Part 4

In Skírnismál 27 occurs the expression horfa ok snugga Heljar til. It is of importance to our theme to investigate and explain the connection in which it is found.

The poem tells that Frey sat alone, silent and longing, ever since he had seen the giant Gymir's wonderfully beautiful daughter Gerd. He wasted with love for her; but he said nothing, since he was convinced in advance that neither Asas nor Elves would ever consent to a union between him and her. But when the friend of his youth, who resided in Asgard, and in the poem is called Skirnir, succeeded in getting him to confess the cause of his longing, it was, in Asgard, found necessary to do something to relieve it, and so Skirnir was sent to the home of the giant to ask for the hand of Gerd on Frey's behalf. As bridal gifts he took with him eleven golden apples and the ring Draupnir. He received one of the best horses of Asgard to ride, and for his defence Frey's magnificent sword, "which fights of itself against the race of giants". In the poem this sword receives the epithets Tamsvöndr (26) and Gambanteinn (32). Tamsvöndr, means the "staff that subdues"; Gambanteinn means the "rod of revenge" (see Nos. 105, 116). Both epithets are formed in accordance with the common poetic usage of describing swords by compound words of which the latter part is vöndr or teinn. We find, as names for swords, benvöndr, blóðvöndr, hjaltvöndr, hríðvöndr, hvítvöndr, morðvöndr, sárvöndr, benteinn, eggteinn, hævateinn, hjörteinn, hræteinn, sárteinn, valteinn, mistilteinn.

Skirnir rides over damp fells and the fields of giants, leaps, after a quarrel with the watchman of Gymir's citadel, over the fence, comes in to Gerd, is welcomed with ancient mead, and presents his errand of courtship, supported by the eleven golden apples. Gerd refuses both the apples and the object of the errand. Skirnir then offers her the most precious treasure, the ring Draupnir, but in vain. Then he resorts to threats. He exhibits the sword so dangerous to her kinsmen; with it he will cut off her head if she refuses her consent. Gerd answers that she is not to be frightened, and that she has a father who is not afraid to fight. Once more Skirnir shows her the sword, which also may fell her father (sér þú þenna mæki, mey, &c.), and he threatens to strike her with the "subduing staff," so that her heart shall soften, but too late for her happiness, for a blow from the staff will remove her thither, where sons of men never more shall see her (Grímnismál 26).

Tamsvendi eg þig drep,
en eg þig temja mun,
mær, að mínum munum;
þar skaltu ganga,
er þig gumna synir
síðan æva sjá.

This is the former threat of death repeated in another form. The former did not frighten her. But that which now overwhelms her with dismay is the description Skirnir gives her of the lot that awaits her in the realm of death, whither she is destined - she, the giant maid, if she dies by the avenging wrath of the gods (gambanreiði). She shall then come to that region which is situated below the Na-gates (fyr nágrindur neðan - 35), and which is inhabited by frost-giants who, as we shall find, do not deserve the name mannasynir, even though the word menn be taken in its most common sense, and made to embrace giants of the masculine kind.

This phrase fyr nágrindur neðan must have been a stereotyped eschatological term applied to a particular division, a particular realm in the lower world. In Lokasenna 63, Thor says to Loki, after the latter has emptied his phials of rash insults upon the gods, that if he does not hold his tongue the hammer Mjolnir shall send him to Hel fyr nágrindur neðan. Hel is here used in its widest sense, and this is limited by the addition of the words "below the Na-gates," so as to refer to a particular division of the lower world. As we find by the application of the phrase to Loki, this division is of such a character that it is intended to receive the foes of the Asas and the insulters of the gods.

The word Nagrind, which is always used in the plural, and accordingly refers to more than one gate of the kind, has as its first part nár (pl. náir), which means corpse, dead body. Thus Na-gates means Corpse-gates.

The name must seem strange, for it is not dead bodies, but souls, released from their bodies left on earth, which descend to the kingdom of death and get their various abodes there. How far our heathen ancestors had a more or less material conception of the soul is a question which it is not necessary to discuss here (see on this point No. 95). Howsoever they may have regarded it, the very existence of a Hades in their mythology demonstrates that they believed that a conscious and sentient element in man was in death separated from the body with which it had been united in life, and went down to the lower world. That the body from which this conscious, sentient element fled was not removed to Hades, but went in this upper earth to its disintegration, whether it was burnt or buried in a mound or sunk to the bottom of the sea, this our heathen ancestors knew just as well as we know it. The people of the stone-age already knew this.

