"Odin" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... old viking times, before Christianity had found its way so far north, the bird which influenced the people most was the raven. He was credited with much knowledge, as well as with the power to bring good or bad luck. One of the titles of Odin was "Raven-god," and he had as messengers two faithful ravens, "who could speak all manner of tongues, and flew on his behests to the uttermost parts of the earth." In those days the figure of a raven was usually emblazoned on shield and standard, and it ...
— Boys and Girls Bookshelf (Vol 2 of 17) - Folk-Lore, Fables, And Fairy Tales • Various
... maps now, and find this wild north land. It is called Scandinavia, and comprises Norway and Sweden. The home of these Northern gods was a city called Asgard, built above the clouds, in the midst of which stood Valhalla, the hall of the chief god, Odin. Such a marvellous place as this was! It had a golden roof that reflected light over all the earth, just like the sun, and its ceiling was supported by spears, while millions of shields formed its walls, over which were draped coats of mail. A huge wolf stood before its ...
— Harper's Young People, August 24, 1880 - An Illustrated Weekly • Various
... north a different story was told, but the meaning was the same. Sometimes men told how Odin (the All-Father) had become angry with Brunhild (the maid of spring), and had wounded her with the thorn of sleep, and how all the castle in which she slept was wrapped in deathlike slumber until Sigurd ...
— The Story of Siegfried • James Baldwin
... in early attempts at historical construction to a not inconsiderable degree. Thus, to take a relatively late example, by Saxo Grammaticus and in the Heimskringla (both of the thirteenth century) the god Odin is made into a human king and the history of his exploits is given in detail.[663] It is, however, especially in the treatment of the old divine heroes, originally true gods, that the process of dedivinization appears. These figures, because ...
— Introduction to the History of Religions - Handbooks on the History of Religions, Volume IV • Crawford Howell Toy
... Maya race, the Tzendals, inhabited a portion of the province of Chiapas. One of their hero-gods bore the name of Votan, a word from a Maya root, signifying the breast or heart, but from its faint resemblance to "Odin," and its still fainter similarity to "Buddha," their myth about him has given rise to many whimsical speculations. This myth was written down in the native tongue by a Christianized native, in the seventeenth century. The MS. came into the possession of Nunez de la Vega, Bishop of Chiapas, ...
— Aboriginal American Authors • Daniel G. Brinton
... Northmen who had ravaged England came eager for blood and plunder, and hating the sight of a Christian church as an insult to their gods, Thor and Odin; but the lapse of a hundred years had in some degree changed the temper of the North; and though almost every young man thought it due to his fame to have sailed forth as a sea rover, yet the attacks of these marauders might be bought off, and provided they had treasure ...
— A Book of Golden Deeds • Charlotte M. Yonge
... the races lasted for ages on ages, but finally Odin, Vili and Ve, the grandsons of Bori, succeeded in putting to death Ymir, the greatest and worst of the giants. And in killing him they accomplished much more than they expected; for from his wounds the blood gushed in such streams that it drowned all the ...
— Journeys Through Bookland - Volume Four • Charles H. Sylvester
... most largely (1 Kings, iv. 32). In the same way the Greeks attributed most of their sayings to Pythagoras; the Arabs to Lokman, Abu Obeid, Al Mofaddel, Meidani, and Samakhshari; the Persians to Ferid Attar; and the northern people to Odin. ...
— Who Wrote the Bible? • Washington Gladden
... kings the Lacedemonians met in large numbers and tore the flesh from their foreheads with pins and needles. It is said that when Odin was near his death he ordered himself to be marked with a spear; and Niort, one of his successors, followed the example of his predecessor. Shakespeare speaks of "such as boast and show their scars." In the olden times it was not uncommon for a noble ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould
... this interesting case, relates that Hohmann, who died at the age of forty, had menstruated regularly to the age of thirty-eight. The penis was imperforate but hypospadic, from whence came the urinary and spermatic discharges, and Hohmann could in turn copulate as either male or female. Odin is also quoted in relation to the case seen at the Hotel-Dieu-de-Lyon, during the service of M. Bondet. The subject was aged sixty-three, and named Mathieu Perret. The case greatly resembled that of Hohmann, at the autopsy being found to be double sexed. So that, while ...
— History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present - Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance • Peter Charles Remondino
... solstice is in some strange fashion the high moment of the year, as the beginning of new activity in nature and in the gods. They solemnized the return of the fiery sun wheel; they traced in those solstice days the operations on earth of Odin and Berchta. They knew in themselves a thing they could not name. And when the supreme experience took place in Christ, they made the one experience typify the other, and became conscious of the divine nature of this nativity. So, by the illuminati, the prophets, the adepts, the time ...
— Christmas - A Story • Zona Gale
... Harek's courage that at once he lifted up no trembling voice and sang lustily, roaring verses old as Odin himself, such as no troll can abide within hearing of, so that those who bore him fell back amazed, and stared at him. Then I saw that on the arms and necks of one or two of these weird folk were golden rings flashing, and I saw, ...
— King Alfred's Viking - A Story of the First English Fleet • Charles W. Whistler
... Rhenish, a German hero. The whole scene of the tragic events is laid in the Rhinelands, where the killing of the Worm also takes place. On a hill in Frank-land Sigurd frees Brynhild from the magic slumber into which Odin had thrown her on a rock of punishment, because she, as a Valkyr, or shield-maiden of his, had brought about the death of a Gothic king to whom the god of battle had promised victory. In the south, on the Rhine, Sigurd is murdered. In ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 5 of 8 • Various
... good war-horse welcomes the stranger. As I said to you anon, Sweyn, I had intended to offer him as a sacrifice to Odin; but as the gods have thus declared him welcome here I must needs change my intentions. Who are you, young Saxon?" he asked as Edmund was brought before him, "and whence do you come? And how is it that a war-ship of your people is found ...
