Since his appearance in the Marvel Universe, Thor's younger brother Loki has become the most popular "cute and charming" villain. Like Thor, everyone loves and hates Loki.
Recently, "Rocky" was launched on Disney+, becoming one of the most popular TV series on the Disney platform, and the rating on Douban was as high as 9.2, which is enough to see Loki's strong appeal as a charming villain.
In addition to the personal charm of actor Tom Hiddleston, Loki in Norse mythology has provided enough complexity for the role.
Today's guest at the hardcore book club is the mythological researcher Silud, who will take us into the world of Norse male gods.
✎ Author | Silud
✎ Edit | Cheng late
In the Marvel Universe, Loki and Thor are both sons of Odin and a pair of brothers who love and kill each other; in Norse mythology, Loki and Odin are righteous brothers, so Loki and Thor are uncles and nephews. But one thing Marvel has retained: Loki doesn't belong to the Asaphites where Odin and Thor belong, but is a descendant of the Frost Giants.
Many myths describe Loki as a handsome, but treacherous, elusive guy who cares only about pleasure and self-preservation. He was sometimes mischievous, sometimes malicious, sometimes helping the gods, sometimes helping the giants, depending on which action was in his best interest at that time.
Loki and Thor. / Stills from Thor 3: Twilight of the Gods
In the early mythology, Loki helped the asaphants to solve many troubles, such as when Asgard first built the city wall, Loki sacrificed the beautiful mare of the ego to hook up with the male horse Swadiphari who moved bricks, and also gave birth to the eight-legged god Junslipnir, who later became Odin's mount.
After Thor lost the hammer, Loki also came up with the idea of dressing Thor as the goddess Freya, pretending to marry the giant Hellum, taking the opportunity to regain the hammer, and so on.
Although Loki helped the gods break the siege many times, the methods he used did not make the Nordics feel particularly honorable. Although he was a god in a sense, there is no trace of nordic worship of Loki in the historical record, because Loki's role is actually the antithesis of the traditional Norse values of honor, loyalty, etc.
He symbolizes disorder, irrationality, and mischief, often violating not only the social order, but also what we call the "laws of nature," and always obstructing other gods who wish to promote the order of the universe.
Sometimes Loki also intervenes in human life, and mortal desires have unnecessary desires and emotions, which cause problems in life, which are said to be blamed on Loki. In short, he occupies a very contradictory and unique position among gods, giants, and other beings.
This is reflected in Loki's family ties, as his father was Fárbauti (meaning cold shooter), his mother was Laufey or Nal (meaning "needle"), and Laufi/Noel could have been a goddess, a giant woman, or something else, which is completely absent from extant sources.
Loki's wife, Sigyn, gave birth to a son with him named Nari or Narfi, a name that may mean "corpse."
Loki is better known for his three children born to the giant Angrboða (meaning "omen of pain"): Jormungand, who is destined to kill Thor at dusk of the gods; Fenrir, the wolf who bites off one of the arms of Tyre, the god of war and oath, and kills Odin in the twilight of the gods; and Hel, the goddess of death, who Marvel describes as Odin's daughter and Loki's sister.
In the Marvel movies, Hel becomes Odin's daughter and Loki's sister. /Thor 3: Twilight of the Gods
For centuries, scholars have tried to explain the meaning of Loki's name, such as associating it with the ancient Scandinavian words logi "fire" or lopt "air," but never got a convincing answer.
However, the linguist Elda Hyde recently discovered in his study of early Nordic folklore that the myth refers to Loki as a net maker, both literally and symbolically as a "fishing net", referring to his cunning schemes to trap the gods in dangerous situations; the word Loki also often appears in the context of figurative situations; in Icelandic, the word "loki" even means "knot" or "dispute", and spiders are sometimes called "loki". Because their knotted nets are made up of a series of knots and rings like the fishing nets made by Loki in mythology.
In this way, the most direct meaning of Loki's name may be "knot" or "dispute", which also indicates that he is a dead knot that brings disaster to the gods.
Distant songs of ice and fire
The Norse mythology we speak of today is more of a national rather than a geographical concept, referring to the myth of the Germanic peoples of northern Europe, that is, the Scandinavians, and the other regions or peoples of northern Europe have developed into a system of unity: for example, Finland has more traditions inherited from the Caucasus, the epic "Kalevara" has many myths and stories about the creation of the universe and the adventures of the original gods; the Nordic indigenous Sami people lived a nomadic life of domesticated reindeer and believed in a "animistic" shamanic culture; it does not belong to this concept.
