Before there was earth or sky, there was only a yawning gap, with fire on one side and ice on the other. That is how the Norse imagined the beginning of everything. The story comes to us mainly from the Poetic Edda poems Voluspa, Vafthrudnismal and Grimnismal, and from Snorri Sturluson’s Prose Edda, a handbook for poets written in Iceland around 1220, some two centuries after Iceland became Christian. The sources don’t always agree, especially about names, so what follows combines them, noting where they differ.
Norse Creation Myth: the Void
In the beginning, there was a void called “Ginnungagap.” It was mighty and yawning. The void was not completely empty; in its dark depths, it held dormant potential. That power waited for an awakening.
To the north of the void was Niflheimr, a realm of fog, ice and water, also called “the dark world.” To the south of the void was Muspellsheim, a realm of fire and flames.
From Niflheim flowed the Élivágar, rivers of venom, which froze as they entered the void. Where that rime met the warm air blowing from Muspelheim it thawed and dripped, and from the drops came the first being: the giant Ymir. The thaw also produced a cow, Auðhumla, whose four rivers of milk fed him.
(One meaning of “Ymir” is twin. This means there may have been two beings formed from the water, however, Ymir’s twin is not mentioned in any of the surviving stories. Still, it’s something to be aware of as we learn more about the Norse creation of the world. Other texts call Ymir “Aurgelmir.” The Old Norse word for “frost” may have had a connotation of “evil.”)
As Ymir slept, he sweated. A man and a woman grew from under his left arm, and one of his legs fathered a son with the other. From these strange beginnings came the race of frost giants. (Snorri tells this with a straight face. We can only guess whether his audience did.)
Authumbla licked the salty ice. As she did, she revealed Buri, the first of the Aesir. It took three days for her to lick Buri free. On the first day, his hair was free. On the second, his head was free, and on the third, he stepped out of the ice and into the void.
Buri had a son, Borr, but Borr’s birth is unexplained. We know that he marries Bestla, a giant. Together, they have Odin, Vili and Ve.
Norse Creation Myth: Meaning
In his book Children of Ash and Elm, archaeologist Neil Price wonders how audiences received these stories: as sacred truth, as wisdom, or as entertainment that relished its own absurdity? Price and Old Norse scholar Jackson Crawford both stress that much of what survives comes from Snorri Sturluson, a Christian writing long after the Viking Age. The older Eddic poems he drew on were built on regular meter and alliteration, which may have helped them survive oral retelling with less change. Even so, we are always looking at Norse myth through a Christian medieval lens, and it’s worth remembering how that lens may bend the picture.
Next: the gods turn on the giant who came before them. Read Part 2, Ymir’s Death.
Sources
- Jackson Crawford on YouTube, The Norse Creation Myth
- Children of Ash and Elm: A History of the Vikings by Neil Price (2020).
