Chapters 44-95 - Germanic Mythology

sorcery is designated in Völuspá 22 by the term síða kyni. Of a thing practiced with
improper means it is said that it is not kynja-lauss, "kyn" -free 13
The reading in Hauksbók, seið hon hvars hon kunni, seið hon hugleikin, evidently
has some "emendator" to thank for its existence who did not understand the passage and
wished to substitute something easily understood for the obscure lines he thought he had
found. 14 From all this follows that Leikin is either a side-figure to the daughter of Loki,
and like her in all respects, or she and the Loki-daughter are one and the same person. To
determine the question whether they are identical, we must observe (1) the definitely
representative manner in which Völuspá, by the use of the name Leikin, makes the
possessor of this name a mythic person, who visits men with diseases and death; (2) the
manner in which Ynglingatal characterizes the activity of Loki's daughter with a person
doomed to die from disease; she makes him leikinn, an expression which, without doubt,
is in its sense connected with the feminine name Leikn, and which was preserved in the
vernacular far down in Christian times, and there designated a supernatural visitation
bringing the symptoms of mental or physical illness; (3) the Christian popular tradition in
which the deformed and disease-bringing horse, which Leikin rides in the myth, is
represented as the steed of "death" or "Hel"; (4) that change of meaning by which the
name Hel, which in the mythical poems of the Elder Edda designates the whole heathen
realm of death, and especially its regions of bliss, or their queen, got to mean the abode of
torture and misery and its ruler - a transmutation by which the name Hel, as in
Gylfaginning and in the Schleswig traditions, was transferred from Urd to Loki's
daughter.
Finally, it should be observed that it is told of Leikin, as of Loki's daughter, that
she once fared badly at the hands of the gods, who did not, however, take her life. Loki's
daughter is not slain, but is cast into Niflhel (Gylfaginning 34). From that time, she is
gnúpleit -- that is to say, she has a stooping form, as if her bones had been broken and
were unable to keep her in an upright position. Leikin is not slain, but gets her legs
broken. 15
All that we learn of Leikin thus points to the Loki-maid, the Hel, not of the myth,
but of Christian tradition. 16
13 All these examples may be found in Vigfusson's dictionary under the first definition of "kyn."
14 This reading offers various other possibilities: "she bewitched the mind, and made it leikinn"; "she
cleverly bewitched the mind"; "she practiced sorcery, which was precious to her."
15 Hún er blá hálf en hálf með hörundar lit. Því er hún auðkennd og heldur gnúpleit og grimmleg. She is
half blue, and half flesh-colored. Thus she is easily recognizable and rather stooped and fierce-looking.
16 While there is no doubt that the Loki-daughter is a distinct personality separate from Hel-Urd, Rydberg's
argument in regard to her proper name being Leikn is weak. His most compelling evidence for this
conclusion is the statement that Thor broke Leikn's legs, and the statement that Odin cast her into Niflheim,
Hel kastaði hann í Niflheim. (For a similar statement in regard to Thjazi's eyes cp. Skáldskaparmál 4, and
Harbardsljóð 19). For want of a better name, I can accept Leikn as a name of Loki's daughter, but each
reader must decide how valid this conclusion is.
For a discussion of the strophe in Heimskringla, Ynglingasaga 17 which seems to call Loki's daughter
"the sister of the wolf and Narvi," see No. 85.