a womb by magic – transcending gender, transcending realities

8/20/2019 A Womb by Magic – Transcending Gender, Transcending Realities

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A Womb by Magic – Transcending Gend er, Transc endingRealitiesIntroduction: Homosexuality and Gender-Bending in the V iking Age

After the introduction of Christianity in Scandinavia (early 11th century AD), lawswere passed that mayhave forbidden same-sex couples from living together like married couples. To be more exact, there wasno exact law against homosexual relations or co-living as such, but rather a rule that outlawedhomosexuality and homosexual relationships as a valid reason t o refuse offers of heterosexual marriage.

As any historian knows, laws against a phenomenon strongly indicates that the phenomenon was knownand practiced before the law was introduced. Thus it is likely that homosexual couples were known andthat some may actually have lived together before the Conversion, in Pagan Scandinavia, or at leastrefused to marry hetereosexually for those reasons.

No records of lesbians are known to us, but in the penalising legal texts they are at least described by anative term: flannfluga(“ she who flees the penis”). No other term is known that describeslesbians, probably because they are not mentioned in the post-conversion texts that we are left with. Malehomosexuals were in the legal texts correspondingly called fuðflogi (“he who flees the vagina”). No lawswere enacted against homosexual relations except the one that prohibited them from refusingheterosexual marriage because of a homosexual relationship.

However, many laws were passed against the offense of calling other me n by terms that indicated “passivehomosexuality” (to be the penetrated part in the relation). These terms were negative and were all directedat the “shameful unmanliness” of men who allowed other men to penetrate them. No shame whatsoever was attached to being the active part, so dominating gay men could freely engage in all the activities theywanted provided they found another male who was willing to risk his reputation, or who, as we shall see,belonged to the “sacred queer” cat egory (more on that later). To tease someone about this was, after theintroduction of Christianity, penalised by law.

We could stop here and wonder if these laws were actual laws against harassment of feminine gay men!But this is probably inaccurate. These laws were passed from within a Medieval Christian context trying todeal with the Scandinavian culture of the time. The Church introduced several laws that were designed toavoid the blood feuds that had ridden the Pagan era like a plague. Blood feuds often began with insults. Itis thus very probable that the insinuation of passive homosexuality in a man was considered a great insultalso during the Pagan Viking Age.

That unmanliness was attached to being the passive part in a homosexual relation was thus probably alsotrue of the Pagan era that preceded these laws. The average Viking Age warrior would be very consciousabout preserving his masculinity and would feel uncomfortable and insulted if he was teased about“unmanliness”, which would include cowardice, fearfulness, physically harming women, or being thepassive part during homosexual intercourse. Before laws were enacted against such teasing, he wouldlikely resort to violence and manslaughter if he became the object of such teasing from someone he couldreach, and/or a blood feud could have begun as a result.

When I first mentioned this subject in one of my videos (where I talked about the myth of crossdressingThor), someone objected, saying that it was impossible to imagine the fierce, manly, warrior Vikings havinghomosexual relations. Apart from the obvious fact that the total absense of homosexuality in any society isan impossibility, seeing as it naturally occurs everywhere, homosexuals making up a considerable minorityof the population in all cultures whether the culture approve of them or not, the statement shows a lack of historical insight. I would like to use the movie “300″ about the last stand of king Leonidas the Spartanking and his 300 fierce Spartan warriors to illustrate my point. I was very amused when I watched thisentertaining movie and king Leonidas jokingly accuses the Athenians of being soft boy lovers.

The Athenians certainly idealized the sexual relationship between grown men and young boys in their puberty, but what the movie completely failed to add is the fact that the fierce warlike Spartans not onlyidealized it, but actually institutionalized it. A young Spartan warrior-to-be would be taken as an apprenticeto an older warrior in order to learn the arts of being a man, which included warriorship but also sex – withthe older man. The manliness, warlikeness and the fierceness of these people was in their eyescompletely compatible with homosexual relations, although to be the passive partner was not suitable for agrown man.

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In warlike, conquering Rome, homosexuality was likewise completely accepted, although a grown Romanmale should not submit to being penetrated. He could, however, freely and without shame penetrateforeigners, young boys, and slaves. I use these examples to demonstrate that modern views onhomosexuality were different in ancient times, and that the Old Norse attitudes may be remnants of alargely common attitude in European cultures in ancient times that were only eradicated and outlawed bythe Church. Female homosexuality in these cultures was also completely unproblematic as such, or to bemore exact, it was ignored. The only restrictions placed on homosexuals in these cultures were the factthat they would have to agree to heterosexual marriage and that males could be ridiculed if they wereknown to be passive partners.

The written material and the archaeological recordsshows us that then, as now, there were people whodefied the ordinary gender stereotypes of their time.In short, during the Viking Age, there were men whodid not mind being called “unmanly”, and who wouldnot even be teased about it, because although theymight have been considered “queer” (unusual), theybelonged to a sacred category, what I would calla ”sacred queer” category. Ragnvald Rettilbeini, theson of Harald Hárfagri, was a seiðmaðr – a sorcerer,and although no record of “unmanly” behavior areknown to us, his nickname rettilbeini could actuallymean “feminine legs” or “welcoming legs” (in apassive, sexual way).

