Norse Creatures and Beings: Giants, Dwarves, Elves, and Monsters

The Norse imagination populates the nine worlds with an extraordinary variety of beings: gods of the Æsir and the Vanir, giants of Jotunheim, dwarves of Svartalfheim, elves of Alfheim, dragons in the sea and under the world tree, wolves at the edges of the world, the valkyries of Odin’s service, the norns of fate, the dishonored dead of Helheim, and — in the later folklore — huldra, nøkken, draugr, sea-serpents, and a host of half-seen monsters. To read the Eddas and the sagas is to enter a world in which every hill may contain a dwarf, every forest a hidden folk, every pond a nøkken, and every burial mound a restless draugr.

This page is an encyclopedic survey of the principal beings of the Norse cosmos. It is arranged by class rather than by importance, so that the giant can be read in the company of the dwarf and the elf, the dragon in the company of the wolf, the valkyrie in the company of the norn. Cross-references throughout link to more detailed treatments of each being, and a “Related Topics” section at the end provides further reading.

The Aesir: The Warrior Gods

The Æsir are the principal tribe of the Norse gods, the divine functionaries of war, sky, sovereignty, and law. The list of Æsir in the Prose Edda is not consistent across sources, but the principal figures include Odin, Thor, Týr, Baldr, Heimdall, Höðr, Víðarr, and Váli. To these are added, in many lists, Bragi (god of poetry), Vidar (the silent god), Forseti (god of reconciliation and arbitration), and Loki, though Loki’s status is ambiguous.

The Æsir are sometimes presented as descended from the primordial cow Auðumbla’s licking of the ice-blocks, which revealed the first of the gods, Búri. From Búri came Borr, whose sons are Odin, Vili, and Vé. The Hávamál and the Völuspá both emphasize that the Æsir are gods of innate power, hel- (the bright, the exalted), as opposed to the Vanir, who are gods of the vanir function, the fertility and the magic of seiðr. The Æsir live in Asgard, connected to the world of men by the bridge Bifrost, and they meet in council at the Iðavöllr in the center of Asgard.

The Vanir: Gods of Fertility and Magic

The Vanir are the second tribe of Norse gods, associated with fertility, the sea, the land’s fruits, and the magic of seiðr. The principal Vanir are Njörðr (god of the sea, the wind, and seafaring), Freyr (god of fertility, sunshine, and peace), and Freyja (goddess of love, war, and the magic of seiðr). The Vanir also include Sjöfn (goddess of love, after Freyr and Freyja), Snotra (goddess of prudence), Gná (the messenger of Frigg), and a few others.

The Ynglinga saga and the Völuspá tell of an early war between the Æsir and the Vanir, in which the two tribes fought over ritual and the Vanir, masters of seiðr, were at first too powerful for the Æsir. Eventually the two sides made peace and exchanged hostages: the Vanir sent Njörðr, Freyr, and Freyja to the Æsir, and the Æsir sent Mímir and Hoenir to the Vanir. The Vanir live in Vanaheim, a world the Eddas locate to the west. The Vanir are sometimes described as being closer to the world of nature than the Æsir; their cults are recorded in the medieval sources as being particularly associated with Sweden, the south of Norway, and the Danish islands, where the major centers of the cult of Freyr were located.

The Jotnar: The Ancient Giants

The Jotnar are the oldest beings of the Norse cosmos, predating the gods themselves. They are the descendants of the primeval giant Ymir, born from the meeting of the cold of Niflheim and the fire of Muspelheim in the abyss of Ginnungagap. From Ymir, the first of the giants, descend all the host of giants who inhabit Jotunheim, and from the giant Bergelmir, who alone survived the flood of Ymir’s blood, descend the post-creation giants, including Þrymr (the giant lord of the wedding of Thor and the recovery of his hammer), Geirröðr (a giant king visited by Thor), Hymir (the giant with whom Thor fishes for the World Serpent), Skaði (the giantess who married the god Njörðr), and Angrboða (the giantess of Loki, mother of the three monsters of the Eddas).

The Jotnar are ambiguous in the Eddas. They are the enemies of the gods, and at Ragnarok they march on Asgard, but they are also the lovers of the gods (Skaði, Gerðr, Járnsaxa) and the parents of some of the most important figures of the mythology (Hel, Fenrir, and the World Serpent are all children of Loki and Angrboða). The Jotnar are not, in this sense, pure “evil” but are the gods’ opposite and complement, the öflgir (the strong) and the þursar (the thurses) of Norse tradition, a class of beings that, like the Greek Titans or the Irish Fomorians, embody the wild, the ancient, the excessive.

The Prose Edda and the Hauksbók divide the giants into several sub-classes:

Risar (rissi), the great giants proper, the most powerful and most often named
Þursar (thurs), often associated with stupidity and brute force
Hrimpursar (“frost giants”), the giants of the cold north
Jötnar (the generic term for the entire class)
Bergrisar (“mountain giants”), the giants of the highlands
Sjötúnsgarpr (“river-giants”) and Sjóvar-giant (“sea-giant”), the giants of the water

This classification is partly inherited from older Gylfaginning material and partly invented by Snorri to organize the traditions he had inherited. The principal source of our knowledge of the giants is the Skáldskaparmál, which contains a long list of named giants and the kennings by which they are referred to in skaldic poetry.