— The Dragon and the Raven - or, The Days of King Alfred • G. A. Henty
... is that about Wednesday which follows. Wednesday, the day consecrated to Odin, the eve of the day sacred to the Thundergod,[254] may also have been held holy by the heathen Slavonians, but to some commentators it appears more likely that the traditions now attached to it in Russia became transferred to it from Friday in Christian times—Wednesday and Friday having ...
— Russian Fairy Tales - A Choice Collection of Muscovite Folk-lore • W. R. S. Ralston
... Belgium, and who, though so brave and daring, was still a pagan, when all the world was fast becoming Christian. And as Clotilda listened, she wished that she could turn this brave young chief away from his heathen deities, Thor and Odin, to the worship of the Christians' God; and, revolving strange fancies in her mind, she determined what she would do when she "grew up,"—as many a girl since her day has determined. But even as they reached the fair city of Geneva—then ...
— Historic Girls • E. S. Brooks
... Odin had a son named Skioldr who settled and reigned in the land which is now called Denmark, but was then called Gotland. Skioldr had a son named Frithleif, who reigned after him. Frithleif's son was called Frothi, and succeeded him on the throne. At the time that the Emperor Augustus ...
— Folk-Lore and Legends; Scandinavian • Various
... that Asgard is up in the sky," Olaf said. "It is a wonderful city where the golden houses of the gods are in the golden grove. A high wall runs all around it. In the house of Odin, the All-father, there is a great feast hall larger than the whole earth. Its name is Valhalla. It has five hundred doors. The rafters are spears. The roof is thatched with shields. Armor lies on the benches. In the high seat ...
— Viking Tales • Jennie Hall
... credit of first exciting that interest in Scandinavian antiquity which has enriched the prose and poetry not only of England but of Europe in general. Gray refers to him in his notes on "The Descent of Odin," and his work continued to be popular authority on its subject for at least half a century. Scott cites it in his annotations on "The Lay of ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Eighteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... a spirit of prophecy. Sicily (sis' i ly). The largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Silenus (si le' nus). The foster-father of Bacchus. Sleipnir (slap' ner). The swift eight-legged horse of Odin. Sonmus (som' nus). The king of sleep. Sparta (spar' ta). Ancient ...
— Classic Myths • Retold by Mary Catherine Judd
... on an even of May Comes a man from Siggeir the King with a word for his mouth to say: "All hail to thee King Volsung, from the King of the Goths I come: He hath heard of thy sword victorious and thine abundant home; He hath heard of thy sons in the battle, the fillers of Odin's Hall; And a word hath the west-wind blown him, (full fruitful be its fall!) A word of thy daughter Signy the crown of womanhood: Now he deems thy friendship goodly, and thine help in the battle good, And for these will he give his friendship and his battle-aid again: But if thou ...
— The Story of Sigurd the Volsung and the Fall of the Niblungs • William Morris
... talking now, son of Hakon!" he shouted. "What think you we should do?—run into the islands, or go to Odin where we are? These men, methinks, will show us ...
— Vandrad the Viking - The Feud and the Spell • J. Storer Clouston
... Mythology. That's made up of tales, and myths, you know. Like Odin and Thor and those, only those were Scandinavian Mythology. So it would be absurd to take it too seriously. But I think, in a way, things like that do harm. You see," he explained, "the more beautiful ...
— Widdershins • Oliver Onions
... In the Scandinavian mythology: one of the most poetical of all mythologies. I have a great respect for Odin and Thor. Their adventures have always delighted me; and the system was admirably adapted to foster the high spirit of a military people. Lucan has a ...
— Gryll Grange • Thomas Love Peacock
... Odin in Valhall I dare not beseech; For him I forsook in days of childhood. But the great new God in Gimle?— All that I ...
— Poems and Songs • Bjornstjerne Bjornson
... uncertainty of movement and eyesight have prostrated the patient and compelled him to surrender at discretion to his nurses and medical advisers, but before the Valkyrie of Delirium are scouring the fields of his understanding, to pounce on the corpses of ideas their Odin had slain. That time was not due for many hours yet, when Gwen got speech of her cousin. She immediately appreciated that the patient was anxious to impress bystanders that this illness was all in the way of business. Also, that she was watching the development of ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... sacrifices to Odin were made at Old Upsala. Outside the church, in a row, are three great mounds of earth, erected in commemoration of Odin, Thor, and Freia—hence our Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. These mounds, of about 60 feet high and 232 feet in diameter, were in former times used as burying-places for the ...
— James Nasmyth's Autobiography • James Nasmyth
... built the town called Odense," replied the Pastor, "the other towns were envious of its better appearance and condition, and particularly the town now called Kjerteminde, and complaint was made to Odin, who was angry, and replied, 'Vaer du mindre' (literally, 'be you less'); this was that they should continue to be smaller towns than Odense. In time the name from Vaer du mindre became altered to its present ...
— A Danish Parsonage • John Fulford Vicary
... the peasants. Thus the Penrith circle is locally known as "Meg and her Daughters," a dolmen in Berkshire is called "Wayland the Smith's Cave," while in one of the Orkney Isles is a menhir named "Odin's Stone." In France many are connected with Gargantua, whose name, the origin of which is doubtful, stands clearly for a giant. Thus we find a rock called the "Chair of Gargantua," a menhir called "Gargantua's Little Finger," ...
