Hildr and the Eternal Battle of the Hjaddings (Hjaðningavíg)

00. INTRODUCTION

Who elected to carry off Hild?

Who are forever fighting?
Who will be reconciled at the [very] last?
Who incited the princes [to fight]?

Hedinn elected to carry off Hild;

The Hjaddings are forever fighting;
They will be reconciled at the [very] last;
Hild incited the princes [to fight].
[Gade, Kari, ed. ‘Háttalykill]

(From the mid-12th cent. Old Norse poem ‘Háttalykill,’ composed by the Norwegian Earl Rögnvald of
Orkney and the Icelander Hallr Þórarinsson, stanza 45.) [01]

The 13th century compiler of Old Norse myths, Snorri Sturluson, relates the Old Norse version of the
Germanic legend of Hild and the Hjaddings’ battle in this way: King Hedinn raided King Hogni’s turf
while the latter was away, and he also jacked Hogni’s daughter, Hildr. When Hogni found out, he
chased Hedinn all the way to the Isle of Hoy in the Orkney Isles of Scotland. Hedinn sent Hildr (of all
people) to her father, with gold neck-rings as atonement, for her own kidnapping. [02]

According to Snorri, Hildr tells her father that if he doesn’t accept that peace-offering, then Hedinn is
ready to fight.

Hogni doesn’t accept the gold; so Hildr trots back to Hedinn, and the battle begins. It goes on all day,
and then the survivors retire to their camps for the night. But Hildr goes to the battlefield and revives
by sorcery those who had died in battle. The next day, the revenants join the living in battle again.
The dead turn into stones until they are revived by Hildr’s witchcraft to fight again. And so it will go
on, until Ragnarök: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ragnar%C3%B6k

Snorri goes on to quote several stanzas of a poem called Ragnarsdrápa, which he attributes to the
earliest known court poet in Old Norse, Bragi Boddason. You can find those stanzas in English, as well
as Snorri’s version of events in: Snorra Edda transl. by Anthony Faulkes: http://vsnrweb-
publications.org.uk/EDDArestr.pdf pages 122 – 124; but, for the benefit of those who are not
familiar with the Old Norse system of ‘kennings,’ I’m going to offer you my own paraphrase of Bragi’s
stanzas:
“And the bloody-minded Valkyrie-like Hildr was out to provoke a fight against her father, when she,
the valkyrie filled with malice, carried a warrior’s neck-ring to the ships.

“That valkyrie overseer of bloody wounds did not offer the splendid ruler Hogni a neck ring with the
idea that he should accept it and run from battle. Thus she continually behaved as if she was opposed
to a battle, although in reality she was goading the princes onwards to a ghastly death.

“Hatred swelled in Hogni’s breast and he did not flinch from battle; his sea-warriors attacked Hedinn,
rather than accepting the neck-rings of Hildr.

“This attack can be seen on the shield that Ragnar gave me, together with a multitude of stories.

“And on the island, instead of Hogni, that war-booty-destroying wicked witch of a woman took
control. The sea-faring king’s whole army steadily advanced from their ships, under their shields.”

Hildr’s own unexplained immunity from dying is a distinctive feature that she shares with another
enigmatic female character in the Old Norse myths, who is also arguably linked to sorcery, namely,
‘Gullveig;’ and Hildr’s connection with sorcery is shared by ‘Heidr,’ who is thought by many scholars to
be Gullveig:’

The war I remember, the first in the world,

When the gods with spears had smitten Gullveig,
And in the hall of Hár had burned her,
Three times burned, and three times born,
Oft and again, yet ever she lives.
Heidr they named her who sought their home
The wide-seeing witch, in magic wise;
Minds she bewitched that were moved by her magic,
To evil women a joy she was.
(Trans. by Henry Adams Bellows, stanza 21. See his translation of the entire poem here:
http://www.voluspa.org/voluspa.htm )

Gullveig, Heidr and the narrator of the Eddic poem Vǫluspá:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/V%C3%B6lusp%C3%A1 will be the subjects of my next blog-post.

Although it is nowhere stated specifically in the still-extant fragments of the Old Norse Hildr myth that
she too was impervious to death, that imperviousness is nevertheless a corollary of her being able to
bring the dead to life night after night until the gods themselves meet their doom.
In this blog-post, I will look at the possible answers to the question: what was the clearly heathen
poet, Bragi Boddason, thinking that Hildr was, what sort of a creature, this mysterious being who was
not a god, but who, nevertheless, had a peculiar power over death? We are never going to know for
sure what Bragi thought, but we have the poem attributed to him, as a kind of lens through which we
can examine a range of possible models as regards Hildr’s identity, as well as other writings, although
the latter must be used warily, as they are mostly dated later than the 9 th century in which Bragi
wrote his poem. We also have early Norwegian and Icelandic law codes to set the social context,
although, again, the earliest written versions of those laws are dated well after Bragi’s time and well
into the Christian period in Scandinavia.

Another issue I will address in this blog-post is the sadly neglected issue of Hildr’s motivation. Every
scholar I have read is given up on this issue, saying that there is not enough information.
Those same archaic laws, however, together with data on social customs, give more than adequate
information on at least the human side of the princess Hildr’s motivation. I am really surprised that
none of the eminent scholars whose writings I have studied have ever seriously tackled that issue, to
the best of my now-considerable knowledge (as you will see) of the Hildr legend.

The third issue that has never, to the best of my knowledge, been addressed by contemporary
scholars, is the question: how does Hildr do it? How does she raise dead men back to life, over and
over again, until doomsday? At least, how were Scandinavian heathens like Bragi thinking it was
done? Again, we’ll never know for sure, but there is a range of possibilities, based on what we can
know about Old Norse magical practices, and a look at some analogues for the Hildr myth, from both
later Norse versions as well as from even later Anglo-Saxon and Celtic analogues.

PICTURE 01 A detail from one of the Viking-Age picture-stones located in Stora Hammars, Lärbro
parish, Gotland, Sweden. Photo by: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:Berig , creative
attribution, share-alike license.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Picture_stone …….
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stora_Hammars_stones ….
The detail shown above from the Stora Hammars 1 stone is thought by a number of scholars to
represent the Hjaðningavíg myth. [03]

01. What Sort of Creature was Hildr thought to have been?

In the paraphrase I gave above of Bragi’s stanzas, I used the word ‘valkyrie.’ The name ‘Hildr’ was a
well-known name of one of Odin’s ‘maidens;’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valkyrie and it
unquestionably carried the valkyrie connotation for Bragi. However, he does not use the word to
describe Hildr; and I only used it because it was either that, or give you an instant crash course right
there in the introduction, in the kennings Bragi does use for Hildr.
That crash course comes now.

01.1 The Kennings, or Epithets, for Hildr, used by the poet of Ragnarsdrápa

Kennings were a short descriptive phrase used by court poets, in place of the actual name for
something. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kenning ….

Bragi uses several kennings to describe the being that ignited the legendary eternal battle, and we are
going to look at those kennings now.

The first one is ‘ósk-Rán,’ where I used ‘valkyrie.’ http://vsnrweb-

publications.org.uk/Skaldskaparmal.1.unicode.pdf page 72. Anthony Faulkes translates this as ‘the
Ran who wishes (too great drying of veins) …’ http://vsnrweb-publications.org.uk/EDDArestr.pdf
page 123.