Dwarves: The Smiths of the Underworld

The dwarves are a class of small, subterranean beings who live in Svartalfheim (also called Nidavellir) and who are the master smiths of the Norse cosmos. The Poetic Edda’s Völuspá describes their origin in some of its stanzas: the gods, having killed the primeval giant Ymir, had his flesh become the earth, his bones the mountains, his blood the seas, and the maggots that bred in his body became the dwarves, endowed with human reason by the gods. The Prose Edda gives a different origin: the dwarves were created from the earth and the blood of Ymir by the gods, in the form of small maggot-like beings that the gods endowed with reason.

The dwarves are central to Norse mythology as the makers of the great magical objects of the gods: Thor’s hammer Mjölnir, Odin’s spear Gungnir, the ring Draupnir, the ship Skíðblaðnir, the boar Gullinbursti, the golden hair of Sif, and many others. The most famous dwarves in the Eddas are Brokkr and Eitri (or Sindri), the brothers who made the golden hair and many of the great objects of the gods; Alvíss (“all-wise”), the dwarf who comes to claim Thor’s daughter; Fjalar and Galar (who killed the wise giant Kvasir); Andvari (the dwarf from whom Loki took the cursed ring); and Mótsognir, the chief of the dwarves according to the Völuspá. The dwarves are not only smiths; they are also seers (as in the case of the völuspá of the Grogaldr), and they are a class of beings with their own politics and their own gods.

Elves: The Light and Dark

The elves are a class of beings in the Norse cosmos whose nature is debated by scholars. The Prose Edda distinguishes between the light-elves (ljósálfar) of Alfheim and the dark-elves (dökkálfar) of Svartalfheim, and treats them as distinct from the dwarves. The Hávamál warns of gifts given to elves (referring, perhaps, to the dísablót sacrifices that might be made to the elven women), and the Völuspá includes the light-elves in the audience of the recreated world.

In the later Icelandic folk tradition, the elves (or huldufólk, “hidden people”) become a familiar element of the landscape, and tales of elf-churches, elf-brides, and elf-music are abundant in the sagas. The Jóns saga helga tells of Bishop Jón Ögmundsson encountering a woman with a great company at the Althing, and a famous passage in the Eyrbyggja saga describes a haunted mound (the Krosshólar) from which the dead emerge to walk among the living. The relationship between the elves of the Eddas and the elves of the sagas is a long-standing scholarly problem, and modern scholars have argued that the two may not be the same kind of being at all.

Dragons and Serpents

The Norse cosmos is home to several dragons and serpents, the most important of which are the World Serpent Jörmungandr and the dragon Níðhöggr. The World Serpent is a child of Loki and the giantess Angrboða, and he lies coiled in the great sea that encircles the world. Thor fishes for him in the tale of Hymiskviða, and at Ragnarok the two meet and kill each other. Níðhöggr gnaws at the roots of Yggdrasil and is one of the cosmic forces of slow destruction.

The Norse sources also contain a long list of other dragons and serpents, including Fáfnir (the dragon of the Völsunga saga who guards a treasure), Glaur (the dragon that Sigrgarðr kills in Sigrgarðs þáttr), and the unnamed wyrm (dragon) of several other sagas. In the later Icelandic and Norwegian folk tradition, dragons appear as the guardians of treasure hoards, the inhabitants of mountains, and the lurking threats of sea and river. The Níðhöggr of the Völuspá is the dragon that gnaws the corpse-thief and the oath-breaker in Náströnd, the strand of corpses along the river of Hel.

Wolves: The Enemies of the Sun

The Norse sources name several wolves who are the antagonists of the gods and the destroyers of the cosmic order. The most famous is Fenrir, the monstrous son of Loki and Angrboða, who is bound by the gods with the silken cord Gleipnir (made of six impossible things) and held until Ragnarok, when he breaks free and swallows Odin. The wolf Sköll (“mockery”) pursues the sun, and his brother Hati Hróðvitnisson (“he who hates”) pursues the moon; both will swallow their prey at Ragnarok. The great wolf Garmr howls in Helheim, and at Ragnarok he breaks free and joins the giants on the field of Vígríðr.

The Norse imagination also knows several other wolves: Geri and Freki, the wolves of Odin, who sit at his feet in Valhalla; Fenja and Menja, the two women of the Grottasöngr who are forced to turn the magic mill Grotti (the poem does not call them giantesses, only meyjar, young women, and the etymology of the names is debated, with some scholars linking them to the Old Norse verb fenna, to drive or whip); and the wargs (vargr, outlaws) of the sagas, who are sometimes half-wolf in the saga descriptions of their terrible killings.

The Valkyries: Choosers of the Slain

The Valkyries (“choosers of the slain”) are the handmaidens of Odin and the attendants of Valhalla. The Grímnismál names them as the war-goddesses who serve the mead of the slain heroes and ride through the air and the sea. The Völuspá mentions them as being “at the windows” of the hall of the slain, and the Völsunga saga describes them as choosing the heroes in battle and bringing them to the great hall.