— Rough Stone Monuments and Their Builders • T. Eric Peet
... or World-mother, knowing all things, yet never herself revealing them, though ready to be called to counsel by the gods, it represents her in action, decked with jewels and gorgeously attended. But, says the Mythes, when she ascended the throne of Odin, her consort (Heaven), she left with mortals her friend, the Goddess of Sympathy, to ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli
... we rowed in, But we seldom saw them thus; Our master is angry with Odin— Odin is angry with us! Heavy odds have we taken, But never before such odds. The Gods know they are forsaken, We must risk the ...
— Songs from Books • Rudyard Kipling
... battle against their own fear of the unseen. They brought with them, out of the heart of Asia, dark and sad nature-superstitions, some of which linger among our peasantry till this day, of elves, trolls, nixes, and what not. Their Thor and Odin were at first, probably, only the thunder and the wind: but they had to be appeased in the dark marches of the forest, where hung rotting on the sacred oaks, amid carcases of goat and horse, the carcases of human victims. No one acquainted with the early legends and ballads ...
— Health and Education • Charles Kingsley
... through the world the three gods Odin, Honir, and Loki come to a waterfall where an otter is devouring a fish that it has caught. Loki kills the otter with a stone, and they take off its skin. In the evening they seek a lodging at the house of ...
— The Nibelungenlied - Translated into Rhymed English Verse in the Metre of the Original • trans. by George Henry Needler
... am at last! Theodore hadn't been up for a week, so I came down, to find Mr. Gunther thundering like Odin because I had promised to help him arrange sittings with you, and had forgotten it. I had to bring him at once. He says his group is all done but the two heads, and he must have yours and the baby's. But he'll tell you all about it. Where is he? Elliston, I mean. ...
— The Nest Builder • Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale
... did, so he did. But we must suppose that Odin, the god of the Norsemen, had thought it time to reward him by calling him off from his earthly battles to the Halls ...
— The Pilots of Pomona • Robert Leighton
... thirsting for justice; the German prides himself upon his Christianity, but is an idolator like the German of other centuries. His religion loves blood and maintains castes; his true worship is that of Odin;—only that nowadays, the god of slaughter has changed his name ...
— The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... is the Temple of Isis, the Temple of Osiris, the Buddha Temple, the Horus Temple, and the Pyramid of Cheops. Farther to the east is the Diva Temple, the Brahma Temple, the Temple of Zoroaster, and the Tomb of Odin. Indeed, everywhere are there suggestions of temples and tombs, pagodas and pyramids, on a scale that no work of human hands can rival. "The grandest objects," says Major Dutton, "are merged in a congregation of others equally grand." With the wealth of form goes a wealth of color. Never, I venture ...
— Time and Change • John Burroughs
... countless rocks fringing the coast of Norway is one forming a striking picture of a horse and rider about to plunge into the surf, fifteen hundred feet below. This gigantic illusion, to the fanciful minds of the old bards presented the image of Odin as he disappeared ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls - Volume VIII, No 25: May 21, 1887 • Various
... dangerous, and cloudless eyes. Rolling and reeking decks have known him, and falling walls, and shrieks, and flames mounting skyward, and viking sagas, and drinking-songs roared from brass throats, and terrible hymns to Odin Allfather in the ...
— Slippy McGee, Sometimes Known as the Butterfly Man • Marie Conway Oemler
... various tribes had the same peculiarities, among which reverence was one of the most marked. They were not idol worshipers, but worshiped God in the form of the sun, moon, and stars, and in the silence of their majestic groves. Odin was their great traditional hero, whom they made an object of idolatry. War was their great occupation, and the chase was their principal recreation and pleasure. Tacitus enumerates as many as fifty tribes of these brave warriors, who feared not death, and even gloried in their losses. ...
— Ancient States and Empires • John Lord
... settling down in Europe; on their wanderings these races lost the original religion of their homes, and with it the right view of life: so, under a new sky, they formed religions for themselves, which were rather crude; the worship of Odin, for instance, the Druidic or the Greek religion, the metaphysical content of which was little and shallow. In the meantime the Greeks developed a special, one might almost say, an instinctive sense of beauty, belonging to them alone ...
— The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Religion, A Dialogue, Etc. • Arthur Schopenhauer
... at Christ upon his Cross; the sight which melted the hearts of our fierce forefathers, and turned them from the worship of Thor and Odin to the worship of 'The white Christ;' and from the hope of a Valhalla of brute prowess, to the hope of a heaven of righteousness and love. Look at Christ upon his Cross, and see there, as they saw, the true prowess, the true valour, the true ...
— David • Charles Kingsley
... is the soil out of which the mythology of the Eddas sprang, though through it each of the older formations crops out in huge masses which admit of no mistake as to its origin. In the Eddas the natural powers have been partly subdued, partly thrust on one side, for a time, by Odin and the Aesir, by the Great Father and his children, by One Supreme and twelve subordinate gods, who rule for an appointed time, and over whom hangs an impending fate, which imparts a charm of melancholy to this creed, ...
— Popular Tales from the Norse • Sir George Webbe Dasent
... was, or rather upon its site stood an earl's home, in days of old, for there some old Kemp, some Sigurd, or Thorkild, roaming in quest of a hearthstead, settled down in the grey old time, when Thor and Freya were yet gods, and Odin was a portentous name. Yon old hall is still called the Earl's Home, though the hearth of Sigurd is now no more, and the bones of the old Kemp, and of Sigrith his dame, have been mouldering for a thousand years in some neighbouring knoll; perhaps yonder, where ...
