Chapters 44-95 - Germanic Mythology

76.
THE PLACES OF PUNISHMENT.
The regions over which the flock of demons fly are the same as those which the
author of Skírnismál has in view when Skirnir threatens Gerd with sending her to the
realms of death. It is the home of the frost-giants, of the subterranean giants, and of the
spirits of disease. Here live the offspring of Ymir's feet, the primeval giants strangely
born and strangely bearing, who are waiting for the quaking of Yggdrasil and for the
liberation of their chained leader, in order that they may take revenge on the gods in
Ragnarok, and who in the meantime contrive futile plans of attack on Hvergelmir's
fountain or on the north end of the Bifröst bridge. Here the demons of restless uneasiness,
of mental agony, of convulsive weeping, and of insanity (Óþoli, Morn, Ópi, and Tópi)
have their home; and here dwells also their queen, Loki's daughter, Leikin, whose
threshold is precipice and whose bed is disease. According to the authority used by Saxo
in the description of Gorm's journey, the country is thickly populated. Saxo calls it urbs,
oppidum (cp. Skírnismál's words about the giant-homes, among which Gerd is to drag
herself hopeless from house to house). The ground is a marsh with putrid water (putidum
cænum), which diffuses a horrible stench. The river Slid flowing north out of Hvergelmir
there seeks its way in a muddy stream to the abyss which leads down to the nine places of
punishment. Over all hovers Niflheim's dismal sky.
The mortals who, like Gorm and his men, have been permitted to see these
regions, and who have conceived the idea of descending into those worlds which lie
below Niflheim, have shrunk back when they have reached the abyss in question and
have cast a glance down into it. The place is narrow, but there is enough daylight for its
bottom to be seen, and the sight of it is terrible. Still, there must have been a path down to
it, for when Gorm and his men had recovered from the first impression, they continued
their journey to their destination (Geirrod's place of punishment), although the most
terrible vapor (teterrimus vapor) blew into their faces. The rest that Saxo relates is
unfortunately wanting both in sufficient clearness and in completeness. Without the risk
of making a mistake, we may, however, consider it as mythically correct that some of the
nine worlds of punishment below Niflheim, or the most of them, are vast mountain caves,
mutually united by openings broken through the mountain walls and closed with gates,
which do not, however, obstruct the course of Slid to the Nastrands and to the sea
outside. Saxo speaks of a perfractam scopuli partem, "a pierced part of the mountain,"
through which travellers come from one of the subterranean caves to another, and
between the caves stand gatekeepers (janitores). Thus there must be gates. At least two of
these "homes" have been named after the most notorious sinner found within them. Saxo
speaks of one called the giant Geirrod's, and an Icelandic document of one called the
giant Geitir's. 6 The technical term for such a cave of torture was gnýskúti (clamor-grotto).
Saxo translates skúti with conclave saxeum. "To thrust anyone before Geitir's clamor-
6 This is found in a verse by the skald Þórvaldr inn veili, in Njal's Saga ch. 102. The phrase has several
variations, this being the one quoted in Egilsson's Lexicon Poeticum.