The Valkyries are a fascinating mix of the divine and the heroic: the major figures — Brynhildr (Brünnhilde), Sigrún (Sigrun), Sváva, Sigrdrífa — are named in the heroic poetry of the Poetic Edda and the Völsunga saga, and they take active roles in the wars of the heroes as well as in the halls of the gods. Brynhildr, in particular, is at the center of a complex of stories in which the Valkyrie becomes a mortal woman and marries a hero, and her conflicts with the other Valkyries and with the great families of the heroic age are the basis for much of the tragic content of the Eddas. The Dísir (dísir), the divine ladies of Old Norse belief, are closely related to the Valkyries, and the dísablót (dís-sacrifice) is attested in several sagas as a sacrificial feast in honor of these beings.

The Norns: Weavers of Fate

The Norns are the three principal weavers of fate in the Norse cosmos. Their names are Urðr (“that which has become”), Verðandi (“that which is becoming”), and Skuld (“that which shall be”). They sit at the foot of Yggdrasil, drawing water from the Well of Urðr to nourish the great tree, and they are responsible for the fates of gods and men. The Völuspá describes them as setting up the laws of men, deciding the length of lives, and choosing the lucky among men.

In addition to the three principal Norns, the sources speak of a wider class of Norns, including Norns descended from the gods, from the elves, and from the dwarves, and of “evil Norns” who bring misfortune. The Norns are a class of being distinct from the Valkyries, though the two are sometimes conflated in later sources. The relationship between the Norns and the concept of fate (urðr) is a key one for understanding Norse cosmology, and it is treated in more detail in the dedicated page on Yggdrasil.

The Disir: Divine Women of the Family

The Dísir are a class of female divine beings closely related to the Valkyries. They are the guardian spirits of families and clans, and they are invoked in the dísablót, a major sacrificial feast attested in several sagas, including Eyrbyggja saga and Víga-Glúms saga. The Dísir are described as arriving at the feast on a stormy winter night, when they might be welcomed or driven off by the proper ritual actions. The dísablót is a major part of the late autumn and early winter religious calendar of the Icelanders, and it may be connected to the Disir in the sense of “ladies” of the household.

The dísir are distinct from the fylgjur (follow-spirits) in that the dísir are attached to a clan or family as a whole, while the fylgjur are attached to an individual. Both are similar in form, however: they often take animal form, they can be seen by those with the sight, and they bring luck or misfortune to those they accompany.

Fylgjur: The Follow-Spirits

The fylgjur (“followers”) are the personal spirit-companions of individuals in Norse tradition. The fylgja is usually conceived of as a woman (or, in the case of powerful male figures, a man) or as an animal — a bear, a wolf, an eagle, a boar, an ox — that follows its human counterpart through life. The fylgja is sometimes visible in dreams, sometimes in waking vision, and its appearance is often interpreted as a sign of the coming death of the person it accompanies.

The fylgja is closely related to the hamr (“shape”), the animal form into which a person with magical gifts can project, and to the draugr, the walking dead of the sagas, who often take animal form. The fylgja concept survives in the later Icelandic folk tradition in the fylgjukona (“fylgja-woman”), a woman who is born with the gift of the second sight and can see the fylgjur of the people around her.

Draugr: The Walking Dead

The draugr (plural draugar) is the most important category of undead in Norse tradition. The draugr is the corpse of a powerful or evil person that has returned from the dead to walk the world of the living, often to harass or kill those who wronged it in life. The draugr is described in several sagas — most famously in the Grettis saga Ásmundarsonar, in which the hero Grettir wrestles with the draugr Kárr inn gamli in his burial mound, and in the Eyrbyggja saga, in which the draugr Þórólfr bægifótr returns from his burial mound to walk among the living.

The draugr has several distinctive characteristics: it leaves its burial mound at night, often visible as a luminous form or as a great shadow; it possesses superhuman strength and can crush or devour the living; it can change its size at will, growing to enormous proportions; and it can ride the rooftops and walk on the sea. The aptrganga (“after-walking”) of a draugr is a sign of a death that is not at peace, and the proper burial rites are essential for preventing it. The draugr is killed by a variety of methods in the sagas: by being beheaded, by being burned, by being cut to pieces, by being turned at the door, by being confronted with a sword named with a particular name, or by being wrestled into submission.

Huldra and Huldrefolk: The Hidden People

The Huldra (and her male counterpart, the Huldrekall) is one of the most important folkloric figures in the Norwegian and Swedish tradition. The Huldra is a beautiful woman who lives in the mountains and the forests, often with a hollow back (like a hollow tree) and a tail (like a cow’s tail). She is closely related to the Norse elves and to the Anglo-Saxon ælf tradition, and her name, huldr (“the hidden”), is the same word as the Old Norse hylja (“to hide”). The Huldra appears in many Norwegian folk tales, and the legend of Huldra’s folk (huldrefolk) is a significant element in the Scandinavian folk religion of the early modern period.

The Huldra is a master of song and dance, and her voice is said to be so beautiful that those who hear it are entranced. She is associated with the wild, the hidden, the secret — and with a long tradition of intermarriage with humans. A man who marries a Huldra must observe certain taboos, and the marriage ends when he breaks one of them. The children of such unions often have some mark of their mother’s hidden nature — a tail, a hollow tooth, an extra finger, or a birthmark — and the saga of Huldra’s daughter is a recurring type. The Huldra is also associated with churches built underground by her folk at night, only to be torn down and rebuilt by humans during the day, and with the white horse that appears at the head of her folk in the wild.

