or swarthy elves, _dökkálfar_. They dwell under the farthest root of the
world-tree, near the northern gate of the lower world (_iormungrundar i
iodyr nyrdra_), and have as their neighbours the Thurses and the unhappy
dead (_náir_--Forspjallsljod, 25). Gylfaginning also (ch. 17) knows of
the swarthy elves, at least, that they "dwell down in the earth" (_búa
nidri í jördu_). As to mythic rank, colour, and abode, they therefore
correspond with the Roman _aquili_, and Saxo has forcibly and very
correctly employed this Latin word in order to characterise them in an
intelligible manner.
The two swarthy elves keeping watch outside of the hall of Nastrands
ought naturally to have been astonished at seeing a living human being
entering their grotto. Saxo makes them receive the unexpected guest in a
friendly manner. They greet him, and, when they have learned the purpose
of his visit, one of them reproaches him for the rash boldness of his
undertaking, but gives him information in regard to the way to Loke, and
gives him fire and fuel after he had tested Thorkil's understanding, and
found him to be a wise man. The journey, says the swarthy elf, can be
performed in four days' fast sailing. As appears from the context, the
journey is to the east. The traveller then comes to a place where not
a blade of grass grows, and over which an even denser darkness broods.
The place includes several terrible rocky halls, and in one of them Loke
dwells.
On the fourth day Thorkil, favoured by a good wind, comes to the goal
of his journey. Through the darkness a mass of rock rising from the sea
(_scopulum inusitatæ molis_) is with difficulty discerned, and Thorkil
lays to by this rocky island. He and his men put on clothes of skin
of a kind that protects against venom, and then walk along the beach
at the foot of the rock until they find an entrance. Then they kindle
a fire with flint stones, this being an excellent protection against
demons; they light torches and crawl in through the narrow opening.
Unfortunately, Saxo gives but a scanty account of what they saw there.
First they came to a cave of torture, which resembled the hall on the
Nastrands, at least, in this particular, that there were many serpents
and many iron seats or iron benches of the kind described above. A brook
of sluggish water is crossed by wading. Another grotto which is not
described was passed through, whereupon they entered Loke's awful prison.
He lay there bound hands and feet with immense chains. His hair and beard
resembled spears of horn, and had a terrible odour. Thorkil jerked out a
hair of his beard to take with him as evidence of what he had seen. As he
did this, there was diffused in the cave a pestilential stench; and after
Thorkil's arrival home, it appeared that the beard-hair he had taken home
was dangerous to life on account of its odour (_Hist. Dan._, 433). When
Thorkil and his men had passed out of the interior jurisdiction of the
rock, they were discovered by flying serpents which had their home on the
island (cp. Völuspa--_thar saug Nidhöggr_, &c., No. 77). The skin clothes
protected them against the venom vomited forth. But one of the men who
bared his eyes became blind. Another, whose hand came outside of the
protecting garments, got it cut off; and a third, who ventured to uncover
his head, got the latter separated from his neck by the poison as by a
sharp steel instrument.
The poem or saga which was Saxo's authority for this story must have
described the rocky island where Loke was put in chains as inhabited by
many condemned beings. There are at least three caves of torture, and in
one of them there are many iron benches. This is confirmed, as we shall
see, by Völuspa.
Saxo also says that there was a harbour. From Völuspa we learn that when
Ygdrasil trembles at the approach of Ragnarok, the ship of the dead,
Nagelfar, lies so that the liberated Loke can go aboard it. That it has
long lain moored in its harbour is evident from the fact that, according
to Völuspa, it then "becomes loose." Unknown hands are its builders.
The material out of which it is constructed is the nail-parings of dead
men (Gylfag., 51--probably according to some popular tradition). The
less regard for religion, the less respect for the dead. But from each
person who is left unburied, or is put into his grave without being, when
possible, washed, combed, cleaned as to hands and feet, and so cared
for that his appearance may be a favorable evidence to the judges at
the Thing of the dead in regard to his survivors--from each such person
comes building material for the death-ship, which is to carry the hosts
of world-destroyers to the great conflict. Much building material is
accumulated in the last days--in the "dagger-and-axe age," when "men no
longer respect each other" (Völuspa).
