Part 4

While a terrible winter is raging, the gods, according to Forspjallsljóð, [*] send messengers, with Heimdall as chief, down to a lower-world goddess (dís), who is designated as Gjöll's (the lower world river's) Sunna (Sol, sun) and as the distributor of the divine liquids ( Forspjallsljóð 9, 11) to beseech her to explain to them the mystery of creation, the beginning of heaven, of Hel, and of the world, life and death, if she is able (hlýrnis, heljar, heims ef vissi, ártíð, æfi, aldurtila). The messengers get only tears as an answer. The poem divides the universe into three great divisions: heaven, Hel, and the part lying between Hel and heaven, the world inhabited by mortals. Thus Hel is here used in its general sense, and refers to the whole lower world. But here, as wherever Hel has this general signification, it appears that the idea of regions of punishment is not thought of, but is kept in the background by the definite antithesis in which the word Hel, used in its more common and special sense of the subterranean regions of bliss, stands to Niflhel and the regions subject to it. It must be admitted that what the anxious gods wish to learn from the wise goddess of the lower world must, so far as their desire to know and their fears concern the fate of Hel, refer particularly to the regions where Urd's and Mimir's holy wells are situated, for if the latter, which water the world-tree, pass away, it would mean nothing less than the end of the world. That the author should make the gods anxious concerning Loki's daughter, whom they had hurled into the deep abysses of Niflhel, and that he should make the wise goddess by Gjöll weep bitter tears over the future of the sister of the Fenris-wolf, is possible in the sense that it cannot be refuted by any definite words of the old records; but we may be permitted to regard it as highly improbable.

* Of the age and genuineness of Forspjallsljod I propose to publish a separate treatise.

Among the passages in which the word Hel occurs in the poetic Edda's mythological songs we have yet to mention Hárbarðsljóð 27, where the expression drepa í Hel is employed in the same abstract manner as the Swedes use the expression "at slå ihjäl," which means simply "to kill" (it is Thor who threatens to kill the insulting Harbard); and also Völuspá 43, Fjölsvinnsmál 25, and Grímnismál 31).

Völuspá 43 speaks of Goldcomb (Gullinkambi, the cock which, with its crowing, wakes those who sleep in Herfather's abode, and of a sooty-red cock which crows under the earth near Hel's halls. In Fjölsvinnsmál 25, Svipdag asks with what weapon one might be able to bring down to Hel's home (á Heljar sjöt) that golden cock Vidofnir, which sits in Mimir's tree (the world-tree), and doubtless is identical with Goldcomb. That Vidofnir has done nothing for which he deserves to be punished in the home of Loki's daughter may be regarded as probable. Hel is here used to designate the kingdom of death in general, and all that Svipdag seems to mean is that Vidofnir, in case such a weapon could be found, might be transferred to his kinsman, the sooty-red cock which crows below the earth. Saxo also speaks of a cock which is found in Hades, and is with the goddess who has the cowbane stalks when she shows Hadding the flower-meadows of the lower world, the Elysian fields of those fallen by the sword, and the citadel within which death does not seem able to enter (see No. 47). Thus there is at least one cock in the lower world's realm of bliss. That there should be one also in Niflhel and in the abode of Loki's daughter is nowhere mentioned, and is hardly credible, since the cock, according to an ancient and wide-spread Aryan belief, is a sacred bird, which is the special foe of demons and the powers of darkness. According to Swedish popular belief, even of the present time, the crowing of the cock puts ghosts and spirits to flight; and a similar idea is found in Avesta (Vendidad, 18), where, in str. 15, Ahuramazda himself translates the morning song of the cock with the following words: "Rise, ye men, and praise the justice which is the most perfect! Behold the demons are put to flight!" Avesta is naively out of patience with thoughtless persons who call this sacred bird (Parodarsch) by the so little respect-inspiring name "Cockadoodledoo" (Kahrkatâs). The idea of the sacredness of the cock and its hostility to demons was also found among the Aryans of South Europe and survived the introduction of Christianity. Aurelius Prudentius wrote a Hymnus ad galli cantum, and the cock has as a token of Christian vigilance received the same place on the church spires as formerly on the world-tree. Nor have the May-poles forgotten him. But in the North the poets and the popular language have made the red cock a symbol of fire. Fire has two characters - it is sacred, purifying, and beneficent, when it is handled carefully and for lawful purposes. In the opposite case it is destructive. With the exception of this special instance, nothing but good is reported of the cocks of mythology and poetry.

