Seiðr Loom

A myth retold · about 5 minutes

The world reborn

After Ragnarök a green earth rises from the sea. Surviving gods meet on Iðavöllr, Baldr returns from Hel, two humans come out of hiding, and a new sun rides the sky. The sources do not agree on who survives.

After Ragnarök by Doepler
After Ragnarök by Doepler, Emil Doepler (1905). Wikimedia Commons, public domain.

Ragnarök is not quite the end. After the sun turns black and the earth sinks into the sea Völuspá 57, the poems and Snorri all see something come after: a second world, washed clean, with a few gods and two humans to live in it. The sources agree on the shape of this new world but differ on who is in it. The retelling below follows Völuspá and brings in Vafþrúðnismál and Snorri's Gylfaginning where they add to it.

The green earth

The seeress who has just described the fire looks again:

Now do I see the earth anewRise all green from the waves again;The cataracts fall, and the eagle flies,And fish he catches beneath the cliffs.Völuspá 59

Snorri repeats this in prose. The earth comes up from the sea "green and fair", and crops grow there without being sown Gylfaginning 53. Völuspá says the same of the fields: "fields unsowed bear ripened fruit, All ills grow better" Völuspá 62.

The gods who return

On Iðavöllr, the plain where the gods built their first halls, the surviving gods meet. They talk about the "terrible girdler of earth", the world serpent, and remember the mighty past and the ancient runes of Odin Völuspá 60. In the grass they find the golden tables (or game-pieces) the gods owned in the beginning Völuspá 61. In Snorri these are "golden chess-pieces" Gylfaginning 53, and they recall the opening of the poem, where the gods "played at tables" in their golden age at Iðavöllr Völuspá 7-8.

Baldr comes back from Hel, and with him Höðr, the brother who killed him. The two live together in Odin's battle-hall Völuspá 62. Hœnir takes up the wand of prophecy, and "the sons of the brothers of Tveggi" (Tveggi being a name of Odin) live in Vindheim, "the wind's home" Völuspá 63.

Vafþrúðnismál gives a different list. When Odin asks who will rule the gods' realm "when the fires of Surt have sunk", the giant names Víðarr and Váli, the two avenger-sons of Odin, and Thor's sons Móði and Magni, who will inherit Mjöllnir after their father falls Vafþrúðnismál 51. Snorri puts both lists together: Víðarr and Váli survive, unharmed by sea or fire, and settle on Iða-Plain where Ásgard once stood; Móði and Magni come with Mjöllnir; then Baldr and Höðr come from Hel, and they all sit together and talk of the Midgard Serpent and Fenrir Gylfaginning 53.

People and a new sun

Völuspá says nothing of human survivors. Vafþrúðnismál does:

Vafthruthnir spake:"In Hoddmimir's wood shall hide themselvesLif and Lifthrasir then;The morning dews for meat shall they have,Such food shall men then find."Vafþrúðnismál 45

Snorri adds that they lie hidden "during the Fire of Surtr", and that their children will fill the world Gylfaginning 53. The names are usually translated "life" and "eager for life"; see Líf and Lífþrasir.

The sky also gets a new light. The sun, Sól, is swallowed at Ragnarök, but before that happens she bears a daughter as bright as herself, and the daughter rides her mother's road Vafþrúðnismál 46-47. Snorri tells this as one more wonder Gylfaginning 53.

The hall on Gimlé

Völuspá's vision climbs higher:

More fair than the sun, a hall I see,Roofed with gold, on Gimle it stands;There shall the righteous rulers dwell,And happiness ever there shall they have.Völuspá 64

Then "a mighty lord" comes "on high, all power to hold", who rules all lands Völuspá 65. The rest of the stanza is missing. And the last image is not peaceful at all. The dragon Níðhöggr comes flying up from below, from the dark hills, carrying the bodies of the dead on his wings, and the seeress sinks back into silence Völuspá 66.

Where the story comes from

There are three main witnesses. Völuspá (stanzas 59–66), probably about the year 1000, gives the new earth, Iðavöllr, the returning gods, Gimlé, the mighty lord and Níðhöggr. Vafþrúðnismál gives the survivors as answers in a wisdom contest: Líf and Lífþrasir Vafþrúðnismál 45, the sun's daughter Vafþrúðnismál 47, the four younger gods Vafþrúðnismál 51, and three throngs of protecting maidens who come "of the giants' kin" Vafþrúðnismál 49. It also says that Njörðr will go home to the Vanir "at the fall of the world" Vafþrúðnismál 39. Snorri's Gylfaginning 52–53 (c. 1220s) unites the two poems.

Where they differ:

Hyndluljóð, in its short Völuspá-like passage, also looks beyond the end: "Then comes another, a greater than all, Though never I dare his name to speak" Hyndluljóð 45.

