Originally published in Andrén, Jennbert & Raudvere (eds.

): Old Norse religion in long-term

perspectives, pp. 68–71 . Nordic Academic Press, Lund, 2006. [Original page shifts are added in
square brackets.]

Hanging on the World Tree Man and cosmos in Old Norse mythic poetry

by Henning Kure
© 2004

The myth of Odin’s hanging on a tree is found in stanza 138–141 of Hávamál.1

. 138 Veit ek at ek hekk vindga meiði á nætr allar nío geiri undaðrok gefinn óðni
siálfr siálfom mér á þeim meiði er manngi veithvers hann af rótom renn.

. 139 Við hleifi mik seldo né við hornigi nýsta ek niðr nam ek upp rúnar œpandi
namfell ek aptr þatan.

. 140 Fimbullióð níonam ek af inom frægia syni bǫlþórs bestlo fǫður ok ek drykk
of gat ins dýra miaðar ausinn óðreri.

. 141 Þá nam ek frævaz ok fróðr vera ok vaxa ok vel hafaz orð mér af orðiorz
leitaðiverk mér af verki verks leitaði.
I know that I hung on windy treeall of nine nights, wounded by spear and given to Odin, self
to myself,
on that treewhich no one knowsof what roots it sprang.
For loaf they did not give me nor for some horn.I peered down,I took up secrets,
screaming I grasped– I fell back from there.
Nine mighty songsI took from the wise son of Bolthor, Bestla’s father, and drink I did getof
the precious mead, drenched with Odrerir.
Then I began to thrive and be wiseand grow and be satisfied. Word to me of word directed
word,
deed to me of deed directed deed.

1 Eddic poetry is quoted from Neckel (1927) sans the interpretative emendations,
capitalizations and punctuations. All translations are mine.

Odin hung for nine nights on a tree, wounded by spear – indicating the (symbolic)
death of a warrior – and given to Odin, to himself by himself. Not for food or
riches, however (cf. Grønvik 1999: 47) – he was not sacrificed, but hung for a
different purpose. He had a vision from below, and in his ‘uptake’ of runes –
secrets – he screamed, and then fell from the tree. The myth is clearly linked to the
myth of Odin’s quest for the mead of poetry, Óðrœrir ‘stirrer of the spirit’ – the
‘precious mead’ of stanza 140.2 The myth tells of Odin’s acquisition of occult
wisdom, resulting in new abilities for growth in mental as well as physical
capacities.

Numerous scholars have mined the myth of Odin’s hanging over the years. The
most recent discussion by Jens Peter Schjødt in his dissertation on initiation (2003:
195–225) sums up most of the past scholarship and provides ample references. The
summary in David Evans’ edition of the poem (1986: 29–34) supplements
perfectly. The following speculations on trees and hanging are meant to add a few,
hopefully interesting tidbits to this existing scholarly lore.

Generally, it is more or less taken for granted that the tree on which Odin hung is
identical with the Ash of Yggdrasill, the so-called world tree of Old Norse myths.
The Ash of Yggdrasill has also been the subject of much scholarly discourse, for a
large part recently summed up by Anders Andrén (2004). See also Lotte Motz
(1991) and Rudolf Simek (1993) for good surveys of the source material. The Ash
of Yggdrasill is a major element in the cosmological descriptions of Vǫluspá and
Grímnismál. It follows that these poems and Hávamál probably inform each other
in some way.

The original argument for the identification of the Ash of Yggdrasill with the tree
of Odin’s hanging is based on the name Yggdrasill. This is usually translated
‘Odin’s horse’. Yggr is one of Odin’s many names, and drasill is used in poetry for
‘horse’, while proper words for horse in some cases are used for ‘gallows’.
Hanging may also be described as ‘riding the gallows’ (Evans 1986: 32).

But is it likely that the gallows represented the old Norsemen’s idea of a world tree,
as this argument implies?

A world tree is a way of imagining the unity of cosmos. A world tree is like a
vertical road, bridging or connecting the ‘world above’ with the ‘world below’. The
sources describe the Ash of Yggdrasill as tall and heið-vanr ‘used to the clear sky’
(Vǫluspá st. 27). It is showered in hvíta-aurr ‘white gravel’ – perhaps hail and
snow, like the tallest mountaintops?3 At least, its branches reach out over the
mountains – the dews in the valleys of the world fall from them. The tree has its
crown in the heavens, forever green, connoting the perpetual life – or non-death –
of the spiritual world above (Vǫluspá st.19).