The Huldra is the mistress of the huldrefolk (hidden folk), a race of beings who live in the mountains and the forests and who are described in detail in the Norwegian Folktale Collection of Asbjørnsen and Moe. The huldrefolk are like the Icelandic huldufólk, but they are particularly associated with the Huldra-king and the Huldra-queen and with the great underground halls of the mountains. The Huldra-king and -queen hold court in the deep mountain halls, and the huldrefolk observe their own laws and customs. The huldrefolk are at the center of the church-stones legend: the huldrefolk begin to build a great church at night, and the humans tear it down by day, until the work is finally completed by one side or the other.

Nøkken, Fossegrim, and the Water-Spirits

The Nøkken (Norwegian), Strömkarl (Swedish), Nix (German), and Kelpie (Scottish) are a family of water-spirits who appear across the Germanic and Celtic worlds. The Nøkken is a man who lives in the deep of the river or the lake, and who plays the fiddle so beautifully that those who hear him must come to him. Once they are in the water, they are drowned. The Nøkken can also take the form of a beautiful white horse, and a child who tries to mount such a horse is dragged down to the bottom.

The Fossegrim (“the lad of the waterfall”) is the Swedish and Norwegian equivalent of the Nøkken, a young man who sits under the waterfall and plays the fiddle. The Fossegrim is said to teach the Hardanger fiddle style to a musician who offers him a black lamb or a piece of good meat, and the legend of the Fossegrim’s tune is one of the most famous in Norwegian folk music. The water-spirits are related to the Huldra and the elves in many ways, and they belong to a class of beings called the Alv or the Álfar in the Old Norse sources.

The Kraken and the Sea-Monsters

The Norse imagination has its own sea-monsters, the most famous of which is the Kraken, an enormous octopus- or squid-like creature said to dwell off the coast of Norway. The Kraken is described in the Konungs skuggsjá (King’s Mirror, c. 1250) as a creature so large that sailors mistake it for an island, and the Norwegian historian Olaus Magnus describes it in his Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus (1555) as a creature “shaped like a crab, but of great size, with claws ten fathoms long.” The Kraken is also the model for the “world-surrounding” sea-monster of older Norse tradition, a creature that may be a folkloric descendant of the World Serpent.

The Norse sources also contain references to the Hafgufa (“sea-mist”), a sea-monster so large that it appears to be a small island when it surfaces, and the Sæhestur (“sea-horse”), a creature said to be a large fish that lives in the deep. The Konungs skuggsjá and the Flateyjarbók describe several such beings, and the medieval Norse imagination clearly distinguished between the whale (hvalr), the sea-snake (sæslanga), and the hafgufa or kraken-like creature.

Fafnir, Glaur, and the Treasure-Wyrms

The Norse tradition knows several specific dragons (or, more properly, wyrms — ormr) who guard treasure hoards. The most famous is Fáfnir, the dragon of the Völsunga saga who sits on a hoard of gold and silver, including the cursed ring Andvaranaut. Sigurd kills Fáfnir and takes the hoard, and the curse of the ring follows the descendants of Sigurd through several generations.

Other named dragons include Glaur (the dragon of Sigrgarðs þáttr that Sigrgarðr slays with the help of a magic sword), Grotti (the dragon that guards the magic mill of the Grottasöngr), and the unnamed wyrms of several other sagas. The Norse dragon is a complex figure: it is the guardian of treasure, the bane of heroes, the child of giants, and the omen of doom. The Fáfnismál and the Sigrdrífumál are the principal Eddic poems that deal with the dragon Fáfnir and the curse of the Andvaranaut ring.

Huldra, Nøkken, and the Other Folkloric Beings

In addition to the great beings of the Eddas, the Scandinavian folk tradition is rich in intermediate beings who inhabit the liminal spaces of the world: the Nøkken of the deep water; the Fossegrim of the waterfall; the Nisse (or Tomte, “the little man of the farm”) of the corners of the farm; the Vette or Vætte of a particular place; the Tusser of the underground. These are not the gods or the giants or the elves of the Eddas, but they are a long-standing part of the Scandinavian folk religion, and the Icelanders and Norwegians of the medieval and early modern periods would have known them as a living part of the world. The Jón Árnason collection of Icelandic folk tales (compiled in the 19th century from 17th- and 18th-century oral tradition) contains hundreds of stories about these beings, and it is the richest single source for the later Scandinavian folk tradition of the beings in question.

The Basilisks and the Serpentines of Folklore

The Norse folk tradition, influenced by the medieval Latin and the Christian bestiary tradition, knows a class of basilisks and serpentines that are not found in the Eddas but are attested in the later sagas and folk tales. The basilisk is a small but deadly serpent whose glance can kill; the cockatrice is a creature half-rooster, half-serpent; the wyvern is a flying serpent; the lindworm is a serpent without legs. These beings, derived from medieval bestiaries, entered the Scandinavian tradition through the medium of the Latin Physiologus and its descendants, and they appear in the Icelandic and Norwegian folk tales as dangers to be avoided or killed by the hero.

The Mound-Dwellers and the Land-Spirits

The Norse tradition has a rich set of land-spirits (sometimes called the landvættir, “spirits of the land”) who are the tutelary deities of a particular place. The landvættir are described in the Landnámabók (the Book of Settlements) as the spiritual owners of the Icelandic landscape, and the settlers are said to have honored them and bargained with them for the use of the land. The landvættir are sometimes represented as a dragon, a bull, a bird, or a giant, and they are the basis of the Icelandic álfrek (elf-worship) and the huldufólk (hidden people) tradition.