Another word for a male sorcerer was seiðberenðr ,which literally translates as “magical womb”.

Archaeology has shown that biological males were sometimes buried with typical female gear and femaledress in Scandinavia. Some biological females, likewise, were buried with masculine gear. These “queer”burials always belong to people who were obviously associated with magic. They were also buried with allhonours. We are getting a glimpse of a society that, despite a strong male-female polarity, actuallyaccepted and even honoured gender-benders of both sexes, and that they associated them with magicand sorcery, which were sacred arts during the Pagan era.

The “Likes of Bitches“

“I despise the godsand Freya is a bitchFor Odin and Freya, boththe likes of bitches I hold” .Thus spoke the poet Hialti Skeggjason at the Icelandic assembly in the year 999 A.D. The young poet hadbeen abroad and returned to Iceland a Christian. Hialti was exiled from Iceland for his blasphemy, but onlythe year after, in 1000 A.D the same assembly that exiled him voted for Christianity to be the new officialOne Faith of all Icelanders. From then on it was allowed to openly despise the old gods, although for thisto sink in took some time.

Some 220 years after the Conversion, the scholar Snorri Sturluson realized that the old mythology wasfinallyabout to fade in the memories of people, the gradual cessation of mythic knowledge rendering theproud metaphoric traditions of Norse poetry meaningless. Snorri´s scholarly love of the past made himspend five years trying to save some of the Norse Pagan worldview for the future, gathering his knowledgefrom families that “still remembered” the customs of old and from poets who created such works as theHávamál , the Völuspá and some other poems later found in the Elder, Poetic Edda.

Pagan beliefs and practices of the home and hearth were still notable in remote places of Scandinaviauntil at least the sixteenth century, indeed, Snorri in the thirteenth century conspicuously states that Freyais the one deity of all the Norse pantheon that still lives and performs her functions as a blotgydja – asacrificial priestess. Rests of pagan folk belief lingered on into modern times, shown in for example thetradition of serving porridge to thetusser as well as in the contents of some fairy tales.

It has always confused me a bit why Hialti Skeggjason chose to offend exactly Odin and Freya in hisspeech at the assembly in 999 A.D. These deities were not the major deities in Iceland: The cult of Thor the thunder god was definitely the most popular in both Iceland and Norway, Freyr holding a good secondposition. In Sweden, Freyr´s was apparently the most important cult.

Odin and Freya were gods of the aristocracy that did not exist in Iceland, as well as of the marginal,initiated people like poets, witches and sorcerers (völur and seidmennir ) as well as berserk warriors.

Apparently, Freya also had some importance in the home-cults of women, sided with Frigg. If Hialti reallywanted to rock the world of Icelandic male peasants, he would have chosen to offend Thor and Freyr,whose cults were certainly strong and popular enough to compete with the new Faith.

file(s) you want in return, I will sendyou my one or more of my translationsof: 1)Voluspa - THE DIVINATION OFTHE WITCH (min.10 dollars)2)Grottesongr - THE SONG OF THEMILLSTONE OF FATE (min 5 dollars )3)Allvissmal - THE SONG OF MUCHKNOWING (min. 5 dollars)

History and Culture

Civilized Men in the Savage North…Democratic ParliamentLabyrinth Rituals in ScandinaviaRoots of the Bronze AgeScandinavia before the Viking Age –MigrationsTemple of Uppsala and DísablótThe Indo-European RootsTHE ORIGIN OF VIKINGS INFRANCIAThe Real Origin of Viking RaidsThe Temple of Nehalennia at

DomburgThree by Three Roots to the EddaMythsTribal Mothers of the North – theMatron Cult of the Iron AgeWitches and Warriors – theNorthern Barbarian CultureWomen and War – The FemaleInciter

Celebrations

The Old Norse Yule Celebration –Myth and RitualViking Halloween – the Alfablot –

Sacrifice to the Elves

Ancient Northern Tribes A-Z

A: Ancient Northern Tribes A-Z Adogit /Halogi – The NorthernmostKingdom Aelvaeonii – Helveconae (SouthSweden and Poland) Aeragnariciii – Ranrike – Viken –The Tribe that Gave Vikings their name? And the Real Gandalf! Alamanni/Alemanni – Suebi, Suevii,Semnones Ambronii (Liguriii) – Flood Survivors

of the 2nd Century BC Ampsivarii – The Tribe thatPerished Angles (Ingles, English) – DanishExpansion and Anglish Migration Angrivarii Atuatuci – Descendants of theCimbri Augandzi – Agder on South Norway – Queen Asa, Halfdan the Black, aHuman Sacrifice and a Man calledWolverine

Mythology

Burning the Witch! – The Initiation of the Goddess and the War of the Aesir and the Vanir.Death-MarriageEdda Poems – A SummaryFylgja – Guardian Spirit and Ancestral Mother


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Yet it would be no good to liken these two gods with bitches. The axe-wielding, thunderous Thor and thephallic Freyr were gods with whom a Norse peasant and warrior could identify; masculine, strong,protective and honest gods married to beautiful and honorable goddesses, they were the rulers of weather, fertility and good sea-faring. Thor´s function was the dynamic and war-like defense againstdestructive forces, Freyr´s was to rule agriculture and livestock – both deities were concerned with rain,sunshine and weather in general.