In her extensive analysis and translation of Bragi’s Ragnarsdrápa, Margaret Clunies Ross translates
ósk-Rán as “the desiring-Ran (of the excessive drying of veins)…” [Clunies Ross (2), page 39] In her
extensive notes on the stanza, Clunies Ross further states that, through Bragi’s use of the phrase “ósk-
Rán ofþerris *æða ‘the desiring- Rán, ie. ‘goddess’ of the excessive drying of veins [VALKYRIE = Hildr]”
Bragi “immediately establishes through this kenning Hildr’s destructive and predatory, almost
cannibalistic qualities.” [ibid, page 40] She goes on to point out that the compound óskamær
appears in several Old Norse literary sources as a term for a valkyrie; and she translates that latter
compound as “’desire [i.e. ‘desired’ or ‘desiring’] maiden…” and she says that, therefore, “the
similarity of the cpd ósk-Rán strongly indicates Hildr’s role as a valkyrie.” [ibid]

Cleasby and Vigfusson translate óskamær as ‘wish maid;’ and, although it is arguable that the term
was intended to refer to the valkyrie Brunhild within the context of her role as a valkyrie, there is
precedent for the term as such. [04]

However, arguing even more strongly than dissident translations in the valkyrie context, against
Clunies Ross’s translation of óskamær as referencing ‘desire, desired or desiring,’ is the use of the
phrase in reference to the Virgin Mary in a 14 th century praise poem, Maríuvísur I:

23 Máttr var móður dróttins

mjög ríkr um frú slíka
sýndr með sætleik reyndum
4 sveit í loganum heita;
þann gaf þessi kvinnu
þrótt óskamey dróttins;
hosk sat brúðr í ‹. . .›
8 baugstalls um dag allan.
“The very great power of the mother of the Lord in relation to this woman in the hot flame, with her
proven kindness, was shown to the people; the chosen virgin of the Lord gave that fortitude to this
woman; the wise woman sat in . . . of the ring-seat [arm or shield] all day long…” [Wrightson, page
51, stanza 23]

Now, whatever the court poet who wrote Maríuvísur I was thinking óskamær meant, I’m pretty sure
he wasn’t thinking of her as an object of desire, nor would he have used language that implied it,
because that would have been blasphemous.

Oh sure, the meaning of a word can change over a period of a few hundred years; but, the use of
óskamær in a poem about Mary certainly doesn’t support the translation of its use in Ragnarsdrapa
as meaning ‘desired, desiring,’ either.

I’m going to come back to a discussion of ósk, but for the moment I want to examine the validity of
Clunies Ross’s interpretation of the compound ósk-Rán in Ragnarsdrapa as being a strong indication
of Hildr’s role as a valkyrie.

The two compounds, óskamær and ósk-Rán are certainly not exact synonyms. ‘Mær’ means ‘maiden,’
whereas Rán as a common noun means ‘robbery.’ [Quinn 01, page 74] As a personal name, Rán
personified the deadly and treacherous aspects of the sea in the mythical form of the wife of the sea-
god. According to Judy Quinn, Rán personified death by drowning, whereas the valkyrie personified
death in battle. [Quinn 01, pages 74 – 75] The two types of death are clearly not the same at all, in
context or in character. And it’s interesting that Bragi’s first kenning for Hildr uses the name of the
personification of death by drowning, because he also says that the battle took place, not at sea, but
on an island.

Quinn conjectures that “Rán’s association with the ruthless killing of men is probably why Bragi
Boddason, in the ninth century, chose her as the base-word in his kenning for the valkyrie, Hildr, in
Ragnasdrápa 1: “ofþerris æða ósk-Rán” [the desiring- (or desired-)Rán of the excessive drying of veins]
(Skm 250).” [Quinn 01, page 82] She also points out that Bragi’s use of Rán’s name in a non-seafaring
context is not quite the sole one in skaldic poetry: “When Hallfreðr vandræðaskáld Óttarsson
imagined the love-making between the woman he desired and her husband, he described her as
gloomy “dýnu Rán” [Rán of the eiderdown] (Lv 15 V), a depiction which encodes both the intimacy he
assumes and the peril he courts.11” [ibid, page 82 – 83]
However, Quinn also points out that “In Helgakviða Hundingsbana I too, a valkyrie is pitted against
Rán in a tussle to control the fate of the hero. In this company, Rán seems to represent the ineluctable
tug of mortality, a force that can only be countered by the temporary protection of a valkyrie whose
medium is air rather than land or sea.” [ibid, page 91] The dyadic representation of Rán and a
valkyrie in Helgakviða Hundingsbana I does not readily suggest to me that they were thought of as
being essentially the same power or force.

Rudolph Simek concluded that “… Rán is the ruler over the realm of the dead at the bottom of the sea
to which people who have drowned go. Whilst [her husband, the giant named Ægir] personifies the
sea as a friendly power, Rán embodies the sinister side of the sea, at least in the eyes of the late Viking
Age Icelandic seafarers…” [Simek (1), page 260]

PICTURE 02 RAN Ran and Her Nets, public domain, various.

As a sister to the goddess of death, I can see Rán; the goddess of the drowned at the bottom of the
sea has a lot in common with the goddess of the underworld where all the people go who don’t die a
warrior’s death. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hel_(being) .

PICTURE 03 HEL ‘Hel’ picture by Zarubina Mkasahara, creative attribution, share-alike license

But, as the next-of-kin to Hildr and her sisters, those who choose who will die in battle:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valkyrie I can’t say that I’m exactly struck by the resemblance.

PICTURE 04 VALKYRIE ‘Valkyrie’ by Peter Nicolai Arbo (1831–1892), public domain.

To sum up: Rán catches those who fall into her power; Hel keeps those who fall into her domain; and
the valkyrie calls to a battle that may or may not be doom for those who answer her call. Those three
actions are quite distinct from each other.

Moreover, the ‘Hildr’ in the earliest Norse legends of the Hjaðningavíg does something other than a
valkyrie call to battle. She calls to a battle where the outcome is pre-determined: where everyone is
doomed, nobody wins, and, most chillingly of all, everyone joins the undead. The fate of the
Hjaðningavíg warriors is to spend eternity in a travesty of the destination they would have been
hoping for: Valhalla: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valhalla . Their terrible fate is not a parallel to
Valhalla; there is no ‘rest’ for them, no convivial drinking and merry-making. They fight and they die,
they turn into stones, and then they get bewitched back into a kind of ‘half-life’ to fight again, until
they die again; and so it goes on until the gods themselves die.
So, I think we should be very careful about drawing casual comparisons of Hildr with Rán and with
Hel. The contexts in which those three beings appear to be operating in the Norse sources are quite
distinct.

There is another reason we should be cautious of making quick assumptions that we know why Bragi
Boddason used the epithet ósk-Rán to describe Hildr, and that is, the calibre of the poet himself.

