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Gleipnir

The silk-soft fetter the dwarves made from six impossible things to bind the wolf Fenrir; it held where two iron chains had failed, and cost Týr his hand.

Gleipnir is the fetter that finally held Fenrir. It is known only from Snorri's Gylfaginning, but there it is told in loving detail (see The binding of Fenrir). The wolf had already broken two iron fetters, Lædingr and Drómi, so Odin sent Skírnir, Freyr's messenger, to dwarves in the land of the Black Elves (Svartálfaheimr) to make a better one Gylfaginning 34.

They made it of six things: the noise of a cat's footfall, the beard of a woman, the roots of a rock, the sinews of a bear, the breath of a fish and the spittle of a bird. Hárr, Snorri's narrator, offers proof with a straight face: Gangleri must have noticed that a woman has no beard, a cat's leap makes no sound and a rock has no roots. The result was "soft and smooth as a silken ribbon" Gylfaginning 34.

On the island Lyngvi in the lake Ámsvartnir the gods asked the wolf to test it. He suspected a trick in so thin a band and agreed only if a god put a hand in his mouth. Týr did. The harder the wolf strained, the tighter the band became, and Týr lost his hand Gylfaginning 34 Gylfaginning 25. The gods fixed the fetter's chain, Gelgja, through a rock called Gjöll, and pinned it deep in the earth with the stone Thviti. Gleipnir holds until Ragnarök, when "all fetters and bonds shall be broken" and Fenrir runs free Gylfaginning 51.

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.

It was made of six things: the noise a cat makes in foot-fall, the beard of a woman, the roots of a rock, the sinews of a bear, the breath of a fish, and the spittle of a bird.
Gylfaginning 34 Snorri's list of the fetter's ingredients.
The fetter was soft and smooth as a silken ribbon
Gylfaginning 34 The fetter looks too slight to hold anything, which makes the wolf suspicious.
when the Æsir enticed Fenris-Wolf to take upon him the fetter Gleipnir
Gylfaginning 25 Snorri recalls the binding when introducing Týr.

Where the sources disagree or fall silent

  • The meaning of the name is unclear; it has been connected with words for 'open' or for 'entangle', but none is secure.

Myths with Gleipnir

The binding of Fenrir The gods raise Loki's wolf-son Fenrir at home until they fear him, then trick him into a magic fetter made of impossible things. Týr puts his hand in the wolf's mouth as a pledge, and loses it.

Related

Fenrir The giant wolf fathered by Loki on Angrboða, raised by the gods, bound with the fetter Gleipnir at the cost of Týr's hand, and fated to swallow Odin at Ragnarök. Týr The one-handed god of battle and courage, who put his hand in the wolf Fenrir's mouth as a pledge so that the gods could bind it, and lost the hand. Dwarves dvergar The underground smiths of Norse myth, made from the giant Ymir's flesh or blood; they forge the gods' greatest treasures, brew the mead of poetry, and fear the daylight. Svartálfaheimr Snorri's 'home of the black elves', where the gods go to have dwarves forge their treasures; the name occurs only in his prose, and his merging of black elves with dwarves is debated. 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. 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.