Nagelfar is the largest of all ships, larger than Skidbladner
(_Skidbladnir er beztr skipanna ... en Naglfari er mest skip_--Gylfag.,
43). This very fact shows that it is to have a large number of persons on
board when it departs from Loke's rocky island. Völuspa says:
Str. 47, 8. Naglfar losnar, Nagelfar becomes loose,
Str. 48. Kioll ferr austan, a ship comes from the east,
koma muno Muspellz the hosts of Muspel
um laug lydir, come o'er the main,
en Loki styrir; Loke is pilot;
fara Fifls megir all Fifel's descendants
med Freka allir, come with Freke,
theim er brodir Byleipt's brother
Byleipts i fór. is with them on the journey.
Here it is expressly stated that "the hosts of Muspel" are on board
the ship, Nagelfar, guided by Loke, after it has been "freed from its
moorings" and had set sail from the island where Loke and other damned
ones were imprisoned.
How can this be harmonised with the doctrine based on the authority of
Gylfaginning, that the sons of Muspel are inhabitants of the southernmost
region of light and warmth, Gylfaginning's so-called Muspelheim? or with
the doctrine that Surt is the protector of the borders of this realm? or
that Muspel's sons proceed under his command to the Ragnarok conflict,
and that they consequently must come from the South, which Völuspa also
seems to corroborate with the words _Surtr ferr sunnan med sviga læfi_?
The answer is that the one statement cannot be harmonised with the other,
and the question then arises as to which of the two authorities is the
authentic one, the heathen poem Völuspa or Gylfaginning, produced in the
thirteenth century by a man who had a vague conception of the mythology
of our ancestors. Even the most uncritical partisan of Gylfaginning would
certainly unhesitatingly decide in favour of Völuspa, provided we had
this poem handed down in its pure form from the heathen days. But this is
clearly not the case. We therefore need a third witness to decide between
the two. Such an one is also actually to be found.
In the Norse heathen records the word _muspell_ occurs only twice, viz.,
in the above-mentioned Völuspa strophe and in Lokasenna, 42, where Frey,
who has surrendered his sword of victory, is threatened by Loke with the
prospect of defeat and death--_er Muspellz synir rida Myrcvith yfir_,
"when Muspel's sons ride over Darkwood." The Myrkwood is mentioned in
Volundarkvida (1) as a forest, through which the swan-maids coming from
the South flew into the wintry Ulfdales, where one chases bears on skees
(snow-shoes) to get food. This is evidently not a forest situated near
the primeval fountains of heat and fire. The very arbitrary manner in
which the names of the mythical geography is used in the heroic poems,
where Myrkwood comes to the surface, does not indicate that this forest
was conceived as situated south of Midgard, and there is, as shall be
shown below, reason for assuming that Darkwood is another name for the
Ironwood famous in mythology; the wood which, according to Völuspa, is
situated in the East, and in which Angerboda fosters the children of Loke
and Fenrer.
One of these, and one of the worst, is the monster Hate, the enemy of
the moon mentioned in Völuspa as _tungls tiugari_, that makes excursions
from the Ironwood and "stains the citadels of rulers with blood." In the
Ragnarok conflict Hate takes part and contends with Tyr (Gylfag.), and,
doubtless, not only he, but also the whole offspring of the Fenris-wolf
fostered in the Ironwood, are on the battlefield in that division which
is commanded by Loke their clan-chief. This is also, doubtless, the
meaning of the following words in the Völuspa strophe quoted above:
"Fifel's descendants all come with Freke (the wolf), and in company
with them is Byleipt's (or Byleist's) brother." As Loke, Byleipt, and
Helblinde are mentioned as brothers (Gylfag., 33), no one else can be
meant with "Byleipt's brother" than Loke himself or Helblinde, and
more probably the latter, since it has already been stated, that Loke
is there as the commander of the forces. Thus it is Muspel's sons and
Loke's kinsmen in the Ironwood who are gathered around him when the great
conflict is at hand. Muspel's sons accompany the liberated Loke from his
rocky isle, and are with him on board Nagelfar. Loke's first destination
is the Ironwood, whither he goes to fetch Angerboda's children, and
thence the journey proceeds "over Myrkwood" to the plain of Vigrid. The
statements of Völuspa and Lokasenna illustrate and corroborate each
other, and it follows that Völuspa's statement, claiming that Muspel's
sons come from the East, is original and correct.
Gylfaginning treats Muspel as a place, a realm, the original home of fire
and heat (Gylfag., 5). Still, there is a lack of positiveness, for the
land in question is in the same work called _Múspellsheimr_ (ch. 5) and
_Múspells heimr_ (ch. 8), whence we may presume that the author regarded
_Múspell_ as meaning both the land of the fire and the fire itself.