— George Borrow and His Circle - Wherein May Be Found Many Hitherto Unpublished Letters Of - Borrow And His Friends • Clement King Shorter
... would clear this ancient author of the errors the Greeks imputed to him. His great learning caused the Orientals to compare him with the Mercury or Hermes of the Egyptians and Greeks; just as the northern peoples compared their Wodan or Odin to this same Mercury. That is why Mercredi (Wednesday), or the day of Mercury, was called Wodansdag by the northern peoples, but day of Zerdust by the Asiatics, since it is named Zarschamba or Dsearschambe by the Turks and the Persians, Zerda by the Hungarians from the north-east, ...
— Theodicy - Essays on the Goodness of God, the Freedom of Man and the Origin of Evil • G. W. Leibniz
... ideals of Teutonism. Men whose ancestors had worshiped Jupiter and Apollo, and who were themselves worshipping the Christian God, Madonna and the great saints, had no spiritual affinity with men whose ancestors could conceive of no Deities higher than Thor, Odin and the other rough, crude, and unmannered denizens of the Northern Walhalla. So Italy stood by Civilization. Her risk was great, but great shall be her guerdon in the approval of her own conscience and ...
— Defenders of Democracy • The Militia of Mercy
... bridge, O thou storm of the sons of Odin, skilful and foremost in the battle, defender of the earth, and restorer of the exiled Ethelred! It was during the fight which the mighty King fought with the men of England, when King Olaf, the son of Odin, valiantly attacked the bridge ...
— Old and New London - Volume I • Walter Thornbury
... yet Spirit or mind, Blood, or beauty, Or lovely hue. Odin gave spirit, Heinir gave mind, Lothur gave blood ...
— Song and Legend From the Middle Ages • William D. McClintock and Porter Lander McClintock
... serious. A more proper part for her was that of a heroine, a queenly heroine,—that of Theresa of Hungary, for example; or, better still, that of Brynhilda the Valkyrie, the beloved of Sigurd, the serpent-killer, who incurred the curse of Odin, because, in the tumult of spears, she sided with the young king, and doomed the old warrior to die, to whom Odin had ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... the matchless tales of All-Father Odin, who crosses the Rainbow Bridge to walk among men in Midgard and sacrifices his right eye to drink from the Well of Wisdom; of Thor, whose mighty hammer defends Asgard; of Loki, whose mischievous cunning leads him to treachery against ...
— The Children of Odin - The Book of Northern Myths • Padraic Colum
... by the old Emperor. It would have been well for the Latins had his age been less. He died in the year 1237, and young Baldwin, who was married to his daughter Martha, became sole emperor. John de Brienne made so great a name that he was compared with Ajax, Odin the Dane, Hector, Roland, and Judas Maccabaeus. Baldwin, who came after him, might have been compared with any of those kinglings who succeeded Charlemagne, and sat in their palaces while ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume VI. • Various
... from his lips in music rolled The Havamal of Odin old, With sounds mysterious as the roar Of billows on a distant shore. Dead rides Sir ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. XII. July, 1863, No. LXIX. - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various
... outlines of the red cliffs of Heligoland appeared, the German cruiser Seeadler came from the island to meet the squadron and reported that the coast ironclads Aegir and Odin, the cruisers Hansa, Vineta, Freya, and Hertha, together with the torpedo-boats, had set out from Wilhelmshaven during the night and had seen nothing of the enemy. The sea appeared free. All the available English warships of the North Sea squadron had ...
— The Coming Conquest of England • August Niemann
... but the great shadow of the tree which hides you from the light of heaven shall be swept away. For this is the birth-night of the white Christ, son of the All-Father, and Saviour of mankind. Fairer is He than Baldur the Beautiful, greater than Odin the Wise, kinder than Freya the Good. Since He has come to earth the bloody sacrifices must cease. The dark Thor, on whom you vainly call, is dead. Deep in the shades of Niffelheim he is lost forever. His power in the world is broken. Will you serve a helpless god? See, my brothers, you ...
— The First Christmas Tree - A Story of the Forest • Henry Van Dyke
... seeing that thou art the greater stranger in these parts. Prythee, tell me, sweet chuck, why wearest thou that dainty garb upon thy pretty body?" At these words the other broke into a short, harsh roar of laughter. "By the bones of the Daemon Odin," said he, "thou art the boldest-spoken man that ever I have seen in all my life. I know not why I do not smite thee down where thou sittest, for only two days ago I skewered a man over back of Nottingham Town for saying not half so much to me as thou hast done. I wear this garb, ...
— The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood • Howard Pyle
... convenient to settle disputes by the summary method of an appeal to arms than to await the issue of a tedious and uncertain lawsuit such an appeal being perfectly competent to those who preferred it, and the belief being strong among the fiery spirits of the age that Odin, the god of war, would assuredly give victory ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne
... very woodlands here, some thirteen hundred years ago, you might have come upon one of the places where your forefathers worshipped Thor and Odin, the thunder and the wind, beneath the shade of ancient oaks, in the darkest heart of the forest. And there you would have seen an ...
— The Good News of God • Charles Kingsley
... them to the college and the cloister, we must consider them as founders at home, and as missionaries abroad; otherwise how could we estimate all that is at stake for Erin and for Christendom, in the approaching combat with the devotees of Odin,—the deadly enemies of all ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... then,—we want to take you for a good long drive to-morrow, and show you something; but the trouble is, the doctor and I are at variance as to what the something shall be. I want you to see Odin's Garden; and the doctor insists that you ought to go to the Cheyenne canyons first, because those are his favorites. Now, which shall it be? We will leave it ...
— Clover • Susan Coolidge
... the Hall of Mists, Freya (or Frigga), wife of Odin the All Father, sat with her golden distaff spinning the clouds. Orion's Belt was known as "Frigga's spindle" by the Norsemen, and the men on the earth, as they watched the great cumulous masses of snowy-white, golden or silver ...