The landvættir are the ancestors of the disir of the family, and they are the principal objects of the blót (sacrifice) in the Icelandic and Norwegian traditions. The most famous of the landvættir-attested festivals is the Álfablót (elf-sacrifice), an autumn festival in honor of the elves and the landvættir.

The Einherjar: Warriors of Valhalla

The Einherjar (“those who fight alone”) are the chosen slain warriors of Valhalla. Half of those who fall gloriously in battle are taken to Valhalla by the Valkyries, and the other half are taken to Fólkvangr, the hall of Freyja. The Einherjar spend their days fighting and their nights feasting, and they are destined to march out with the gods at Ragnarok.

The Einherjar are described in the Grímnismál as a great host, with 540 doors in Valhalla through which 800 warriors can march abreast. They are attended by the Valkyries, who bring them mead, and by Odin, who watches them prepare for the final battle. The Einherjar are sometimes said to be the most excellent of the warriors of the past, including the great heroes of the Völsunga saga and the Hervarar saga.

The Hounds and the Ravens of the Gods

The Norse gods are often accompanied by animal companions who share their attributes. Odin has the wolves Geri and Freki (“the ravenous” and “the greedy”) and the ravens Huginn and Muninn (“thought” and “memory”). Thor has the two goats Tanngrisnir and Tanngnjóstr (“teeth-barer” and “teeth-grinder”) who pull his chariot, and he is sometimes described as having the dwarf Þjálfi and the human woman Röskva as his human servants. Freyja has the boar Hildisvíni and the cat-drawn chariot (in some readings), and Heimdall is said to have the Gjallarhorn and to be the watchman of the gods. The animal companions of the gods are an important part of the Eddic image, and the Huginn and Muninn of Odin are among the most famous of these.

The Sea-Beings: Rán, Ægir, and the Nine Mothers of Heimdall

The Norse cosmos includes a family of sea-beings associated with the great sea that encircles the world. The Ægir (“sea”), also called Gymir (a name for the sea), is the personified ocean; he is the brother of Kári (the wind) and the father of nine daughters (sometimes identified with the nine mothers of Heimdall), who are the waves of the sea. Rán (“robbery” or “plunder”) is the wife of Ægir, and she has a net in which she catches those who drown. The drowned are said to be welcomed into Rán’s hall on the bottom of the sea, where they live a melancholy but not unpleasant existence. The drowned dead are, in some readings, the equivalents of the slain dead of Valhalla, with Rán as their mistress rather than Odin.

The nine daughters of Ægir are named in the Prose Edda: Himinglæva, Dúfa, Blóðughadda, Hefring, Uðr, Hrönn, Bylgja, Böðgul, and Kolga. They are the waves of the sea, and the nine mothers of Heimdall are sometimes identified with them. The Himinhrjóð and the Gjálp are mentioned as daughters of Geirröðr in the tale of Thor’s visit to the giant.

The Fylgjur, Disir, and the Guardian Spirits

The Norse tradition has a rich set of guardian spirits who attend to individuals, families, and clans. The fylgja (“follower”) is the personal spirit-companion of an individual; the dís (“lady” or “sister”) is the clan-spirit; the landvættir are the spirits of a particular place. These beings are often described as taking animal form — a bear, a wolf, an eagle, a boar, a fox — and they can be seen by those with the second sight. The fylgja is sometimes described as being born with the person, sometimes as being chosen at some crucial moment in life, and the fylgjukonur (fylgja-women) of the Icelandic sagas are a class of women with the gift of seeing these spirits.

The dísir are also the valkyries in their female, clan-attending aspect, and the dísablót is a sacrificial feast in their honor. The dísir are most active in the autumn and winter, in the time of darkness and the dying of the light, and they are the patrons of the women of the household, who tend the feast and welcome the dísir into the home.

The Hidden Folk: Álfar and the Icelandic Tradition

The álfar (elves) of the Icelandic folk tradition are perhaps the most distinctive of the Scandinavian intermediate beings. The Icelandic huldufólk (“hidden people”) are conceived of as a race of beings who live in rocks, hills, and cliffs, and who are for the most part invisible to humans. The huldufólk have their own churches (built underground or in cliffs), their own king, their own families, and their own ways of life. The relations between the huldufólk and the Icelanders are close: they are the ancestors of certain Icelandic families, the patrons of certain places, and the objects of certain sagas (most famously the Eyrbyggja saga and the Svarfdæla saga).

The huldufólk are not always benevolent. They can be mischievous, malicious, or simply indifferent, and they have their own laws and their own disputes. The famous Selkirk woman of the 19th century (a kvennagráttr or wailing woman) is sometimes identified as a huldufólk, and the magic stones of the Icelandic countryside are said to be the altars of the huldufólk.

The Draugr in Detail: Walking Corpses of the Sagas

The draugr is one of the most thoroughly described supernatural beings in the sagas, and the Grettis saga Ásmundarsonar is the principal source for the type. The draugr is described as a luminous figure that emerges from its burial mound at night, often with a black or grayish appearance, sometimes with swollen features and groaning or bellowing voice. The draugr is supernaturally strong, can change its size at will (sometimes growing to enormous proportions to fill the doorway of a hall), and can crush or devour the living.