Grímnismál 31 is remarkable from two points of view. It contains information - brief and scant, it is true, but nevertheless valuable - in regard to Yggdrasil's three roots, and it speaks of Hel in an unmistakable, distinctly personal sense.

In regard to the roots of the world-tree and their position, our investigation so far, regardless of Grímnismál 31, has produced the following result:

Yggdrasil has a northern root. This stands over the vast reservoir Hvergelmir and spreads over Niflhel, situated north of Hvergelmir and inhabited by frost-giants. There nine regions of punishment are situated, among them Nastrond.

Yggdrasil's second root is watered by Mimir's fountain and spreads over the land where Mimir's fountain and grove are located. In Mimir's grove dwell those living (not dead) beings called Ásmegir and Ásasynir, Lif and Leifthrasir and their offspring, whose destiny it is to people the regenerated earth.

Yggdrasil's third root stands over Urd's fountain and the subterranean thingstead of the gods.

The lower world consists of two chief divisions: Niflhel (with the regions thereto belonging) and Hel; Niflhel situated north of the Hvergelmir mountain, and Hel south of it. Accordingly both the land where Mimir's well and grove are situated and the land where Urd' s fountain is found are within the domain Hel.

In regard to the zones or climates, in which the roots are located, they have been conceived as having a southern and northern. We have already shown that the root over Hvergelmir is the northern one. That the root over Urd's fountain has been conceived as the southern one is manifest from the following circumstances. Eilif Gudrunarson, who was converted to Christianity - the same skald who wrote the purely heathen Þórsdrápa - says in one of his poems, written after his conversion, that Christ sits suðr at Urðarbrunni, in the south near Urd's fountain, an expression which he could not have used unless his hearers had retained from the faith of their childhood the idea that Urd's fountain was situated south of the other fountains. Forspjallsljóð puts upon Urd's fountain the task of protecting the world-tree against the devastating cold during the terrible winter which the poem describes. Óðhrærir skyldi Urðar geyma mættk at verja mestum þorra. - "Urd's Odrerir (mead-fountain) proved not to retain strength enough to protect against the terrible cold." This idea shows that the sap which Yggdrasil's southern root drew from Urd's fountain was thought to be warmer than the saps of the other wells. As, accordingly, the root over Urd's well was the southern, and that over Hvergelmir and the frost-giants the northern, it follows that Mimir's well was conceived as situated between those two. The memory of this fact Gylfaginning has in its fashion preserved, where in chapter 15 it says that Mimir's fountain is situated where Ginnungagap formerly was - that is, between the northern Niflheim and the southern warmer region (Gylfaginning's "Muspellsheim").

Grímnismál 31 says:

The root under which the frost-giants dwell we already know as the root over Hvergelmir and the Niflhel inhabited by frost-giants.

The root under which human beings, living persons, mennskir menn, dwell we also know as the one over Mimir's well and Mimir's grove, where the human beings Lif and Leifthrasir and their offspring have their abode, where jörð lifandi manna is situated.

There remains one root: the one under which the goddess or fate, Urd, has her dwelling. Of this Grímnismál says that she who dwells there is named Hel.

Hence it follows of necessity that the goddess of fate, Urd, is identical with the personal Hel, the queen of the realm of death, particularly of its regions of bliss. We have seen that Hel in its local sense has the general signification, the realm of death, and the special but most frequent signification, the elysium of the kingdom of death. As a person, the meaning of the word Hel must be analogous to its signification as a place. It is the same idea having a personal as well as a local form.

The conclusion that Urd is Hel is inevitable, unless we assume that Urd, though queen of her fountain, is not the regent of the land where her fountain is situated. One might then assume Hel to be one of Urd's sisters, but these have no prominence as compared with herself. One of them, Skuld, who is the more known of the two, is at the same time one of Urd's maid-servants, a valkyrie, who on the battlefield does her errands, a feminine psycho-messenger who shows the fallen the way to Hel, the realm of her sisters, where they are to report themselves ere they get to their destination. Of Verdandi the records tell us nothing but the name, which seems to preclude the idea that she should be the personal Hel.

