Andvari is attested in Old Norse sources (12th-century attestations) as a member of the dwarf class within Norse mythic narrative. He functions in the cycle of heroic legend as the keeper of a hoard of gold and a magical ring; when the god Loki captures him and seizes his treasure, Andvari pronounces a curse on the stolen wealth that later precipitates the deaths of major heroic figures, integrating his episode into the broader causal sequence of Norse heroic-mythic events.
Sources describe Andvari as a dwarf who dwells beneath a waterfall, reflecting the common Norse portrayal of dwarves as subterranean or hidden craftsmen and treasure-keepers. He is also said to possess the ability to transform into a pike (Old Norse gedda), and attestations report him appearing both in dwarf form and in pike form in the narrative.
Narrative sources attribute to Andvari: the keeping of a hoard of gold and ownership of a magical ring (Andvaranaut) that aided his wealth; the power of shape-change into a pike at will; and the capacity to pronounce a binding curse on the gold after it is stolen. The story records that Loki, using a net provided by the sea-figure Rán, caught Andvari in pike form and compelled him to surrender his gold and ring; after they were taken and passed among gods and heroes the cursed treasure brought about fatal consequences. Sources also relate a later narrative episode in which Andvari discovered the cave where his gold had been left, though his ring remained lost.
Weaknesses
- conditioncaught as a pike with a net provided by Rán
Wards
None recorded.
Angrboða
Angrboða is a jötunn (giantess) in Norse myth attested briefly in the Poetic Edda and Prose Edda as the partner of Loki and the mother of three world‑shaping offspring: Fenrir, Jörmungandr, and Hel. Surviving medieval attestations are sparse; most descriptions of her beyond genealogy derive from modern retellings and popular culture.
Ask and Embla
In Norse myth Ask (Askr) and Embla (Embla) are the first human man and woman, fashioned from wood/trees by the gods at the beginning of the cosmos and endowed with the gifts that make them human; they serve as the progenitors of humankind in the Norse cosmological narrative.
Atter
In Norse tradition, Atter refers to various forms of poison, corruption, or noxious influence that can manifest physically or morally. (Note: * Power tier should be Primordial only for its ability to cause cosmic-scale harm (e.g., societal consumption). However, most of its described abilities fall under Greater or Lesser powers, implying A)
Aurboða
Aurboða is a jötunn (giantess) in Norse mythology attested as the wife of the jötunn Gymir and mother of the jötunn Gerðr; the name also appears separately as one of the nine maidens in the poem Fjölsvinnsmál. Her name is debated etymologically as either 'gravel-bidder' (aurr + boða) or, in an alternative reading, 'gold-bidder' (aur + boða).
Auðumbla
Auðumbla is the primeval cow of Old Norse cosmogony attested in the Prose Edda: she nourishes the primordial jötunn Ymir with rivers of milk and by licking salty rime-stones reveals Búri, an ancestor of the gods. Her name and role link fertility, nourishment, and the emergence of key lineages in the Norse origin narrative.
Baldr
Baldr (Old Norse Baldr; Old English Bældæġ; Old High German Balder/Palter) is a god in Germanic mythology. In the Norse branch he is named as a son of Odin and Frigg and as a member of the Aesir, attested alongside brothers such as Thor and Váli in the supplied sources.
Barri
Barri (also attested Barrey/Barey) is a mythic place-name in Old Norse tradition, named in Skírnismál and Snorri Sturluson’s Gylfaginning as the rendezvous-site where Freyr and Gerðr will meet nine nights after prior events. The term is etymologically ambiguous between a grove/wood and an island or a grain-field, and scholars debate whether its semantic field evokes woodland or agricultural fertility.
Baugi
Baugi is a jötunn (giant) in Old Norse myth who appears as a secondary actor in the mead of poetry narrative preserved in Skáldskaparmál and the þulur. He is presented as the brother of Suttungr, provides and uses an auger named Rati to bore into the mountain Hnitbjörg, and figures in Odin's (Bölverk’s) bargain and deception to obtain the mead of poetry.
Beli
Beli is a jötunn (giant) in Old Norse myth known chiefly as an adversary slain by the god Freyr. Attestations are fragmentary: he appears in Eddic and skaldic references as the named foe of Freyr and as an element in kennings, and scholars treat the fuller myth as largely lost.
Bergelmir
Bergelmir is a jötunn in Norse mythology, attested as a descendant of the primordial giant Aurgelmir (Ymir) and portrayed as the survivor who preserves the frost-jötunn line after the primeval flood caused by Ymir's death. He appears in two primary Old Norse contexts: the poem Vafþrúðnismál (where he is implied to be an infant laid in a lúðr) and Snorri Sturluson's Gylfaginning (where he and his wife escape on a lúðr).
Beyla
Beyla is a minor attendant of the Vanir god Freyr attested only in the Poetic Edda poem Lokasenna (prose introduction and stanzas 55 and 66). Surviving texts give her no independent cult or clear domain; modern scholars have proposed she may be an agricultural personification based on name-interpretation and association with Freyr.
Blóðughófi
Blóðughófi (variant Blóðhófr) is a named mythic horse in Old Norse poetic tradition attested in þulur (name-lists) as the steed associated with the god Freyr, glossed literally as "Bloody Hoof." The attestations are primarily catalogic rather than narrative, and no extended mythic episodes or independent powers are directly ascribed to this horse in the surviving cited materials.
Community Record
- [1]Andvari — Wikipedia. Wikipedia, entry 'Andvari'wiki
- [2]Andvari — Wikidata. Wikidata item Q525149other