Thor´s popularity in Iceland becomes very clear in Snorri´s Edda, where Thor-mythology seems todominate the picture completely. Going to the older source, the Poetic Edda, however, Thor has becomeless important, and in many of the poems in which he features, he is being made fun of! His male pride, hisbrute strength and his aggressive fear of the giants become the object of ridicule both in the Trymskvida

and in the Hárbardsljod . The characters who tell him off in each of the poems are Freya, who forces thegod to dress up as a woman, and Odin, who refuses to Thor the entrance into his divine spheres, tellinghim to seek his mother Earth, for she will show him the way.

Even Snorri reveals a myth in which Thor is being humiliated for his masculine pride and belief in his ownstrength – being taken down by an old woman and made a fool of in the presence of grander cosmicbeings. Yet Snorri is quick to tell of Thor´s “revenge”, hoping to reestablish the honor of a favorite god.

What the myths of Thor seem to reveal is a certain ambivalence in the relations between the popular cultsof Thor, attended to by the common folk – and the marginal cults of Odin and Freya, which seemed tohave been ecstatic cults of initiation for the specially interested.

Modern Stereotypes: The Patriarch and the Beauty

Freya is often identified with Aphrodite – the goddess of love and beauty. Much emphasis has been put onher sexual character – an emphasis that has little foundation in the actual texts. There are three storiesthat serve to “establish” Freya´s role as ruling the sphere of sex and love: Snorri states that Freya “likedromantic poems” and was good to pray to in such cases. In the Poetics Edda, there is a passage in thepoem Lokasenna where Loki accuses Freya of having slept with all the elves and Aesir in the hall of Aegir.

Another text describes how Freya granted a night each to the four dwarfs who made the Fiery Jewel for her.

The image of Freya as the goddess of love is so deeply rooted in the popular mind that other passagesare also taken for granted as proof of her role as a love goddess. When she refuses to marry a giant,exclaiming that she is not crazy for men, this is understood as irony, since the goddess of love certainlymust be quite eager. When the giantess Hyndla accuses her of running about like the goat Heidrún withthe bucks, and having men flying about her skirts, this is understood as another proof. In the 19 century,freethinking poets in Scandinavia spoke of Freya as the protectress of prostitutes, and modern theatremakes Freya appear like a punk hooker. This line of thought goes all the way back to Hialti Skeggjasonwho in 999 A.D gave Freya the name of bitch.

In fact, that Freya likes romantic poems is not the only feature Snorri relates. He also relates that she isthe greatest among goddesses, that she owns her own splendid halls and rules her own lands, that she isher own boss in every situation, and that she moves through the world wearing many names in the searchof her husband Odr – the poetry, weeping tears of red gold as she goes. As head valkyrie, she rules over and chooses the slain for Valhalla, and only after she has chosen does Odin receive his half of thewarriors – that she sends to him – and she keeps the other half to herself.

In the Lokasenna poem, Freya is not the only goddess accused of promiscuity: Absolutely all the other goddesses are accused by Loki of just the same “immoral” behavior. The poem concludes with thedownfall of Loki for misunderstanding the gods.

The four dwarfs who forged the Fiery Jewel were the four directions, and if we consider Freya´s origin as asun-goddess , it sort of gives the four nights a new meaning. It could be that Freya really means no whenshe says so, and is not so crazy for men that she would marry an ogre, and it is certain that thecomparison with the goat Heidrún is a piece of esoteric knowledge. Heidrún means “Bright Runes” and isthe source of the Precious Drink of Memory, Poetry and Wisdom. Her admirers are her worshippers, theinitiates to seek to become worthy of her drink and her sacred embrace.

What Freya and all her hypostases actually do in the Poetic Edda does not limit her to the sexual sphereat all. She stands out as a witch, a teacher, an initiator, a guide in the Underworld, a ruler of an alternative

Afterlife. In countless hypostases, she enters Sacred Marriage with countless heroes: These countless“marriages” have to do with initiation and the union of the individual soul with the divine All-Soul. She is theGreat Goddess, the one being behind every other dís. She is the receiver of the dead, taking the souls of the dead into her divine embrace – how could she be anything else but the lover of all gods, the lover of all elves – elves representing the immortal souls?

Now as to Odin, his name of “bitch” and “castrate” has been happily ignored by most popular presentations. He is supposedly the All-Father, the patriarch and king of a hierarchic pantheon, the god of war and human sacrifice, the ruler of Valhalla and an infamous lover.

