Chapters 44-95 - Germanic Mythology

The river which is mentioned in Erik Vidforli's, Gorm's, and Hadding's sagas has its
prototype in the mythic records. When Hermod rides to the lower world on Sleipnir
(Gylfaginning 49), he first journeys through a dark country (compare above) and then comes to
the river Gjöll, over which there is the golden bridge called the Gjöll-bridge [Gjallarbrú]. On the
other side of Gjöll is the Hel-gate [Helgrindur], which leads to the realm of the dead. In Gorm's
saga, the bridge across the river is also of gold, and mortals are forbidden to cross to the other
side.
A subterranean river hurling weapons in its eddies is mentioned in Völuspá 36. In
Hadding's saga we also read of a weapon-hurling river which forms the boundary of the Elyseum
of those slain by the sword.
In Vegtamskviða 14 2-3 is mentioned an underground dog, bloody about the breast, coming
from Niflhel, the proper place of punishment. In Gorm's saga the bulwark around the city of the
damned is guarded by great dogs. The word nifl (the German Nebel), which forms one part of the
word Niflhel, means mist, fog. In Gorm's saga, the city in question is most like a cloud of vapor
(vaporanti maxime nubi simile). 15
Saxo's description of that house of torture, which is found within the city, is not unlike
Völuspá's description of that dwelling of torture on the Náströnds ["corpse-shores"]. In Saxo, the
floor of the house consists of serpents wattled together, and the roof of sharp stings. In Völuspá,
the hall is made of serpents braided together, whose heads from above spit venom down on those
dwelling there. Saxo speaks of soot a century old on the door frames; Völuspá of ljórar, air- and
smoke-openings in the roof (see further Nos. 77 and 78).
Saxo himself points out that the Geruthus (Geirröðr) mentioned by him, and his famous
daughters, belong to the myth about the Asa-god Thor. That Geirrod after his death is transferred
to the lower world is no contradiction to the heathen belief, according to which beautiful or
terrible habitations await the dead, not only of men but also of other beings. Compare
Gylfaginning 42, where Thor with one blow of his Mjölnir sends a giant niðr undir Niflhel (see
further, No. 60).
As Mimir's and Urd's fountains are found in the lower world (see Nos. 63, 93), and as
Mimir is mentioned as the guardian of Heimdall's horn and other treasures, it might be expected
that these circumstances would not be forgotten in those stories from Christian times which have
been cited above and found to have roots in the myths.
When the Danish adventurers had left the horrible city of fog in Saxo's saga about Gorm,
they came to another place in the lower world where the gold-plated mead-cisterns were found.
The Latin word used by Saxo, which I translate with cisterns of mead, is dolium. In the classical
Latin, this word is used in regard to wine-cisterns of so immense a size that they were counted
among the immovables, and usually were sunk in the cellar floors. They were so large that a
person could live in such a cistern, and this is also reported as having happened. That the word
dolium still in Saxo's time had a similar meaning appears from a letter quoted by Du Cange, 16
written by Saxo's younger contemporary, Bishop Gebhard. The size is therefore no obstacle to
Saxo's using this word for a wine-cistern to mean the mead-wells in the lower world of Germanic
14 This poem is also known as Baldurs draumar.
15 "They went on; and saw, not far off, a gloomy, neglected town, looking more like a cloud exhaling vapour." Saxo,
Book VIII; Elton translation.
16 Charles Dufresne Du Cange (1610-1688), French historian and philologist. Author of "Glossarium ad scriptores
mediae et infimae latinitatis" (Paris, 3 vols. fol. 1678; new edition with addenda by Dom Carpentier, Paris, 7 vols.,
4to, 1840-1850; 10 vols., 1882-1887).