Below, the tree reaches deep into the underworld. In Vǫluspá st. 19–20, this is
expressed through the imagery of the tree standing over the urðarbrunnr, which –
as a well – leads in the opposite direction of a tree. The genitive composite urðar
would normally refer to death – as in urðarmáni ‘death-moon’, an omen – or to the
chthonic, as in urðar áttbogi ‘family-dweller of the rock heap’, a giant. These
associations are also
2 The myth of Odin’s quest for the mead of poetry is referred to in Hávamál st. 104–110, and
perhaps also in stanza 13–14. Snorri Sturluson gives an elaborate – and perhaps too interpretive
(cf. Frank 1981) – account of the myth in the first part of Skáldskaparmál.3 In Gylfaginning chap.
16, Snorri interprets the hvíta aurr as holy water and mud of the urðarbrunnr with which the
norns sprinkle the tree. [See further on this in new end note.]

contained in the unique reference of Vǫluspá to Urðr the norn, who administers
destiny – life and death – to the children of mankind.

The same package of men, giants and death below the world tree is found in the
description of the three roots of the Ash of Yggdrasill, according to Grímnismál st.
31. One root reaches Hel, the realm of death, another the giants, and the third
reaches mankind.

In his paraphrase in Gylfaginning chapter 15, Snorri cannot resist systematizing this
further, trying to synthesize the [68/69] two parallel poetic variations of a singular
concept into a combo of roots and wells. In the process, however, he seems to miss
the poems’ point of summing up the material as well as the chthonic world.

According to Grímnismál st. 29–30, the gods congregate every day at the Ash to
give counsel. They come from their own world or sphere. Thor crosses water to get
there, an indication of moving between the various domains of the Old Norse
cosmos. They assemble in order to govern the worlds at the roots of the tree – the
realms of men, giants, and death – at the place of access to these worlds.

This place may have a counterpart in the physical world. Anders Andrén (2004:
406ff) proposes that the three-pointed monuments consisting of large stones set in
the shape of a triangle with concave sides are representations of the base of
Yggdrasill’s Ash, the three points representing the roots. Traces of a central pillar
have even been found in some of the three-point monuments. If Andrén is right
(and I believe he is), this may indicate the tradition of the three roots as very old.

Evidence is rather scant though – the three roots are only mentioned once in the
mythic poetry – but Andrén finds support for the idea of a world tree representation
in similar monuments shaped as outlines of boats. They are found all over the
Viking world and were used for cremation graves.
The three-point monuments – found all over Sweden and Norway – were likewise
used for cremation, according to Andrén. In some cases there is one large
monument for an entire burial site of hundreds of graves, in other cases the
monuments were smaller and contain one grave each.

Singular three-point monuments in the open landscape, without any association

with graves, are also found – often very large and impressive constructions. These
may have been used for other cultic activities, sacrifices for instance.

Andrén suggests various underlying concepts for the three-point monuments, all of
which have their merits, but the most obvious slipped his attention: The analogue
of the key concept behind the boat representations. Their combination of boat and
cremation may be elucidated by the myth of Balder’s burial, found in Gylfaginning
chapter 49, where the witch Hyrrokkin sends off Balder in a boat on his last
journey to the realm of death. The name Hyrrokkin means ‘shriveling by fire’, an
apt description of a body being cremated. She is most likely the process of sending
Balder to Hel, and the boat is definitely the vehicle. The boat representations are
symbolic vehicles of transportation to the otherworld.

If the three-point monuments represent the world tree – the ‘road’ between the
worlds of cosmos – they may likewise have been perceived as transportation or
access points to the otherworld. The monuments would have represented the
connection with the spiritual world. They would have been doorways of a sort,
suitable sites not only for sending off the dead, but also for worship and blót and
any other activity involving contact with the supernatural. A place of gathering in
order to communicate with those gods assembled in the same place on ‘the other
side’. (Wells serve much the same purpose as points of spiritual access, apropos the
urðarbrunnr.)

And to gain access to another world was – of course, as many scholars have
pointed out – precisely why Odin hung on the tree.