The true etymology of _Múspell_ was probably as little known in the
thirteenth century, when Gylfaginning was written, as it is now. I shall
not speak of the several attempts made at conjecturing the definition of
the word. They may all be regarded as abortive, mainly, doubtless, for
the reason that Gylfaginning's statements have credulously been assumed
as the basis of the investigation. As a word inherited from heathen
times, it occurs under the forms _mutspelli_ and _muspilli_ in the Old
Saxon poem Heliand and in an Old High German poem on the final judgment,
and there it has the meaning of the Lord's day, the doom of condemnation,
or the condemnation. Concerning the meaning which the word had among the
heathens of the North, before the time of the authors of Völuspa and
Lokasenna, all that can be said with certainty is, that the word in the
expression "Muspel's sons" has had a special reference to mythical beings
who are to appear in Ragnarok fighting there as Loke's allies, that is,
on the side of the evil against the good; that these beings were Loke's
fellow-prisoners on the rocky isle where he was chained; and that they
accompanied him from there on board Nagelfar to war against the gods.
As Gylfaginning makes them accompany Surt coming from the South, this
must be the result of a confounding of "Muspel's sons" with "Surt's
(Suttung's) sons."
A closer examination ought to have shown that Gylfaginning's conception
of "Muspel's sons" is immensely at variance with the mythical. Under
the influence of Christian ideas they are transformed into a sort of
angels of light, who appear in Ragnarok to contend under the command
of Surt "to conquer all the idols" (_sigra öll godin_--Gylfag. 4) and
carry out the punishment of the world. While Völuspa makes them come
with Loke in the ship Nagelfar, that is, from the terrible rocky isle in
the sea over which eternal darkness broods, and while Lokasenna makes
them come across the Darkwood, whose name does not suggest any region
in the realm of light, Gylfaginning tells us that they are celestial
beings. Idols and giants contend with each other on Vigrid's plains;
then _the heavens_ are suddenly rent in twain, and out of it ride in
shining squadrons "Muspel's sons" and Surt, with his flaming sword, at
the head of the fylkings. Gylfaginning is careful to keep these noble
riders far away from every contact with that mob which Loke leads to the
field of battle. It therefore expressly states that they form a fylking
by themselves (_I thessum gny Klofnar himininn, ok ridu thadan Muspells
synir; Surtr ridr fyrstr, &c. ... enn Muspells synir hafa einir sér
fylking, er sá björt mjök_--ch. 56). Thus they do not come to assist
Loke, but to put an end to both the idols and the mob of giants. The old
giant, Surt, who, according to a heathen skald, Eyvind Skaldaspiller,
dwells in _sökkdalir_, in mountain grottoes deep under the earth (see
about him, No. 89), is in Gylfaginning first made the keeper of the
borders of "Muspelheim," and then the chief of celestial hosts. But this
is not the end of his promotion. In the text found in the Upsala Codex,
Gylfaginning makes him lord in Gimle, and likewise the king of eternal
bliss. After Ragnarok it is said, "there are many good abodes and many
bad;" _best it is to be in Gimle with Surt (margar ero vistar gothar og
margar illar, bezt er at vera a Gimle medr surtr)_. The name Surt means
black. We find that his dark looks did not prevent his promotion, and
this has been carried to such a point that a mythologist who honestly
believed in Gylfaginning saw in him the Almighty who is to come after
the regeneration to equalise and harmonise all discord, and to found holy
laws to prevail for ever.
Under such circumstances, it may be suggested as a rule of critical
caution not to accept unconditionally Gylfaginning's statement that the
world of light and heat which existed before the creation of the world
was called Muspel or Muspelheim. In all probability, this is a result of
the author's own reflections. At all events, it is certain that no other
record has any knowledge of that name. But that the mythology presumed
the existence of such a world follows already from the fact that Urd's
fountain, which gives the warmth of life to the world-tree, must have had
its deepest fountain there, just as Hvergelmer has its in the world of
primeval cold, and Mimer has his fountain in that wisdom which unites the
opposites and makes them work together in a cosmic world.
Accordingly, we must distinguish between _Múspells megir_, _Múspells
synir_, from Surt's clan-men, who are called _Surts ætt_, _synir
Suttunga_, _Suttungs synir_ (Skirnismal, 34; Alvissm., 35). We should
also remember that _Múspell_ in connection with the words _synir_ and
_megir_ hardly can mean a land, a realm, a region. The figure by which
the inhabitants of a country are called its sons or descendants never
occurs, so far as I know, in the oldest Norse literature.
