The giant wolf Fenrir is an important character in Norse mythology. In Norse mythology, the battles between Thor and the world-serpent have been interpreted as a kind of struggle for cosmic balance and order. The norse wolf Fenrir was fathered by Loki, the shape-shifter and trickster, and Angrboda, a giantess from Jötunheimr. This trio of mythological characters also includes the world-serpent Jörmungandr and the norse Goddess of the dead, Hel.
As we shall see, wolf-like characters play an important role in the cosmologies of the Nordic people and were mentioned several times in Old Norse literary sources, as well as several depictions on runestones such as Thorwald’s Cross from Kirk Andreas on the Isles of man. (Lindow, 2001, p.217).
It has been speculated that all three of these beings are ultimately Fenrir in disguise, but under different names.
In the Eddas, we learn that Fenrir was raised by the God of war Tyr. In the Lokasenna, stance 38, Loki mentions how Fenrir tore off Tyr’s right arm. The Aesir Gods responded and Odin sent Skirnir. Despite the giant-wolf Fenrir being suspicious, he was chained on the island of Lyngvi.
In the Gylfaggining, stance 24, we learn that the most dangerous offspring of Loki was a wolf-cub. The Aesir Gods became anxious once they found out that the three ‘monsters’, the norse goddess of death Hel, the Midgard serpent Jörmungandr and the norse wolf Fenrir, were the children of Loki and the giantess Angrboda, Odin had to take action. In Asgardr, Odin threw Hel into the Underworld, and Jörmungandr into the deep sea. (e.g. Preben Sørensen, 2002, p. 132, John Lindow, 2001, p.112). The Gods, however, became more anxious as Fenrir the wolf grew up and attempted to bind him. Odin knew that it was the norse wolf Fenrir who would later kill him upon the arrival of Ragnarök. Thus, as written in the poem Völuspá stance 53-54, Fenrir appears as Hveðrung’s son, consequently devouring Odin.
In the Vafþrúðnismál 46-47 Fenrir himself swallows the sun.
Thus, two other wolves in Norse mythology, Hati and Sköll, are also said to be moon and sun chasers. The question is whether they replaced Fenrir, as he was chained by the Gods due to this growing power, or perhaps, Hati and Sköll are different manifestations of Fenrir remains a question to be answered. (Davidson, 1988, p. 191). As mentioned by the scholar John Lindow, Snorri Sturluson only mentions that two wolf swallow the sun and the moon at the end of Ragnarök in 39-40 of Völuspá.
He, however, does not specific if the two wolves are equivalent to the norse wolf Fenrir (Lindow, 2001, p.113). What is important here to note is that the Nordic concept of Ragnarök was cyclical and there was a restoration after. The Norse people shared a cyclical worldview, in which death and destruction are never considered to be final (Pétursson, 1983b, p. 60).
There are several questions that arise when we read about the giant wolf Fenrir devouring Odin and that two other wolves are moon and sun chasers.
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The first question that might arise is: Could Odin be understood as a solar God, does he represent the sun? (see e.g. Annette Lassen, 2021).
Another question, consequently, could be if Norse mythology depicts other celestial bodies?
Several scholars have argued that Germanic myths contain celestial aspects and that the narratives of the myths themselves are projected skywards. As of recently, scholar Gísli Sigurðsson (2014, 2019) proposed that Yggdrasil, for instance, is projected skyward as the milky way. The idea that the milky way is related to the axis mundi of the Norse Germanic cosmology has also been previously investigated by Arthur Drews (1923, p. 106). As he further notes, the Norse myths of the Eddas may be read as celestial events, the point of view of memory studies, this aspect is important as it reflects how memory of mythological names and narratives is attached to fixed and moveable phenomena in the visible sky above for interactive retrieval. (Sigurðsson, 2022).
At this point of this article, let’s take a quick flight to Siberia and have a look at traditional Siberian cosmologies.
Although unrelated to Norse mythology, there’s a widespread motif of a ‘sun-eater’ among petroglyphs throughout Siberia, as has been demonstrated by the Estonian scholar Enn Ernits, who wrote the research paper entitled ‘on the cosmic hunt in north eurasian rock-art’ in 2010. The idea that the sun has been captured by an animal, often a celestial bear or elk, appears to be widely spread outside of Europe and in particular to the east of the Ural mountains.
Could a similar idea have circulated in Scandinavia, i.e., was it Fenrir that chased and swallowed the sun?