His role as a sexually ambivalent witch-god is less prominent in the popular image. His ecstatic character,his shaman behavior and his intimate association with the Great Goddess and the magical sphere of

Haustlöng – a Skaldic Poem aboutSoul RetrievalHyperboreans – A CuriousPilgrimage from Scandinavia toGreece BCIndividual and Collective PowersOld Norse Sources to PaganismÓðinn and the dísir SOLARLJOD – The Song of the SunThe "Worlds" of Old Norse MythsThe Dwarfs of Old Norse Myths

The Eddas – Genuine Sources toPagan Mythology?The Mead in the UnderworldThe Sacred Drink and other Linksbetween Indian, Iranian, Greek,Celtic and Norse MythologiesThe Sources to Old Norse MythsValkyriur – Ladies of War Warrior Initiation and WitchTeachersWomb by Magic – TranscendingGender, Transcending Realities

Rituals of Initiation in the

Poetic Edda1. Óðinn and Gunnlǫð – TheInitiation of a God2. Freyr and Gerðr – The Initiation of a God3. Ottarr and Freyia – The Initiationof an Einheri4. Svipdagr and Menglǫð – TheInitiation of a Hero5. The Reincarnating Valkyria –Initiation in the Heroic Poems6. The Mead and the Maiden – TheInitiation of the Goddess

Seiðr - Old Norse MagicDivinatory Seiðr – Old Norse Texts(translated to English)Seiðmaðr and Earl – The MaleSorcerer or ShamanThe Völva – the Norse Witch

Bibliography

Literature – Bibliography

Lyrics

Asmegin – Huldradans LyricsGjallarhorn – I Riden Sa LyricsKråkevisa – The Song of the CrowWARDRUNA – Helvegen LyricsWardruna Rotlaust Tre Fell lyrics(English translation)

Hidden Knowledge in OldNorse Myths (Video Series)

Video 1-9 (Cosmology andMetaphors)Video 10-18 (Ritual and Initiation)Video 19-27 (Deciphering theCodes of Norse Mythology)Video 28-29 — (Higher Mysteries)

Norse Paganism Videos

Idunn and SkadiNiflunga Saga TrilogyOdin´s Raven Charm – A ForgottenEdda PoemRunes, Mead and InitiationThe Divine Priestess

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women are rarely explored any further, although some scholars certainly have shown that Odin wastranscending boundaries to the extreme, also those of gender.

Transcending Gender in the Edda

” Then Splendid World[1] said, the brightest of gods prophetic he was like all Vanir gods:“Let us cover Thor with the bridal veil let us give him the broad Jewel of Fire [Freyias necklace 2]Let the keys jingle from his belt

let women´s clothing fall down to his knees Let gems be fastened on his breast let us arrange the bridal veil on his head” Then said Thor, the manly god:“The Aesir will mock me and call me unmanly if I let the bridal linen cover me.” Then said Loki, son of Leaf Island:”Quet, Thor, with that kind of speech! Soon the giants will live in Ásgarðr,if you don’t retrieve your hammer.” Trymskvida, st.15-18, Poetic Edda.

Old Norse society nurtured, as most tribal cultures (as well as most parts of modern society) rather clear-cut gender roles. Burial contents and imagery show that gender roles were clear: Yet there wereexceptions – and these exceptions were not only accepted, but even so honored that the proof followedthe “queer” individuals to their graves.

Modern knowledge of DNA has enabled archaeologists to decide gender in ancient burials, and thepuzzlement has been great upon discovering that burials assumed to be masculine or feminine sometimesturn out to be the very opposite. Women were sometimes buried with full hunting gear as far back as theStone Age, and from the Viking Age there are graves in which men have been buried in full femaleadornment and traditional women´s equipment. The same men appear to have had a cultic function.[3]

As to famous ship burial at Oseberg, the splendid remains of which is on permanent display at the VikingShip Museum in Oslo, Norway – two elderly women of equally high rank were buried aboard a beautifulship some time in the early 10 century A.D. The women were probably cultic leaders, maybe priestessesor witches (völur [4] ), accompanied as they were by a wealth of obvious cult objects. Among the smaller objects was a cult staff – possibly the famous wand always carried by a völva, as well as a pouch filled withcannabis seeds. Archeologist Britt Solli has pointed out one interesting feature about the burial contents:The objects belong, in equal measure, both to the masculine and the feminine spheres, showing howthese two women apparently transcended traditional gender roles in some way or other, and that theywere honored as such.

Adam of Bremen, in 1071 A.D., described male Pagan priests dancing in an “effeminate manner”. Tacitus,a thousand years earlier, remarks that male German priests would wear women´s outfits. Going to other sources, Bronze Age pictograms frequently shows figures that appear androgynous – we see phallicfigures wearing the emblem of the Sun goddess within their bellies.

Old Norse mythology and legends not only contain, they are in fact crammed with characters whotranscend what we know to have been the common gender assignments, and these characters are alwayspowerful ones, either magical or magically inclined in some way or other.

Among the divine pantheon and their giant counterparts, Odin and Freya both transcend gender roles.Odin learns from the witches, learns from females, how to practice seidr and galdr , magical functions thatwere considered the spheres of women. He never hesitates to cross-dress or even change his very shapeinto that of a woman´s. Freya, on her side, lives alone and unmarried, rules her own spheresindependently and keeps her own court, takes all the lovers she wishes for, and travels by herself throughthe world. She is still honored as the “most splendid of goddesses”. She might sound like a modern,liberated woman – in her own time she more probably reflected the life of the independentvölva, a witch, awoman exempt from the normal rules of female roles and power – or lack of it.