We do not need the philological detour around the gallows in order to perceive the
tree of Hávamál st. 138 as the world tree. The tree is vindugr4 ‘windy’, indicating
the top of the tree reaching the heaven, which in Vǫluspá st. 63 is described as
vindheim viðan ‘the wide realm of wind’. And the roots are unknown because they
not only reach into the earth – the matter of the material world of man – but far
deeper, all the way below into the underworld of giants and death.

The action clearly is vertically directed. Odin peered down, and took the secrets of
the underworld up. When he left the tree after nine nights, he fell, a downward
movement indicating his position of hanging in the tree to be in the windy part, in
the branches.

Though not specified by Hávamál, most readers take it for granted that Odin hung
by his neck in the manner of an execution. Various indications of human sacrifices
to Odin by hanging, and cognomens like Hangatýr ‘god of the hanged’ and galga
gramr ‘lord of the gallows’ may point in the same direction – though they may also
simply reflect Odin as lord of the dead.

The myth of Odin’s hanging is a myth about initiation, as shown by Jens Peter
Schjødt (2003). During the liminal phase of an initiation rite, the initiand travels –
in a spiritual sense – to another world. There he acquires numinous knowledge in
some form, knowledge that irreversibly alters his status when he returns to his own
world. This is what happened to Odin. He hung for nine nights – the liminal phase
– and returned from his ordeal with new powers.

A few scholars have suggested alternative ways of hanging, emphasizing the aspect
of a ritual rather than a mode of execution (Fleck 1971, Grønvik 1999). Nothing
can be proven in this regard, one way or the other.

The liminal phase of an initiation rite is a symbolic death – the old persona dies and
the initiand is reborn with a new persona. The point is not for the initiand to die for
real, however, as in an execution. As we saw, neither is death per se the point of
Odin’s hanging. It is merely a means of gaining access to the otherworld. An
execution by hanging could take place on any old tree – yet the myth specifies the
branches of the world tree. What seems to be semantically important is not the way
of hanging, but rather the fact of connecting with the world tree.

Hanging on the world tree is a representation of being in connection with the

spiritual spheres – or maybe even of becoming that connection. Denominations
such as bǫnd and hǫpt for gods may describe them as links to the otherworld.

We may see this concept at work on the great rune stone of Jelling. Its portrait of
Christ hanging on the cross is well known. On closer inspection, however, we may
note that there is actually no cross. Christ himself forms the cross. Instead, he
seems to be entangled in branches, a clear visual of connecting with the tree. We
have other Viking age pictures of similarly bound male figures, usually termed “the
bound giant” or “the bound Loki” by archaeologists. These pictures have been
found all over the Viking world and indicate a widespread concept.
4 There is no compelling reason to assume the compound vingameiðr for vindga meiðr here
(Evans 1986: 134).
If I am right, Christ is here shown in the iconic-symbolic language of the old North
as a link to the spiritual world. If this concept was associated with Odin in
particular, the conversion message of King Harald Bluetooth inscribed in [69/70]
runes on the Jelling stone becomes even more powerful. Haraltr ias sar uan
Tanmuark ala auk Nuruiak auk tanir kaurda kristna – “Harald who won for
himself all of Denmark and Norway, and made the Danes Christians.” The last four
words are inscribed below the portrait of Christ, an illustration that may have added
to the message: Look! Christ has taken the place of Odin.

So maybe the Jelling stone shows us how Odin was hanging on the world tree,
entangled for nine nights in the branches of the Ash of Yggdrasill.5 For this to be
likely, the myth and the concepts of the myth must have had a prominent position
in the Old Norse mindset.

The fact that the world tree derives its name from its association with this myth,
testifies to the importance of Odin’s ritual hanging.

If the name Yggdrasill actually does mean ‘Odin’s horse’, it is not necessarily a
reference to the gallows. A horse is a means of transportation. This could be the
reason why the tree would be called Odin’s horse – it provides transportation to the
underworld. It would be a parallel to the eight-legged Sleipnir ‘the slippery one’, on
which Odin rides to Hel in another myth (Baldrs draumar st. 2–3).

However, there is another – at least philologically possible – translation of the

name of the world tree. The full term is not just Yggdrasill or askr Yggdrasill, but
the genitive Yggdrasils askr, the Ash of Yggdrasill – or sometimes just ‘the Ash’.
With a singular exception, the world tree is referred to consequently throughout the
Old Norse sources in this way – a fact that is often swept aside. Is it ‘The Tree of
Odin’s Horse’ then? The tying pole of the shaman’s steed, as Lotte Motz (1991)
suggests?