Bragi lived in the 9th century, in the twilight of the Viking era, and he has been variously described as
having been a court poet to Norse, or Swedish or Danish kings. Margaret Clunies Ross states that: “If
Bragi’s patron Ragnarr is to be identified with the Viking leader who led an attack on Paris in 845,
supposedly died in a snake-pit at the hands of King Ælla of Northumbria, and was the father of the
Ingware and Ubba that the F version of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle claims led raids on England in the
860s and 70s (de Vries 1928a; McTurk 1991a), then their association is just possible chronologically
and geographically, as Ragnarr’s connections within Scandinavia were with Norway as well as with
Denmark (Smyth 1977, 17 – 20). [05]

Ursula Dronke argues that the “complex brilliance of the diction of the Ragnarsdrápa,” together with
the “less sophisticated use of the dróttkvætt [courtly poetic metre],” and the lack of a saga framework
for Bragi all strongly suggest that the Ragnarsdrápa is “an authentic work of Bragi’s, and unless the
attributions of poems to scalds [court poets] of identifiable are all to be doubted, it seems safe to
assume that Bragi’s verses were earlier than theirs and belonged to the ninth century…” [Dronke (1),
pages 204 – 205]

The next epithet applied to Hildr in the Ragnarsdrápa is hristi-Sif hringa [Faulkes, Skáldskaparmál,
1998, page 72], which Anthony Faulkes translates and interprets to mean “ring – (sword) shaking Sif
(Hild)…” [Faulkes, Snorra Edda, page 123]. Clunies Ross translates it as “shaking-Sif (goddess) of rings
(VALKYRIE = Hildr)” [Clunies Ross (2), p. 39]. She also states that “The connotations of this keening are
complex…” focusing on the various meanings that ‘ring’ could have in the epithet, and suggesting that
“Bragi’s choice of the goddess-name Sif, wife of Þórr, which has the sense ‘kinship, affinity’ as a
common noun, may be ironic here, for Hildr is concerned to break the ties of kinship.” [Clunies Ross
(2), page 40]

But, surely the ‘kinship, affinity’ boat would have already sailed, at the same time that Hedinn had
kidnapped our girl Hildr.

Richard North translates the epithet as ‘Sif of shaking bracelets’ and interprets it as a kenning for a
“marriageable woman: Hildr” [North, page 131].
The next kenning that the poet Bragi applies to Hildr is: sú til bleyði boeti-Þrúðr… dre‹y›rug‹r›a
benja. [Faulkes (1), p. 73.
The phrase in between those two phrases, ‘málma mætum hilm‹i› men,’ belongs to another idea in
the poem; Old Norse court poetry was also complex in its structure.)

The translations I have of Ragnarsdrápa, those of: Clunies Ross, Richard North, Anthony Faulkes and
Arthur Brodeur, are fairly similar with respect to this kenning, all something along the lines of: “This
bloody wound-curing Thrud…” [Faulkes (2), p. 123]

Although Margaret Clunies Ross indicates, correctly, that the epithet means ‘Valkyrie,’ she also
interprets it in this context as meaning the same ‘Thrud’ who is said by at least one court poet to be
the daughter of Thor. She bases this interpretation, and understandably so, on the first verse of
Ragnarsdrápa, which refers to a giant named Hrungnir by way of the kenning ‘the thief of Þrúðr,’ and
Snorri quotes a court poet who used the kenning ‘Thrud’s father’ to refer to the god Thor. [Faulkes
(2), p. 72 – 73] The kenning ‘thief of Thrud’ refers to a myth that has been lost, unfortunately. A
related kenning, also quoted by Snorri, by the late-tenth century court poet Eilífr Goðrúnarson in his
praise poem to the god Thor, Þórsdrápa, calls Thor ‘the one who strongly misses Þrúðr.’
https://web.archive.org/web/20060923215727/http://www.hi.is/~eybjorn/ugm/thorsd00.html or
‘the one who longs for Thor in his heart.’ [Faulkes (2), page 85]

Thrud (Old Norse ‘Þrúðr’) is one of the oldest recorded base-names in kennings, dating back to the
10th century. Hild (O.N. ‘Hildr’) is even older, dating back to the 9 th century in kennings. [Price, page
286]

It shows up in a kenning for ‘warrior’ or ‘revenant’ [06] in the only known record on a rune-stone, of a
complete verse in the court poetry meter called dróttkvætt
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alliterative_verse#Dr%C3%B3ttkv%C3%A6tt

05 KARLEVI STONE
The Karlevi runestone in Vickleby Parish, Mörbylånga Municipality, Öland, Sweden.
This is a picture of an archaeological site or a monument in Sweden, number Vickleby 10:1 in the RAÄ
Fornsök database. Photo by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Berig, Creative attribution, share-
alike license
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karlevi_Runestone
For more on the Karlevi Runestone and the reference to Thrud, see note 06.

The name ‘Þrúðr’ means ‘power, treader’ [Price, page 283] and, as Thor’s ‘daughter,’ she is, “like
Thor’s son, Magni, a personification of her father’s strength. “ [Simek (1), page 329]
The final kenning that Bragi aims Hildr’s way is ‘fengeyðandi fljóða fordæða nam ráða,’ which
Anthony Faulkes translates as ‘that victory-preventing witch among women.’ [Faulkes (1) page 73,
and Faulkes (2) page 123, respectively] Faulkes notes in his introduction to the Prose Edda that he
went for a very literal translation of the Edda. In his ‘Glossary’ to Skaldskaparmal, Faulkes gives the
following range of meanings for fordæða: f. evil-doer, wicked creature, witch; f. fljóða evil creature
among women v254/4 (subj. of nam ráða)
P. 277, Skáldskaparmál 2. Glossary and Index of Names Edited by Anthony Faulkes, Viking Society for
Northern Research http://www.vsnrweb-publications.org.uk/Edda-2b.pdf

However, Arthur Brodeur’s translation of the same phrase: ‘that baleful witch of women, wasting the
fruits of victory,’ [Brodeur, page 132], is the best and most fully accurate, within the context of how
the word fordæða would likely have been understood by Bragi in the late 9th century, in terms of its
connotations with respect to his stanzas on the Hjaðningavíg. [07] [08]

Given the legal connotations for the concept as set down in the earliest written Old Norse laws,
Margaret Clunies Ross’s 1973 translation of ‘arch-sorceress’ for the word fordæða in Bragi’s stanzas is
inaccurate [Clunies Ross (1), page 91]; and her 2017 translation of ‘evil-doer’ for the same is
inadequate. [Clunies Ross (2) pages 43, 44].

And of course, we have Snorri’s characterization of Hildr as being the daughter of a king. Not that this
rules out her having a non-human side to her, by any means. [See Note 04(ii), for the example of
Brynhildr.] The legendary princess Skuld, who shared her name with one of the Old Norse ‘fates’
called Norns, as well as with a valkyrie, was another epic trouble-maker along the general lines of
Hildr in character: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skuld_(princess) ……

It’s clear that Bragi thought of Hildr of the Hjaðningavíg as being an entity possessed of supernatural
powers malign intent, incarnate in female human form. In order to maintain the battle of the
Hjaddings until the end of the gods themselves, Hildr would have to be effectively immortal herself.
However, she does not start out in the legend of the eternal battle is being manifestly of another
world. She is a princess who apparently gets abducted, and it is from that viewpoint that I would now
like to address her motivation for wreaking a truly terrifying revenge on both her abductor’s army and
that of her failed protector’s. I will return later to the question of what Hildr was, when we look at
the question of ‘how does she do it, how does she bring stones back to life every night?

