Norse mythology · 3 chapters

Odin's Wanderings: The Grímnir Cycle

The Allfather tests a king's hospitality, from between two fires

Odin and Frigg quarrel over their foster sons, Odin's ward King Geirrøð and Frigg's ward his brother Agnarr. Frigg tells Odin that Geirrøð, now king, is inhospitable. Odin goes disguised as a wanderer called Grímnir to test him. Geirrøð, warned by Frigg, tortures the stranger between two fires for eight days without food or drink. Only the boy Agnarr, Geirrøð's son, shows the wanderer compassion and gives him a horn of ale. Odin, sitting between the fires, begins to speak, and for the next section of the Grímnismál, reveals the entire cosmology: the names of the halls, the worlds, the creatures of Yggdrasil, the weapons of the gods. When Geirrøð finally recognizes Odin, he leaps to free him, trips on his own sword, and dies.