Njord and Skadi

by Sheena McGrath

  (Vsp 62-3: Larrington)

  So Hoenir reappears, along with the two antagonist gods, no longer enemies. (McKinnell calls them the “innocent gods”.[109]) There could be a pattern here, since relations between Odin and Loki were pretty fraught.

  You will probably have noticed that the wanderings of Hoenir and his friends all take place “early” in the Norse myths. It may be that Odin was still exploring the nine worlds at this stage, or maybe he just hadn’t pissed everyone else off yet. Still, Hoenir does appear, which is more than he does in most of the later ones. It may be that he is a deity of first and last, but not middle bits. I can’t prove that the story of Thiazi is an early one, but I notice that in Skáldskaparmál it’s the first story told, which I find suggestive. (The frame in Skld has the poet Bragi telling stories to the giant Aegir: was his wife's kidnapping by a giant uppermost in his mind?)

  Further evidence of a Loki/Hoenir/Odin triad comes from a later source: a ballad from the Faroe Islands. This is called Loka tattur ("Tale of Loki"), and it tells how a farmer lost a bet with a giant, and has to give him his son. The farmer calls on first Odin, then Hoenir, then Loki to hide the boy. Loki, of course, not only saves the child but also kills the giant. Those who see a bird-form for Hoenir will be interested that he hides the child in a swan's feather. There are several different versions of the song, and it probably dates to the late Middle Ages.[110]

  Just as a side note, there’s a wonderful cartoon online of Loki, Odin and Hoenir out wandering. The other two naturally dash off to do whatever crazy thing they know will get them in trouble, and poor Hoenir gets dragged along. I think of it when I’m reading the stories of Reginsmal and Hst.[111] (I especially liked someone’s comment that Hoenir was clearly a Greek god who had somehow wandered into Norse myth, where the gods always do things they shouldn’t.)

  Þiazi

  If you are used to thinking of giants as big, slow and stupid, Hst will confuse you. It describes Thiazi as "much-wise" and "cunning", adjectives that could be applied to Odin. Again, the poem calls him "most terrible", which implies that as an enemy he was hard to beat.

  Leaving the poem aside for a moment, we can see other tributes, grudging or otherwise, in other references to Thiazi throughout Norse literature. Some of this may be the old trick of talking up your enemy to make your victory seem greater, but there is a pattern to the references. Like the giants Odin matches wits with, he is not your ordinary thick troll.

  "I killed Þjazi, the powerful minded giant.

  I threw up the eyes of Olvaldi's son

  into the bright heavens.

  They are the greatest sign of my deeds,

  those which all men can see afterwards.

  What were you doing meanwhile, Harbard?"

  (Har. 19 Larrington's trans.)

  "Thrymheim the sixth is called

  where Þjazi lived, the terrible giant,

  but now Skadi, shining bride of the gods,

  lives in her father's ancient courts"

  (Grim. 11 Larrington's trans.)

  The other thing we know about him is that he is rich, although the Aesir don’t manage to get their hands on that; presumably that’s why Skadi doesn’t demand monetary compensation. We are told in Skáldskaparmál:

  Þjazi and his brothers Gangr and Idi had a father named Ölvaldi. Ölvaldi was very rich in gold, and when he died his three sons divided their inheritance between them by each in turn taking a mouthful. For this reason the expressions "speech of Þjazi, Gangr or Idi" and "Idi's shining talk" are kennings for gold.

  (Chapter XX, Faulkes' trans.)

  (It is hard to know if the detail about taking their gold in mouthfuls is meant to show how odd the giants are, or if there was some story behind it. Norse myth is full of this sort of tantalizing detail.)

  Thiazi was also known as the “lady-wolf”, a reference to his kidnapping of Idunn, or “snowshoe deity's fosterer", because he’s Skadi’s father. The first appears in Haustlöng, right at the beginning, before he’s even had a chance to blackmail Loki, let alone seize Idunn. Haustlöng also has several mentions of Thiazi as Skadi’s father, most of which are rather complex kennings like: The rock-Gefn-[giantess-] refuge-[cave-]god [giant], or the bow-string-Var’s [Skadi’s] whale [ox]. Two others, “Morn’s hungry father” and “Morn’s father”, are simpler to parse, once you know that “Morn“ is a generic name for a giantess.

