The cold,
hidden-away condition of the dead, separated from the bright, warm
life of the upper world, would naturally suggest their being
consigned to the keeping of some under-world deity, unless, indeed,
they could lay claim to a second higher life by virtue of any great
warlike deed done up here. By degrees misfortune must have deepened
into suffering; and, as the moral sense quickened, the idea would
arise of there being a retribution for misdeeds done on earth as well
as an emptiness of its missed glories. There is a description given
of some place of punishment--it is not quite clear what place it
refers to--in these words,--
"A hall standing
Far from the sun
In Nastrond,
Its doors turn northward,
Venom drops fall
Through its apertures;
The Hall is twined
With serpents' backs.
There she saw wading,
Through sluggish streams,
Bloodthirsty men
And perjurers;
There Nidhög sucks
The corpse of the dead
The wolf tears men--
Understand ye yet, or what?"
"Now," says Har; that was when he had finished his description of
Ragnarök, "If thou, Gangler, hast any more questions to ask, I know
not who can answer thee, for I never heard tell of any one who could
relate what will happen in the other ages of the world." "Upon
which," the story says, "Gangler heard a terrible noise all round
him; he looked everywhere, but could see neither palace, nor city,
nor any thing save a vast plain. He therefore set out on his return
home." And so disappears king Gylfi.
But we, who are not so presumptuous as to enquire into the future of
the ages, and are neither learned nor over inquisitive like king
Gylfi, will go on listening to the great-grandmothers' stories, giant
stories and god stories--a little bit that one remembers, and a
little bit that another remembers, and so on; and all the time we
will try to make the story tellers clear to one another and to
ourselves as they go on, translating their old fashioned words into
our own common every day words and modes of speech, so that we may
have at least a chance of understanding them.
CHAPTER I.
THE ÆSIR.
PART I. A GIANT--A COW--AND A HERO.
In the beginning of ages there lived a cow, whose breath was sweet,
and whose milk was bitter. This cow was called Audhumla, and she
lived all by herself on a frosty, misty plain, where there was
nothing to be seen but heaps of snow and ice piled strangely over one
another. Far away to the north it was night, far away to the south it
was day; but all around where Audhumla lay a cold, grey twilight
reigned. By-and-by a giant came out of the dark north, and lay down
upon the ice near Audhumla. "You must let me drink of your milk,"
said the giant to the cow; and though her milk was bitter, he liked
it well, and for him it was certainly good enough.
After a little while the cow looked all round her for something to
eat, and she saw a very few grains of salt sprinkled over the ice; so
she licked the salt, and breathed with her sweet breath, and then
long golden locks rose out of the ice, and the southern day shone
upon them, which made them look bright and glittering.
The giant frowned when he saw the glitter of the golden hair; but
Audhumla licked the pure salt again, and a head of a man rose out of
the ice. The head was more handsome than could be described, and a
wonderful light beamed out of its clear blue eyes. The giant frowned
still more when he saw the head; but Audhumla licked the salt a third
time, and then an entire man arose--a hero majestic in strength and
marvellous in beauty.
Now, it happened that when the giant looked full in the face of that
beautiful man, he hated him with his whole heart, and, what was still
worse, he took a terrible oath, by all the snows of Ginnungagap,
that he would never cease fighting until either he or Bur, the hero,
should lie dead upon the ground. And he kept his vow; he did not
cease fighting until Bur had fallen beneath his cruel blows. I cannot
tell how it could be that one so wicked should be able to conquer one
so majestic and so beautiful; but so it was, and afterwards, when the
sons of the hero began to grow up, the giant and his sons fought
against them, too, and were very near conquering them many times.
But there was of the sons of the heroes one of very great strength
and wisdom, called Odin, who, after many combats, did at last slay
the great old giant, and pierced his body through with his keen
spear, so that the blood swelled forth in a mighty torrent, broad and
deep, and all the hideous giant brood were drowned in it excepting
one, who ran away panting and afraid.
After this Odin called round him his sons, brothers, and cousins, and
spoke to them thus: "Heroes, we have won a great victory; our enemies
are dead, or have run away from us. We cannot stay any longer here,
where there is nothing evil for us to fight against."
The heroes looked round them at the words of Odin. North, south,
east, and west there was no one to fight against them anywhere, and
they called out with one voice, "It is well spoken, Odin; we follow
you."
"Southward," answered Odin, "heat lies, and northward night. From the
dim east the sun begins his journey westward home."
"Westward home!" shouted they all; and westward they went.
Odin rode in the midst of them, and they all paid to him reverence
and homage as to a king and father. On his right hand rode Thor,
Odin's strong, warlike, eldest son. On his left hand rode Baldur, the
most beautiful and exalted of his children; for the very light of the
sun itself shone forth from his pure and noble brow. After him came
Tyr the Brave; the Silent Vidar; Hödur, who, alas! was born blind;
Hermod, the Flying Word; Bragi, Hœnir, and many more mighty lords
and heroes; and then came a shell chariot, in which sat Frigga, the
wife of Odin, with all her daughters, friends, and tirewomen.