Reading it today

Two stanzas draw most of the debate. The "mighty lord" of Völuspá 65 is read by many scholars as Christ or the Christian God, and the stanza has sometimes been thought a later addition. Others argue it could be a native idea. The unnamed "greater than all" of Hyndluljóð has received the same readings. Níðhöggr's flight is just as disputed. Some read it as evil surviving into the new world. Others think the dragon is leaving, or that the seeress has returned from the future to her own grim present as she sinks. That the world rises again also distinguishes Norse myth from purely final apocalypses, though some scholars suspect Christian influence here too. The cyclical reading, in which the world will end and rise more than once, is a modern interpretation; the sources describe one renewal only.

Key passages

Now do I see the earth anew Rise all green from the waves again
Völuspá 59 The seeress sees a new earth rise from the sea after the fire.
Then fields unsowed bear ripened fruit, All ills grow better, and Baldr comes back
Völuspá 62 Baldr and Höðr return from Hel to live in the new world.
In Hoddmimir's wood shall hide themselves Lif and Lifthrasir then
Vafþrúðnismál 45 Two humans survive in hiding; this is not in Völuspá.
In the gods' home Vithar and Vali shall dwell, When the fires of Surt have sunk; Mothi and Magni shall Mjollnir have
Vafþrúðnismál 51 Vafþrúðnismál names a different set of surviving gods from Völuspá.
In that time the earth shall emerge out of the sea, and shall then be green and fair; then shall the fruits of it be brought forth unsown.
Gylfaginning 53 Snorri combines Völuspá and Vafþrúðnismál into one account.
From below the dragon dark comes forth, Nithhogg flying from Nithafjoll
Völuspá 66 The poem's last image is the dragon Níðhöggr in flight, its meaning debated.

Who appears

Víðarr The silent son of Odin and the giantess Gríðr, nearly as strong as Thor. At Ragnarök he avenges his father by tearing apart the wolf Fenrir, and he survives into the new world. Váli Odin's son by Rindr, born to avenge Baldr: at one night old, unwashed and uncombed, he killed Baldr's slayer Höðr. He survives Ragnarök. Móði A son of Thor, named only alongside his brother Magni: the two survive Ragnarök and inherit their father's hammer Mjöllnir. Magni Thor's son by the giantess Járnsaxa. At three nights old he lifted the dead giant Hrungnir's leg off his father; after Ragnarök he and his brother Móði inherit Mjöllnir. Mjölnir Mjöllnir Thor's short-handled hammer, forged by the dwarf brothers Brokkr and Sindri: it never misses, always returns to his hand, kills giants, and hallows brides, pyres and the dead goats it brings back to life. Baldr Odin and Frigg's son, the brightest and best-loved of the gods. His death by a mistletoe dart, thrown by his blind brother Höðr, is the first great loss on the road to Ragnarök. Höðr The blind god who killed his brother Baldr with a shaft of mistletoe, guided, in Snorri's telling, by Loki. He is killed in revenge by Váli and returns with Baldr after 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. Líf and Lífþrasir Líf ok Lífþrasir The two humans who survive the end of the world hidden in Hoddmímir's wood, living on the morning dew, and from whom the new world is peopled. Gimlé A golden-roofed hall brighter than the sun, where the righteous will live after Ragnarök; Snorri says it already stands at the southern end of heaven. Iðavöllr The plain at the heart of the gods' home where they first built their temples and forges, and where the surviving gods meet again after Ragnarök. Níðhöggr The dragon that gnaws the root of Yggdrasil from below and feeds on the dead at Náströnd; at the end of Völuspá it flies up with corpses on its wings. Sól The sun as a goddess: daughter of Mundilfari and sister of the Moon, she drives the sun's horses across the sky with a wolf at her heels. Surtr The fire-giant who guards Múspell with a flaming sword; at Ragnarök he rides out from the south, kills Freyr and burns the whole world. Náströnd The 'corpse-shore', where a hall woven of serpents, far from the sun, drips venom on oath-breakers and murderers; the Norse sources' clearest place of punishment. Njörðr The Vanir god of the sea, winds and wealth, father of Freyr and Freyja. Sent to the Æsir as a hostage after their war, he married the giantess Skaði, an ill-matched union of sea and mountain. 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. Thor Þórr The thunder god, strongest of the Æsir: son of Odin and Earth, husband of Sif, and with his hammer Mjöllnir the gods' defender against the giants, until he dies killing the World Serpent. Ragnarök The foretold end of the gods' world: wolves swallow sun and moon, Loki and the monsters break loose, the gods fall in battle, Surtr burns the earth, and a new world rises.