WISE WOMANS PROPHECY --------------------

The Voluspa The Voluspa, or the wise woman s prophecy, is told in both the Poetic Edda and the Prose Edda. The tale is a story of Odin calling upon a Volva (wise women) to give him advice. She gives him the tale of the creation of the unive rse, and ultimately tells him the tale of Ragnarok. It is in this tale where we learn of the tale of Tyr loosing his hand to the Fenris wolf. The gods decided to shackle the wolf Fenrisulfr (Fenrir), but the beast broke ev ery chain they put upon him. Eventually they had the dwarves make them a magical ribbon called Gleipnir from the noise a cat makes when it moves, the sinews of a bear, the breath of a fish, the spittle of a bird, the beard of a woman, and t he roots of a mountain. The gods took those items from the world and that is why they do not exist today. Fenrir refused to be bound with it unless one of the g ods put his hand in the wolf s mouth. Tyr agreed, and the other gods bound the wolf. After Fenrir had been bound by th e gods, he struggled to try and break the rope. When the gods saw that Fenrir wa s bound they all laughed, except Tyr, who had his right hand bitten off by Fenri sulfr.