Eleven months they journeyed westward, enlivening the way with
cheerful songs and conversation, and at the twelfth new moon they
pitched their tents upon a range of hills which stood near the
borders of an inland sea. The greater part of one night they were
disturbed by mysterious whisperings, which appeared to proceed from
the sea-coast, and creep up the mountain side; but as Tyr, who got up
half a dozen times, and ran furiously about among the gorse and
bushes, always returned saying that he could see no one, Frigga and
her maidens at length resigned themselves to sleep, though they
certainly trembled and started a good deal at intervals. Odin lay
awake all night, however; for he felt certain that something unusual
was going to happen. And such proved to be the case; for in the
morning, before the tents were struck, a most terrific hurricane
levelled the poles, and tore in pieces the damask coverings, swept
from over the water furiously up the mountain gorges, round the base
of the hills, and up again all along their steep sides right in the
faces of the heroes.
Thor swung himself backwards and forwards, and threw stones in every
possible direction. Tyr sat down on the top of a precipice, and
defied the winds to displace him; whilst Baldur vainly endeavoured to
comfort his poor mother, Frigga. But Odin stepped forth calm and
unruffled, spread his arms towards the sky, and called out to the
spirits of the wind, "Cease, strange Vanir (for that was the name by
which they were called), cease your rough play, and tell us in what
manner we have offended you that you serve us thus."
The winds laughed in a whispered chorus at the words of the brave
king, and, after a few low titterings, sank into silence. But each
sound in dying grew into a shape: one by one the strange,
loose-limbed, uncertain forms stepped forth from caves, from gorges,
dropped from the tree tops, or rose out of the grass--each wind-gust
a separate Van.
Then Niörd, their leader, stood forward from the rest of them, and
said, "We know, O mighty Odin how you and your company are truly the
Æsir--that is to say, the lords of the whole earth--since you slew
the huge, wicked giant. We, too, are lords, not of the earth, but of
the sea and air, and we thought to have had glorious sport in
fighting one against another; but if such be not your pleasure, let
us, instead of that, shake hands." And, as he spoke, Niörd held out
his long, cold hand, which was like a windbag to the touch. Odin
grasped it heartily, as did all the Æsir; for they liked the
appearance of the good-natured, gusty chief, whom they begged to
become one of their company, and live henceforth with them.
To this Niörd consented, whistled good-bye to his kinsfolk, and
strode cheerfully along amongst his new friends. After this they
journeyed on and on steadily westward until they reached the summit
of a lofty mountain, called the Meeting Hill. There they all sat
round in a circle, and took a general survey of the surrounding
neighbourhood.
As they sat talking together Baldur looked up suddenly, and said, "Is
it not strange, Father Odin, that we do not find any traces of that
giant who fled from us, and who escaped drowning in his father's
blood?"
"Perhaps he has fallen into Niflheim, and so perished," remarked
Thor.
But Niörd pointed northward, where the troubled ocean rolled, and
said, "Yonder, beyond that sea, lies the snowy region of Jötunheim.
It is there the giant lives, and builds cities and castles, and
brings up his children--a more hideous brood even than the old one."
"How do you know that, Niörd?" asked Odin.
"I have seen him many times," answered Niörd, "both before I came to
live with you, and also since then, at night, when I have not been
able to sleep, and have made little journeys to Jötunheim, to pass
the time away."
"This is indeed terrible news," said Frigga; "for the giants will
come again out of Jötunheim and devastate the earth."
"Not so," answered Odin, "not so, my dear Frigga; for here, upon this
very hill, we will build for ourselves a city, from which we will
keep guard over the poor earth, with its weak men and women, and
from whence we will go forth to make war upon Jötunheim."
"That is remarkably well said, Father Odin," observed Thor, laughing
amidst his red beard.
Tyr shouted, and Vidar smiled, but said nothing; and then all the
Æsir set to work with their whole strength and industry to build for
themselves a glorious city on the summit of the mountain. For days,
and weeks, and months, and years they worked, and never wearied; so
strong a purpose was in them, so determined and powerful were they to
fulfil it. Even Frigga and her ladies did not disdain to fetch stones
in their marble wheelbarrows, or to draw water from the well in
golden buckets, and then, with delicate hands, to mix the mortar upon
silver plates. And so that city rose by beautiful degrees, stone
above stone, tower above tower, height above height, until it crowned
the hill.
Then all the Æsir stood at a little distance, and looked at it, and
sighed from their great happiness. Towering at a giddy height in the
centre of the city rose Odin's seat, called Air Throne, from whence
he could see over the whole earth. On one side of Air Throne stood
the Palace of Friends, where Frigga was to live; on the other rose
the glittering Gladsheim, a palace roofed entirely with golden
shields, and whose great hall, Valhalla, had a ceiling covered with
spears, benches spread with coats of mail, and five hundred and forty
entrance-gates, through each of which eight hundred men might ride
abreast. There was also a large iron smithy, situated on the eastern
side of the city, where the Æsir might forge their arms and shape
their armour. That night they all supped in Valhalla, and drank to
the health of their strong, new home, "The City of Asgard," as Bragi,
their chief orator, said it ought to be called.