— A Book of Myths • Jean Lang
... of Hunding gathered themselves—Alf and Eywolf, Hiorward and Haward—and the hosts met in the plain under Lowfell. There was war in heaven while those armies made it on earth. Out of the lightning flare came the Valkyrs, daughters of Odin, choosers of the slain. They rode grey horses; they wore helms and coats of mail; their spear-heads gleamed like fire. Helgi sat by the Eagle Rock and cried out to them to stay. And one—it was Hogni's daughter, Sigrun—turned him her ...
— Gudrid the Fair - A Tale of the Discovery of America • Maurice Hewlett
... story the moral; and that the story had generally a nucleus of fact within all its distortions and exaggerations. This holds good of the Odinic and Grecian myths; all are now more or less inclined to believe that the deities of Zeus's or Odin's dynasties were real conquerors or civilisers of flesh and blood, like the Manco Capac of the Peruvians, and that it was around records of their real victories over barbarous aborigines, and over the brute powers of nature, that ...
— Literary and General Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... Palaeolithic Implements in Upper Egypt, Boston, 1881. See also Evans, Ancient Stone Implements, chap. i, pp. 8, 9, 44, 102, 316, 329. As to stone implements used by priests of Jehovah, priests of Baal, priests of Moloch, priests of Odin, and Egyptian priests, as religious survivals, see Cartailhac, as above, 6 and 7; also Lartet, in De Luynes, Expedition to the Dead Sea; also Nilsson, Primitive Inhabitants of Scandanavia, pp. 96, ...
— History of the Warfare of Science with Theology in Christendom • Andrew Dickson White
... more of the Scandinavian religion through the Eddas, the Iliad of the Northmen, than of the religion of the Germans; but the two religions were closely allied. Among the chief gods worshiped by the Germans were Woden, called "Odin" in the North, the highest divinity, the god of the air and of the sky, the giver of fruits and delighting in battle; Donar (Thor), the god of thunder and of the weather, armed with a hammer or thunderbolt; Thiu (Tyr), ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... lull I heard a voice, I knew 'twas Odin's call. The Valkyrs are gathering round my bed To lead me ...
— Poems • Frances E. W. Harper
... existence of worship of stone pillars in Orkney. When he says it continued till a late period, I suppose he must allude to the standing stone at Stenness, perforated by a hole, with the sanctity attached to promises confirmed by the junction of hands through the hole, called the promise of Odin. Dr. Daniel Wilson enters into this fully in Praehistoric Annals of Scotland, pp. 99, 100, 101. It has been told myself that if a lad and lass promised marriage with joined hands through the hole, the promise was held to be binding. Whence the sanctity ...
— Notes and Queries, No. 181, April 16, 1853 • Various
... celebrated for his prudence and wisdom. Two of his proverbs are yet remembered and repeated among Laplanders. To express the vigilance of the Supreme Being, he was wont to say, "Odin's belt is always buckled." To show that the most prosperous condition of life is often hazardous, his lesson was, "When you slide on the smoothest ice, beware of pits beneath." He consoled his countrymen, when they were once preparing to leave the frozen deserts of Lapland, ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... Up to its golden roof with sobs and cries; And on the tables stood the untasted meats, And in the horns and gold-rimm'd skulls the wine. And now would night have fall'n, and found them yet Wailing; but otherwise was Odin's will. And thus the father of the ages spake:— "Enough of tears, ye Gods, enough of wail! Not to lament in was Valhalla made. If any here might weep for Balder's death, I most might weep, his father; ...
— Poetical Works of Matthew Arnold • Matthew Arnold
... priests at the altars, destroying both prelates and people, and forcing the Britons to take refuge in the woods and mountains. Though driven westward, the Celtic Church did not perish, and every now and then some devoted monk would try to establish himself among the worshippers of Thor and Odin. Such a mission was extremely dangerous, for so intense was the hatred of the pagan conquerors for the religion of the New Testament that it was almost impossible for a Christian teacher to show himself among them ...
— The New Girl at St. Chad's - A Story of School Life • Angela Brazil
... them all a good omen, and as they rowed towards Bathstead they saw a flock of ravens, which encouraged them yet more, since the raven was the bird of Odin, the haunter of fields of strife ...
— Hero-Myths & Legends of the British Race • Maud Isabel Ebbutt
... shown The painted histories of the olden might, The King of the Wends Thassilo's stern fight On land with Nimrod, and on ocean wide With Neptune. Rivers too personified Appear—the Rhine as by the Meuse betrayed, And fading groups of Odin in the shade, And the wolf Fenrir and the Asgard snake. One might the place for dragons' stable take. The only lights that in the shed appear Spring from the table's giant chandelier With seven iron ...
— Poems • Victor Hugo
... short-lived sons of men were doing. Sometimes they came in their own god-like splendor and might; sometimes they came disguised as feeble men folk, with all man's weaknesses and all his passions. Sometimes Odin, as a beggar, wandered from one country to another, craving charity; sometimes, as a warrior clad in coat of mail, he rode forth to battle for the cause of right; or as a minstrel he sang from door to door, and played sweet music in the halls of the great; or as a huntsman he dashed ...
— Hero Tales • James Baldwin
... Moon: "I looked down upon the great plain covered with coarse grass, and upon the barren fields. I mirrored my face in the Tyris river, while the steamboat drove the fish into the rushes. Beneath me floated the waves, throwing long shadows on the so-called graves of Odin, Thor, and Friga. In the scanty turf that covers the hill-side names have been cut.[1] There is no monument here, no memorial on which the traveller can have his name carved, no rocky wall on whose surface he can get it ...