02. What motivation did the princess Hildr have for exacting a gruesome revenge against both her
abductors and her would-be protectors?
Margaret Clunies Ross points out that: “… it was abnormal for an abducted woman to offer
compensation to her wronged father, more unusual still for her to bring about her father’s death. In
most cases of abduction recorded in Old Icelandic literature the woman avenges herself on her
abductor, as in Ch. 48 of the Ynglingsaga, and not on her own kin; moreover, the settlement of an
abduction case was a male affair, the woman’s male kinsfolk being the only ones entitled to avenge
her theft.8 …” [Clunies Ross (1), page 77]

However, neither Clunies Ross nor any other scholar I consulted appears to have carefully examined
the assumption that – drawing on Snorri Sturluson’s phrases for Hildr in Hattatal, such as ‘Hedinn’s
darling,’ ‘Hildr prepares a bed for most helmet-damagers,’ and the like – they all seem to have made,
which is that, when our girl Hildr sashayed onto her daddy’s ship, she was there as the representative
of her lover/default hubby by way of abduction Hedinn, there to make peace between the two men.
That’s the basic assumption that has never really been challenged by any scholar, as far as I know,
with respect to Snorri’s writings on the subject and his quotes from Bragi Boddason. [09]

Given the venom with which Bragi has described her, plus the fact that her appearance at her father’s
ship to negotiate over her own kidnapping would been something that was simply never done or even
contemplated in Old Norse society, I should think it would behove scholars to look a little deeper into
what was happening, at least, from Bragi’s point of view in the late ninth century.

The earliest sources for the myth, Ragnarsdrápa, Háttalykill and Snorri, agree that Hildr was the
perpetuator of the eternal battle. They all agree that Hildr was abducted by Hedinn. Bragi says that
Hildr only pretended to be working for peace. Snorri says that Hildr went to her father’s ship and
offered him her own gold neck-ring as recompense for her own kidnapping. Snorri also says that, just
before the battle first commenced, Hedinn offered Hildr’s father, Hogni, a great deal of gold to settle
the matter. Hogni’s reply? ‘Should’a thought of that before I drew my sword, boyo.’

From these utterances, we can extrapolate the following idea: Hedinn was willing to offer Hogni a lot
of gold, much more than one neck-ring, to settle the matter, and, Hogni would have been willing to
accept the gold. Therefore, I think that it would be fair to say that our girl Hildr probably neglected to
mention any offer of serious treasure to her father to settle the feud.

Well, why not? It was a king after all, who abducted her. And she was Hedinn’s ‘beloved,’ according
to Snorri:
“Hjaldrremmir tekr Hildi
(hringr brestr at gjǫf) festa,
hnígr und Høgna meyjar
hers valdandi tjald;
Heðins mála býr hvílu
hjálmlestanda flestum,
morðaukinn fliggr mæki
mund Hjaðninga sprund.

“The battle-strengthener [ruler] engages himself to Hild [a valkyrie], the ring is broken as a gift. The
ruler of the host moves under Hogni’s daughter’s [Hild] tent [his shield]. Hedin’s beloved [Hild]
prepares a bed [i.e. selects them for death] for most helmet-harmers [warriors]. The lady of the
Hiadnings receives a wedding gift, a sword famous for slaying.” [Faulkes (2), pages 195 – 196]

As Margaret Clunies Ross pointed out, it was simply not done, for women to negotiate compensation
for their own abduction.

So, what would have happened, logically, if a princess who’d been abducted then freely, evidently,
walked onto her father’s ship to negotiate that compensation, what would the response have been?

I think the reaction of a 9th century audience, (or, really any audience not composed of people who
live in ivory towers) would have been along the lines of the following:

Princess: ‘Hi, Dad.’

Dad, ‘So, he let you go, did he?’
Princess: ‘Well, not exactly, Dad. You see, I promised him I would get you to agree to compensation
for my kidnapping.’
(By now, the 9th century Norse audience is rolling in the aisles.)

Dad: ‘I see. So, you ran away with him, did you? Well you can just go back to your lover-boy then,
missy; you are not my daughter anymore, as of this very moment. And you are going to inherit
diddly-squat, you hear me girl, zilch!’
More shrieks of laughter from the audience. Fade to black.

It’s pretty clear, however, that Bragi was not writing a farce, and that nobody was laughing.

So, we need a different lens with which to look at what could have happened, given the context of the
earliest recounting of the Hjaðningavíg myth.

The earliest evidence from written sources as to the laws on abduction indicates that the Norse
peoples took the kidnapping of their women very seriously: both the kidnapper and anyone who
helped him or harboured him after the fact faced a penalty of full outlawry if the case wasn’t settled
between the parties involved. [10]
Margaret Clunies Ross spent a great deal of effort looking for hidden meanings in Hildr’s offering of
her neck-ring to her father as some kind of sneaky gesture to shame him, in order to explain his rage.
[Clunies Ross (1)]

However, her theory is really unnecessary, in my opinion, because, the very fact of Hildr’s showing up
to negotiate compensation for her own abduction would have had all kinds of ‘shame’ issues attached
to it.
Her father’s natural response upon seeing his daughter sashay up the gangplank would have been
anger and suspicion as regards her possible role in her own kidnapping. Not the best context for a
peace talk.

Given this likely scenario, then, why would a warrior who had the nerve to jack a princess in a raid
then turn around and hide behind her skirts, as it were, asking her of all people to negotiate the terms
for peace?

The answer, from a 9th century Scandinavian society’s perspective, is that he simply wouldn’t. And a
princess would never agree to peace either, for any price, and certainly not for the price of handing
over her own gold necklace. Rudolph Simek enlightens us as to the reason why:

“Archaic marriages were based on a legal contract between two families, and the transference of the
woman from the control of the previous family member responsible for her to the husband is a central
moment in Germanic marriages. Even in medieval Icelandic texts, which are far advanced from the
early Middle Ages, it was not the love between two partners or even the consumption [sic, Simek
means ‘consummation,’ of course] of the marriage that mattered, but the contract arranged and
sealed by the father when he gave the bride away.
“In Germanic law we can distinguish between at least five different types of marriage, only the first
three of which would have been considered lawful marriages, or a matrimonium, namely
contract-marriage
friedel-marriage (cf. ON friða) [note *below]
concubinate
abduction (with consent)

abduction (without consent)

but only the first one was based on a proper contract and made the offspring capable of inheriting.
[Emphasis mine.] The bride’s father (or whoever else had jurisdictional power over her) would be
addressed and he was in charge of the marriage contract. This was not valid before a price (ON
mundr) was paid to the family (rather than gifts were presented to the girl herself at this stage) and
the dowry (heimanfylgja) had been agreed on. The marriage itself became valid when this contract
was valid, when a wedding had been held in the presence of at least six guests serving as witnesses
and the bridal couple had publicly entered the bed. This procedure in pre-Christian and early Christian
Iceland was rounded off with the morning gift (linnfé). However all the first three types of marriage
were considered legal, but the third only as a form of co-habitation between a man and a socially
inferior woman, and there was no contract, no payment and no compulsory morning gift involved.
This, by the way, is the type of union attempted by Freyr with Gerðr in Skírnismál.” [Simek (02), page
106]

We can see, therefore, that a marriage by abduction, with or without Hildr’s consent, automatically
disinherited her and any children she had. Oh sure, the kings could write her and the offspring in, but
it would be at their pleasure, not automatically given; and if there were other, more ‘legitimate’ heirs,
then Hildr’s children could expect to have to fight for their share of any inheritance. Furthermore,
Hildr’s now considered to be ‘married,’ to a guy she probably didn’t choose; so, her life has had a
serious dent put in it; but, hey, it’s all okay to those two kings, as long as she’s ‘paid for,’ with gold. As
Snorri says, Hedin tries to negotiate with his “father-in-law” just before battle commences. [Faulkes
(2), page 122]

And scholars say her motivation isn’t clear. Are they joking? Hildr’s a princess, she’s high-born and
coddled. Until suddenly, her nice, proper life and reputation get jacked from her, by two barterers,
who are now figuring out how much gold they’ll have to trade so that they can move on from the bad
state they’ve left her in. I’d be damn bitter, too. And looking for revenge.

