Seiðr Loom

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Hreiðmarr

Father of Otr, Fáfnir and Reginn, who makes the gods pay a gold ransom for his son's death and is killed by his own son for it.

Hreiðmarr is the householder at the centre of the otter's ransom. Odin, Loki and Hœnir ask him for a night's lodging and show him the otter they have killed. It is his son Otr. With his sons Fáfnir and Reginn he seizes them and demands that the skin be filled and covered with red gold Reginsmál, prose 1 Skáldskaparmál 39. Snorri calls him rich and "very skilled in black magic" Skáldskaparmál 39. When one whisker still shows, Odin covers it with the ring Andvaranaut, and Loki tells Hreiðmarr that the gold will be the death of him and his sons Reginsmál, prose 3 Reginsmál 6. Hreiðmarr is not afraid Reginsmál 9.

He refuses his sons any share. In Reginsmál Fáfnir stabs him in his sleep, and the dying man calls on his daughters Lyngheiðr and Lofnheiðr. Lyngheiðr answers that a sister seldom avenges her father on her brother Reginsmál, prose 4 Reginsmál 10-11. Snorri says instead that "they slew their father", both brothers together, though in his next lines Fáfnir alone claims the deed Skáldskaparmál 40.

In the sources

Quoted from the hosted translations; each line is checked against the text when the site is built. Select a reference to read it in context.

the husbandman who dwelt there was named Hreidmarr: he was a man of much substance, and very skilled in black magic.
Skáldskaparmál 39 Snorri's description of the gods' host.
The gold so red shall I rule, methinks, So long as I shall live
Reginsmál 9 Hreiðmarr dismisses Loki's warning about the gold.
Lyngheith and Lofnheith, fled is my life, And mighty now is my need!
Reginsmál 10 Dying, he calls on his daughters for vengeance.

Where the sources disagree or fall silent

  • Who killed him: Fáfnir alone in Reginsmál, both sons together in Snorri's first sentence (though Snorri's Fáfnir then speaks as the killer).

Myths with Hreiðmarr

Otter's ransom and Andvari's curse Loki kills an otter that turns out to be a farmer's son. To buy their lives the gods must fill and cover its skin with gold, which Loki wrings from the dwarf Andvari, along with a ring Andvari curses. The curse starts working at once. Sigurðr slays Fáfnir Urged on by his foster-father Reginn, the young Sigurðr digs a trench on the dragon's path and stabs Fáfnir from below. A taste of the dragon's heart-blood lets him understand the birds, who warn him that Reginn means to kill him.

Related

Otr Son of Hreiðmarr who fished in otter shape; Loki killed him with a stone, and the gold paid for his death carries Andvari's curse. Fáfnir Son of Hreiðmarr who killed his father for the otter's ransom and lay on the gold as a dragon on Gnitaheiðr until Sigurðr killed him from a pit. Reginn Hreiðmarr's son, a dwarfish smith who fosters Sigurðr, forges his sword and sends him against his brother Fáfnir, then plots to betray him and is beheaded. Andvari A dwarf living as a pike in a waterfall, from whom Loki extorts all his gold, including a ring he curses so that it will destroy whoever owns it. Andvaranaut Andvaranautr The cursed gold ring taken from the dwarf Andvari, used to cover the last whisker of the otter's skin, and later worn by Brynhildr and sent as a warning by Guðrún. Odin Óðinn Chief of the Æsir: a one-eyed god of wisdom, poetry, magic, war and the dead, who gave an eye and hanged himself on a tree for knowledge, and who dies at Ragnarök. Loki The giant-born trickster counted among the Æsir: father of Fenrir, the Midgard Serpent and Hel, contriver of Baldr's death, bound until Ragnarök. Hœnir A shadowy god, Odin's travelling companion, who gave sense to the first humans, went to the Vanir as a hostage after their war, and survives Ragnarök to take up the prophetic wand.