Then we have the great, ancient goddess Skadi, whose shrines and sanctuaries have left their traces inplace-names all over Scandinavia, showing how she was once, before the Viking Age, a much-honoreddeity. In the mythical poems the poets are playing with the meaning of her name, which is “damage”,“harm”, “accident” and “death”. She is a typical ogress of death, living in the rocky wilderness

accompanied by wolves and shooting with bow and arrow. She is assigned a giant status, becoming divineonly through marriage to a god – a marriage that she promptly leaves when she finds the newsurroundings unbearable. But she is always really on the side of the gods and has lovers among them –lovers who are as androgynous as herself, such as Njordr, Loki and Odin. Her butch image is probably aremnant of her original role as a honored deity: She is a hunter and a warrior, she rules her own lands androams the mountains and the wilderness alone. She is the patroness of skiing and hunting with bow andarrow, and as a warrior she terrifies even the mighty Aesir. Her aggressive and “masculine” behavior ishonored in the myths, as they were in her widespread cult.

The Golden Age and RagnarokTribal Mothers of the North – theMatron Cult of the Iron Age

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2. Metaphorical Wolves:Werewolves, Warriors and Outlaws – We Are Star Stuff tilWarrior Initiation and Witch TeachersEric Swanson tilRoots of theBronze AgeHenning Kure tilThe Eddas –Genuine sources to paganreligion?Henning Kure tilThe Eddas –Genuine sources to paganreligion?Eric tilOld Norse MythologyHenning Kure tilBurning the Witch! – The Initiation of the Goddess andthe War of the Aesir and the Vanir.Henning Kure tilBurning the Witch! – The Initiation of the Goddess andthe War of the Aesir and the Vanir.Leif Trollbani tilThe Real Origin of

Viking Raidswillem versteeg til AncestralMothers and Goddess Collectivesin German Iron Age Votive Altarsand Inscriptions dedicated to the“Matrones”.Donald Dean tilOld NorseMythology

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Loki is another character who easily plays with shape and gender. He transforms into a mare, couples witha stallion and gives birth to the magical steed Sleipnir, the “Glider”, the eight-legged horse who can takeits rider through to different worlds. He cross-dresses and changes into a woman just as Odin does, andsees no shame in it at all, although he, like sorcerers generally, is sometimes accused of “shameful” and“unmanly” behavior. Loki was never worshipped in any Norse cult, and seems to have been a purelypoetical character, somewhat like the hero of a folktale, or rather an anti-hero, popular and infamous in histrickster role at the same time. Some scholars have compared him with the Christian Devil, but Loki is morecomplex than just evil – he might be devious and irresponsible, but he is still one of the gods, and thepoets use his personality for what it is worth: He becomes the image of the human condition itself, bothsexes, both divine and material, craving, lusting, emotional, ambitious, sulking, jealous, but even so he isvitality itself, the life fire and the passion, and the gods use him to steer and guide them through thematerial world.

Both Skadi and Loki are more associated with the magical arts and the “other side”, just as Odin andFreya are. Skadi belongs to the wilderness, associated with rocks, wolves, winter and hunting, symbols of the Underworld. Loki, her lover, is the one traveling between the worlds, changing shape and gender atwill, and the only one who knows how to please her, the giantess of death and destruction, when her anger threatens to destroy the gods. He does so by playing on her sense of humor and on her devotion to harm,ridiculing his own masculinity for all to see. As they appear, the pair is the more barbaric counterparts of Odin and Freya, their mirror images in rougher outfits.

Just as Skadi is a mistress of the Underworld, so is Freya, although her realm is described as beautiful andshining. The two, Skadi and Freya, appear as the two sides of the face of Hel, Mistress of the Dead: Theone face is grim and dark, the face of death, the other side is young and bright, the face of new life. Yet,both are the same.

And just as the two might be called sisters, so Odin and Loki are brothers, at least foster brothers andblood brothers, friends and perhaps even lovers some time in the past, both pursuing the same arts, thatof magic, of shape-changing, divination and the altering of fate, even the ultimate fate of death. But Loki isdoomed to love the wrong side of death, the one that only means “destruction”. In the Lokasenna, the oldfriends, now turned enemies, recall their past in mocking words:

23. Odin spoke:

“If I gave to those that did not deserve it,to small men, the victory Then you spent eight winters below the ground you were a woman and a milking cow you gave birth there:I call that unmanly behavior.”

24. Loki spoke:”You performed seidr, they said,You were at Sami-Island, beating drums in the manner of witch-women:You traveled the world in the shape of a sorceressI call that unmanly behavior.” 25.Frigg spoke: ”The stories of what you two did in the past you ought not to speak of to anyone What these two gods did togetherin the time of origin is better forgotten.” .Self-counsciously, the poet of the Lokasenna does not deny the mythical facts: Loki has been a woman,Loki has given birth like a woman and nursed babies. Odin has been acting like a sorcerer within thespheres of women, of witches and apparently cross-dressed or moved in the world as a female. Something

more might have happened between the two, something that the poet, with the words of Frigg, finds tooshameful to say out loud. We must remember that the poem was written down and probably also createdduring the new era, when the new faith and a new world-view was influencing and changing, finally tooverthrow, the old.

A clue to what happened is actually to be found in two different poems, where the bickering between oldfriends seems to reflect the actions of Odin and Loki.