Clearly, it’s just about the gold, for dear old Dad. If he gets enough of it, then he really won’t care too
much about what happens to her. Those two kings, her father and her abductor, are just barterers,
intent on bartering her life away.

Who the hell do they think they’re trying to buy and sell? She’ll show them who she is. She’ll show
them who they’ve messed with.

And that’s when she makes her decision, uses the power inherent in her name and what turns out to
be her essentially supernatural nature: ‘Hildr,’ ‘battle.’

Why have the scholars missed this point? I think it must have been because they’ve all taken Snorri
at face value when he calls Hildr Hedinn’s ‘bed-mate, sweet-talker, lover,’ in Old Norse, ‘mala.’ [12]
It’s really a failure to accord to the scheming, unscrupulous 13th century poet-historian the gift of
irony, because Snorri is clearly drawing on early sources most of which we don’t have access to. He
quotes Bragi, who actually says right out that Hildr only pretended to be about peace. This strongly
suggests that Snorri accepts Bragi’s version of the legend as having been the correct one. It is more
reasonable, therefore, to accept that Snorri must have been speaking ironically when he calls Hildr
Hedinn’s ‘bed-mate, honey.’ [12] [13] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snorri_Sturluson
We know that the two kings involved were willing to settle the abduction issue with gold, because
Snorri says: “Then Hogni called out to his father-in-law Hedin and offered him atonement and a great
deal of gold to make amends. Then Hogni replied, “You have offered this too late, if you want
atonement, for I have now drawn Dainsleif, which the dwarfs made, which has to be the death of
someone every time it is unsheathed…” [Faulkes (2), page 122]

So, if the abductor was willing to give a lot of gold in compensation, and the other was willing to take
a lot of gold as compensation, then how did that battle happen?

Snorri says our girl Hild had gone to daddy and – offered him a lot of gold? No. She offered him her
own neck-ring and then said in the next breath that Hedin was ready to fight if Hogni didn’t accept her
neck-ring as compensation. Hogni answered his daughter “curtly.” [Faulkes (2), page 122]

So, here’s a model that does make sense of the context: Hedinn gets suckered in by his little ol’
‘mala.’ [12] She tells him how flattered she was that he chose her and went to all that trouble and
danger to obtain her. (Spoiler alert: she’s not flattered, and she hates him for ruining her life and
taking away her choices. If you don’t believe me, just remember how this story turns out, and who’s
responsible for the way it ends. Hedinn’s ‘honey’ is the honey from Hell.) [13]

She tells him how she can’t wait to show him a really good time.

But, she’s terrified that Daddy will kill her new hubby if he’s the one to go to the ship to negotiate.
Daddy has a bad temper, you see, and will likely skewer Hedinn or any of his men who go to the ship.
She could tell him stories about Daddy that would help him to understand the truth of what she’s
saying, but, there just isn’t time. Does he want the death of one of his own men on his conscience?
Of course not. Does he want to kill her, his new bride, with grief by getting killed himself? Certainly
not. Well, then, there’s only one solution. She’ll go tell Daddy how rich Hedinn is, and she’ll offer him
a lot of gold as compensation. He finally agrees.

Now Hildr goes to Daddy’s ship. She talks sweetly, telling her father that she begged Hedinn to let her
come to see her dear father, and, out of the goodness of his heart, he agreed to let her bring his offer
of compensation. Her story makes Hogni look good to his men; so, he’ll accept her story at face value,
at least for the time being. Then, Hildr offers him just her very own neck-ring, as compensation,
coupled with a threat to challenge his courage, a very important attribute in a Viking chieftain. [11]
She doesn’t say, ‘Oh, no daddy, you’ve misunderstood. Hedinn’s going to give you a lot of gold, the
necklace was just an example of what he’s going to give you.’ Nope. She says: ‘Take it or Hedinn will
fight you to the death, daddy dearest,’ knowing darn well what the result will be.

And what is the response? Her father answers her curtly. Vesuvius would have looked tame by
comparison to papa’s reaction to this affront to his reputation, and, it’s on, now. [11]

So, she scoots back to Hedinn and tells him she’s really sorry, but she’s just too darn precious to
Daddy, and he’d rather fight than take even the (huge, no doubt) amount of gold that her sweet new
hubby Hedinn had offered for her. She’ll cheer on her new hubby in the battle to come, though, and
of course she hopes he’ll be coming home victorious to her warm embrace.

And then, Hogni’s warriors attack Hedinn “rather than accepting Hildr’s neck-rings.”
[Faulkes (2), page 123]

Now how was that hard to see, as being the logical model of Hildr’s motivation and subsequent
response, based on what we’ve been told from the earliest versions of the myth? Myself, I don’t
think that was hard at all. You just have to think like an abducted valkyrie-princess would have been
thinking, and accord Snorri Sturluson of all people the simple respect of considering him capable of
irony in his descriptions of the sweet-talker from hell. [12] [13]

And this brings us to:

03. How does Hildr do it, how does she bring ‘stones’ back to life every night?

Snorri is the only one of the early sources to refer to the men and their weapons being turned into
stones every day, and being revived by Hildr every night, only to fight again. [Faulkes (02), page 123].

Snorri states: “Then they began the engagement that is known as the Hiadnings’ battle, and fought
all that day, and at night the kings went to their ships. But during the night Hild went to the slain and
woke up by magic all those that were dead. And the next day the kings went onto the battlefield and
fought, and so did all those that had fallen the previous day. This battle continued day after day, with
all those that fell, and all the weapons that lay on the battlefield, as well as shields, turning to stone.
And when day came, all the dead men got up and fought, and all the weapons were useable. It says in
the poems that the Hiadnings must thus await Ragnarok. Bragi the poet composed a passage based
on this story in his drápa for Ragnar Lodbrok:” [ibid]

Leaving aside for the moment another question that has never been addressed by any scholar except,
in passing, Ursula Dronke [14], – namely, how does Hildr keep herself alive long enough to torment
everyone around her until Hell breaks loose? – There is the question of the mechanics of her
legendary ability to ‘wake up’ the armies out of death, repeatedly, until the end of time, in fact.

Snorri uses a fairly generic word in Old Norse, fjǫlkyngi, for ‘magic,’ in the above passage, ‘ [Faulkes
(01), page 72]. And that, dear readers, is the only word, literally, from the early sources, on the
supposed mechanism of resurrection.

