THOR’S VISIT TO HYMIR

The story of Thor’s visit to the Giant Hymir is told in verse in a poem of the Poetic Edda (Hymiskviða) and in prose in Snorri’s Edda. In the Eddic poem the myth begins by recounting how the gods, gathered at a banquet given by Ægir, discovered through magic arts that he had in his possession a huge number of kettles. Thor hinted to Ægir that he was inferior to the Æsir, and in revenge Ægir asked Thor to go out and find a kettle large enough to brew ale for all the Æsir at one time. No one had heard of a kettle of this size, until finally Tyr let it be known that his father (his mother’s father?), the Giant Hymir, who lived to the eastward of the Elivagar, had one that was a mile deep; but it was impossible for any one to get hold of it without trickery. Thor and Tyr accordingly drove away from Asgard and in due course arrived at the house of man named Egil; there they stabled the goats and continued on foot to Hymir’s farm, only to discover that he had gone out hunting. On walking into the hall they found Hymir’s wife (?), a hideous Giantess with nine hundred heads. Hymir’s daughter (?), Tyr’s mother, nevertheless received them kindly and hid them behind eight immense kettles that were hanging in the room, since, as she said, Hymir was not well disposed toward visitors. After a long time Hymir came home. As he stepped in at the door, the icicles that hung from his frosty beard sent forth a tinkling sound. His daughter greeted him with smooth words and told him that Thor and Tyr had come to see him: “There they are, hiding behind a pillar under the staircase.” At the piercing looks that shot from the eyes of the Giant, the pillar burst asunder and the crossbeam broke in two; all the kettles fell down and were shattered into bits except one only, which had come more finely tempered from the forge. Thor and Tyr now had to step out from their hiding; Hymir himself was ill at ease when he saw the deadly enemy of the Giants under his own roof. Three oxen were slaughtered for the evening meal, and of these Thor alone ate two. The next day Hymir proposed that they should go out hunting, to see if they could not bag something really worth eating; Thor, on the other hand, offered to row a boat out to sea if Hymir would provide bait for fishing. Hymir pointed to his own herd of cattle, and Thor was not slow in tearing the head off an enormous black bull. Thor and Hymir now rowed so far out to sea that the Giant became alarmed, and then they began to fish. Hymir pulled in two whales at once; while Thor, who had taken his seat aft, baited his hook with the bull’s head and started angling for the Midgard Serpent. And sure enough, the Serpent took the bait and the hook with it. Thor hauled his catch up to the gunwale and gave it a blow on the head with his hammer so that the mountains echoed to the sound and the whole earth quaked; but the line parted and the Serpent sank back into the sea. As they rowed homeward Hymir sat in a fit of temper and spoke never a word. When they touched land, he asked Thor either to make the boat fast or to carry in the catch, thinking in either case to put his strength to the test. Thor laid hold of the boat by the prow and drew it ashore without bailing out the bilge water; then he picked up the oars and the bailing dipper and carried them up to the house, and the whales to boot, as if they were nothing at all. Still Hymir was not content; Thor was strong enough both at rowing and at carrying burdens, but the question remained whether he had the power to break the Giant’s beaker into bits. Thor hurled it against a stone pillar, but the pillar broke and the beaker was left whole. Then Tyr’s mother advised Thor to throw it against Hymir’s own hard forehead; Thor did so, and this time the beaker burst, while the Giant’s forehead remained unscathed.

Hymir felt his loss keenly, yet he said they might have the kettle if they were able to carry it out of the house. First Tyr tried to lift it, but it would not budge an inch. Thor was compelled to bend to the task himself; he took so strong a grip that his feet went through the floor. Finally he succeeded in slinging the kettle over his head, but it was so large that the handles clattered at his heels. Hurrying away, he traveled a great distance before looking back; on doing so at length, he saw Hymir and a whole army of many-headed Giants setting out in pursuit from their rocky fastnesses in the east. He threw the kettle off his shoulders, swung his hammer, and killed every one of the band. He had not gone far on his journey, however, before one of the goats stumbled to earth half dead; it was halt on one foot, and for that mishap malicious Loki was to blame.1 Thor finally brought the kettle into the presence of the assembled gods; and in it Ægir was thereafter compelled to brew the ale for the yearly banquet which he had to provide for the Æsir.

According to Snorri’s Edda, Thor set out all alone, in the likeness of a “young lad,” without his wagon or his goats, and so arrived one evening at Hymir’s dwelling. He remained there during the night, and in the morning got permission to go out fishing with Hymir, although the Giant did not look for much help from a fellow so young and small. Thor asked Hymir

1 It may be that Loki had misled Thjalfi, Egil’s son, to split the goat’s thigh bone. As to the supposed time of all these happenings, the Eddie poem reveals nothing; it tells only that the “mountain-dweller” had to pay for the damage with his own children.

for bait, and on being told to provide for himself he tore the head off Hymir’s biggest bull, Heaven-Bellower (Himinhrjótr). Thor plied the oars; but when Hymir thought they were going rather too fast, he asked Thor to lay by, since they had reached his accustomed fishing banks; Thor for his part, wanted to row farther out. When they had gone on some distance, Hymir declared it would be unsafe to venture beyond a certain point for fear of the Midgard Serpent. Thor nevertheless rowed on and on, until Hymir became very ill at ease. At last Thor pulled in his oars, prepared a stout line and a hook to match, and baited it with the bull’s head. Then he dropped the line, and the Midgard Serpent took the bait so that the hook pierced the roof of his mouth. The Serpent gave the line such a violent jerk that Thor’s knuckles were dashed against the gunwale; furiously angry, he rallied his Æsir strength and pulled so hard that his feet went through the boat and struck the bottom of the sea. He succeeded in drawing the Serpent up to the gunwale; and a terrible sight it was to see Thor fix his piercing eyes on the Serpent and to see the Serpent glare in turn at Thor, spewing venom meanwhile. Hymir grew pale with terror as he caught sight of the Serpent and saw the waves washing into the boat and out again; fumbling for his bait knife, he cut the line off against the gunwale, and the Serpent sank back into the sea. Thor threw his hammer after it, but did not succeed in killing it. Yet he struck Hymir such a blow with his fist that the Giant tumbled overboard head first. Thor himself waded ashore.