Love advice from Icelandic sagas: Don't date someone who doesn't dream

 

“If you don’t dream, don’t bother to call on me again.” 

–   Thyri Haraldsdóttir, a noblewoman, to a medieval king of Denmark who wanted to marry her.

 

Iceland has always been a country of dreamers. Dreaming is important in the Icelandic sagas and in the Völuspa even the gods go to wise women for help with their dreams. A Gallup survey of 1,200 Icelanders in 2003 found that 72 percent found meaning in their dreams, and many reported dreaming the future and sharing dreams regularly within their families. The Icelandic language distinguishes vital categories of significant dreams, such as dreams of the future (berdreymi) and dream visions (draumspa).

The story of Thyri Haraldsdóttir, from the Icelandic sagas, is a beautiful example of how dreaming can make us wiser, and opens the way of the heart. Thyri [written in Icelandic as Þyri] was the daughter of an earl in Holstein, although some say she was the daughter of an English king. She was a dreamer who saw far and deep into the nature of things, and her father consulted her on all important affairs.

Gormur, king of Denmark, wanted to marry Thyri and asked her father for her hand. The earl said that he would leave his daughter to decide for herself, “since she is much wiser than I am.” Thyri told her royal suitor to go home and build himself a new house, just big enough to sleep in, where no house had stood before. In this place he must sleep alone for three nights, and pay close attention to his dreams. Then he must send a messenger to her to report on his dreams.

“If you don’t dream, don’t bother to call on me again,” Thyri told him firmly.

Gormur remembered his dreams, and the content satisfied Thyri, because she consented to marry him. The dreams were recounted at the wedding feast.

 In the first dream, three white boars came out of the sea, fed on the grass, and went back to the sea. In the second, three red boars came out of the sea, and did the same. In the third dream, three black boars with great tusks did the same, but when they returned to the sea, there was such a loud rush of the waves returning to the land that the noise could be heard throughout Denmark.

Thyri's interpretation was that the three white boars represented three very cold, snowy winters which would kill "all the fruits of the ground." The red boars meant there would next be three mild winters, while the black boars with tusks indicated there would be wars in the land. The fact that they all went back into the sea showed that their effect would not be long-lasting. The loud noise as the waves of the sea rolled back on the Danish shores meant that "mighty men would come on the land with great wars, and many of his relations would take part." 

She said that had he dreamed of the black boars and the rushing waves the first night, she would not have married him, but now, since she would be available to provide advice, there would be little injury from the wars. We might wonder whether the writer who recorded this narrative was familiar with the tale in Genesis of Pharaoh's dream and how Joseph's interpretation saved Egypt from  famine. 

In a region of strong women, Thyri became the wisest of queens, remembered as "The Pride of Denmark". Through dreaming, she helped the king to scout the future and read the true factors at work behind the surface of events. Decisions of state were based on these dreams.

 

 

Source: The story of Thyri Haraldsdóttir is in the version of Ólafs Saga Tryggvasónar in the 14th century Icelandic Flateyjarbók. While Thyri is not actually Icelandic, her story comes to us through Icelandic tradition. I am indebted to Valgerður Hjördis Bjarnadóttir, a gifted Icelandic dreamer and scholar who is helping to revive the ancient dreamways, for bringing this wonderful story to my attention, and for the translation on which this summary is based. You can read more about Icelandic dreaming, both medieval and modern. in The Secret History of Dreaming.

Image: Viking queen from "The World of the Vikings" exhibition at the National Museum of Denmark

The Wand Woman and the Odin Squirt

 I do much of my best reading and research in the middle of the night, between naps. Last night I decided to take a break from my recent four hour sessions with Jung's Black Books (which make the Red Book look like beach reading) and return to my studies of Viking era history, mystery and magical practices.

My particular focus last night was the staff or wand of the völva, or seeress. The word völva means "staff-carrier" or wand woman and the staff was her principal power tool, used for summoning spirits, for projecting harm or healing, for astral riding, for opening portals between worlds, for blasting enemies and probably for sex magic. It could be as large as a medieval pole-weapon or as slim and elegant as a wand acquired in Diagon Alley in the Harry Potter stories.

I read the description of a decorated völr (staff) in the Saga of Erik the Red. I examined scores of photos of staffs unearthed in the gravesites of Scandinavian women of power in Neil Price's monumental book The Viking Way. Most of the ones that have survived are metal but surely many more - long since decomposed - were of wood. One of the surviving wooden staffs, found in a bog at Hemdrup in Jyllund, Denmark, has a remarkable set of carvings suggesting an association with soul travel. A female figure in a feathered robe appears to be flying through the air, with her dogs nearby amd a triquetra as a magical seal.

I went online seeking more images and discovered that Etsy has dozens of pages offering reconstructions. Then I found this wonderful painting (above) of a völva striding forth with her staff by Arkel Eli Petersen, one of a series reproduced as postage stamps in the Faroe Islands, a self-governing province of Denmark.

I reread the Völuspá in the Poetic Edda, in which Odin journeys to a (deceased) völva to clarify the meaning of a dream and see into the future. Even the All-Father, no slouch at magic himself, turns to a völva when he wants reliable divination.

After five hours with my Norse books, I took a break by cooking one of the few dishes of which I am proud: a super-spicy hot chili loaded with fresh jalapenos and many cloves of garlic. Crushing garlic, I managed to squirt myself and was temporarily blinded in one eye. This has happened before, with lemon juice, as memorable punctiation to an interactive adventure in realms of soul healing and the care and relocation of draugr (Old Norse for the restless dead) I may tell elsewhere. Dabbing garlic juice from my eye,I again recalled how Odin paid with an eye at the well of Mimir for the power to see into the Otherworld.

Note to self: be careful what you squeeze after squeezing in a full helping of Norse mythology and magic.

The Völva as Cat Woman

I have long recgonized that my nocturnal habits are catlike and as I pursue my Norse studies - in dreams and visions as well as in books and conversation with friends who have walked these paths - I am struck by how important cats seem to be in Scandinavian myth and magic. The latest confirmation:

She comes in this silver body from a trove of jewelry unearthed at the former estate of a Viking magnate on Lake Tissø in western Zealand. Since the settlement was named for the god Tyr some scholars speculate that she was part of a blót, a sacrifice to the god. She has the face of a cat, or a shapeshifter in the midst of transformation.

Some think she is Freyja, the great goddess of the Vanir and mistress of magic who rides through the sky in a wagon pulled by cats. I suspect she is a völva, a seeress who may have painted her face like this in seidr and other rituals. Face paint was found inside a little cat-shaped box that was also a belt buckle. In other Viking tombs we find the remains of völva outfits including catskin gloves and hoods lined with catskins.

This cat woman resides for now in the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen, at least when the lights are on.