— What the Moon Saw: and Other Tales • Hans Christian Andersen
... Newstead Abbey, a skull was found in a secret niche of the walls. It might have been that of the monk who haunted the house, or of one of his own ancestors, or of some victim of the morose race. It was converted into a goblet, and used at Odin-like orgies. Though the affair was but a whim of youth, more odious than poetical, it caused some talk, and raised around the extravagant host the haze of a mystery, suggesting fantasies of irreligion and horror. ...
— The Life of Lord Byron • John Galt
... can only resume, in a few words, their real or imaginary connection with the ruin of ancient Rome. Our fancy may create, or adopt, a pleasing romance, that the Goths and Vandals sallied from Scandinavia, ardent to avenge the flight of Odin; [20] to break the chains, and to chastise the oppressors, of mankind; that they wished to burn the records of classic literature, and to found their national architecture on the broken members of the Tuscan and Corinthian ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 6 • Edward Gibbon
... backwards. The Doctor was not less well mounted; in fact, the Icelandic pony is quite a peculiar race, much stronger, faster, and better bred than the Highland shelty, and descended probably from pure-blooded sires that scoured the steppes of Asia, long before Odin and his paladins had ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... Playhouse, so that he could live without begging; whom the Earl of Southampton cast some kind glances on; whom Sir Thomas Lucy, many thanks to him, was for sending to the Treadmill! We did not account him a god, like Odin, while he dwelt with us;—on which point there were much to be said. But I will say rather, or repeat: In spite of the sad state Hero-worship now lies in, consider what this Shakespeare has actually become among us. Which Englishman we ever made, in this land ...
— English Prose - A Series of Related Essays for the Discussion and Practice • Frederick William Roe (edit. and select.)
... I am, I seek the fight, and offer as the prize The untasted bait that bribed my soul, nor thou the boon despise; Else, like some worn-out beast of prey, Starkather soon must lie, Nor gain the bliss that Odin gives ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 361, November, 1845. • Various
... Gimle is meant the abode of the righteous after the day of judgment; by Naastrand, the place of punishment after the same dread sentence; by Ragnarok, the last day; Valhal, the temporary place of happiness to which the god Odin invites those who have been slain in battle; and Hel, the goddess of death, whose abode is termed Helheim. With these explanations the reader will be able to understand the subjoined passage, which expresses the Norse idea of the future purgation ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier
... not the thought of race From Asian Odin drawn In History's mythic dawn, Nor what we downward trace, —Plantagenet, York, Edward, Elizabeth,— Heroic names approved,— The blood of the people moved; But that, 'mongst those he loved, He ...
— The Visions of England - Lyrics on leading men and events in English History • Francis T. Palgrave
... burning breath, A fiery Soul that knows no fear, The armed hosts of Odin hear Her voice amid ...
— Dreams and Dream Stories • Anna (Bonus) Kingsford
... young fellow. Conversation chiefly about the profits booksellers make of us scribblers. I remember Peter Pindar saying, one of the few times I ever met him, that the booksellers drank their wine in the manner of the heroes in the hall of Odin, out of authors' skulls." This was a sharp saying; but Rogers, if he had chosen to relate his own experiences when he negotiated with Mr. Murray about the sale of Crabbe's works, and the result of that negotiation, might have ...
— A Publisher and His Friends • Samuel Smiles
... "Teutonism" but indulged it, and it was stimulated by some of the teachers, especially the magnificent Zeller, so full of vigour and joy in existence. I can still see the gigantic young Swiss, as he made the pines tremble with his "Odin, Odin, death to ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers
... how each day they became fonder of each other, called Frithiof to him and bade him remember that he was only a humble subject and could never hope to wed Ingeborg, the king's only daughter, descended from the great god Odin. The warning, however, came too late, for Frithiof already loved the fair maiden, and vowed that he would have her for his bride at ...
— Myths and Legends of All Nations • Various
... maintained itself in more Northern latitudes. It was brought to Britain by the German invaders, continued there till the seventh century, and was brought in again in a more Northern form by the Norsemen, who in their turn "gradually deserted Thor and Odin for the white Christ."[3] Bede tells hardly anything of the paganism which had been the religion of England a century before he wrote; in this he is like other Christian teachers who might have told but did ...
— History of Religion - A Sketch of Primitive Religious Beliefs and Practices, and of the Origin and Character of the Great Systems • Allan Menzies
... epoch when the nations of the East invaded Europe, the Scandinavians began to land on the coast of England. Their operations are little better known than those of the barbarians: they are hidden in the mysteries of Odin. ...
— The Art of War • Baron Henri de Jomini
... a Runic manuscript, the language of the original population of Iceland, invented by Odin himself," cried my uncle, angry ...
— A Journey to the Centre of the Earth • Jules Verne
... don't know that it is. But your folk would pay no ransom, and it would seem foolish if I had let you go offhand. Not but what your folk have not proved their wisdom, for they have got rid of us pretty cheaply. Odin! ...
— A King's Comrade - A Story of Old Hereford • Charles Whistler
... among whom they lived; they were received and welcomed wherever they went, and even kings delighted to honor them. In short, their art was supposed, by the Anglo-Saxons, to be of divine origin, having been invented by Odin, the great All-Father, and perfected by Bragi, the musician of the gods. As, however, civilization advanced and Christianity became established, this admiration for the minstrel and his art became modified in a degree. He was no longer ...
— Six Centuries of English Poetry - Tennyson to Chaucer • James Baldwin
... say so in a very special and emphatic sense," said Turnbull. "I do not believe in nature, just as I do not believe in Odin. She is a myth. It is not merely that I do not believe that nature can guide us. It is that I do not believe that ...