The killing of a draugr is a recurring motif of the sagas. The methods are various: the hero wrestles the draugr into submission (as Grettir does with Kárr inn gamli), the draugr is beheaded or cut to pieces, the draugr is burned, the body is exhumed and the head cut off and placed at the body’s feet, the body is reburied with iron or with a stake through it, or the body is moved to a more propitious location (such as the seashore). The aptrganga (“after-walking”) is a sign of a death that is not at peace, and the proper funeral rites are essential for preventing it.

The draugr is closely related to the haugbúi (“mound-dweller”), a being that lives in a particular burial mound and emerges from it to walk the countryside, and to the draumsjón (“dream-vision”), the appearance of the dead in the dreams of the living. In some sagas, the draugr is not malicious at all but simply persists in returning because of unfinished business or a wrong that has not been righted, and the resolution of the saga is the resolution of the draugr’s grievance.

The Huldra and the Hidden Folk in Norwegian Tradition

The Norwegian tradition has a particularly rich record of huldra-tales, and the figure of the Huldra is one of the most fully developed in Scandinavian folklore. Asbjørnsen and Moe’s Norske Folkeeventyr (1841–1844) preserves a wide range of stories in which the Huldra is encountered in the forest, on the mountain, in the hayfield, and at the dance. The motif of the unspeakable name is recurrent: a man who learns the Huldra’s true name gains a kind of power over her, and a man who speaks the name aloud is sometimes able to free himself or to compel her aid. The motif has analogues in the Schellenmärchen of the German tradition and in the later English fairy-tale, and it is one of the most widely distributed in the European folk record.

The Soul in Norse Tradition: Fylgja, Hamr, and Hugr

The Norse concept of the soul is plural rather than singular. The fylgja (“follower”) is the personal spirit-companion of an individual, usually conceived of as a woman (or, in the case of powerful figures, a man) or as an animal that follows its human counterpart. The hamr (“skin” or “shape”) is the form into which a person with magical gifts can project, often in a state of berserkergang (berserker-fury) or in the sejd of a völva (prophetess). The hugr is the mind or thought, a separable aspect of the person that can travel independently of the body. The önd is the breath, the animating spirit that departs at death. The hönd is the active hand, the principle of action that survives in the fame of the dead.

These multiple components of the soul are not just abstract theological concepts; they are active beings in the sagas. The fylgja of a man may appear to a friend as a sign of the man’s coming death. The hamr of a völva may fly out of her body in the form of an animal, while her body lies as if dead. The hugr of a wise man may be sent out to discover the future. The multiple components of the soul are the basis for much of the magical practice of the Norse world, and the völva who is “outside herself” in the Völuspá is a figure in whom the various aspects of the soul are operating independently of each other.

The Mound-Dwellers and the Cult of the Dead

The Norse tradition has a long and rich cult of the dead, and the mound-dwellers (haugbúar) are an important part of it. The haugbúi is a dead person who persists in his burial mound and who can be visited, propitiated, and even communicated with. The helreið (“Hel-ride”) of a hero to the mound of a dead ancestor is a recurring motif in the heroic poetry, and the Helreið Brynhildar and the Hervarar saga’s Hervör’s summons of the dead Angantýr are the most famous examples.

The cult of the dead is closely bound up with the family and the clan. The dead are not just individuals but members of a kin, and their honour (sœmd) and fame (hróðr) are the property of the family. The mound of the ancestors is the place where the family meets, and the draugr who emerges from the mound is a sign of a wrong that has not been righted within the family. The resolution of a draugr is often the resolution of an inter-generational grievance, and the reburial or reconciliation that ends the haunting is a sign of the family’s reintegration.

The Disir in Greater Detail: The Lady of the Clan

The dísir are the divine women of the clan. They are sometimes described as being born with the family, sometimes as being adopted at a critical moment, and sometimes as being the spirits of the female ancestors who have passed on. The dísir are most active in the autumn and winter, in the season of darkness and the dying of the light, and the dísablót (dís-sacrifice) is a major feast of the late autumn in the Icelandic and Norwegian traditions.

The dísablót is described in several sagas, including the Eyrbyggja saga and the Víga-Glúms saga, and it is a women’s feast in the sense that the women of the household tend it. The feast is held in a dísarsalr (“hall of the dísir”) or in the women’s quarters of the long-house, and the men of the household are not necessarily present. The dísir are invited with a formal summons, and they bring luck and prosperity to the household. If they are not properly invited, they bring misfortune and death.

The Vätte, the Nisse, and the Spirits of the Place

The landvættir (“spirits of the land”) are the tutelary deities of a particular place. The Landnámabók describes the settlement of Iceland as a bargain between the settlers and the landvættir, in which the settlers are allowed to use the land in exchange for honoring the spirits. The landvættir are not always benevolent; they can be dangerous to those who offend them, and they are the source of the magical places of the Icelandic landscape, the sacrificial stones, the hidden people, and the élfhólar (elf-hills).

The nisse (or tomte or tunkall) of the Scandinavian folk tradition is a kind of small household spirit, often described as a gnome-like figure in a red cap, who lives in the corners of the farm and who can bring luck or misfortune. The nisse is a late tradition, derived from the older landvættir and the dísir, but it has become a central part of the Scandinavian folk tradition. The nisse is the central figure of the Christmas traditions of Scandinavia, and the Yule-tomte who brings gifts to children is a direct descendant of the older nisse.