The phrase Na-gates does not stand alone in our mythological eschatology. One of the abodes of torture lying within the Na-gates is called Nastrond (Náströnd), and is described in Völuspá as filled with terrors. And the victims, which Nidhogg, the winged demon of the lower world, there sucks, are called náir framgengnir, "the corpses of those departed".

It is manifest that the word nár thus used cannot have its common meaning, but must be used in a special mythological sense, which had its justification and its explanation in the heathen doctrine in regard to the lower world.

It not unfrequently happens that law-books preserve ancient significations of words not found elsewhere in literature. The Icelandic law-book Grágás (ii. 185) enumerates four categories within which the word nár is applicable to a person yet living. Gallows-nár can be called, even while living, the person who is hung; grave-nár, the person placed in a grave; skerry-nár or rock-nár may, while yet alive, he be called who has been exposed to die on a skerry or rock. Here the word nár is accordingly applied to persons who are conscious and capable of suffering, but on the supposition that they are such persons as have been condemned to a punishment which is not to cease so long as they are sensitive to it.

And this is the idea on the basis of which the word náir is mythologically applied to the damned and tortured beings in the lower world.

If we now take into account that our ancestors believed in a second death, in a slaying of souls in Hades, then we find that this same use of the word in question, which at first sight could not but seem strange, is a consistent development of the idea that those banished from Hel's realms of bliss die a second time, when they are transferred across the border to Niflhel and the world of torture. When they are overtaken by this second death they are for the second time náir. And, as this occurs at the gates of Niflhel, it was perfectly proper to call the gates nágrindr.

We may imagine that it is terror, despair, or rage which, at the sight of the Na-gates, severs the bond between the damned spirit and his Hades-body, and that the former is anxious to soar away from its terrible destination. But however this may be, the avenging powers have runes, which capture the fugitive, put chains on his Hades-body, and force him to feel with it. The Sun-song, a Christian song standing on the scarcely crossed border of heathendom, speaks of damned ones whose breasts were risted (carved) with bloody runes, and Hávamál 157 of runes which restore consciousness to náir. Such runes are known by Odin. If he sees in a tree a gallows-nár (virgil-nár), then he can rist runes so that the body comes down to him and talks with him (see No. 70):

Ef eg sé á tré uppi
váfa virgilná,
svá eg rist
og í rúnum fák,
að sá gengur gumi
og mælir við mig.

Some of the subterranean náir have the power of motion, and are doomed to wade in "heavy streams". Among them are perjurers, murderers, and adulterers (Völuspá 39). Among these streams is Vadgelmir, in which they who have slandered others find their far-reaching retribution (Reginsmál 4). Other náir have the peculiarity which their appellation suggests, and receive quiet and immovable, stretched on iron benches, their punishment (see below). Saxo, who had more elaborate descriptions of the Hades of heathendom than those which have been handed down to our time, translated or reproduced in his accounts of Hadding's and Gorm's journeys in the lower world the word náir with exsanguia simulacra ["lifeless shades" - Fisher, p. 266].

That place after death with which Skirnir threatens the stubborn Gerd is also situated within the Na-gates, but still it has another character than Nastrond and the other abodes of torture, which are situated below Niflhel. It would also have been unreasonable to threaten a person who rejects a marriage proposal with those punishments which overtake criminals and nithings. The Hades division, which Skirnir describes as awaiting the giant-daughter, is a subterranean Jotunheim, inhabited by deceased ancestors and kinsmen of Gerd.

Mythology has given to the giants as well as to men a life hereafter. As a matter of fact, mythology never destroys life. The horse which was cremated with its master on his funeral pyre, and was buried with him in his grave-mound, afterwards brings the hero down to Hel. When the giant who built the Asgard wall got into conflict with the gods, Thor's hammer sent him "down below Niflhel" (niður undir Niflhel - Gylfaginning 42). King Gorm saw in the lower world the giant Geirrod and both his daughters. According to Grímnismál 31, frost-giants dwell under one of Yggdrasil's roots - consequently in the lower world; and Forspjallsljóð says that hags (giantesses) and thurses (giants), náir, dwarfs, and swarthy elves go to sleep under the world-tree's farthest root on the north border of Jormungrund [*] (the lower world), when Dag on a chariot sparkling with precious stones leaves the lower world, and when Nat after her journey on the heavens has returned to her home ( Forspjallsljóð 24, 25). It is therefore quite in order if we, in Skirnir's description of the realm which after death awaits the giant-daughter offending the gods, rediscover that part of the lower world to which the drowned primeval ancestors of the giant-maid were relegated when Bor's sons opened the veins of Ymir's throat (Sonatorrek 3) and then let the billows of the ocean wash clean the rocky ground of earth, before they raised the latter from the sea and there created the inhabitable Midgard.