  The rest of Thiazi’s family don’t support the stupid giant hypothesis either, at least if we go by their names. (Which is pretty much all we have for them.) His father is variously given as Alvaldi in Hárbarðsljóð, which would mean something like "All-Mighty", or Ölvaldi in Snorri's version, "keeper of the beer". Gang (“Gait”[112], or "Wanderer"[113]) and Idi (“the moveable”, “the hard-working one”) are less easy to understand. Maybe like Skadi on her skis and Thiazi flying through the sky, we’re meant to understand them as moving quickly and ranging across the worlds. (Although Idi makes me think of a handle or other mechanical, turning, device.)

  They are mentioned briefly in the Grottasongr, which is the chant performed by two giant maidens as they work a mill for the Danish king Frodi:

  Hrugnir was hard, as was his father,

  but Thiazi was mightier than them

  Idi and Aurnir, our relations,

  rock-giants' brothers: we were born from them.

  (Grott. 9 Orchard's trans.)

  It's not clear who Aurnir was, although it might be another name for Gang. According to Simek, the name appears in later kennings[114] and in thulur (lists of poetic terms), sometimes as Aurnir, sometimes as Örnir. He suggests that it means something like "rock or earth-dweller", like Auregelmir and Aurboda.[115] (Since Thiazi and Skadi are mountain-giants, that would make sense.)

  There may be more similarities between Thiazi and Skadi than we think. The Shorter Voluspa, interpolated in Hynd, refers to Thiazi as "the giant who loved to shoot". Perhaps he hunted in the mountains, too:

  Baldr's father was heir to Bur,

  Freyr married Gerd, she was Gymir's daughter,

  of the giant race, and Aurboda's,

  though Thiazi was kinsman, the giant who loved to shoot; Skadi was his daughter.

  (Hynd. 30 Larrington's trans.)

  Although, Andy Orchard has it as "the cover-keen giant" and Hollander has "the skulking thurs", and an older translation by Henry Bellows has "The dark-loving giant". Clearly it's a bit obscure.

  I have quoted this verse because it establishes the kinship of the two giant families. The kenning "mountain-Finn" implies a connection between the Finns with their skis, bows, and odd religion and the giants, which I will be discussing in another chapter.

  We don’t know if there was actual existing lore that Skadi and Gerdr were family, but one can see how they would be grouped together: both giantesses who married Vanir gods. It's interesting that Gerdr has two parents, whereas Skadi conforms to the beautiful giantess/ scary dad/ absent mom pattern that crops up in many of the sagas. In Gylf Snorri tells us that Aurboda was one of the mountain giants, so perhaps Skadi and Gerdr were related through her.

  Another suggestive point, although I don’t want to make too much of it, is the kenning “The battle-bold Rognir [Odin, i.e. chief] of land-whales [giants],” which seems to imply that as Odin is to the gods, so Thiazi is to the giants. It’s unusual, to say the least, to compare a god to a giant, and Thjodolf must have had a reason for doing it. Rognir means “Chief”[116] and so its application to Odin is obvious, but why Thiazi gets that title is obscure. It might well tie in with Margaret Clunies-Ross’s argument that Thiazi and his aett were both rich and powerful, which is why Thiazi was so bold with the gods, and why they don’t just kill Skadi.[117]

  There is one parallel with Odin, though, that might suggest itself. Odin seduced the giantess Gunnlod, who was supposed to be guarding the mead of poetry. For three nights he slept with her, each night taking a drink of the mead. When Gunnlod's father discovered what he was up to,
Odin changed himself to an eagle and flew off, with the angry giants in hot pursuit, also in eagle form.

  Once again the giant dies at the hands of the Aesir, and they get to keep the treasure they stole from the jotuns. The difference between Odin and Thiazi is that Odin succeeded, Thiazi failed. The giant may have stolen the apples and (possibly) made Idunn his sexual partner, but unlike Odin he doesn't get to keep the treasure he stole. While Odin's theft was to benefit himself and the skalds he was patron of, Thiazi's attempt brings no lasting benefit to the giants.

  The myth of Thiazi's eyes was well-known also. The poet Bragi Boddason, or Bragi the Old, mentions it in his Ragnarsdrapa, which like Hst is a shield-poem, depicting various heroic feats of Thor's:

  He who threw into the wide winds' basin the ski-goddess's [Skadi's] father's eyes above the dwellings of the multitude of men.

