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Minty · Posted: Thu Aug 23, 2007 8:28 pm Post subject: Odin

Odin (also known as Wodan or Wotan) was the chief God of Germanic Mythology; he was the son of Bor and the grandson of Buri. He was favoured by the Vikings particularly and rose to prominence in the 8th and 9th centuries. These raiders and seafarers were attracted by Odin’s love of battle and as the “father of the slain”, for in Valhalla, a vast hall in the divine fortress of Asgard, the one-eyed god was said to preside over the Einherjar (“glorious dead”). It seems that at this time Odin overtook Tyr (who had been identified as the sky god of the northern European people by the Romans). Tyr kept his interest in war, but hard-bitten warriors looked to Odin for their inspiration. The power to whip men up into a state of berserk rage, in which they felt neither pain nor fear, was Odin’s alone. These terrifying berserkers would rush into the fighting, naked and biting the edges of their shields in a maddening frenzy. Odin’s name means something similar to “madness” or “fury”. It indicates possession, as in the battle-frenzy exhibited by the Irish battle hero, Cuchulainn.
That Odin came to be the foremost god shows just how important fighting and warfare always was in the Germanic tradition. It should be noted, however, that he did not possess martial ecstasy himself; rather he inspired it in a devious manner. Odin was always ready to stir up trouble, and on one occasion ordered the fertility goddess, Freyja, to “find two kings and set them at each other’s throats” so that their vassals (lords) would wade through rivers of blood on the battlefields. The Danish King Harald was given many victories in battle as he was said to have been instructed in tactics by the god. In his final battle, though, Odin was said to have taken the place of the King’s charioteer and is said to have driven the King to his death. When asked about such withdrawals of luck, Odin was said to reply with “the grey wolf watches the halls of the gods”. Bringing to Valhalla heroic warriors that were slain in battle was the only policy that Odin could adopt under the constant threat of Ragnarok (the doom of the Gods). These Einherjar (“glorious dead”) were desperately needed for the final battle on the Vigrid Plain, where nearly all would perish in the struggle between the gods and the frost giants. Odin himself was to be killed by Fenrir, the monstrous wolf offspring of the fire god, Loki, and the frost giantess, Angrboda.
As well as his authority over the glorious dead and the battlefield, Odin was also a god of wisdom and magic. As the first-born son of, Bor, and the oldest of the gods, he was treated by the other gods as their father. As shifty-eyed as he may have been, there was also a strong positive side to his character as the most learned god. This opposite positive/negative side is very similar to the Hindu god Shiva, the great destroyer/saviour of Indian mythology. Odin’s love of wisdom was so great that he was prepared to sacrifice himself to explore its depths. He was often pictured as a one-eyed old man with grey hair, his face hidden by a broad brimmed hat or hood. He sacrificed his eye into Mimir’s well in return for a drink of its “immense wisdom”. He gained insight another way, by hanging himself from Yggdrasil, the cosmic tree, for nine days. This voluntary death and subsequent resurrection by means of magic, gave Odin more wisdom than anyone else. During the Vikings heyday, hanging was an important part of Odin worship, even being seen as a shortcut to Valhalla, the Viking raid of Nantes (in north western France) in 842 can therefore be seen as the outcome of this barbarous pledge to the god. Most of the city’s inhabitants were killed and hanged, naked or clothed, from the town’s trees. It was “axe-age, sword-age,” a violent chapter prior to the end of the world that would come at Ragnarok.
As well as Frigg, his wife in Asgard, Odin had many other wives, and he fathered many children. Among those said to be his children are Balder, Hodr, Vali and Thor.
Odin kept himself informed about the happenings of the nine worlds with the aid of his two faithful ravens, as Vikings at sea sent out ravens to find land. Odin’s own ravens Huginn (thought) and Muninn (memory) flew about and then “whispered into his ears every scrap of news which they saw or heard tell of”. Because of his wisdom and his knowledge of events, he was oppressed by the approach of Ragnarok. Just as Germanic mythology had started with a cosmos covered in blood (that of the original frost giant, Ymir, when Odin and his brothers, Vili and Ve had carved the world of men from his dead body), so the final chapter was to be a battlefield, where the gods were to gush out their own blood, at Ragnarok, the doom of the gods. Ragnarok began with the death of Odin’s son, Balder, and the realization, that in Loki, the god of fire, they had allowed the growth of evil. There was nothing that Odin could do to halt the inevitable. His only solace was the knowledge that his resurrected son, Balder, would be worshipped in his place in a new age, in a new land which would emerge from the sea.

Compiled from: The Ultimate Encyclopedia of Mythology - Arthur Cotterell and Rachel Storm.
Northern Mythology - Benjamin Thorpe

BB, Minty. xx

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RavenStar · Posted: Fri Aug 24, 2007 8:55 am Post subject:

Thanks for that Minty ~ really interesting stuff.

I love reading about the different Gods and Godesses