* With this name of the lower world compare Gudmund-Mimir's abode á Grund (see No. 45), and Helligrund (Heliand., 44, 22), and neowla grund (Caedmon, 267, 1, 270, 16).

The frost-giants (rimethurses) are the primeval giants (gigantes) of the Teutonic mythology, so called because they sprang from the frost-being Ymir, whose feet by contact with each other begat their progenitor, the "strange-headed" monster Thrudgelmir (Vafþrúðnismál 29, 33). Their original home in chaos was Niflheim. From the Hvergelmir fountain there the Elivágar rivers flowed to the north and became hoar-frost and ice, which, melted by warmth from the south, were changed into drops of venom, which again became Ymir, called by the giants Aurgelmir (Vafþrúðnismál 30-31; Gylfaginning 5). Thrudgelmir begat Bergelmir countless winters before the earth was made (Vafþrúðnismál 29; Gylfinning 7). Those members of the giant race living in Jotunheim on the surface of the earth, whose memory goes farthest back in time, can remember Bergelmir when he var á lúðr um lagiðr. At least Vafthrudnir is able to do this (Vafþrúðnismál 35).

When the original giants had to abandon the fields populated by Bor's sons (Völuspá 4), they received an abode corresponding as nearly as possible to their first home, and, as it seems, identical with it, excepting that Niflheim now, instead of being a part of chaos, is an integral part of the cosmic universe, and the extreme north of its Hades. As a Hades-realm it is also called Niflhel.

In the subterranean land with which Skirnir threatens Gerd, and which he paints for her in appalling colours, he mentions three kinds of beings - (1) frost-giants, the ancient race of giants; (2) demons; (3) giants of the later race.

The frost-giants occupy together one abode, which, judging from its epithet, hall (höll), is the largest and most important there; while those members of the younger giant clan who are there, dwell in single scattered abodes, called gards. [Compare the phrase jötna görðum í (30:3) with til hrímþursa hallar (30:4).] Gerd is also there to have a separate abode (Skírnismál 28).

Two frost-giants are mentioned by name, which shows that they are representatives of their clan. One is named Rimgrimnir (Hrímgrímnir - 35), the other Rimnir (Hrímnir - 28).

Grimnir is one of Odin's many surnames (Grímnismál 47, and several other places; cp. Egilsson's Lex. Poet.). Rimgrimnir means the same as if Odin had said Rim-Odin, for Odin's many epithets could without hesitation be used by the poets in paraphrases, even when these referred to a giant. But the name Odin was too sacred for such a purpose. Upon the whole the skalds seem piously to have abstained from using that name in paraphrases, even when the latter referred to celebrated princes and heroes. Glum Geirason [Gráfeldardrápa] is the first known exception to the rule. He calls a king málm-Óðinn. The above epithet places Rimgrimnir in the same relation to the frost-giants as Odin-Grimnir sustains to the asas: it characterises him as the race-chief and clan-head of the former, and in this respect gives him the same place as Thrudgelmir occupies in Vafþrúðnismál. Ymir cannot be regarded as the special clan-chief of the frost-giants, since he is also the progenitor of other classes of beings (see Vafþrúðnismál 33, and Völuspá 9; cp. Gylfaginning 14). But they have other points of resemblance. Thrudgelmir is "strange-headed" in Vafþrúðnismál; Rimgrimnir is "three-headed" in Skírnismál (31; cp. with 35). Thus we have in one poem a "strange-headed" Thrudgelmir as progenitor of the frost-giants; in the other poem a "three-headed" Rimgrimnir as progenitor of the same frost-giants. The "strange-headed" giant of the former poem, which is a somewhat indefinite or obscure phrase, thus finds in "three-headed" of the latter poem its further definition. To this is to be added a power which is possessed both by Thrudgelmir and by Rimgrimnir, and also a weakness for which both Thrudgelmir and Rimgrimnir are blamed. Thrudgelmir's father begat children without possessing gýgjar gaman (Vafþrúðnismál 32). That Thrudgelmir inherited this power from his strange origin and handed it down to the clan of frost-giants, and that he also inherited the inability to provide for the perpetuation of the race in any other way, is evident from Alvíssmál 2. If we make a careful examination, we find that Skirnirsmal presupposes this same positive and negative quality in Rimgrimnir, and consequently Thrudgelmir and Rimgrimnir must be identical.