The Scandinavians and the Anglo-Saxons were two major branches of the Germanic peoples. "Germanic" is a collective term used by Julius Caesar, Tacitus, and other Romans to describe the non-"Celtic" and non-"Slavic" tribes of Central Europe's Germania.
The approximate location of the area occupied by the "Germanic" peoples of Caesar's time. /wiki
After centuries of wars and complex population migrations, the differences between them are not purely geographical. However, the distinguishing feature of these Germanic tribes was their language, which spoke Germanic rather than dialects based on Celtic, Slavic or Latin. The basic form of the Germanic language was established around 500 BC, and since then Germanic culture has coexisted with the culture of its rival Celtics on the territory.
Historically, the Germans occupied most of the European continent north of Scandinavia, Iceland, the British Isles and the Alps.
By the 8th century, Germanic dialects had developed and differentiated into Dutch, Flemish, English, Danish, Swedish, Norwegian, and Icelandic. The latter four, which make up the "North Germanic" or "Scandinavian languages", differ considerably from the main "West Germanic languages" because they were separated earlier. And then, despite all the differences, the myths and legends of the two have much in common.
According to Norse mythology, the origin of life, the formation of the world, and the birth of all things are all the result of the violent collision of ice and snow and fire, and this concept is a vivid portrayal of the active volcanic geological movement in the subarctic region.
As early as after B.C., this genesis legend about the period of "heaven and earth xuanhuang, the universe flood" was circulated in the form of oral recitation among the Nordic Germanic tribes. By the Middle Ages, Icelandic scholars had written them down.
Gullfoss Waterfall in Iceland. /wiki
There are now two main Eddas that can be examined: the "pre-Edda", or "poetic Edda", discovered in 1643 by the Icelandic scholar Błynjolf Sweenssson, which was written between the 9th and 13th centuries and includes 14 mythological poems; and the "Post-Edda", or "Prose Edda", written by the Icelandic poet Snørri Sturusson in the early 13th century, an interpretative work based on the former Edda and some now-unexamined sources.
In Norse mythology, heaven, earth, and man are formed in this way: in the beginning, there were only two regions in the world, one cold and one hot, namely the snow and ice country Niflheim and the flame country Of Muspelheim, and there was a huge "Ginnungagap" between these two countries.
The soaring flames from Mosbiheim, the sparks splashed on both sides of the Kinnga Gap, and also on the ice mounds piled up next to the chasm. The ice melts into water vapor after encountering the hot Mars, and is frozen again by the strong cold wind blowing from Nifheim.
In this way, after thousands of years of ice and snow, the first life was born in the ice dome: the archaeopteryx Ymir (meaning "twin"). He sweated in his sleep, and many male and female frost giants were born from under his armpits and legs.
Illustration of audhumla, an 18th-century Icelandic manuscript. /wiki
As the snow and ice continue to melt, a cow, Audhumla(meaning "plump humming"), emerges from the snow and ice, licking the ice and the salt frost on the ice for a living, and feeding Imir with milk. The cow kept licking ice cubes and salt grains, saving Buri, the original god of the Asaphite tribe, Odin's grandfather, Buri (meaning "ancestor").
Brie's son Bor ("son") grew up marrying Bestla, daughter of the giant Bolthorn (meaning "pernicious thorn"), and soon had three sons: Odin (or "leader of the gods"), Vili (meaning "will"), and Ve (meaning "sacred").
Ymir is attacked by Odin, Willie, and Phy. /wiki
When they grew up, the three Odin brothers killed Imir, used his body to construct everything in the world, and then used ash and elm trees to make the first pair of human men and women, Ask (meaning "ash tree") and Embla (meaning "elm tree"), and built a fence around their residence, Midgard (also known as the atrium or human being), to protect them from the ice giants.
The atrium is connected to the rest of the universe, the Níu Heimar, through the branches and roots of the world tree Yggdrasil. There is a poem in the former Edda that mentions the "Nine Realms", but none of the surviving sources has given a complete list of the Nine Realms, and scholars can only reconstruct it as follows:
1. Asgard, the kingdom of the Assaids (Æsir).
2. Vanaheim, the kingdom of the Warner gods
3. Alfheim, the land of the elves
4. Midgard, on earth
5. Jotunheim, the land of giants
6. Nifheim, the primordial world of ice and snow
7. Mossbiheim, the original world of fire
8. Nidavellir/Svartalfheim, a land of gnomes
9. Hel, the world of the dead ruled by the eponymous goddess of death, Hull
The nine worlds appear to be arranged along two axes, vertical and horizontal. The vertical axis corresponds to the trunk of eugatrah, with Asgard on the highest branch, Midgard on the ground in the trunk, and Haier underground between the roots; the horizontal axis is based on the Norse geographical knowledge of the world, so Asgard is directly above the trunk, connected to other worlds by means of the Rainbow Bridge (meaning "sparkling").