  (Skld 23 Faulkes)

  There's some ambiguity about this feat, however, because while Thor claims credit for Thiazi's death, and throwing his eyes into the sky as stars in Hárbarðsljóð, in Snorri's version (Skaldskaparmál) Odin is said to have done it, possibly as an additional bit of compensation to Skadi after Loki makes her laugh.

  Both Thiazi and the giant Aurvandil end up giving up parts of their bodies to become stars. Aurvandil lost his toe to frostbite when he and Thor were returning from Jotunheim after he fought Geirrod. Thor had broken off the toe and thrown it up into the sky, where it became a star. There has been some discussion of exactly which star, with Venus and Rigel, the toe of Orion, as the top contenders. (One book shares him out: Alcor in the Ursa Major is the legendary toe, while Rigel is the other big toe.[118]) However, if his toe was Rigel, the rest of Orion should also be associated with him, so it must be Venus. (Etymology seems to back this up; Aurvandil comes from *austaz ‘east’, which is related to words for dawn, and the second half of his name is related to the words "wend" and "wander".[119]) This seems to follow the pattern of giants as embodying natural phenomena. (See the chapter on giant cults for more on this.)

  Another point is that when the gods agree to share their ox-meat with Thiazi, the meat is said to be from the “holy table”, in other words a sacrificial offering. (For more on a possible sacral role for Hoenir, see the chapter on his character.)

  We don’t know just what Thiazi’s name means, although there have been many guesses, from “Fat, Large” to “Slave-Binder” to something to do with thunder (this last from the 19th century, natch). Simek covers himself by saying "etymology uncertain", while McKinnell says that in modern Icelandic thjassi means "giant, fat man" and suggests that it is related to Old High German tado, "king" or Greek τιταν "titan, giant" (originally "father deity") and Sanskrit tatas, "father". McKinnell thinks that if Thiazi's name does relate to these older words, then his part of the myth must also be old.[120]

  Why does Thiazi stop their food cooking?

  Ími steinn heiti!

  Aldri reykr rjúki!

  Aldri seyðir soðni!

  Út yl, Inn kyl!

  Ími steinn heiti!

  'Imi heated the stone.

  Never shall the smoke smoke.

  Never shall the cooking be cooked.

  Out heat, in cool!

  Imi heated the stone.'[121]

  This rather mysterious runic inscription is possibly a spell to spoil someone's cooking. Imi seems to come from im, "embers, ashes, dust". The strong form Ímr appears as a giant-name in Vafþrúðnismál 5 and elsewhere as a wolf-name, but there is no other instance in the runic corpus of the verb heita ‘to heat’.

  Then Odin went to try the wisdom

  of the all-wise giant;

  to the hall he came which Im's father owned;

  Odin went inside.

  (Vaf. 5, Larrington's trans.)

  There were also other cooking spells, such as:

  Ud, Ølen, og ind Kjølen! I 3de N.

  ‘Out, ale, and in, cool! In the third name.’[122]

  The authors think that that "ale" olen, has been substituted for yl, "heat". They also instance a inscribed bone found in Lincoln, England, which reads (possibly): "B.... heats the stone" or "A stone is called B....".[123]

  It might seem like a particularly pointless thing for Thiazi to do, but as always with myth, it's worth looking more closely. The gods, after all, had stepped out of Asgard, the realm they had so carefully set apart from the realm of the giants. This may very well have been Thiazi's way of teaching them who's boss in Utgard. Very little has been made of the gods taking an ox for their meal, although presumably those oxen belonged to someone, and that someone might mind their cattle being stolen, killed and eaten.

  Another theory has it that he was demanding offerings, just as the gods received them. North, in his translation of Hst, suggests as much, noting that the "broad table" would be an altar, and the "sacred meal" speaks for itself. I'm not entirely convinced by this, but there is something neat in the idea of the giants turning the tables on the gods like this.

  You could interpret this two ways. First, if you follow Kristensen, the tangled relationship between the gods and giants is one of family and those who will not acknowledge family. Thiazi's gesture can be read as a way to make the gods respect their ancestors, and those who are kin through them. Second, Steinsland thinks that it reflects:

  ...knowledge of an old ritual of sacrifice. The story relates that beyond the limits of the blessed homes of gods and men, tribute is to be paid to the powers who are the owners of the land.[124]

  So Thiazi would be the "owner" of this particular area, or at any rate one of them, and he demanded sacrifice or tribute accordingly.