It is a duel of words between the sorcerer Sinfiötli, who represents Odin, and his old friend, now foe,Gudmundr, who represents Loki, in the poem of Helgi Hundingsbani:

37. Sinfiötli spoke: “You were a witch-woman at the Island of Being you loath wench, you came with lies

you would not own no other man,you said then, – than Sinfiötli. 38. You caused harm, troll-valkyrieyou were indecent and horny at All-Father´s place

All the one-harriers at Odin´s fought to have you, you false woman.

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39. We two together at the Peak of History[6]had nine wolves (as children) and I was the father.” .The revelation of Sinfiötli´s sexual and procreative relation to the giant Gudmundr in the past isremarkable, for Sinfiötli very clearly speaks of Gudmundr as a female, as a wench, a völva, as a falsevalkyrie who gives birth to nine wolves that he himself fatheres. But Gudmundr is, in the text, neverthlessvery clearly a male. Gudmundr does not reply be defending himself against the accusations of havingbeen a woman, only states that Sinfiötli is not so very manly himself:

40. Gudmundr spoke:“You did not father the wolves of Greed

even if you are older than all of them:You were castrated by the Grove of Gnipa By troll-maidens at the Peak of Thor.” .The accusations of unmanliness continue further in the poem:

42. Sinfiötli spoke:“You were the bride of Grani[7] at the Shining Fieldswith a golden brithle you were forced to trot You were often tired like the reindeer doeon many a pathway with me at your back .” (This is a way of saying that Sinfiötli had Gudmundr sexually) 43. Gudmundr spoke: “You were a poor working woman, milking the goats of Golden you were, another time

you were the daughter of Imdr(…)” .The theme of homosexuality, transsexuality and gender-bending behavior is very strong in this poem. Thisis also very clearly in connection with magical arts and with esoteric revelations. In fact, the other poem of Helgi Hundingsbani (the second one), describes Helgi as starting out his career as initiate dressing up asa woman: A male, royal prince taking the role of a slave woman:

…Helgi could not save himself in any other way than to take the clothes of a servant-maid and sit down togrind. They searched, but could not find Helgi. Then spoke Blind the Soul-Evil:

2. “Sharp eyes has the maid by the mill of Hagal She is not of peasant stock the millstone breaks , the grinding bench explodes.” 3. A harsh fate has a chief received when relatives must grind the grains She would be better suited with her hand,to grasp around the sword handlethan around the mill-turning handle.” 5.Hagal answered and spoke:“I do not wonder if that mill makes soundswhen here a royal maiden is turning the handle She used to float freely above the skies in a Viking manner she dared to go forth (as a warrior)Before Helgi took her…” .These verses not only bend the male role, making a point out of how heroes don female and evensubservient roles: They also speak of women that ought to clasp the sword handles rather than grind flour,who dare to act like Vikings and who are free to soar the air. Yet again, the theme of transcending bothsocial status and gender is very much in connection to esoteric revelations.

In each case, both Sinfiötli´s, and Helgi´s, the heroes are facing the giant stock: The representatives of Fear, Greed and Death. They are also repeating the divine struggle between gods and giants. There is aremarkable similarity between the word-duel of Sinfiötli and Gudmundr, and the word-duel of Odin andLoki.

Yes, what did these two gods do together in the past? Did they create the Wolves of Greed together whenthey mixed their blood? For certain, Loki does not hesitate to take the shape of a woman, and Snorrirelates how he, in the shape of a mare, conceives and gives birth to Sleipnir, the horse that takes Odinthrough the worlds and that will jump unharmed across the fence of Hel. It is tempting to guess that thedialogue between Sinfiötli and Gudmundr actually tries to say out loud that which “ought to be forgotten”about the relation between the god Odin and the giant Loki. Loki is the spokesman of the giants, just asGudmundr is, and although he is of giant stock, he has a partly divine status. The name of Gudmundr actually means “Source of Divinity”.

The “Unmanly”

“Odin knew that art which brings the most power, and he practiced it himself, it is called seidr, and from ithe could know all the fates of human beings and all things that were to happen, and he could give deathand bad health to people, who could take the wit of some people and give it to others. But this sorcery led

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Rituals of Initiation in the

Poetic Edda1. Óðinn and Gunnlǫð – TheInitiation of a God2. Freyr and Gerðr – The Initiation of a God3. Ottarr and Freyia – The Initiationof an Einheri


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to much unmanliness for those who practice it, so that menfolk could not practice it without shame, and sothey taught it to the priestesses.”

Snorri,Heimskringla

The poem of the previous section revealed that Sinfiótli, a powerful sorcerer, the son of a king, a mentor of princes, was castrated in the past. He shares this feature with another such mentor, the kingly advisor andsorcerer Atli of another poem. Both are figures reminiscent of shamans or sorcerers, who guide their initiates through their trials.

This is when one of Odin´s most “disturbing” names ought to be mentioned: Neither Snorri nor the PoeticEdda hide the fact that the great god´s twelfth name is Ialk – the Castrate.

