Popular Tales from the Norse

Featuring tales like “Why the Sea is Salt” and “The Old Dam and Her Hen,” Popular Tales from the Norse includes a complete translation of the creation poem, typically called Völuspá. Völuspá is a 60-stanza poem that tells the story of the creation of the world from the Old Norse collection of Poetic Edda, a collection of religious stories in verse. The poem, considered one of the most important stories in Norse mythology, begins with a völva, a female seer, requesting silence from humans. Turning to Odin, the woman begins to recite an ancient creation myth, wherein the world was empty until Burr, the father of Odin, lifted land out of a vast sea. The gods then established order in the universe by placing the sun, moon and stars in particular places and giving them specific movement patterns, starting the moon’s phases and the cycle of day and night. As the legend goes, the gods made three giant maidens and a race of dwarves to populate the land. Soon after, the first man and woman were created, and warring amongst the gods ensued. The story ends with a prophecy: the world would once again be in perfect order, without war, but only after the gods engage in an epic war and Odin himself is killed. After her startling conclusion, the völva describes a giant dragon bearing the corpses of the great Norse gods on its wings.