Chapters 44-95 - Germanic Mythology

more original form than Bodvild, and Nidhad than Niðuður, Niðaður. The name Nidhad
is composed of nid (neuter gender), the lower world, Hades, and had, a being, person,
forma, species. Nidhad literally means the lower world being, the Hades being. Herewith
we also have his mythical character determined. A mythical king, who is characterized as
the being of the lower world, must be a subterranean king. The mythic records extant
speak of the subterranean king Mimir (the Middle-Age saga's Gudmund, king of the
Glittering Fields; see Nos. 45, 46), who rules over the realm of the well of wisdom and
has the dis of fate as his kinswoman, the ruler of the realm of Urd's fountain and of the
whole realm of death. While we thus find, on the one hand, that it is a subterranean king
who captures Völund's sword and armring, we find, on the other hand, that when
Hotherus is about to secure the irresistible sword and the wealth-producing ring, he has to
travel to the same winter-cold country, where all the traditions here discussed (see Nos.
45-49) locate the descent to Mimir's realm, and that he, through an entrance "scarcely
approachable for mortals," must proceed into the bosom of the earth after he has subdued
a Mimingus, a son of Mimir. Mimir being the one who took possession of the treasure, it
is perfectly natural that his son should be its keeper.
This also explains why Niðaður in Völundarkviða is called the king of the Njares.
A people called Njares existed in the mythology, but not in reality. The only explanation
of the word is to be found in the Mimir epithet, which we discovered in the variations
Narvi, Njörvi, Nari, Neri, which means "he who binds." They are called Njares, because
they belong to the clan of Njörvi-Nari.
Völundarkviða (str. 17, with the following prose addition) makes Nidad's queen
command Völund's knee-sinews to be cut. Of such a cruelty the older poem, "Deor the
Scald's Complaint," knows nothing. 8 This poem relates, on the other hand, that Nidad
bound Völund with a fetter made from a strong sinew:
siþþan hinne Nidhad on
nede legde
sveoncre seono-bende
After Nidhad on him
placed constraints
slack bonds of sinew
8 The current Penguin Classics translation by Michael Alexander in The Earliest English Poems renders the
lines below as "Nithhad put a knife to his hamstrings laid clever bonds (on the better man)." This error is
likely caused by a familiarity with the Völund legend, and either a misunderstanding of or an attempt to
explain the sinew bonds. I mention this only because the book is easily accessible, and well-worth reading.