Thor and Loki went hunting giants. They stopped at a peasant home and ate heartily, offering their own goats as meat—magic goats that would come alive again later. But the peasants’ son cracked a goat bone—a mistake with terrible consequences.
Thor and Loki went hunting giants. They stopped at a peasant home and ate heartily, offering their own goats as meat—magic goats that would come alive again later. But the peasants’ son cracked a goat bone—a mistake with terrible consequences.
The more Thor thought about giants, the more he wanted to kill them. He was obsessed. So one morning he said he’d head east on a killing spree, and when Loki offered to tag along, Thor agreed. Theirs was a twisted alliance.
They set out in the goat-drawn chariot and spent the full day traveling across Midgard. Come evening, they stopped at a humble farm and asked for room and board. The farmer’s wife offered these weary guests room quite readily, but she apologized that the board could only be vegetable gruel, for there was but little meat.
Thor said he’d supply the meat, and he swiftly slaughtered his two goats. He set the skin aside and told the farmer’s family to throw the dinner bones on the skins as they ate. The hungry farmer gaped at such a feast. But after the meat was gone, the farmer’s son Thjalfi stared at a goat thighbone. Marrow was far too delicious and nutritious to waste. He snuck over and split that bone, sucked out the marrow, and tossed it onto the bone pile.
That night all slept soundly.
In the morning Thor woke first. He held the hammer Mjolnir over the bone-filled goat skins and muttered magic words. Instantly, the goats were whole again, and fully alive. But one had a lame hind leg. Thor stomped into the room where the farm family slept still. “Who broke my goat’s thighbone?” He raised Mjolnir high in threat.
Hanging fish to dry is an old Viking tradition.
In the last story Thor devoured an ox, eight salmon, and other treats, and later in this chapter we’ll see an extravagant eating contest. The idea that gods might eat huge amounts must have been appealing to the Norse people because the harsh, long winters meant farmers spent much time simply trying to get enough food for their families. They grew vegetables and grains and collected fruits. The Norse also hunted game, raised animals, and fished. They ate this fish fresh, smoked, salted, or fermented.
The farmer offered anything, anything at all, if he would spare their lives.
Now, Thor was quick to anger, obviously, but also quick to regain his senses. The terrified faces of the family gave him pause. With a wave of the hand he said he’d simply take the boy Thjalfi and his sister Roskva as his servants, and that would be that.
The idea of balance—of a punishment that fit the crime—was foreign to Thor. That these two children should hereafter spend their lives in servitude never fazed him, such was his sense of self-importance. But then, he was a god—and gods were important, after all.
So Thor and Loki and the boy Thjalfi and his sister Roskva set out on foot till they reached the seashore. They slept on an open strand. In the morning they found an old boat and crossed the waters into Utgard, which surrounded the stronghold of the giants in Jotunheim. Then Thjalfi ran ahead, scouting, and found an enormous hall in a pine glade for them to sleep in. In the middle of the night, however, they woke to a great trembling underfoot—the whole earth roared. Thor was sure it was an earthquake, but no sooner than he said that, it stopped. Still, they didn’t feel safe staying where they were. So they explored the grand hall and found a side room, where three of them entered; Thor stood guard at the doorway with Mjolnir at the ready. But no one slept really; how could they with the roaring returning intermittently as it did? Dread sat like mud in their mouths.
In the morning Thor crept outside and saw a giant asleep. This was a bigger giant than any Thor had ever known before. The giant snored. Aha! the source of the roars. As Thor stood there, the giant woke. Thor was so surprised, he didn’t kill him, but, instead, acted sensible and asked who he was.
“Skrymir,” said the giant. And he asked if Thor and his crew had moved his glove.
Instantly Thor understood. The enormous hall they’d slept in was Skrymir’s glove, and the side room was the thumb part. Amazing!
Skrymir offered to share food. Then he accompanied them on their journey. But his strides were so long and so fast that the others were soon left behind and didn’t catch up to him till nightfall, when he had stopped to sleep. Again, he let them raid his knapsack for food, but he fell asleep as they did so. Thor and Loki and Thjalfi and Roskva wrestled with the knot on that sack, but they couldn’t open it. Thor became convinced that this was exactly what Skrymir had intended. In his too typical fury, he slammed the giant on the forehead with Mjolnir. The hammer broke the skin.