— The Ball and The Cross • G.K. Chesterton
... companion of the tricksy Paupukkeewis, the boastful Iagoo, and the strong Kwasind. If a Chinese traveller, during the middle ages, inquiring into the history and religion of the western nations, had confounded King Alfred with King Arthur, and both with Odin, he would not have made a more preposterous confusion of names and characters than that which has hitherto disguised the genuine personality of the great ...
— Hiawatha and the Iroquois Confederation • Horatio Hale
... country over which he reigned, and which will be noticed in connection with Denmark; these two countries forming a greater part of the ancient Scandinavia, from which our Teutonic ancestors migrated, the land of Odin, and Frea, and Thor, those half-fabulous deities, concerning whom there are still divided opinions; some supposing that they were heroes, and others, impersonations of virtues, or elements and wonders of nature. The mythology of Greece does not more fully abound ...
— A Modern History, From the Time of Luther to the Fall of Napoleon - For the Use of Schools and Colleges • John Lord
... of this name to the Teutonic Wuotan or Odin is certainly striking and will afford a new argument to the enthusiastic Rafn, and other advocates of ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 7, May, 1858 • Various
... Ivor Blue, He turned to the East his eye: “Now help me, Odin, for thou hast might, ...
— Grimmer and Kamper - The End of Sivard Snarenswayne and other ballads - - - Translator: George Borrow • Thomas J. Wise
... guess is as good as any. At any rate, Mercury, Apollo, Neptune, and Hercules were worshiped under the form of a square stone, while a large black stone was the emblem of Buddha among the Hindoos, of Manah Theus-Ceres in Arabia, and of Odin in Scandinavia. Everyone knows of the Stone of Memnon in Egypt, which was said to speak at sunrise—as, in truth, all stones spoke to man in the sunrise ...
— The Builders - A Story and Study of Masonry • Joseph Fort Newton
... enough, we want revenge. Odin and Thor will not know their children; our spears should ...
— Alfgar the Dane or the Second Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... symbol was the horse. The favourite, and therefore the chosen sacrifice of Odin, their ancestor and God, the horse's flesh was eaten at the sacrificial meal; the horse's head, hung on the ash in Odin's wood, gave forth oracular responses. As Christianity came in, and the eating ...
— The Ancien Regime • Charles Kingsley
... mind, that originally dower was only the price paid by the suitor to the father for his good will; while portion, on the other hand, was the sum paid by the father to persuade a suitor to take a daughter off his hands. Let us remember, therefore, that in those times, as Odin was supreme in Asgard as the Great Father of Gods and men, so in his own house every father of the race that revered Odin ...
— The story of Burnt Njal - From the Icelandic of the Njals Saga • Anonymous
... altogether, and lived in the northern parts of Europe. They were tall, fair, large people, very brave and spirited, with much honour and truth, though apt to be savage and violent; and they showed more respect to their women than any of the heathens did. They had many gods, of whom Odin, who left his name to the fourth day of the week, was the chief and father. Freya, the Earth, was his wife, and Thor was Thunder. There was a story of Baldur, a good and perfect one, who died by the craft of Lok the Destroyer, ...
— The Chosen People - A Compendium Of Sacred And Church History For School-Children • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... different from the race of the light-haired Germanic nations; and though the Druid caste recalls to our minds one of the institutions of the Ganges, this does not demonstrate that the idiom of the Celts belongs, like that of the nations of Odin, to a branch of the Indo-Pelasgic languages. From analogy of structure and of roots, the Latin ought to have penetrated more easily on the other side of the Danube, than into Gaul; but an uncultivated state, joined to great moral ...
— Equinoctial Regions of America • Alexander von Humboldt
... nations the cow is regarded as a divinity. In Norse mythology the milk of the cow Andhumbla afforded nourishment to the Frost giants, and it was she that licked into being and into shape a god, the father of Odin. If anything could lick a god into shape, certainly the cow could do it. You may see her perform this office for young Taurus any spring. She licks him out of the fogs and bewilderments and uncertainties in which he ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various
... of gold; The sea, the grove, the harvest and the vine Spring from their gods and claim a birth divine; While heroes, kings and sages of their times, Those gods on earth, are gods in happier climes; Minos in judgment sits, and Jove in power, And Odin's friends ...
— The Columbiad • Joel Barlow
... by Lady Jocunda's practical jests and overpowering gaiety. When she addressed herself to me, my answers were as constrained and as concise as possible; and, as I was afterwards told, I seemed, at the close of my reply to each interrogative of her ladyship's, to answer with Odin's prophetess, ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. IV • Maria Edgeworth
... the hill of Lidskialf Odin rose, The throne, from which his eye surveys the world; And mounted Sleipner, and in darkness rode To Asgard. And the stars came out in heaven, High over Asgard, to light home the King. But fiercely Odin gallop'd, moved in heart; And swift to Asgard, to the gate, he came. And terribly the ...
— On The Art of Reading • Arthur Quiller-Couch
... had a great heart, and she made a great end, such an one as was loved of our northern race, and that even I, the old merchant knave, desire and shall not win, who doubtless am doomed to die a cow's death in the straw. Pray the All-Father Odin—nay, that is heresy for which I might burn if you or the wenches told it to the priests—pray God, I mean, that He may grant you a better, as He did to old Thorgrimmer, if the tale be true, Thorgrimmer whose sword you wear and ...
— The Virgin of the Sun • H. R. Haggard
... identified by the garter king-at-arms. Still more recently the mythical spirit has taken violent possession of the Washington ancestry, and an ingenious gentleman has traced the pedigree of our first president back to Thorfinn and thence to Odin, which is sufficiently remote, dignified, and lofty to satisfy the most exacting Welshman that ever lived. Still the breach made by Colonel Chester was not repaired, although many writers, including some who should have known better, ...