A closer look at the traditional translation of the name reveals it as an

interpretation. Yggr, a name for Odin, is derived from ygg, which means
‘terrifying’. And drasill is ‘one who walks’, saunters – we still have it in Icelandic
drasla, according to one of the etymologies mentioned by Jan de Vries (1962). It is
a heiti suitable for a horse – the only attested use – but the meaning ‘horse’ may not
necessarily have been exclusive. Furthermore, the first part of the name is not the
genitive Yggs drasill, ‘the horse of Odin’ – or literally: ‘the walker of the terrifier’
– but rather the adjectival Yggdrasill, ‘the terrifying walker’. The awe-inspiring
wanderer of Old Norse myth who – judging from the extant sources – would first
come to the Viking mind in this case, might not have been the horse of Odin, but
rather Odin himself.

Though not attested elsewhere, Yggdrasill may be yet another name for Odin. And
Yggdrasill’s Ash would then mean Odin’s Tree. The name would still refer to the
tree upon which he hung for nine nights. But this interpretation opens for a possible
glimpse of man’s position in the mental cosmos of the old North.

As mentioned, in one case only, the name of the Ash is given as Yggdrasill, rather
than Yggdrasill’s Ash. It occurs in Vǫluspá when the tree is first presented by
name, in the first line of stanza 19. Even here, some of the manuscripts have
Yggdrasils – the handwritten form of an ending ‘s’ may have been confused with
the last ‘l’. But let us assume that Yggdrasill without an ‘s’ is not a writer’s error.
5 Cf. the words of the vǫlva when she in Vǫluspá st. 2 outlines the origins of her knowledge: man
ek ... nio í viðiur, miǫtvið mæran “I recall ... nine in the branches, the famous ash...”

. 17 Unz þriár kvomo ór því liði ǫflgir og ástgir æsir at húsi fundo á landi lítt
megandi ask ok emblo ørlǫglausa

. 18 ǫnd þau né átto óð þau né hǫfðo lá né lætiné lito góða Ǫnd gaf óðinn óð gaf
hœnir lá gaf loður og lito góða.

. 19 Ask veit ek standa heitir yggdrasill hár baðmr ausinn hvítaauriþaðan koma
dǫggvar þærs í dala falla stendr æ yfir grænn urðar brunni.
20 Þaðan koma meyjar
margs vitandi
þriá r ó r þeim sæ
er und þolli stendr
urð héto eina
aðra verðandi
ská ro á skíði
skuld ina þriðjo
Þær lǫg lǫgðo
þær líf kuro
alda bǫrnom
ørlǫg seggja.

Then three came from that group. Potent and loving Æsir, at the house, found on the ground
the hardly capable Ash and Embla without destiny.
Breath they didn’t own, spirit they didn’t have, no pulse or gesture, nor healthy looks.
Breath Odin gave, spirit Hoenir gave, pulse Lodur gave
and healthy looks.
Ash I know standing,is called Yggdrasill,a tall tree showeredwith white gravel.From there
originate the dews, that which fall in the valleys. Green it stands ever over
the Well of Urd.
From there come maidens, much knowing,three from that lake, which lies under the pillar.
Urd they called one,
the other Verdandi– they carved on splinters – Skuld the third.They laid down laws,they
choose lifefor the children of mankind, men’s destinies.

Metrically and poetically, the line could easily have been composed with the
regular name. The standard formula of the name has been broken up – deliberately,
I believe (like everything in Vǫluspá) and thus causing the unique name form – in
order for the line to be composed with ask as the first word. The explanation for
this may be found in stanza 17, where the gods give life to Askr & Embla, the first
man and woman. In order to see the point, we need the context of the entire
sequence of Vǫluspá st. 17–20:

Imagine we are hearing, for the very first time, a performer recite the line
introducing the world tree in stanza 19:

Ask veit ek standa, heitir Yggdrasill...

Hearing the line for the first time, our spontaneous association to the mentioning of
“Ask...” will be to Askr, the man – named just two stanzas earlier. Only when the
performer of the poem goes on do we realize that this is about another ash. A link
between man and tree is created in our minds, a closure supported by a well-
established poetic convention.

