Old Norse literature about Vikings is filled with famous last clashes, daring last words, songs of death and defiance. When men died in battle, it was believed that the god of war Odin gathered slain warriors chosen from his home in Asgard – the abode of the gods in Norse mythology. Odin’s mythical hall, called Valhalla, was a warrior’s paradise built of spear rods and covered with shields.
The Vikings’ glorious attitude to death was key to their success on the battlefields of Europe, writes Tom Shippey in I will die laughing, the life and death of the great Vikings. This fatalistic “Viking state of mind,” he said, was a sort of death cult – a psychological advantage that allowed them to fight fearlessly.
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Valhalla: the warrior’s paradise
“Valkyrie and a Dying Hero”, from the collection of the National Museum, Stockholm.
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According to Viking mythology, when a warrior fell on the battlefield, he was greeted by a valkyrie – a supernatural female figure. Valkyries protected some warriors but guided spear points and arrows into the bodies of others. In the mind of the Vikings, battles were not determined by military prowess but through these fateful women.
Mythical valkyries led slain heroes (the einherjar) from the battlefield to the magnificent Odin Hall. Built of weapons and armor, Valhalla was the promised land of a Viking warrior. The poetic Edda, a collection of myths and heroic stories written in 13th-century Iceland, depicts the dramatic construction of Valhalla: “from the spearheads that the building has for rafters, it is covered with shields, coats of mail are strewn over benches.
A wolf hung over the western gate of Valhalla, according to the writings, and an eagle hovered above the wolf. In his translation of The poetic Edda, medieval scholar Carolyne Larrington notes that these creatures are “Germanic beasts of battle; their appearance indicates that a fight is imminent. ”
That impending fight was the cataclysmic Battle of Ragnarok, a mythological event the Vikings believed would someday happen.
“Ragnarok is like Armageddon, the battle at the end of the world,” writes Shippey. “In it, the gods and their human allies will march to fight against frost giants and fire giants, trolls and monsters. ”
In Ragnarok, Odin would fight alongside his einherjar who pass through the 540 gates of Valhalla. Eight hundred einherjar would come out of each, ready to defend Asgard against the invading forces of chaos. Odin knows that Ragnarok is coming. In Valhalla, his einherjar Train for the event by engaging in daily battles. As detailed in the Edda, those who were killed in these battles were quickly resuscitated. For a Viking warrior, the battles of Valhalla enabled him to continue his earthly career in the afterlife, preparing for the fateful day he would fight alongside the god of war Odin.
Jackson Crawford, an Old Norse scholar at the University of Colorado, Boulder, describes Ragnarok as the predetermined death of the gods. For the Vikings, fate was immutable and an integral part of the Nordic worldview. “Ragnarok is the equivalent of the ‘programmed’ day of the dead gods that every mortal has,” Crawford said. “If you can only achieve the good afterlife by dying in battle, and you’re going to die on a particular day, whatever you do that day, you’re going to take every good opportunity to fight.” ”
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Eric Bloodaxe, Haakon the Good
Not all Viking warriors were allowed to enter the mythical Valhalla, but ancient Norse poems describe heroes who are said to have received this honor. Eiríksmál, a poem written around 954, honors the 10eNorwegian ruler of the century, Eric Bloodaxe. The poem describes the king’s warlike existence, attacking the coasts of Europe – and Odin’s preparation for his arrival in the afterlife. The verses of the poem state, “What kind of a dream is this, that I had been thinking before daybreak as I was preparing Valhalla for a slain army?” I woke up on einherjar, asking them to get up to sprinkle the benches and rinse the cups. I asked the valkyries to bring wine, as if a chef was coming. ”
Viking sagas on Haakon the Good, king of Norway from 934 to 961, describe preparations for his entry into Valhalla. In the poem 990 Hákonarmál, the Norse gods Hermod and Bragi ask Odin to welcome Haakon into Valhalla. “Hermod and Bragi told Odin ‘to go and meet the monarch because a king comes here in the hall who is considered a champion,” ”the poem reads. While the poems describe Bloodaxe and Haakon’s many victories on earth, it was believed that their greatest battles would be fought in the afterlife at Ragnarok.
A great viking death
The Ride of the Valkyries, from the collection of the National Museum, Stockholm.
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One of Valhalla’s most legendary warriors was Ragnar Lothbrok, a ninth-century Danish Viking hero whose exploits fill the pages of Nordic chronicles. While historians cannot be sure whether Ragnar existed as a real man (or men), or was conceived from decades of mythology, Ragnar was famous for his bravado – even in the face of excruciating death.
In the 12th century poem Ragnar Lothbrok’s song of death, readers learn of the heroic fate of this Viking. Ragnar intended to sail for England and vowed to conquer it with a fleet of only two ships. After a few victories across the island, he was captured by the Northumbrian king Ælla. The king had Ragnar thrown into a snake pit, hoping he would suffer a slow and painful death.
In this moment of what seemed like inevitable defeat, Ragnar composes a death song about how Valhalla awaits his arrival. Its last verse ends with the declaration: “ I will die laughing. ”
As Crawford notes, passages like these show how mythology attributed a fearless state of mind to Viking warriors. “The choice is not between living and dying,” he said, “it’s between dying badly and dying well the day you die anyway.”