The Valkyries and the Heroic Tradition

The Valkyries of the heroic tradition are not the same as the Valkyries of the Eddas proper. The Eddas describe them as the choosers of the slain, the war-goddesses who ride through the air and the sea and bring the chosen warriors to Valhalla. The heroic sagas and Eddic poems, however, give them individual names and personalities: Brynhildr (Brünnhilde) of the Völsunga saga, Sigrún of the Helreið Brynhildar, Sváva of the Helgakviða Hjörvarðssonar, Sigrdrífa (another name for Brynhildr) of the Sigrdrífumál. These are complex, powerful women, often described as having supernatural knowledge and magical power, and they often have important roles in the heroic narrative.

Brynhildr, in particular, is at the center of a complex set of stories in which she is first a Valkyrie whom Odin punishes by giving her the sleep of a mortal, then a mortal woman awakened by the hero Sigurd, and finally a tragic figure whose death drives the rest of the saga. Her figure has been one of the most influential in the Scandinavian heroic tradition, and her legend is at the base of much of the German and Norse romance literature of the medieval period.

The Berserkers and the Úlfhéðnar: Animal Warriors

The berserkers (berserkir) and the úlfhéðnar (wolf-skinned warriors) are the most famous of the Norse warrior-societies, distinguished by their animal-skin attire and their frenzied fighting style. The berserkers wore bear-skins and entered a state of berserkergang (berserker-fury), in which they fought with superhuman strength and were said to be immune to fire and iron. The úlfhéðnar wore wolf-skins and fought in a similar fashion. Both are described in the Ynglinga saga and in Hrafnsmál and other skaldic poems.

The berserker is closely related to the fylgja and the hamr in the sense that the berserker is, in some sense, projecting his soul into the form of the animal whose skin he wears. The berserker is not merely a warrior who wears a bear-skin; he becomes the bear in some deeper sense, and the berserker’s fury is the bear’s fury, transposed into human form. This shamanic element in the berserker tradition is one of the most distinctive features of the Norse warrior-spirituality, and it is a key part of the cult of Odin, in which the warrior-god gives his followers the gift of animal-shape and animal-fury.

The berserker is not entirely outside the social order; he is a member of the warrior-class, and his outbursts are tolerated or even welcomed in the right circumstances. But the berserker is also a dangerous member of the social order, and the late medieval Icelandic and Norwegian law codes contain provisions for dealing with the berserker-outbursts and the killing of a man in a state of berserkergang. The berserker is the figure of the excessive warrior, the one who has gone too far into the animal and who has not yet come back.

The Trolls of Scandinavian Folklore

The trolls (Old Norse troll, plural tröll) are the great figures of Scandinavian folklore, especially in the Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish traditions. The troll is a large, ugly, often stupid being, frequently female, who lives in the mountains, forests, and caves. The troll is sometimes described as a giant, sometimes as a kind of pre-human creature, sometimes as a demon in the Christian sense. The troll is closely related to the giant of the Eddas, and in some traditions, the troll is the post-Christian descendant of the older Jotnar.

The trolls are particularly associated with the Norse folk-tale tradition, and the Asbjørnsen and Moe collection, the Icelandic Folktale Collection of Jón Árnason, and the Danish Eventyr of Hans Christian Andersen are full of troll-figures. The troll is often a guardian of treasure (in the manner of Fáfnir), an opponent of the hero (as in the tales of the Three Billy Goats Gruff and The Giant Who Had No Heart in His Body), and a lover of human women (in the manner of the huldra-figures). The troll is also vulnerable to sunlight, which turns the troll to stone, and this is a recurring motif of the folk tradition.

The Giants of the Water: The Hafgufa and the Sea-Serpents

The Norse sources contain several references to sea-serpents and sea-monsters that are not the World Serpent but are related to it. The Hafgufa (“sea-mist”) is described in the Konungs skuggsjá (King’s Mirror) as a creature so large that sailors mistake it for an island, and that has a mouth so wide that it could swallow a ship. The Hafstrambe is a similar being. The Margygr (“sea-ogress”) is a sea-monster of the type of the Greek Scylla, and the Sæhestur (“sea-horse”) is a large fish that lives in the deep.

These sea-monsters are not all the same being. The Konungs skuggsjá distinguishes between the whale (hvalr), the sea-serpent (sæslanga), and the hafgufa, and the description of the hafgufa suggests that it is a kraken-like creature of the type later described by Olaus Magnus. The medieval Norse imagination clearly included a wide variety of sea-monsters, and the sea-rods (sæ-rotte, “sea-rat”) and sea-swallows (sæ-svala) are also attested in the sagas as beings of the sea.

The Giants of the Land: The Bergrisar and the Thurses

The Norse tradition has a rich set of mountain giants and forest giants who are distinguished from the frost giants of the northern Jotunheim. The bergrisar (“mountain giants”) live in the mountains, the þursar (thurses) live in the caves and the forests, the hrimpursar (“frost giants”) live in the cold north, and the jötnar are the generic term for the whole class. Each sub-class has its own characteristics: the bergrisar are strong and dull, the thurses are more clever, the hrimpursar are the most powerful and the most ancient, and the jötnar are the most varied.