Thor was annoyed at the noisy snoring of the giant Skrymir; he climbed onto the sleeping giant’s head and slammed him with his hammer. But the giant was so enormous, all he did was wake up surprised.
The giant woke. “What leaf fell on my head?”
Yikes. Mjolnir had barely wounded the giant, much less killed him. The four snuck away and worried half the night. But Skrymir’s snoring irritated Thor so much that he went back and slammed Mjolnir with all his might against the giant’s forehead.
The giant woke. “Did an acorn fall on my head?”
Yikes and double yikes. But this giant didn’t seem threatening, not really. So, near dawn Thor tiptoed back and swung Mjolnir harder than ever into the giant’s temple.
The giant woke. “Bird droppings—they must have fallen on me.” Now he saw Thor. “Gather your party and go home. The folk ahead are much larger than me.” Then Skrymir took his sack and marched north into the mountains.
But Thor and his companions persisted through the forest until they came to a high gate. They forced their way between the bars and entered a huge hall, where giants lolled on benches and leered at them. The giant king said he knew this puny thing before him was the god Thor, and he challenged the travelers to display a skill.
Loki took the challenge. “I can eat faster than anyone.”
A giant named Logi sat at the opposite of a wooden trencher from him. Servants filled it with food. Then Loki and Logi ate their way toward each other. But Logi the giant ate not only the food but the bones and trencher as well. He won.
“Who’s next?” asked the giant king.
Thjalfi said, “I can run faster than anyone.”
A small guy named Hugi—a giant, but small for a giant—raced Thjalfi. Hugi easily won. They raced three times. Hugi won three times.
Thor bet a giant king that he could drink more than anyone. The giant gave him a full horn. Thor drank and drank, but he couldn’t drain the horn.
“And you, Thor?” asked the giant king.
“I can drink more than anyone,” said Thor.
“Quite a boast,” said the giant king. He gave Thor a horn to drain.
Thor took an enormous draught. But much still remained in the horn. He took a second draught. And a third. It was as though the horn held a rising tide.
“Bah! Give me a second task,” said Thor. “Anything.”
“Boast away, will you?” The giant king challenged Thor to pick up his cat.
Thor tugged on the cat, but its paws stayed on the ground even as its back stretched and arched higher and higher. Thor pushed himself under the cat and heaved himself upward. The most that moved was a single paw. “Bah!” Thor screamed. “I want a third challenge. Someone wrestle with me!”
After failing at two tasks, Thor asked for someone to wrestle him, for he thought he could beat anyone. But an old giantess named Elli defeated him.
The giants laughed. Only the old giantess Elli hobbled forward; she dropped her walking stick. It was shameful to fight a woman, but Thor was eager to clear his name. He lunged at her. She stood firm. He persisted. She brought him to his knees.
“Enough,” said the giant king. “Let’s feast and then rest.”
And so all ate and drank themselves silly and slept in the huge hall, and the giant king showed a generosity that Thor couldn’t fathom.
The next day Thor and his companions left. The giant king accompanied them out to the forest. Thor was chagrined that he had failed, and feared the giant king would bad-mouth him to everyone. But the giant king explained that he had cast a spell on them. All that had happened was partly illusion. The giant king was, in fact, that giant Skrymir, and if Thor’s hammer had hit its mark, it would have killed him. The giant Logi, who won the eating contest against Loki and consumed even the trencher, was really wildfire. The giant Hugi, who won the race against Thjalfi, was really the giant king’s thoughts. The horn that Thor couldn’t drain had its bottom in the sea. The cat he couldn’t lift was the serpent Jormungand, who circled Midgard and bit his own tail. And Elli was old age itself. So Thor and his companions had, in fact, done very well in these challenges and proven themselves worthy. “But don’t come back,” said the giant king. “I used magic to vanquish you this time. I’ll use it again. I’ll protect Utgard however I must.”
Amazing! This giant was far better at deception than even Loki! In anger at having been tricked, Thor raised his hammer. But the giant king had already vanished. Thor chased after him, ready to crush the huge hall with Mjolnir, but the hall had also vanished.
Thor went back home, stopping by the farm to get his two goats, but keeping Thjalfi and Roskva as servants. He was a greedy god; mercy meant nothing to him.
