Note 39 — The Wise-Woman’s Prophecy

The stanza is almost certainly in corrupt form. The third line is presumably an interpolation, and is lacking in most of the late paper manuscripts. Some editors, however, have called lines 1–3 the remains of a full stanza, with the fourth line lacking, and lines 4–5 the remains of another. The stanza depicts the torments of the two worst classes of criminals known to Old Norse morality—oath-breakers and murderers. Nithhogg (“the Dread Biter”): the dragon that lies beneath the ash Yggdrasil and gnaws at its roots, thus symbolizing the destructive elements in the universe; cf. Grimnismol, 32, 35. The wolf: presumably the wolf Fenrir, one of the children of Loki and the giantess Angrbotha (the others being Mithgarthsorm and the goddess Hel), who was chained by the gods with the marvelous chain Gleipnir, fashioned by a dwarf “out of six things: the noise of a cat’s step, the beards of women, the roots of mountains, the nerves of bears, the breath of fishes, and the spittle of birds.” The chaining of Fenrir cost the god Tyr his right hand; cf. stanza 44.