This result, that Urd is identical with Hel; that she who dispenses life also dispenses death; that she who with her serving sisters is the ruler of the past, the present, and the future, also governs and gathers in her kingdom all generations of the past, present, and future - this result may seem unexpected to those who, on the authority of Gylfaginning, have assumed that the daughter of Loki cast into the abyss of Niflhel is the queen of the kingdom of death; that she whose threshold is called Precipice (Gylfaginning 34) was the one who conducted Baldur over the threshold to the subterranean citadel glittering with gold; that she whose table is called Hunger and whose knife is called Famine was the one who ordered the clear, invigorating mead to be placed before him; that the sister of those foes of the gods and of the world, the Midgard-serpent and the Fenris-wolf was entrusted with the care of at least one of Yggdrasil's roots; and that she whose bed is called Sickness, jointly with Urd and Mimir, has the task of caring for the world-tree and seeing that it is kept green and gets the liquids from their fountains.

Colossal as this absurdity is, it has been believed for centuries. And in dealing with an absurdity which is centuries old, we must consider that it is a force which does not yield to objections simply stated, but must be conquered by clear and convincing arguments. Without the necessity of travelling the path by which I have reached the result indicated, scholars would long since have come to the conviction that Urd and the personal Hel are identical, if Gylfaginning and the text-books based thereon had not confounded the judgment, and that for the following reasons:

The name Urðr corresponds to the Old English Vurd, Vyrd, Vird, to the Old Low German Wurth, and to the Old High German Wurt. The fact that the word is found in the dialects of several Teutonic branches indicates, or is thought by the linguists to indicate, that it belongs to the most ancient Teutonic times, when it probably had the form Vorthi.

There can be no doubt that Urd also among other Teutonic branches than the Scandinavian has bad the meaning of goddess of fate. Expressions handed down from the heathen time and preserved in Old English documents characterise Vyrd as tying the threads or weaving the web of fate (Cod. Ex., 355; Beowulf, 2420), and as the one who writes that which is to happen (Beowulf, 4836). Here the plural form is also employed, Vyrde, the urds, the norns, which demonstrates that she in England, as in the North, was conceived as having sisters or assistants. In the Old Low German poem "Heliand," Wurth's personality is equally plain.

But at the same time as Vyrd, Wurth, was the goddess of fate, she was also that of death. In Beowulf (4831, 4453) we find the parallel expressions:

him vas Vyrd ungemete neah: Urd was exceedingly near to him;
vas deád ungemete neah: death was exceedingly near.

And in Heliand, 146, 2; 92, 2:

Thiu Wurth is at handun: Urd is near;
Dôd is at hendi: death is near.

And there are also other expressions, as Thiu Wurth nâhida thus: Urd (death) then approached; Wurth ina benam: Urd (death) took him away (cp. J. Grimm, Deutsche Myth., i. 373).

Thus Urd, the goddess of fate, was, among the Teutonic branches in Germany and England, identical with death, conceived as a queen. So also in the North. The norns made laws and chose life and örlög (fate) for the children of time (Völuspá). The word örlög (nom. pl.; the original meaning seems to be ur-laws, that is, the original laws) frequently has a decided leaning to the idea of death (cp. Völuspá: Eg sá Baldri örlög fólgin). Hakon Jarl's örlög was that Kark cut his throat (Nj., 156). To receive the "judgment of the norns" was identical with being doomed to die (Ynglingasaga 47, Ynglingatal 32 - norna dóms notið hafði). Fate and death were in the idea and in usage so closely related, that they were blended into one personality in the mythology. The ruler of death was that one who could resolve death; but the one who could determine the length of life, and so also could resolve death, and the kind of death, was, of course, the goddess of fate. They must blend into one.

In the ancient Norse documents we also find the name Urd used to designate death, just as in Heliand and Beowulf, and this, too, in such a manner that Urd's personal character is not emphasised. Ynglingatal 28 calls Ingjald's manner of death his Urðr, and to determine death for anyone was to draga Urðr at him [Lex. Poet. - draga urð at e-m: cause someone's death].

Far down in the Christian centuries the memory survived that Urd was the goddess of the realm of death and of death. When a bright spot, which was called Urd's moon, appeared on the wall, it meant the breaking out of an epidemic (Eyrbyggja Saga, 270). Even as late as the year 1237 Urd is supposed to have revealed herself, the night before Christmas, to Snaebjorn to predict a bloody conflict, and she then sang a song in which she said that she went mournfully to the contest to choose a man for death. Saxo translates Urðr or Hel with "Proserpina" (Book III, p. 75 - "the goddess of death" - Fisher).