Rainbow Bridge in Asgard. /wiki
The human kingdom of Midgard revolves around the trunk (and therefore in the middle of both axes), and some stories say that the human world and Asgard can be connected by the Rainbow Bridge, but the Rainbow Bridge is guarded by Heimdall, so that only the heroic spirits of the warriors who died in battle can step into the paradise that Odin has prepared for them, Valhalla; the giant kingdom Jotunheim surrounds Midgard, which is much farther away from the trunk than the human world.
As for where the other kingdoms are, there are many opinions, because all other worlds are invisible except for Midgard, although they sometimes appear in certain ways, such as Jotunheim coinciding with the natural wilderness, Hull coinciding with the tomb, and Asgard coinciding with the sky.
The Tree of the World. /wiki
In different ancient texts, the details of the Nine Realms are different, but the Tree of The World is basically the same. It is often thought of as a ash tree, in the words of the ancient Norse poem "The Prophecy of the Prophetess (Völuspá)", the tree is "Friend of the Clear Sky", and it is so high that its canopy is far above the clouds.
Another ancient Norse poem, Hávamál, adds that the tree is "windy" because its towering canopy is often surrounded by fierce winds.
"No one knows where its roots are," because they stretch all the way to the underworld, and no one but the shaman can see it while it's alive.
Many animals live in the stout branches and roots of the Tree of the World.
An eagle and a falcon inhabit the tallest branches; deep underground there is the black dragon Nidhogg and his children nibbling on the roots; in the middle of the tree lives a ratatoskr (meaning "drill teeth"), which runs around the trunk, provoking dissension between the dragon and the eagle; and four stags on the tree, who are natural branch builders.
While the activities of these animals may be interesting, they have a deeper meaning: the tree is slightly eaten away by a few wild beasts, which means that it is doomed to die, and the universe that surrounds it will eventually perish.
From the Viking Age
Our main knowledge of Norse mythology and traditions comes from Norse Viking archaeology, which was far from the sphere of Influence of The Romans and did not convert to Christianity until the 10th century, much later than England, Southern and Central Europe, and even after this Christianity, Icelandic and Danish writers retained interest in ancestral legends.
The term Viking did not refer to a certain country or territory, but to a way of life that plundered foreign lands and wealth, especially to the (modern)Danes, Norwegians, and Swedes known for their seafaring, who ventured through much of the world during the Viking Age (circa 793-1066 AD).
A picture of a Viking longship invading England on a Bayeux tapestry. /wiki
The motives that drove the Vikings to sea were eternal, universal human desires: wealth, prestige, and power.
The Vikings valued wealth itself, and fighting and confrontation were a necessary means to an end. Closely linked to the desire for wealth is the desire for honor, prestige, and power. The chiefs generously distributed their wealth to their warriors, thereby increasing their power. Their belief system was based on battle and honor, and the acquisition of wealth further strengthened their desire for battle and confrontation.
In fact, confrontation is the central theme of Norse mythology, which is itself a creative force. The Archaeopteryx, Imir, was born in a confrontation of fire and ice, and the gods of Asaph had to kill Imir in order to shape this world.
It was the first purposeful killing in the universe, done by the Lord God Odin himself, so it was not a sin like the biblical myth of Cain killing Abel, but rather a good, even holy act.
This is not to say, of course, that the Norse people consider the value of killing to be sacred; they naturally make a distinction between legitimate and unlawful killing. But they embraced this belligerent lifestyle, hoping that it would bring them great honor and fame.
Stills from Vikings.
According to some historians, it was out of this desire that Berserkers in Northern Europe would take a poisonous mushroom before going to war to gain their ferocious power in battle—after all, being taken to heaven by Valkyrie after death and enjoying fine wine and wild boar meat every day in Valhalla was better than having to die in bed (known to the Nordics as "firewood death") and embark on a difficult journey to the cold underworld of Hull alone.