In Snorri’s Edda, in Skáldskaparmál chapter 31, Snorri explains how “poets have
called men ash or maple, lund or other masculine tree denominations,” (...hafa
skáldin kallat menn ask eða hlyn, lund eða ǫðrum viðar heitum karlkendum...6
Lund means ‘grove’, but in poetry also ‘tree’) and Snorri follows up in chapter 47
with numerous skaldic examples of [70/71] this poetic practice. Also in eddic
poetry we find the tree as a symbol of man, for instance in Hávamál st. 49–50.

Vǫluspá describes in stanza 17–18 how the primordial couple, Askr & Embla, first
are given life by the gods – the Æsir, a name with possible connotations to ‘above,
in the air’ and so on. Then, in stanza 20, humans are given destiny by the chthonic
norns – who originate from below the tree. Strung out between these two acts of
creation – and connecting them7 – we find the description of the world tree, leading
us from the gods’ sphere of influence above (in stanza 17) to that of the norns
below (in stanza 20).
The closure generated by the two Ashes – the man and the tree – further prompts us
to see the analogue. Man has his feet on the ground, anchored in this world, with
roots – ties – to death and chaos in his nature. But his crown, his head or mind, is in
the mental or spiritual world.

Like the world tree, man possesses the capability of connecting the world above
with the world below. But it takes the way of the god to create the link, to tie up the
connection inherit in man – a fact of which we are reminded by the name
Yggdrasill and its association with the myth of Odin hanging on the world tree, and
– perhaps – to the iconography of the Jelling rune stone.

Yggdrasil’s Ash may be more than the world tree, at least in Vǫluspá. Odin’s Askr
clearly indicates where man belongs – it is not with the norns. He is ‘man of the
god’, divine man, perceived as the central pillar of the Old Norse cosmos.

6 Snorri is quoted from Faulkes (1998).7 Former scholarship maintained that the stanza
introducing the Ash of Yggdrasill broke the continuity of Vǫluspá’s anthropogenic myth, but Gro
Steinsland (1979) has convincingly established the unity of the sequence.

Andrén, A. 2004. “I skuggan av Yggdrasil”, in Andrén, Jennbert & Raudvere (eds.)

Ordning mot kaos. Lund. 389–430.

Evans, D.A.H. 1986, Hávamál. London.Faulkes, A. 1998. Edda. Skáldskaparmál,

vol. I. Exeter.Fleck, J. 1971. “Óðinn’s Self-Sacrifice—a New Interpretation”.
Scandinavian Studies, 43: 119–142,

385–413.Frank, R. 1981. “Snorri and the mead of poetry”, in U. Dronke et al. (eds.)
Specvlvm Norroenvm.

Odense. 155–170.Grønvik, O. 1999. Håvamål. Oslo.Motz, L. 1991. “The Cosmic

Ash and other Trees of Germanic Myth”. ARV Scandinavian Yearbook

of Folklore, vol. 47: 127–141.Neckel, G. 1927. Edda. Heidelberg.Schjødt, J.P.

2003. Initiation, liminalitet og tilegnelse af numinøs viden. Århus Simek, R. 1993.
Dictionary of Northern Mythology. Cambridge.Steinsland, G. 1979. “Treet i
Vǫluspá”, Arkiv för Nordisk Filologi 94: 120–150. de Vries, J. 1962. Altnordisches
etymologisches Wörterbuch. Leiden.

AN ADDITIONAL COMMENT (2014)

I am no longer so sure that man was thought to 'belong with the gods' in particular
in the Old Norse worldview. It rather seems like the categories male and female
were used to symbolize the exchange and cooperation of the various spiritual forces
that were thought to rule or guide the world and the existence.

In the paper above (p. 2) I suggest hvíta-aurr ‘white gravel’ to denote the snow of a
mountaintop. I no longer believe in that idea. White – the color of clearness and
invisibility in Old Norse tradition – certainly denotes 'above', but today I am
convinced that aurr, the sediment in any form at the bottom of a body of water,
consequently is used in the Old Norse mytho-poetic language as a symbol of
'below', the underworld.

Thus, in Vǫluspá st. 19, aussinn hvíta-auri describes the growing force from below,
just as the falling dew represents the nourishing force from above. The entire stanza
is about the dynamic exchange and movement between above and below, and this
is exactly what goes on in (at least) this sequence of the poem, as well as in
Hávamál's description of Odin hanging on the tree.