  In the story of Thor's journey to Utgard-loki, he has a similar encounter with the giant Skýmir. He was travelling with his two child companions, Thialfi and Roskva, as well as Loki, and he met up with Skýmir on the way. The giant proposed that they pool their food, but no sooner had Thor taken out their share than Skýmir seized it all and put it in his pack. He then set off so quickly that Thor and co. soon lost him. By the time they caught up, and wanted to make dinner, Skýmir was asleep.

  The rest of the story is a humorous account of Thor trying to get his food back, and Skýmir not even noticing Thor's hammer-blows because he is so much larger. So the story is only a half-parallel to Thiazi, because while both steal food, and seem to get away with it, and make a god suffer, the outcome is quite different. Skýmir does not suffer any consequences for his deeds. (You could argue that this is the burlesque element of the story: giants make a fool of Thor and he has to take it.)

  Clunies-Ross and Jarich Oosten float two more, even more speculative theories. She offers a Levi-Straussian reading on the subject of hypergamy, where the gods do not want to cook their food (let their women marry out), which is why Idunn has apples and turns into a nut (both raw foods). The giants, on the other hand, are only too eager to cook their food with the gods, which is why Thiazi can cook the ox. In the end, though, his giant appetite betrays him, and he eats most of it. (Which gives a sidelight on Freyja's comment that if she married a giant she would be the most ragr of women. It may not just be social demotion she fears, but someone whose appetite even she can't satisfy.)

  Jarich Oosten, on the other hand, sees it as an origin myth, pointing to the origins of cooking and time.[125] The gods would have had to give eternal time, where things like cooking can't finish, for the passing of time which allows the food to complete cooking. The downside, of course, is that things that exist in time age, as the Aesir do once they enter the stream of time. The cooking is a precursor to the theft of the apples later.

  Also, note that when Loki begrudged the eagle his share of the food, he was coerced into giving Thiazi the apples. (These, being a raw food, require no cooking.) Once again, Oosten thinks, the Aesir got the best of the deal, because they got the ability to cook from Thiazi, and were able to escape the consequences of passing time with the apples Idunn held.

  While we're on the subject of cooking, it's worth not
ing that myth begins with Thiazi messing with the cooking fire that the gods have made, and ends with him being roasted alive.

  Thiazi and the Eagle

  Despite what you might think, not that many beings in Norse myth can fly. Of those who do, they inevitably do it by means of shapeshifting. Odin can turn himself into an eagle and fly. The giants Thiazi and Suttung also can assume eagle shape, but how exactly they do this we are not told. The giant Hraesvelgr, whose wings are the origin of all the winds, takes the form of an eagle. Loki travels through the air, although he often borrows Freyja or Frigg's bird-form to do it. (We never see either goddess fly, though.) The valkyries and Frigg's handmaiden Gna ride through the air on horses. That's pretty much it.

  Some gods, in fact, are famous for their more pedestrian nature, especially Thor, who either walks (across Bifrost to the gods' councils) or rides his chariot, drawn by two goats. At other times he wades across fords in rivers (Harb) or takes a boat across the waters. Clunies-Ross points out that when Thor ventures into Jotunheimar, he does so to punish the giants or keep them in order. Odin and Loki, however, fly there, usually with the aim of ripping the giants off.[126]

  In the story of Thiazi, however, the moral lines are less clear. Thiazi begins the action by keeping the gods' food from cooking, then stealing most of it. Then he tortures Loki into doing what he wants, abetting a kidnapping of a most vital goddess, Idunn. Thiazi must have known he was taking quite a risk. His first appearance, in eagle form, might be a way of indicating that here was a giant whose powers were well-matched to those of Odin and Loki. Thiazi spends most of the myth in eagle form, actually. He first appears in an enormous tree in that form, drags Loki behind him that way, and later chases Loki again when he steals Idunn back. (Loki betrays him, by the way, and by extension his giant kin, when he lures Thiazi into the trap the Aesir have set for him.[127] Skadi is not the only person seeking revenge in this story.)