However, since the world was formed in the corpses of the Frost Giants, the status quo of the world is still largely influenced by the Giants. Even though the gods had shaped the universe according to their own goals, some of Ymir's qualities—his power, rudeness, chaos—still existed in the world.
In the norse eyes, the world was a battlefield between gods and giants, and their forces were evenly matched. Humanity is in the middle of a confrontation between holiness, order and goodness on one side and blasphemy, chaos and evil on the other. This conflict and confrontation is never-ending, because the world is formed on it.
Twilight of the gods
Loki is a typical example of this contradiction and conflict. In later mythology, Loki commits a series of evil deeds, such as a feast hosted by the sea god Egil for the asaphants, until the late Thor arrives and asks him to get out, or kill him with a hammer, before Loki leaves the hall and curses him, because he knows that Thor will really beat him with a hammer.
But the most famous evil is Loki's role in the death of Baldr," the god of light, or "hero."
Badr once had a nightmare and had a premonition that he would be plotted against. The gods were anxious about this, and his mother Frigga sent a messenger to make all the birds and beasts swear that they would not harm Badr. But the messenger did not pass on the order to the mistletoe because he felt that the fragile and incompetent plant did not need to be guarded against. Loki, however, used the mistletoe to make a sharp arrow, inciting the god of darkness Holder to come forward, and holding his hand to bend the bow to aim, shooting Badr to death.
Illustration of Badr's death in an 18th-century Icelandic manuscript. /wiki
The messenger god Hermod then rode Sleppner to the dungeon, pointing out that Badr was loved by all living things, and begging Hull to release him. Hull retorted that if that were the case, it would not be difficult to ask any being in the world to weep for Bader, and that as long as this happened, Badr would return to the celestial realm from the underworld.
Almost all creatures weep for Badr, with the exception of a cold female giant named Þökk, who is almost certainly Loki disguised, so Badr must stay in the dungeon forever.
As a result of Loki's crime, the gods eventually forged a chain out of the guts of Loki's son, Narver, and tied Loki to a boulder in the cave. A venomous snake hovered above him, trying to drip venom on him. Loki's loyal wife, Siegen, sat next to him with a bowl to take in the snake's venom.
When the bowl was full, she had to leave her husband to dump it, when the venom dripping on Loki would make him writhe and convulse in pain, causing an earthquake. Loki lay in this state until he broke free of his grip at dusk.
In the ultimate battle between the gods and the giants, Loki joins the battle on the side of the giants, and even the captain of the ship that steers the ship of giants, the "nail ship", which brings many giants to the battlefield with the gods. Loki and Heimdall, the god of dawn who guards the Rainbow Bridge, engage in a fierce battle and end up in the apocalyptic battle.
Rocky and Siegen, an 1890 oil painting by M.E. Wenger. /wiki
For many years, scholars have tried to decipher the meaning behind Badr's death, and the killing of one twin is actually very common in ancient Indo-European mythology, such as Manu killing his twin brother Yemo, Romulus killing Remus, and there are many stories of twins killing each other in Greek mythology; mistletoe may be a symbol of thunder and fire, a passport to the yin and yang worlds, and Aeneas once carried a golden mistletoe to visit his father's ghost.
Some scholars believe that it may be a myth that deforms the cycle of seasons, and that Bader, although not returning to the celestial realm, eventually existed underground in an invisible form, much like the Osiris of Egyptian mythology.
However, it is difficult to explain that Hodel is blind, and Loki's role in this myth is an element that other twin myths do not have. Some scholars believe that Badr was the only god of perfect character among the Asaph gods, and his death was completely innocent, so it bears a distinct image of a Christian martyr.
The ancient belief in Badr may have been a bountiful or martial spirit worship, but like Loki, Badr's significance in Norse mythology is not in his relationship with humans, but as a catalyst for the twilight of the gods.
Many myths mention the end times, such as in Mayan mythology, where the present age is called the Quaternary, inhabited by creatures that survived the first three epochs and the inhabitants of the Quaternary era itself, which will eventually be destroyed by the flood; in Aztec mythology, the present epoch is called the "fifth sun", and the world will be destroyed by the earthquake in the year of the "four earthquakes", after which time will stop forever and the universe will be dead; in Persian mythology, the devil brought the cold winter of the Ice Age to the human world, exterminating most of the life on earth.
However, in terms of the details of the end itself and the afterlife, most of these myths are vague and vague, and norse mythology depicts the twilight of the gods and the destruction of the universe in such detail that it is the most different feature of Norse mythology from other national myths.