In regard to the names of the points of the compass in the poetic Edda,
_nordan_ and _austan_, it must not be forgotten that the same northern
regions in the mythical geography to which various events are referred
must have been regarded by the Icelanders as lying to the east from
their own northern isle. The _Bjarmia ulterior_, in whose night-shrouded
waters mythical adventurers sought the gates to the lower world, lay in
the uttermost North, and might still, from an Icelandic and also from a
Norwegian standpoint, be designated as a land in the East. According to
the sagas preserved by Saxo, these adventurers sailed into the Arctic
Ocean, past the Norwegian coast, and eastward to a mythical Bjarmia, more
distant than the real Bjarmaland. They could thus come to the coast where
a gate to the lower world was to be found, and to the Nastrands, and if
they continued this same course to the East, they could finally get to
the rocky isle where Loke lay chained.
We have seen that Loke is not alone with Sigyn on that isle where in
chains he abides Ragnarok. There were unhappy beings in large numbers
with him. As already stated, Saxo speaks of three connected caves of
torture there, and the innermost one is Loke's. Of the one nearest to it,
Saxo tells nothing else than that one has to wade across a brook or river
in order to get there. Of the bound Fenrer, Loke's son, it is said that
from his mouth runs froth which forms the river Von (Gylfag., 34). In
Lokasenna (34) Frey says to the abusive Loke: "A wolf (that is, Fenrer) I
see lying at the mouth of the river until the forces of the world come in
conflict; if you do not hold your tongue, you, villain, will be chained
_next to him_" (_thvi næst_--an expression which here should be taken
in a local sense, as a definite place is mentioned in the preceding
sentence). And as we learn from Völuspa, that Freke (the wolf) is with
Loke on board Nagelfar, then these evidences go to show that Loke and
his son are chained in the same place. The isle where Fenrer was chained
is called in Gylfaginning _Lyngvi_, and the body of water in which the
isle is situated is called _Amsvartnir_, a suitable name of the sea,
over which eternal darkness broods. On the isle, the probably Icelandic
author of Völuspa (or its translator or compiler) has imagined a "grove,"
whose trees consist of jets of water springing from hot fountains (_hvera
lundr_). The isle is guarded by _Garmr_, a giant-dog, who is to bark
with all its might when the chains of Loke and Fenrer threaten to burst
asunder:
Geyr Garmr mjök
fyr Gnipahelli
Festr man slitna,
en Freki renna.
According to Grimnersmal, Garm is the foremost of all dogs. The dogs
which guard the beautiful Menglad's citadel are also called Garms
(Fjölsvinnsmal). In Gylfaginning, the word is also used in regard to a
wolf, Hate Manegarm. _Gnipahellir_ means the cave of the precipitous
rock. The adventurers which Thorkil and his men encountered with the
flying serpents, in connection with the watching Hel-dog, show that
Lyngve is the scene of demons of the same kind as those which are found
around the Na-gates of Nifelheim.
Bound hands and feet with the entrails of a "frost-cold son" (Lokasenna,
49), which, after being placed on his limbs, are transformed into iron
chains (Gylfag., 54), Loke lies on a weapon (_a hiorvi_--Lokasenna,
49), and under him are three flat stones placed on edge, one under his
shoulders, one under his loins, and one under his hams (Gylfag., 54).
Over him Skade, who is to take revenge for the murder of her father,
suspends a serpent in such a manner that the venom drops in the face of
the nithing. Sigyn, faithful to her wicked husband, sits sorrowing by his
side (Völuspa) and protects him as well as she is able against the venom
of the serpent (Postscript to Lokasenna, Gylfag., 54). Fenrer is fettered
by the soft, silk-like chain Gleipner, made by the subterranean artist,
and brought from the lower world by Hermod. It is the only chain that can
hold him, and that cannot be broken before Ragnarok. His jaws are kept
wide open with a sword (Gylfag., 35).
79.
THE GREAT WORLD-MILL. ITS MISTAKEN IDENTITY WITH THE FRODE-MILL.
We have yet to mention a place in the lower world which is of importance
to the naïve but, at the same time, perspicuous and imaginative cosmology
of Teutonic heathendom. The myth in regard to the place in question is
lost, but it has left scattered traces and marks, with the aid of which
it is possible to restore its chief outlines.