Seidr was a kind of divinatory magic and was of central importance to the Old Norse cult. It involved the artof not only seeing, but also altering, fate. It was an art led by much respected women called the völur (völva, sg.), or witches, and by the more dubious seidmennir – the seidr -men, the male practitioners, thesorcerers. In the sagas, such men are described in negative terms, and were seemingly only feared, notrespected. There are several accounts where male sorcerers are being prosecuted. The negative attitudeis, however, probably a result of the time in which the sagas were written: The thirteenth and thefourteenth centuries. Not only was seidr an art of magic: Worse, if we should trust the saga writers, itinvolved “unmanliness”.

Scholars endlessly debate whether this “unmanliness” meant that the male practitioners actuallyperformed transgender or homosexual acts, or whether it just meant that they performed an art thattraditionally belonged to the spheres of women. All women, to some extent, might have learned some levelof seidr, as some of the sagas suggest. During séances of seidr , all women present take a central andactive role while the men keep to the periphery, only to observe and receive divination.

It is still curious why Snorri claims that the art ofseidr was left to the priestesses because the priests felt itwas unmanly. Seidr was said to be the most powerful of all arts, the art “which gave the most power”, andone may wonder how come the men would disregard that!

Odin, on his side, remained the great king of the gods without feeling any shame at all for acting as an“unmanly” performer ofseidr . The sagas show that until the end of the Viking Age, large numbers of mendid in fact performseidr in spite of the “unmanliness” associated with it. So it is not true that men ceased towork withseidr , only, perhaps, that they received less respect than the female practitioners, whom wehave seen were highly revered. But was it really so?

The CastratesThere are quite a lot of indications that men who learned seidr were respected and even held high statusat some time. The mighty Odin himself was their teacher, their role model, Odin whose cult was attended toby kings and high-ranking members of society, by the much appreciated professional bards, and bywarrior heroes. The two examples of castrated men in the Poetic Edda, Sinfiötli and Atli, were highlyrespected members of the royal court, with the authority to teach princes.

In my opinion,seidr for men could involve both transsexuality and homosexuality, but it was also “unmanly”because it belonged, firstly, to the feminine sphere. In the old Norse worldview, femininity was associatedwith the “other” side, with the magical, with wilderness and the afterlife. Masculinity represented “this” sideof existence, the world of politics and society. Each sex could move between these borders, but politicalaction was still considered a masculine sphere, whereas magical actions were considered feminine. Awoman who had no other choice than to speak for herself at the assembly (a widow with no grown man to

speak her case) would assume a masculine role that was acceptable, but not preferable. A man whodevoted his life to the magical art was assuming a feminine role that was acceptable, but not entirelyrespected by all in an otherwise rather macho society.

There were also most probably different kinds of male practitioners, some rather more gender-bendingthan others. While some are called seidmadr – the word definitely asserting his masculine sex, a differentkind of male practitioner was called a seidberendr – literally meaning a “seidr -vagina”. That theseidr -manand the seidr -vagina are two different types of male practitioners becomes clear in the poem Hyndluljod ,where the two are assigned different heritages, just as the völvahas her own.

One curious observance is the fact that the male castrates – Odin, Sinfiötli and Atli – are likened untohorses. The name Ialk is not translated as eunuch, but as a gelding – a castrated horse. At the same time,the witch – the völva – is named after her wand or staff, the völ , which is also the name of the penis of astallion. We do know from a saga of a domestic ritual involving the penis of a sacrificed horse – called“Völsi ” – being offered to the giantesses. Another connection to the giantesses is made in the poemquoted earlier where Sinfiötli is said to have been gelded by giantesses.

The titlevölva indicates that she has been initiated to the völ , and this is what gives her the authority towield it. The graves ofvölur suggest that they were related to both masculine and feminine spheres, andthe wand might very well be a phallic symbol, giving her authority to transcend the boundaries of gender.In the same manner, we might imagine, did a particular kind of male sorcerers – the “seidr -vaginas” –operate with a symbolic (or self-experienced) vagina associated with the female practice of seidr to a

4. Svipdagr and Menglǫð – TheInitiation of a Hero5. The Reincarnating Valkyria –Initiation in the Heroic Poems6. The Mead and the Maiden – TheInitiation of the Goddess

Seiðr - Old Norse Magic

Divinatory Seiðr – Old Norse Texts(translated to English)Seiðmaðr and Earl – The MaleSorcerer or ShamanThe Völva – the Norse Witch

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degree or in a fashion that perhaps the “ seidr -men” could not. Perhaps this experience of having a specialvagina for magical purposes was a permanent condition experienced by transsexual sorcerers, or perhapsit was something experienced at particular ritual occasions. One Old Norse word for “sorcerer”,Gylfi ,actually indicates “shape-changing sorcerer”, “werewolf”, and “sorcerer changing into a woman every ninthnight .” [i]

Transgender behavior is not unusual in many shamanistic contexts. Castration and feminization of malepractitioners or devoted worshippers is known also from Mystery cults such as that of Cybele, and in someHindu cults even today. In Old Norse society, male practitioners of seidr were common enough, and one of their most powerful deities, Odin, practiced it without shame. The poems speak of gender bending as aquite honorable, or at least some times useful and necessary, if not a normal thing to do. In my opinion,

the negative attitudes to male practitioners is a late influence, caused by the aggressive machismo of medieval and Christianized Europe reaching Scandinavia and altering the old pagan worldview.

