Most cultures have an “in the beginning” story that describes how the world came into being. The Vikings are no different. At the center of the Norse creation story is Ymir, also known as Aurgelmir, the first of all beings. A primordial giant that was the hermaphroditic ancestor of all giants, the Vikings also believed…
One of the most popular Norse gods thanks to his excellent portrayal by Idris Elba in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Heimdall was the watchman of the gods, and it was his job to sound the alarm on his horn if the enemies of the gods tried to gain entry to Asgard over the rainbow bridge.…
Niflheim, the “World of Mist”, is considered among the nine worlds of the Norse cosmos. Described as a world of darkness, cold, mist, and ice, it was one of the primordial worlds. Along with Mulspelheim, the “World of Fire”, Niflheim played an important role in the Norse creation myth. It is also sometimes considered a…
One of the nine worlds that formed the cosmos in Norse mythology, Muspelheim, the realm of fire, plays an important role in both the creation of the Norse universe and its final destruction at Ragnarok. Muspelheim was the home of the Fire Giants, an old enemy of the Aesir gods led by Odin. They were…
The History Channel’s TV show Vikings has really set the bar in terms of good representations of the Vikings in film and television, but they are far from the first to have tried to bring our favorite warriors to life. Scores of films have been made about the Viking Age, some good, some bad, and…
While Thor might be the best-known of the Norse gods, Odin was the most important of the Viking deities. Called the “Allfather” in recognition of his role as the ruler of the Aesir gods, he was a complex being. He was the god of war, wisdom, magic, death and the runes. He was intelligent and…
In Thor: The Dark World we are taken to Svartalfheim, where Peter Dinklage plays a dwarf of giant stature. Upon seeing it, we would be forgiven for thinking that it looked like Tolkien’s home of the dwarves, Moria, but in space. Both fictional worlds are based on the home of the dwarves, also known as…
The Vikings called that the land in which they, human beings, dwelled Midgard (Middle Earth) or Mannheim (Home of Man). They believed that it was one of the nine worlds that made up the cosmos of Norse mythology. It was separated and protected from the rest of the cosmos by a great body of water…
Helheim, which literally means “house of Hel” in Old Norse, was one of the nine worlds within the universe of Norse mythology. It was an underworld realm of the dead, where those who did not find themselves in Valhalla, the afterlife of brave warriors, were destined to spend eternity. But despite the similarity in their…
The Valkyries are some of the most well-known and ferocious women from our Viking past. Sometimes called Walachuria, they were servants of Odin whose principal role was to select brave fallen warriors and take them to dwell in Valhalla. But what do we really know about the Valkyries as a group of divine shield maidens,…