“…The word used in Guta saga (GLGS, 64 line 13) to describe Avair Strabain is fielkunnugr skilled in
many things, and this word and its equivalents were also used, frequently with a positive connotation,
to indicate skilled in magic arts, especially in OWN sources. The word fordeþskepr and its equivalents
were more often used negatively in the sense, witchcraft, black arts…” [Peel, page 162]

But, saying she did it by ‘magic’ in the heathen Scandinavian period is like us saying we ‘had some
weather’ today – it doesn’t even begin to tell the story, because Scandinavian heathens had a fair
number of culturally important forms of magic:
Runes: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runes
Seiðr: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sei%C3%B0r
Galdr: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Galdr

to name several of the most important categories, other than herbal remedies, which were often
mixed with one of the above magical practices to increase their efficacy.

However, Snorri does throw in three more concepts germane to the question of how the early tellers
of the legend may have conceived of the ‘resurrection:’ he says Hild ‘woke up’ the dead; he says the
dead were ‘woken up’ at night; and he says the dead plus their battle accoutrements turned into
stones at the end of each daily battle. And he gives one final clue: the supposed location of the
battle: “When King Hogni got to Norway he discovered that Hedin had sailed over the sea to the
west. Then Hogni sailed after him all the way to the Orkneys, and when he got to the place called
Hoy, he found Hedin there with his army…” [Faulkes (2), page 122]

So, now, I want to use those clues to look at one possible context for the mechanics of ‘resurrection’
in the Hjaðningavíg legend; and that is, the idea that Hildr used a supernatural board game, possibly
one that had been stolen from the gods themselves.

Not much is known about the group of board games called ‘tafl’ within Old Norse heathen culture.
We don’t know for sure how they were played, or what the rules were. And “tafl may mean any sort
of board game” within that culture. [Tolkien, page 37]
What we have been able to infer from the material and literary data, however, is that tafl games were
closely connected with death, magic and the realm of the gods, and burials of warriors in particular.

06 EARLY 11th CENTURY BOARD GAME, TRONDHEIM, NORWAY

‘Nefltafl’ board, with bone pieces
photo by Photo by: NTNU Vitenskapsmuseet at https://www.flickr.com/people/38254448@N05
Creative attribution, share-alike license

There is some archaeological evidence that the games had spiritual and cultural dimensions beyond
the merely material aspects, one grave even having a game laid out in the center of it as if a game was
in progress. [Hall, page 446].

The best-known and finest of the Viking-era Eddic poems, Völuspá, ‘Prophecy of the Seeress,’ ties a
tafl game belonging to the gods with their ‘golden era,’ and the loss of it with the loss of their peace
and prosperity:
8. at tables played at home;
joyous they were;
to them was naught
want of gold,
until three came
thurs- maidens,
all powerful,
from Jötunheim.
[Völuspá (01)]

The game is also tied to the beginning of a new world the seeress predicts will come after Ragnarök,
the ‘doom of the gods:’
57. She sees arise,
a second time,
earth from ocean,
beauteously green,
waterfalls descending;
the eagle flying over,
which in the fell
captures fish.
The Æsir are found
on Ida´s plain,
and of the mighty earth-encircler speak, and of the great-god’s ancient runes.
59. Then again shall
the wondrous
golden tables
be found in the grass;
those they had owned
in early days.
[Völuspá (01)]

A.G. van Hamel argues that the word Thorpe translates as ‘wondrous,’ ‘undrsamligar,’ has more of the
meaning of ‘eerie,’ ‘supernatural,’ ‘supremely magical.’ [van Hamel, pages 221 – 225]

One of the game’s most striking appearances in the Viking sagas, is in the ‘Saga of King Heidrik the
Wise:’

A man named Gestumblindi had seriously pissed off one King Heidrek. The king sent him a summons
to appear, to be reconciled with the king or to die, whichever he cared to choose. Gestumblindi
didn’t like his chances for a judgment by the king’s ‘wise men;’ so he sacrificed to Ódin and asked him
for help. Ódin appeared to him one evening and changed clothes with Gestumblindi, and told him to
make himself scarce for a while.
Then, Ódin appeared before King Heidrek in the guise of Gestumblindi, saying he had come to be
reconciled with the king. Rather than submit to the king’s councillors for judgment, the ersatz
Gestumblindi opted for Door Number 2: a riddle contest with the king; and, if the latter failed to
answer all the riddles that ‘Gestumblindi’ posed to him, then Gestumblindi was off the hook for any
other ‘reconciliation’ trials. [Paraphrasing Tolkien, page 32]

“… Then said Gestumblindi:

(55) What thanes are they to the thing riding, all at one5 together; across the lands their liegemen
sending seeking a place to settle? This riddle ponder, O prince Heidrek!”

“‘Your riddle is good, Gestumblindi,’ said the king; ‘I have guessed it. These are Ítrek and Andad, 6
sitting at their chequerboard.’

“NOTE 5 If the ‘thanes’ who ride to the ‘thing’ (meeting) are the kings in chess, one would not expect
them to be called either sáttir or sextán (sixteen); but in fact it is not clear what the game is (tafl may
mean any sort of board-game).

“NOTE 6 Ítrekr may have been a name for Ódin, and Andaðr or Ǫnduðr is found in a list of giant-
names, so that it is just conceivable that the pieces in this game were thought of as representing a
conflict between the gods and the giants. The solution in [manuscript] H is: þat er tafl Ítreks
konungs.” [Tolkien, page 37] [‘That is the tafl game of King Ítrek’s’. My translation for that last
sentence in English]

[In the saga, Gestumblindi goes on to ask two more riddles connected with tafl games.]

Ursula Dronke points out that in the Þulur (lists of names, synonyms and kennings mentioned in Eddic
sources, found in Skaldskaparmal), Ítrek is identified with Odinn and Andaðr is the name of a giant,
possibly meaning ‘Dead One.’ [Dronke (2), page 119]
The reference to Odin and Ítrek can be found on page 156 of Faulkes (2). The reference to Andaðr
appears as ‘Ondud’ on page 156 of in Faulkes’ translation of Skaldskaparmal [Faulkes (2)] , and as
Anduðr on page 111 of his Icelandic edition of the same [Faulkes (1)]. In his ‘Glossary and Vocabulary’
to Skaldskaparmal, Faulkes confirms on page 444 that Anduðr is a name for a male giant; and on page
235 he confirms that the word ‘andaðr’ means ‘dead.’ [Faulkes (4)]

Dronke argues that in the Old Norse world-view, there was “a symbolic link between tafl and the
world’s fortune,” and that “the contending of Ítrekr and Andaðr at tafl and the association of dice with
tafl re-enact, as it were, “the element of chance in the world’s fortune.” [Dronke (2), pages 120 – 121]

The earliest written legal sources indicate that heathen beliefs included “doing things to stones or
filling them with magical power.” [15]

The early 11th century picture- stone GS 19, discovered in the church of Ockelbo, Sweden, displays
scenes from the Sigurd legends, as well as a scene of two beings playing a tafl game.