Gerd, who tries to reject the love of the fair and blithe Vana-god, will, according to Skirnir's threats, be punished therefore in the lower world with the complete loss of all that is called love, tenderness, and sympathy. Skirnir says that she either must live alone and without a husband in the lower world, or else vegetate in a useless cohabitation (nara) with the three-headed giant (31). The threat is gradually emphasised to the effect that she shall be possessed by Rimgrimnir, and this threat is made immediately after the solemn conjuration (34) in which Skirnir invokes the inhabitants of Niflhel and also of the regions of bliss, as witnesses, that she shall never gladden or be gladdened by a man in the physical sense of this word:

* With ásliðar, asa-champions, there can hardly be meant others than the ásmegir gathered in the lower world around Baldur. This is the only place where the word ásliðar occurs.

More plainly, it seems to me, Skirnir in speaking to Gerd could not have expressed the negative quality of Rimgrimnir in question. Thor also expresses himself clearly on the same subject when he meets the dwarf Alvis carrying home a maid over whom Thor has the right of marriage. Thor says scornfully that he thinks he discovers in Alvis something which reminds him of the nature of thurses, although Alvis is a dwarf and the thurses are giants, and he further defines wherein this similarity consists: þursa líki þyki mér á þér vera; erattu til brúðar borinn: "Thurs' likeness you seem to me to have; you were not born to have a bride". So far as the positive quality is concerned it is evident from the fact that Rimgrimnir is the progenitor of the frost-giants.

Descended to Niflhel, Gerd must not count on a shadow of friendship and sympathy from her kinsmen there. It would be best for her to confine herself in the solitary abode which there awaits her, for if she but looks out of the gate, staring gazes shall meet her from Rimnir and all the others down there; and she shall there be looked upon with more hatred than Heimdall, the watchman of the gods, who is the wise, always vigilant foe of the rimethurses and giants. But whether she is at home or abroad, demons and tormenting spirits shall never leave her in peace. She shall be bowed to the earth by tramar (evil witches). Morn (a Teutonic Eumenides, the agony of the soul personified) shall fill her with his being. The spirits of sickness - such also dwell there; they once took an oath not to harm Baldur (Gylfaginning 49) - shall increase her woe and the flood of her tears. Topi (insanity), Opi (hysteria), Tjosul and Otholi (constant restlessness), shall not leave her in peace. These spirits are also counted as belonging to the race of thurses, and hence it is said in the rune-song that þurs veldr kvenna kvillu, "thurs causes sickness of women". In this connection it should be remembered that the daughter of Loki, the ruler of Niflhel, is also the queen of diseases. Gerd's food shall be more loathsome to her than the poisonous serpent is to man, and her drink shall be the most disgusting. Miserable she shall crawl among the homes of the Hades giants, and up to a mountain top, where Ari, a subterranean eagle-demon has his perch (doubtless the same Ari which, according to Völuspá 50, is to join with his screeches in Rymur's shield-song, when the Midgard-serpent writhes in giant-rage, and the ship of death, Naglfar, gets loose). Up there she shall sit early in the morning, and constantly turn her face in the same direction - in the direction where Hel is situated, that is, south over Mt. Hvergelmir, toward the subterranean regions of bliss. Toward Hel she shall long to come in vain:

Ara þúfu á
skaltu ár sitja,
horfa og snugga Heljar til. "On Ari's perch thou shalt early sit, turn toward Hel, and long to get to Hel."

By the phrase snugga Heljar til, the skald has meant something far more concrete than to "long for death". Gerd is here supposed to be dead, and within the Na-gates. To long for death, she does not need to crawl up to "Ari's perch". She must subject herself to these nightly exertions, so that when it dawns in the foggy Niflhel, she may get a glimpse of that land of bliss to which she may never come; she who rejected a higher happiness - that of being with the gods and possessing Frey's love.

I have been somewhat elaborate in the presentation of this description in Skírnismál, which has not hitherto been understood. I have done so, because it is the only evidence left to us of how life was conceived in the fore-court of the regions of torture, Niflhel, the land situated below Yggdrasil's northern root, beyond and below the mountain, where the root is watered by Hvergelmir. It is plain that the author of Skírnismál, like that of Vafþrúðnismál, Grímnismál, Vegtamskviða, and Þórsdrápa (as we have already seen), has used the word Hel in the sense of a place of bliss in the lower world. It is also evident that with the root under which the frost-giant dwells impossibly can be meant, as supposed by Gylfaginning, that one under which Mimir's glorious fountain, and Mimir's grove, and all his treasures stored for a future world, are situated.