Poems, from the heathen time, speak of two wonderful mills, a larger and
a smaller "Grotte"-mill.
The larger one is simply immense. The storms and showers which lash the
sides of the mountains and cause their disintegration; the breakers of
the sea which attack the rocks on the strands, make them hollow, and cast
the substance thus scooped out along the coast in the form of sand-banks;
the whirlpools and currents of the ocean, and the still more powerful
forces that were fancied by antiquity, and which smouldered the more
brittle layers of the earth's solid crust, and scattered them as sand
and mould over "the stones of the hall," in order that the ground might
"be overgrown with green herbs"--all this was symbolized by the larger
Grotte-mill. And as all symbols, in the same manner as the lightning
which becomes Thor's hammer, in the mythology become epic-pragmatic
realities, so this symbol becomes to the imagination a real mill,
which operates deep down in the sea and causes the phenomena which it
symbolizes.
This greater mill was also called _Grædir_, since its grist is the mould
in which vegetation grows. This name was gradually transferred by the
poets of the Christian age from the mill, which was grinding beneath the
sea, to the sea itself.
The lesser Grotte-mill is like the greater one of heathen origin--Egil
Skallagrimson mentions it--but it plays a more accidental part, and
really belongs to the heroic poems connected with the mythology.
Meanwhile, it is akin to the greater. Its stones come from the lower
world, and were cast up thence for amusement by young giant-maids to
the surface of the earth. A being called _Hengikjöptr_ (the feminine
_Hengikepta_ is the name of a giantess--Sn. Edda, i. 551; ii. 471) makes
mill-stones out of these subterranean rocks, and presents the mill to
King Frode Fridleifson. Fate brings about that the same young giantesses,
having gone to Svithiod to help the king warring there, Guthorm (see
Nos. 38, 39), are taken prisoners and sold as slaves to King Frode, who
makes them turn his Grotte-mill, the stones of which they recognize from
their childhood. The giantesses, whose names are Fenja and Menja, grind
on the mill gold and safety for King Frode, and good-will among men for
his kingdom. But when Frode, hardened by greed for gold, refuses them the
necessary rest from their toils, they grind fire and death upon him, and
give the mill so great speed that the mill-stone breaks into pieces, and
the foundation is crushed under its weight.
After the introduction of Christianity, the details of the myth
concerning the greater, the cosmological mill, were forgotten, and there
remained only the memory of the existence of such a mill on the bottom
of the sea. The recollection of the lesser Grotte-mill was, on the other
hand, at least in part preserved as to its details in a song which
continued to flourish, and which was recorded in Skaldskaparmal.
Both mills were now regarded as identical, and there sprang up a
tradition which explained how they could be so.
Contrary to the statements of the song, the tradition narrates that the
mill did not break into pieces, but stood whole and perfect, when the
curse of the giant-maids on Frode was fulfilled. The night following
the day when they had begun to grind misfortune on Frode, there came a
sea-king, Mysing, and slew Frode, and took, among other booty, also the
Grotte-mill and both the female slaves, and carried them on board his
ship. Mysing commanded them to grind salt, and this they continued to do
until the following midnight. Then they asked if he had not got enough,
but he commanded them to continue grinding, and so they did until the
ship shortly afterwards sank. In this manner the tradition explained
how the mill came to stand on the bottom of the sea, and there the mill
that had belonged to Frode acquired the qualities which originally had
belonged to the vast Grotte-mill of the mythology. Skaldskaparmal, which
relates this tradition as well as the song, without taking any notice of
the discrepancies between them, adds that after Frode's mill had sunk,
"there was produced a whirlpool in the sea, caused by the waters running
through the hole in the mill-stone, and from that time the sea is salt."
80.
THE WORLD-MILL (_continued_).
With distinct consciousness of its symbolic signification, the greater
mill is mentioned in a strophe by the skald Snæbjorn (Skaldskap.,
ch. 25). The strophe appears to have belonged to a poem describing a
voyage. "It is said," we read in this strophe, "that _Eyludr's_ nine
women violently turn the Grotte of the skerry dangerous to man out
near the edge of the earth, and that these women long ground Amlode's
_lid_-grist."
Hvat kveda hræra Grotta
hergrimmastan skerja
ut fyrir jardar skauti
Eyludrs níu brúdir:
thær er .. fyrir laungu
lid-meld .....
.........
... Amloda mólu.