Thor and the serpent in the twilight of the gods. /wiki
Before the dusk of the gods comes, there will be a harsh winter of three years, when human beings will be morally corrupted and kill each other; the sun and moon will be engulfed, and the world will be dark; the forests will collapse and the rainstorm will rage; the mortal enemies of the gods of Asaph will besiege from all sides, and the chaos before the creation will reappear; but after the twilight of the gods, the order of the world will be rebuilt, and the dead god of light, Bader, will be resurrected.
The advent of a new world and the end of myth
The polytheistic faith of Northern Europe was attacked by Christianity from the 6th century AD, and by the 9th century, the kings of European Christendom began to send priests to Northern Europe, and one of the orders led by the Bishop of Ansgar was sent to Denmark and Sweden by Louis the Pious, Charlemagne's successor. The beliefs of the Nordics began to change under the influence of missionary activities and recognized the political benefits that came with it.
By around 1000 AD, the conversion to Christianity was almost complete, and the Swedish polytheistic tradition lasted for two more generations and disappeared completely by the 12th century, so perhaps the later evolution of Norse mythology was heavily influenced by Christianity.
Some scholars believe that the Twilight of the Gods has many similarities with the Book of Revelation written by Christian authors, so Nordic poets with Christian backgrounds may have written this apocalyptic story with reference to the Book of Revelation.
In the Middle Ages, Christianity adopted a policy of eradication of pagan deities. Although pagan beliefs were suppressed, the names of the gods were never forgotten, and in the various languages spoken in German and Scandinavia, four days a week were named after the gods.
Academic interest in ancient myths and heroic stories began in Iceland in 1640 when the poetic Edda was discovered, and then as Edda and Saga were translated into other languages, interest in Norse mythology spread rapidly throughout Europe in the 17th and 18th centuries, and triggered a fierce debate between Greek mythology and Norse mythology in the field of art and education.
Lee M. Holland translated the cover of the English edition of Poetic Edda. /wiki
By the 19th century, scandinavia's romantic literature and art was filled with nostalgia and admiration for the heroic era, such as dragon-shaped ships, such as Nevin, Valkyrie, winged samurai, and so on.
Nostalgia for ancient splendor often has patriotic and nationalist overtones, and the political contradictions between Denmark and Germany, Denmark and Britain in the 19th century further inspired similar intentions.
By the 20th century, the German Nazis, who admired the purity and superiority of Aryan blood, used myths to make political claims, and some Nazis even hoped to openly restore the worship of the German gods Wodin (i.e., Odin) and Thor, but Hitler thought that this practice was more foolish, so he did not implement it.
Of the various literary works based on Norse mythology, perhaps the most famous is Wagner's opera tetralogy The Ring of the Nybelungen, which, although similar in name to the famous medieval Germanic epic Song of the Nibelungen, varies greatly.
A design manuscript from the premiere of the Nibelungen in 1876. /wiki
Wagner's script is based on the story of the Walson family in Icelandic mythology, but through various techniques, the characters of the gods are rendered, and by linking the fate of Siegfried and the curse of the treasure to the ultimate fate of the gods, giving the opera a grandeur that the original material did not have, and is still loved today. But Wagner's widow and sons tended to emphasize the racist tendencies of opera, making the play the prototype of Nazism in the eyes of many, and it took a long time to get out of that shadow.
There are two long works of English literature based on Norse mythology: one is William Morris's long poem "The Siegel of the Walsons", which seeks to get rid of the reckless, barbaric feelings that ancient myths bring to the reader, focusing on nostalgic sentiments.
This work has been forgotten, but another work that still has great influence and appeal around the world today is Tolkien's fantasy epics The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings, and The Elven Diamond. As a scholar of Norse and Anglo-Saxon mythology and legend, The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings draw heavily from Scandinavian myths and legends.
Biblical stories, Greco-Roman mythology, Norse mythology, they constitute the spiritual archetypes of Western culture. It is these archetypes that make the great themes of world mythology connected to today's world.
The PS4 game God of War also references a large number of Norse European mythology.
In recent years, Norse mythology has stirred up a new boom, and in addition to various film and television dramas, there are also many popular ACG works. From this point of view, these fascinating myths, created by the early cultures of the distant Nordic countries, still have an impact on contemporary society in ways that were unforeseen by previous generations.
The author of this article is Luther Silude, a fan of mythological archaeology and a contributor to the mythology column of "Flying Fantasy World". He is the author of "Male God Examination" (2019) and "City of Myths" (2020).