07 GS 19 OCKELBO RUNESTONE
Picture by Photo by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Berig , creative attribution, share-alike license.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sigurd_stones#Gs_19

Andreas Nordberg argues that in Iron-Age Scandinavia, “the grave monument can be regarded as a
passage or threshold, i.e. a ‘gateway’ between this and the Other World;” [Nordberg, page 36] and,
that “the grave also seems to have served as a ‘door’ to the Other World for example on occasions
when surviving relatives were trying to summon the dead to the world of the living.” [ibid, page 37]

In her deeply thoughtful article ‘Doors to the dead. The power of doorways and thresholds
in Viking Age Scandinavia,’ Marianne Hem Eriksen makes the same argument for Viking Age graves.
[Eriksen, pages 187-214]

In addition to Snorri’s mention of Orkney, the early 12th century Earl of Orkney, Rögnvaldr, mentions
both tafl and runes as being among the nine skills he especially possesses:
Tafl em ek örr at efla;
íþóttir kannk níu;
týnik trauðla rúnum;
tíðs mér bók ok smíðir.
Skríða kannk á skíðum;
skýtk ok roek, svát nýtir;
hvártveggja kannk hyggja:
harpslátt ok bragþáttu.

(I am quick at playing board games; I have

nine skills; I forget runes slowly; the book is
a preoccupation with me and also craftsmanship.
I am able to glide on skis; I shoot and I
row so that it makes a difference; I am able
to understand both: harp-playing and poems.) [Jesch, page 156]

Snorri references the particular Orkney Island of Hoy in his re-telling of the Hjaðningavíg myth,
perhaps because of its peculiar stony landscape:

08 BEACH AT HOY
“Beach at Hoy showing the unusual large pebble shaped stones (around half a meter to a meter long)”
by https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/User:F%C3%A6 ; creative attribution, share-alike license

09 OLD MAN OF HOY

“Old Man of Hoy” photo by https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Grinner ; creative attribution and
share-alike license

In my next blog-post, on Gullveig and Heidr, I will come back to the question of the mechanics of
‘raising the dead.’

04. Other and Later Versions of the Hjaðningavíg Myth.

The Danish writer Saxo Grammaticus probably composed his version of the Hjaðningavíg early in the
13th century. He clearly had trouble with the motivation aspect of Hildr’s incitement to eternal battle,
although he accepted it as being a traditional part of the legend. He makes Hildr and Hedin lovers,
whose marriage was approved at first by Hildr’s father, Hǫgni. However, “certain slanderers” brought
to Hǫgni “a trumped-up charge” that Hedin had “dishonoured” Hildr before marriage [Saxo, page 147
– 149], and this was what led to the battle of the Haddings, which, according to Saxo, took place “on
the island of Hiddensee,” the island of the Mecklenberg coast, west of Rügen. [Saxo, Notes on Text,
page 87]. Saxo states that: “According to popular belief, Hild yearned so ardently for her husband
that she conjured up spirits of the dead men at night so that they could renew their fighting.” [Saxo,
page 149]

Sörla þáttr eða Heðins saga ok Högna, ‘The tale of Sörli, with the story of Hedin and Hogni’
This late 14th century version of the Hjaðningavíg myth shows a Christian determination to stamp out
once and for all any ideas the people may have had about pagan entities holding power over human
lives and deaths. Short version: the battle is the fault of those pagan rogues, Odin and Freyja, who
get their comeuppance when the Christians, led by the 10th century Norwegian King Olaf Tryggvason,
show up on the island of Hoy, to put an end to that ‘eternal battle’ nonsense. Here’s the longer
edition of the story: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%C3%B6rla_%C3%BE%C3%A1ttr and Elizabeth
Ashman Rowe does an excellent summary in her article [Rowe]. As Judy Quinn points out: “… it is
hardly surprising that in the context of the accreted narrative tradition surrounding King Óláfr
Tryggvason and his work to convert pagans into Christianity preserved in Flateyjarbók and elsewhere,
traditions were reconfigured to counter any notions that magic could resurrect mortals, or that
valkyries might have control over the timing of a man’s death…” [Quinn (2), page 811]

10 LOKI STEALS FREYJAS NECKLACE

‘Loki steals Freyja's Necklace’ in Sörla þáttr eða Heðins saga ok Högna. Drawing by F.W. Heine

11 ODIN
‘Odin’ by Sir E. Burne-Jones, 1895

Skíðaríma
A century or so after Sörla þáttr was written, some Icelandic wit responded with Skíðaríma.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sk%C3%AD%C3%B0ar%C3%ADma Read as a clap-back to the clearly
Christian-proselytizing account of the Hjaðningavíg, which bowdlerized and sought to destroy a
legendary legacy from pagan times, Skíðaríma is a real scream.

‘Skíðaríma’ is the title of Theo Homan’s brilliant two-year study into the texts, with a complete
Icelandic text, commentaries and English translation.
My paraphrase, along with quotes in italics from Homan’s translation: Odin drinks Skíði’s health, but
cringes when the latter asks God to reward Odin, and then tells Skíði, a sneaky and thieving beggar,
that he “must choose a woman.” He can have anyone except Odin’s “dear Freyja.” Skíði chooses
“dear Hildur the slim,” Hǫgni’s daughter. Hǫgni is thrilled, and says “I cannot choose any better, for
here we are dealing with an honourable man.” When asked her opinion of the marriage proposal,
Hildur says: “I promised Hedinn that I would wait for him, but if my father asserts himself in this I will
not despise Skíði.”
“Skíði stretched out a dirty hand. Then he was going to be wedded to Hildur. Odin offered him the
land of Asia and all he wanted to choose. With this the hero acquired the title of king, experienced
and swift in battle. Many gibed at the man: “Boorish Skíði seems to me.” Skíði hastily crossed
himself, quickly with his paw. This tiding reached us: he got a blow on his snout. Heimdallur dealt
him this blow with the fair end of his horn….” [Homan, pages 354 – 355].

At the end, it all turns out to be a dream; but, you’d have to be really obtuse, not to see the message
behind the story of the sneaky and thieving – but Christian – beggar who dreamt that he was going to
get everything he wanted just handed over to him, in the hall of the pagan gods.

I was howling with laughter by the time I’d finished reading the entire tale.

05 Was the myth of the Hjaðningavíg drawn from a foreign source?

There was for sure an older Greek legend of battle going on apparently ‘till the end of time,’ and that
was the battle of Marathon, as related by one Pausanias, writing in the 2 nd century A.D. (also known
as C.E.) [16]

However, it would appear that the battle of Marathon was a ghostly one, albeit with ‘daemonic
spirits,’ whatever those would happen to be.

Examples of the dead coming back to life to fight on until doomsday, are a lot harder to come by, not
that this has stopped scholars from trying to scrounge one up.

One Irish battle often mentioned in connection with the Hjaðningavíg is ‘Cath Maige Tuired: The
Second Battle of Mag Tuired:’ https://celt.ucc.ie/published/T300010.html (Also known as the
second battle of Moytura or Moytirra.) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cath_Maige_Tuired

Michael Chesnutt quite rightly points out that: “Snorri’s tale [of the Hjaðningavíg] conflates several of
the motifs for which Irish parallels have been mentioned. According to Cath Maige Turedh, the Tuatha
Dé Danann [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuatha_D%C3%A9_Danann ] enjoy three magic
advantages: their wizard can revive the dying; their weapons are “reborn overnight;” and their
druidesses can create an army out of stones or other raw material. In Skáldskaparmál , we are first
told that the princess raised the fallen. Later it is added that the men and weapons on the battlefield
were turned to stone, only to regain their former shape next day. Snorri separates these statements,
as though uncertain of their joint meaning. If the distinct elements found in the Irish version were
allusively handled (or already confused) in his poetic sources, we can understand his bewilderment.”
[Chesnutt, page 132] That seems like a reasonable assessment, especially with respect to Snorri’s
interpretation, writing in the 13th century, and it does sound like Snorri may have added a few things
to the mix of the legend – something he was certainly not above doing.