It has been argued that this ‘sun-eater’ motif is strongly tied to a indigenous Siberian complex of myths, called the Cosmic Hunt.
The motif of the Cosmic Hunt (Motif F59. 2 according to S. Thompson’s index) comprises a set of cognitive myths that can be found across the northern hemisphere but lacks ethnographic representations in Europe due to its hunter-gatherer origins. It is most prevalent in Siberia and in North America.
In Eurasia, celestial bodies served as a cognitive memory-storage to retrieve and store myths (e.g., Emilia Pasztor, 2019)
As the myth and its celestial narratives are projected skywards, the mythical event involves a group of hunters that pursue a celestial elk or a bear in north Eurasia, sometimes chasing the sun. There are different variants of this particular motif. However, in northern Eurasia, they are all linked to several star constellations such as Orion, Arcturus and Ursa Major. (Berezkin, 2005).
Traditional hunting cultures repeated the process of primeval creation ritually at the founding of habitations and the inauguration of power and sacral-cosmic landscapes, because they wanted to participate in the originally creative power of the cosmos. By doing so, essential aspects of their cosmologies were projected skywards not only as a mean for retrieval of memory, but the archaic worldview also understood the environment, i.e., landscape, seascape, skyscape as being alive. (Rappenglueck, 2013, p. 402, 407).
Whether or not the Norse people actually projected their mythologies onto the sky in this way remains a subject of much debate among scholars. But regardless of the answer, it’s clear that the movements of the Sun and other celestial bodies are deeply ingrained in indigenous Siberian mythology. And as such, it continues to capture our imagination and inspire awe today.
Furthermore, it could offer analogies to the question of deeper layers inherent to European pre-Christian mythologies and how these myths were structured (e.g. Roslyn M. Frank, 2014). Perhaps, a starry sky also served the old Norse people to store, remember and to retell their myths, generation after generation.
References:
Lindow, J. (2001). Handbook of Norse mythology. Santa Barbara, Calif: ABC-CLIO.
Orchard, A. (1997). Dictionary of Norse myth and legend. London: Cassell.
Paul Acker and Carolyne Larrington. (2002). The poetic Edda : essays on Old Norse mythology. New York :Routledge,
Davidson, H. R. E. (1988). Myths and Symbols in Pagan Europe: Early Scandinavian and Celtic Religions. United Kingdom: Manchester University Press.
Sigurdsson, Gisli. (2014). Nordic Mythologies Interpretations, Intersections, and Institutions.
Sigurdsson, Gisli. (2022). How Gylfi’s Illusion Breathes Life into the Sky. Religionsvidenskabeligt Tidsskrift. 74. 231-246. 10.7146/rt.v74i.132105.
Drews, Arthur, 1865-1935, (1923) Der sternhimmel in der dichtung und religion der alten völker und des christentums, eine einführung in die astralmythologie. Retrieved from the Digital Public Library of America, http://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/001392219
Ernits, Enn. (2010). On the Cosmic Hunt in North Eurasian Rock Art. Folklore : Electronic Journal of Folklore. 44. 10.7592/FEJF2010.44.ernits.
Berezkin, Yuri. (2005). Cosmic Hunt: Variants of Siberian-North American Myth. Folklore (Tartu). 31. 10.7592/FEJF2005.31.berezkin.
Rappenglueck, M. (2013). The Housing of the World: About the Significance of Cosmographic Concepts for Habitation. Nexus IX Conference Book.
Lassen, A. (2021). Odin’s Ways: A Guide to the Pagan God in Medieval Literature (H.F. Leslie-Jacobsen, & M. Cormack, Trans.; 1st ed.). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003187981
Frank, Roslyn M. (2014) “The skylore of the indigenous peoples of Eurasia.” In: C.L.N. Ruggles (ed.), The Handbook of Archaeoastronomy and Ethnoastronomy (pp. 1679-1686). Berlin: Springer Publishing Company (a pre-publication draft).
Pétursson, S.K. (1983b [1922]). Fornguðspeki í Ásatrúnni (part two). Gangleri. Tímarit um guðspeki og andleg mál 57(2), 50–62.
Emilia Pasztor (2019).Visualisation of the sky in traditional cultures of Eurasia and its ancient representations. DOI:10.4324/9780203730935-10 In book: Visualising Skyscapes (pp.177-199).