The fact that Odin and Freya and their counterparts in myth and legend transcend the roles assigned for their gender, combined with the fact that they were the major deities of seidr – a kind of sorcery – wouldprobably be have been enough to see them as “bitches” and examples of the true perversion of the oldfaith by those who did not wish to look any deeper.

Transcending Realities

As mentioned, the poems speak of cross-dressing and gender-bending behavior as an honorable, or atleast useful, if not normal thing to do. And this is important: Although acceptable, it was not normal.Bending the boundaries of gender was not a structural thing to do – it was not something anyone could

just do at whim. Transcending gender boundaries was an important and powerful act, and it meantsomething to the practitioners and to the observers – it was part of a cultic or magical experience.

The stanzas quoted above about Gudmundr and Sinfiötli shows that the hero or his opponent frequently iscompared not to just any kind of woman, but to a witch or a valkyrie. Gudmundr is not only taking the roleof a woman, he is also taking the role of a völva and a valkyrie, magical and powerful creatures. As suchhe dwells with the one-harriers – Odin´s chosen warriors in Valhalla. Yet, because of his giant destructivenature he leads his companions them astray and births the wolves of Greed. In other sources, Loki is thefather or parent of those wolves, so we may safely say that Gudmundr is a facet of Loki.

In the case of Helgi, his opponents realize that the flour-grinding servant girl, the one who draws the mill-stone, is no ordinary maid. But instead of recognizing the male Helgi, they believe that he is the valkyriewho rides air and sea, the great Valkyrie who was “taken” by the former Helgi Hjörvardsson, who soaredfreely as a viking goddess, but was now reduced to turning a mill-stone.

Now what does the mill-stone actually mean? Another poem identifies the mill-stone – it is very clearly theMill of Destiny, drawn by two captured giantesses who used to be valkyries.[8] This is, of course, what themen in the poem are referring to: The valkyrie who used to be free has been reduced to a slave drawingthe mill of destiny in order to serve a greedy king.

The theme of a valkyrie – a fate spinner – being captured, enslaved or enchanted into sleep, made toshape destiny at the whim of a greedy king – is a very common one that constantly repeats itself throughout the Poetic Edda. It always ends with the valkyrie rebelling and avenging herself, and with fatalresults for the greedy king. The valkyrie is a kind of norn, a mythical creature or goddess who rules thedestiny of her chosen individual, whom she chooses at birth. The relation between the valkyrie and theindividual soul seems to be close to the point of identification. For now it is enough to say that therelationship between a person and his valkyrie is very intimate – the two are parts of each other, and sherepresents, if nothing more, the destiny of her chosen person, the secret workings of fate beneath thesurface.

Now Helgi “becoming” the woman who draws the mill of destiny – in fact becoming a norn – is obviouslymeant to symbolize something deeper than just a strategic means to hide. He becomes not only a slavegirl, he becomes his own enslaved fate, drawing the mill of destiny while a captive of his enemies. As hebecomes his own fate-spinner, and draws his own fate, he escapes slavery, only to meet his once againfree-soaring valkyrie who guides him towards final freedom.

Perhaps this is a hint to what the puzzling gender-bending is most likely really about: The merging betweena man and his female soul, his divine destiny?

All popular imagery of the fierce, brutish Viking berserk aside, there was an aspect to Norse Paganmanhood, more or less liminal, that was not quite as macho as national romanticism would have preferred.

Article by Maria Kvilhaug

See article on Native American Two-Spirits here.

Main Sources:

“Sejd – och andra studier i nordisk själsuppfattning” – Dag Strömbäck (2000)


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“Seid – myter, sjamanisme og kjønn i Vikingenes tid” – Brit Solli (2002)

The Poetic Edda

[1]Heimdallr - Shining World, Splendid World, the guardian of the bridge between worlds

[2]Brisinga Mén – Fiery Jewel, Freya´s necklace

[3] Britt Solli, 2002, Seid – Kjønn, sjamanisme og seid

[4]völur , plural ofvölva, (“staff-carrier”) a witch or seeress, priestess of divination and magic

[5] Whether one should translate to sorcerer or sorceress here is uncertain.

[6] Saganes…

[7] Grani is the horse that carried Sigurdr and his divine gold alive through the fatal fire.

[8] TheGrottasongr – the Song of the Mill

[i] Fritzner, Johan,Ordbog over det gamle norske sprog , 1886

2 Responses to A Womb by Magic – Transcending Gender,Transcending Realities

Pingback:Month for Loki, Day 15: Some Words on Our Relationship…and Choice | bloodteethandflame

Paul Borda says:

26. januar 2014 at 12:49

Thank you for this essay. I really enjoyed reading it.

I have a somewhat off topic question; the image above that a appears to be a drawing of a naked manholding to dragons, do you have any further info on it? Where it comes from and when? I tried makingsense of the runes and I started to wonder if they were miscopied in places, but I’m very much a novice inOld Norse so clear words could be staring me in the face and I’d miss it.

At first glance, the image struck me as having similarities to the Smiss stone, aka the Snake Witch or Ormhäxan, in that the figure is frontal in a squatting (birthing?) position and holding two serpents/dragons.

Thank you for your work,Paul

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a womb by magic – transcending gender, transcending realities

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