However, there’s a problem with concluding from Chesnutt’s remarks, that the Irish legend gave rise
to the Norse one in its essential elements, and that is Chesnutt’s own dating of the two legends. He
goes on to say to say that “Cath Maige Turedh cannot be precisely dated, but in its present form it can
be no older than the eleventh century. Most likely it is a product of the Middle Irish literary revival… of
the eleventh or twelfth centuries…” [Chesnutt, pages 132 – 133]

And previously, Chesnutt had made it clear that he did not accept Snorri’s attribution of the
Ragnarsdrápa as being from a 9th century poet. He said: “Háttalykill [
http://userpage.fu-berlin.de/~alvismal/4list.pdf ] and Skáldskaparmál are not our only witnesses to
the Everlasting Fight motif in Norse literature, but they are certainly older than any other example.
37
” His note 37 states: “With the exception, that is, of the Hjaðningavíg story in Saxo, which point of
chronology stands somewhere between the two…” [Chesnutt, page 131]

However, more recently, Margaret Clunies Ross has set out a case for dating Ragnarsdrápa to the
ninth century: “Most scholars have accepted that Rdr [Ragnarsdrápa] and Bragi’s poetry generally
are of ninth-century date and pointed to such features as the sporadic observance of hendingar, [ cf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alliterative_verse#Dr%C3%B3ttkv%C3%A6tt ] especially aðalhending [
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/a%C3%B0alhending ] in the even lines, and the relatively
straightforward word order, while acknowledging that both diction and metre show the dróttkvætt
stanza to be already fully operational by his time (cf. de Vries 1957). However, Marold (1986b),
following the earlier views of Sophus Bugge (1894), has associated Rdr with the reconquest of
Northumberland by the Danes 980 – 1015 and thus disputes its early date.” [Clunies Ross (2), page
28]

With respect to the issue of the dating of the works Snorri quotes in Skáldskaparmál Alan Bernstein
remarks: “The value of Snorri’s work is that he intended it to preserve older poetic (and mythological)
traditions that he considered in danger of fading away under the influence of Christianity. Despite the
lateness of his record, Snorri explicitly drew on older poems, the Elder, or Poetic Edda, that date, in
some cases, from the ninth century. Because so many interpolations have been detected in the Poetic
Edda, it is difficult to know how much of the surviving text actually dates back that far. Nonetheless, it
is reasonable to assume that these poems are written testimonies of older, oral traditions. Regardless
of the precise age of the written sources, it is clear that non-Christians of the Germanic language
group attributed identifiable activities to the dead and to groups of the dead.” [Bernstein, page 124]
However, even if one accepts the later date of late tenth to early eleventh century, a transfer of the
eternal-battle motif to the Norse myth from the Second Battle of Moytura would still seem to be
highly unlikely, based on Chestnutt’s own dating of the latter legend.

Alan Bernstein considers that the Irish legend of The Death of Muircertach mac Erca
http://www.ancienttexts.org/library/celtic/ctexts/muircertach.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muirchertach_mac_Muiredaig_(Mac_Ercae)
parallels that of the Hjaðningavíg. Although he does not try to date the Irish legend or to assess which
of the two legends might have influenced the other one, he concludes: ““…Yet the Germanic and Irish
concepts have important features in common.
The parallel between Síd and Hildr is crucial. Both women have the ability to summon dead men in
troops. [Bernstein, page 159]
“…In Irish tales such as The Death of Muichertach mac Erca, as in Old Norse, armies of the dead fight
at the behest of women with supernatural powers….” [ibid]

However, in his own re-telling of the Irish myth, Bernstein states that:

“… At different times, she [Sín] summons more “troops,” who wage imaginary battles that gradually
cause Muirchertach to lose his mind. Sín conjures up blue men who fight goat-headed men. Unable to
see that they are imaginary, Muirchertach fights them all. Everyone he kills stands up again and
continues to fight until he becomes exhausted (§21). Soon blue men fight headless men. Then
Muirchertech fights stones, clods of earth, and bundles of grass (§23). As Muirchertach’s grasp of
reality begins to slip, Cleitech’s priests intervene asking, “Why are you striking stones, O Muirchertach,
who has lost his mind?” (§25) Seeing in Cleitech the possibility of help, Muirchertach confesses to him
and receives communion (§26–28). For her part, Sín derides the priests, because “they sing only what
is irrational” (§30). As Muichertach’s madness deepens, he remembers the prophecy that he will die as
his grandfather did, not in battle, but in a fire (§35). He imagines himself attacked by the lineage
descending from Niall of the Nine Hostages, legendary founder of the rival dynasty that ruled from
Tara (§35). It will emerge (§49) that Sín’s loyalty is to this dynasty.
“Having charmed Muirchertach to sleep after a premonitory nightmare that accurately predicted that
what she would cause him to believe would happen, Sín arranges the lances and spears of armies in
battle at the doors and windows of the house, all pointing inward. Then, she formed a host of men
around the fortress. She set fire to the house and came to bed with the king. He awoke and exclaimed
correctly: “A phantom army has appeared to me burning the house on my head and massacring my
people right up to the door.” Sín replied soothingly, and accurately, “No harm will come from that
except that it has appeared.” (§§38–39). As the fire seems more menacing, Muirchertach (losing track
of the fact that this is all appearance) asks, “Who is that all around the house”? (§40). Sín replies with
the list of Muirchertach’s Tara-based enemies from his earlier nightmare (§35) and she adds that their
leader has come “to avenge himself on you for the battle of Granar” (where, we learn later—§49—
Muirchertach had killed Sín’s father). The text states objectively: “He did not know that it was not true
and that there was no flesh-and-blood army surrounding the house” (§40). This is the final illusion.
Believing himself surrounded by his enemies, his house ablaze, fated to die in a fire as his grandfather
did before him, Muirchertach takes refuge in a wine barrel he believed to be empty and drowns. The
house falls in on him (§42). Duaibsech dies of grief for Muirchertach (§46). After the funeral, Sín
appears magically alongside the proceedings. It is clear she is of the sídhe, and the priests
realize who she is. She bargains with them, a confession in return for paradise. In her confession she
admits that she has exacted revenge for Muirchertach’s victory over her father and all his clan, for
having exterminated the ancient tribes of Tara (§49). Then, Sín, too, dies of grief for Muirchertach
(§49). Cairnech prays Muirchertach out of hell and into paradise (§51).” [Bernstein, page 157]

“Sín’s character fits the description in William of Auvergne. A beautiful woman discovered during a
hunt when separated from his attendants attracts a man to his destruction. Sín’s ability to conjure up
troops of combatants exemplifies the theme of the Ghostly Troop…” [Bernstein, page 158]

See, the fairy Sín’s conjurations are the conjuring up of ghosts; she is most emphatically not said to be
bringing men back to life; her conjurations are illusions. Until she burns her victim up in a very real
fire that she’s convinced him to think is just another delusion, of course.

It seems to me that, if anything, the Irish legend of The Death of Muircertach mac Erca is yet another
attempt by medieval Christian propagandists to do away altogether with the valkyries as a legendary
power. The Hjaðningavíg has become an illusory conjuration of ghosts, and if you believe in the
legend, it can kill you.