— George Washington, Vol. I • Henry Cabot Lodge
... mythology in all its strength and weirdness. As classical mythology had become hackneyed, poets like Gray rejoiced that there was a new fountain to which they could turn. Thor and his invincible hammer, the Frost Giants, Bifrost or the Rainbow Bridge, Odin, the Valkyries, Valhal, the sad story of Baldur, and the Twilight of the Gods, have appealed strongly to a race which takes pride in its own mythology, to a race which today loves to hear Wagner's translation of these myths into the music of Die ...
— Halleck's New English Literature • Reuben P. Halleck
... focussed itself; a silly laugh welled up in his throat. "It would be no strange wonder if I did not," he chuckled. "Odin has changed you greatly; your face was never so beautiful. But this once you ...
— The Ward of King Canute • Ottilie A. Liljencrantz
... planets, as they had been discovered, had been named from Norse mythology—Odin and Baldur and Thor, Uller and Freya, Bifrost and Asgard and Niflheim. When the Norse names ran out, the discoverers had turned to other mythologies, Celtic and Egyptian and Hindu and Assyrian, and by the middle of the Seventh Century they were ...
— Graveyard of Dreams • Henry Beam Piper
... suspect that superstition was the parent of despotism? The descendants of Odin, (whose race was not extinct till the year 1060) are said to have reigned in Sweden above a thousand years. The temple of Upsal was the ancient seat of religion and empire. In the year 1153 I find a singular law, prohibiting ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon
... they conquered England, were rude, barbarous, and cruel. The gods of their worship were bloodthirsty and revengeful. Odin, their chief divinity, in his celestial hall drank ale from the skulls of his enemies. In the year 596, the Monk Augustine, or Austin, was sent by Pope Gregory to attempt their conversion to Christianity. He and his associates were so successful that on one occasion ten ...
— The Bay State Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2 • Various
... supposed to be. Olaf Gueldmar had been invited to the Manor at this period,—Errington wrote many urgent letters, and so did Thelma, entreating him to come,—for nothing would have pleased Sir Philip more than to have introduced the fine old Odin worshipper among his fashionable friends, and to have heard him bluntly and forcibly holding his own among them, putting their feint and languid ways of life to shame by his manly, honest, and vigorous utterance. But Gueldmar had only just returned to the Altenfjord after nearly a year's absence, ...
— Thelma • Marie Corelli
... the Irish missionaries under the papal control, as well as in converting many of the more remote German tribes who still clung to their old pagan beliefs. His energetic methods are illustrated by the story of how he cut down the sacred oak of Odin at Fritzlar, in Hesse, and used the wood to build a chapel, around which a monastery soon grew up. In 732 Boniface was raised to the dignity of Archbishop of Mayence and proceeded to establish, in the newly converted ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson
... how Miss Edgeworth's Frank made himself ridiculous by showing off to Mrs. J— , and how she herself had once been overwhelmed by the laughter of the Wardour family for having rehearsed to poor Mrs. Brown all the characters of the gods of the Northmen—Odin, Thor, and all—when she had just learnt them. So she was more careful than before not to pour out all the little that she knew; and she was glad she had not committed herself, for she had very nearly volunteered the information that Pompeii was overwhelmed by Mount Etna, before she ...
— Countess Kate • Charlotte M. Yonge
... tells of harp-shaped instruments, usually played by mysterious harpists in the cool depths of river or ocean. In Scandinavian lore, Odin, under the name of Nikarr, was wont to play on a harp in his home beneath the sea, and from time to time allowed one or more of his spirits to rise through the waters and teach mortals the strains ...
— Chatterbox, 1906 • Various
... your gabs, everybody," he commanded sternly. "There's no sense in going over the prose lit. You can do that better by yourselves. God knows I'm not going to waste my time telling you bone-heads what Carlyle means by a hero. If you don't know Odin from Mohammed by this time, you can roast in Dante's hell for all of me. Now listen; the prof said that they were going to make us place lines, and, of course, they'll expect us to know what the poems are about. Hell! ...
— The Plastic Age • Percy Marks
... become fishermen and small landholders in Sweden, Norway, and Denmark. "Jeudi," or Jupiter's day, becomes their god Thor's day, or Thursday; "Mardi," or Mars's day, is their Tiu's day, or Tuesday; "Mercredi," or Mercury's day, is Odin's or Woden's day, ...
— Germany and the Germans - From an American Point of View (1913) • Price Collier
... be Moslems in secret to this day in Andalusia, and if there were worshippers of Odin and Thor till lately on the shores of the Baltic, may not some secret votaries of Jupiter and Mars have lingered among the recesses of the Balkan, for centuries after Christianity had ...
— Servia, Youngest Member of the European Family • Andrew Archibald Paton
... ship. And sometimes in his excitement he would slip outside into the darkness, and hear far up in the frosty sky the whistle of the swans as they flew southward, and fancy them the shield-maids of Odin on their ...
— The Path of the King • John Buchan
... to believe that the earliest British legends recorded the glories of King Arthur—the defender of Christianity against the worshippers of Odin. The origin of these accounts have been traced by some to Scandinavian, by some to Arabian sources, but we may suppose them to have arisen among those ancient British people who inhabited Wales and Cornwall,[35] and passed over in the fifth and sixth centuries to Brittany (Armorica). ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... but a lion in war, The pride of her kindred, the heroine grew: Her grandsire, old Odin, triumphantly swore,— "Whoe'er shall provoke thee, th' encounter shall rue!" With tillage or pasture at times she would sport, To feed her fair flocks by her green rustling corn; But chiefly the woods were ...
— Poems And Songs Of Robert Burns • Robert Burns |
