12
votes
What is the source of the fable of Thor’s attempt to drink up a small spring?
I love this story! According to good ol' Wiki, which is sourced, this story comes from an Icelandic rímur cycle. It is also cited in the Gylfaginning.
Your story and the rest of it are from the third ...
10
votes
Accepted
What is the relationship between Thor and storms?
The 11th century Christian missionary Adam of Bremen wrote,
"Thor, they say, presides over the air, he governs the thunder and lightning. the winds and rains."
The Norse believed that ...
- 4,067
10
votes
Is Odin Thor's father?
As you say Snorri Sturluson writes this cited text in the prologue to his Prose Edda, one of our chief sources of Norse mythology. The old Scandinavian worshipers did not have a written language ...
- 166
10
votes
Accepted
What is the source of the fable of Thor’s attempt to drink up a small spring?
This seems to be a somewhat distorted version of a story from Gylfaginning, in which Thor, Loki and Tjalvi travels to Útgarða-Loki, a jotun and sorceror, who presents Thor, Loki and Tjalvi with ...
- 6,027
9
votes
Accepted
Can Thor fly in Norse mythology?
AFAIK, there is actually nothing that explicitly says that he can fly, even when he uses his chariot. Þrymskviða, verse 21, describes how he goes to Jotunheim:
Then home the goats | to the hall ...
- 6,027
8
votes
Accepted
What kind of offerings did worshipers make to Thor?
Blood and poetry.
Before I go any deeper, I want to clear up a misconception: Thor is not really a god of thunder. Yes, he does generate it, but his main function is as guardian against the forces of ...
- 6,027
8
votes
Accepted
Does Thor use an axe and/or sword in the Myths?
No, those weapons are inventions of the comics.
We do have a couple of stories in which Thor can not use Mjölnir. In Þrymskviða, the hammer has been stolen by the giant Thrym who demands the hand of ...
- 6,027
7
votes
Accepted
Why is Thor's chariot pulled by goats?
Thor's "ride" fits with his role as god of the common people. While most of the gods ride horses, Thor drives a wagon, or walks. (He walks across Bifrost, the rainbow bridge, according to the Prose ...
- 5,920
7
votes
Why is Thor's chariot pulled by goats?
Snorri’s tale of the goats’ being being magically reconstituted after being eaten for meat is of a common type of mythic motif, a fantasy cherished by a people who know hunger intimately. (...
- 1,400
6
votes
Accepted
Does Thor's strength confer a degree of physical invulnerability?
Thor can take a lot, but he is not invulnerable
The best example of this is in the story of Hrungnir. In the duel with the obnoxious giant, Thor's hammer Mjölnir collides with the whetstone Hrungnir ...
- 6,027
6
votes
Who made Mjölnir?
If you look in Faulkes' translation of the Poetic Edda the story can be found on pp. 96-7, in the section of Skaldskaparmal that explains kennings for gold. The story begins when Loki cuts off the ...
- 5,920
5
votes
Can Thor fly in Norse mythology?
He uses his chariot to fly, not his hammer though.
Thor had a chariot to travel across the sky, which was drawn by two giant goats: Tanngniost and Tanngrisnir.
source
I've never seen anything of ...
- 6,720
4
votes
Thor and Bifröst
These rivers are mentioned in verse 29 of the Grimnismol:
Kormt and Ormt and the Kerlaugs twain
Shall Thor each day wade through,
When dooms to give he forth shall go
To the ash-tree Yggdrasil;
For ...
- 5,378
3
votes
Is Odin brother of Loki?
The Marvel characters are not the real mythological characters and resemble the actual portrayals of the Norse gods in almost no ways beyond the superficial (name, vague powers).
So any and all ...
cmw♦
- 7,383
3
votes
Why is Thor's chariot pulled by goats?
It looks less weird in the context of a version of the Auriga mythology involving goats. Part of Auriga are the Haedi, the two goat kids.
- 41
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