The giants are not just brute force. The Eddaic giants include figures of great wisdom and power: Mímir (the keeper of the well of wisdom), Vafþrúðnir (the giant who knows the secrets of the past), Þrymr (the lord of the wedding at which Thor’s hammer is stolen), Geirröðr (the giant king visited by Thor), Hymir (the giant with whom Thor fishes for the World Serpent), and Skaði (the giantess who marries the god Njörðr). The giants are a complex class, and the Eddas give them the kind of dignity and depth that is reserved for the gods themselves.

The Supernatural Beings in the Sagas: A Catalogue

A full catalogue of the supernatural beings of the sagas is a long one. In addition to the beings already discussed, the following are attested:

Aptrgöngur (“after-walkers”) — the walking dead, the draugr
Álfar (elves) — the bright and beautiful light-elves of the Eddas
Bergrisar — the mountain giants
Berserkir — the bear-skinned warriors
Búar — the dwellers in the mounds, related to the draugr
Draugar — the walking dead
Dísir — the female clan-spirits
Dvergatal — the catalogue of the dwarves in the Völuspá
Egil — a kind of giant in some regional traditions
Fylgjur — the personal spirit-companions
Hafgufa — the sea-monster
Hamr — the magical animal form
Haughundar — the hounds of the burial mounds
Heljar — the dwellers in Hel
Huldrefolk — the hidden people of the mountains
Huldufólk — the Icelandic hidden people
Höggormar — the great serpents
Jötnar — the giants
Landvættir — the spirits of the land
Ljósálfar — the light-elves
Mara — the nightmare-incubus
Mökkurkalfr (Mokkurkalfi) — the clay-giant calf fashioned as a deceptive figurehead in Þorsteins saga Víkingssonar
Myrkálfar — the dark-elves
Niðingar — the dishonored dead
Níðhöggr — the dragon at the root of Yggdrasil
Nisses — the small household spirits
Nökkvi — the water-spirit
Rísar — the great giants
Sága — a goddess
Sjórævar — the sea-robbers, sometimes the undead
Skrímsl — the monsters of the sagas (a general term)
Skuggalífir — the shadow-people
Svartálfar — the dark elves of the underground
Tívar — a poetic name for the gods
Troll — the great beings of the Norwegian, Swedish, and Danish folk tradition
Tusser — a kind of underground dwarf in the Danish tradition
Úlfhéðnar — the wolf-skinned warriors
Vættir — the spirits (a general term)
Valkyries — the choosers of the slain
Vampýr — the blood-sucking undead (attested in late medieval Icelandic and Norwegian sources)
Vettir — the local spirits
Yfirvættir — the high spirits of the upper air

This catalogue is a working list, not an exhaustive one; the sagas and the folklore have many more. What is clear is that the Norse world is densely populated with non-human beings, and that the medieval Icelander or Norwegian would have lived in a world of many classes of being, each with its own role, its own cult, and its own danger.

Sources and Scholarly Notes

The principal sources for the creatures and beings of Norse mythology are:

The Poetic Edda, especially the Völuspá, Vafþrúðnismál, Grímnismál, Þrymskviða, Hymiskviða, Fáfnismál, Sigrdrífumál, Hávamál, Alvíssmál, and Skírnismál
The Prose Edda of Snorri Sturluson (c. 1220), especially the Gylfaginning and the Skáldskaparmál
The Heimskringla of Snorri, especially the Ynglinga saga
The Íslendingasögur (the family sagas of the Icelanders), especially Eyrbyggja saga, Grettis saga, Gísla saga, Hrafnkels saga, Þorsteins saga Síðu-Hallssonar, and Svarfdæla saga
The Eddaic heroic poems, especially the Völsunga saga and the related Eddic poems (Helreið Brynhildar, Guðrúnarhvöt, Hamðismál)
The konunga sögur (kings’ sagas), especially Hrólfs saga kraka and Hervarar saga
The late medieval Icelandic sagas, especially the riddarasögur (knight-sagas) and the lygjasögur (lying-sagas)
The folktale collections, especially Jón Árnason’s Íslenzkar þjóðsögur og ævintýri (1862–64) and the Norwegian Folktale Collection of Asbjørnsen and Moe
The Konungs skuggsjá (King’s Mirror, c. 1250), an important Norwegian source for natural and supernatural history
The Gesta Danorum of Saxo Grammaticus (early 13th century)
Adam of Bremen’s Gesta Hammaburgensis Ecclesiae Pontificum (c. 1070), which describes the temple at Uppsala and the Norse gods

Modern scholarship is anchored by the work of H.R. Ellis Davidson (Gods and Myths of Northern Europe, 1964; The Road to Hel, 1943), John Lindow (Norse Mythology: A Guide to Gods, Heroes, Rituals, and Beliefs, 2001), Andy Orchard (Dictionary of Norse Myth and Legend, 1997), Carolyne Larrington (The Poetic Edda, 2014; The Norse Myths: A Guide to the Gods and Heroes, 2017), Margaret Clunies Ross (Prolonged Echoes, 1994), Ursula Dronke (The Poetic Edda, 1969–2011), Gro Steinsland (Fornnordisk religion, 2005), Terry Gunnell (The Origins of Drama in Scandinavia, 1995), and Hilda Ellis Davidson (Roles of the Northern Goddess, 1998).