Skadi
Skadi was a giantess counted among the Norse gods, the goddess of hunting and skiing who lives in the mountains and hunts with a bow. She married Njord, chosen by his feet, and went back to her father’s mountain hall, Thrymheim.
Meaning
Skadi was the daughter of the giant Thjazi. Store norske leksikon calls her the goddess of hunting and skiing and gives one of her by-names as Skigudinne, “ski goddess”. Lex says her name, Old Norse Skaði, is of disputed origin, and the Troth notes that it is grammatically masculine. Snorri’s Prose Edda says that after she left Njord she lived in the mountains at Thrymheim and went about with a bow and arrow, shooting animals; Brodeur’s 1916 translation puts her on snowshoes and calls her the Snowshoe-Goddess, where Store norske leksikon and the Troth put her on skis. These stories reach us through books written by Christian writers at the start of the Middle Ages, as the National Museum of Denmark notes. Skadi is honoured in Heathenry today: the Troth writes that she is called on for luck in hunting and skiing and for help in travels through the wilderness.
Origin and history
The oldest skaldic poem, Bragi the Old’s Ragnarsdrápa, already calls her ǫndurdís, “ski goddess”, the Troth notes. Place names show she had a cult: the Troth, citing Simek’s Dictionary, lists Skedevi, Skedvi and Skea in Sweden among names from “Skadi’s sanctuary”, and in Lokasenna Skadi herself speaks of counsel coming from “my dwellings and fields”. The Swedish History Museum illustrates its page on her with a Viking Age ski found in a bog at Bastusund in Norrbotten, 176.5 cm long, with a raised footrest and a tip carved like a snout.
Coming to Asgard armed
When the gods had killed her father, Snorri says, Skadi “took helm and birnie and all weapons of war” and went to Asgard to avenge him. The gods offered her atonement instead: a husband chosen by his feet alone, who turned out to be Njord, and a laugh, which Loki won from her with a crude trick involving a goat. To complete the settlement Odin threw Thjazi’s eyes into the sky and made two stars of them. Store norske leksikon calls this bot, compensation for the killing. The Troth reads her as a woman doing what Norse law gave to men, avenging kin and inheriting her father’s land, and says she is often honoured by women who have had to fight to win a place for themselves in a world that would deny it to them.
Skis, bow and mountains
In Grímnismál (Grimnismol) her home is her father’s: “The sixth is Thrymheim, | where Thjazi dwelt”, and “Now Skathi abides, | the god’s fair bride, In the home that her father had.” Store norske leksikon says that when the marriage failed she moved up into the mountains, where she goes on skis and hunts with bow and arrow. The Swedish History Museum notes her likeness to the god Ullr, who is also described in the myths on skis or snowshoes, and Brodeur’s Snorri uses the same word for both: Ullr is “so swift on snowshoes, that none may contend with him”.
The serpent over Loki
Skadi has a part in Loki’s punishment. When the gods had bound him, Snorri says, “Skadi took a venomous serpent and fastened it up over him, so that the venom should drip from the serpent into his face.” Lex explains this by Loki’s guilt for Thjazi’s death. In Lokasenna she tells him that the gods will bind him on the rocks, and he answers that he was “first and last | at the deadly fight There where Thjazi we caught.”
Sons of Odin
Snorri’s Ynglinga saga, Store norske leksikon says, gives Skadi several sons by Odin, of whom only one is named, Sæming. The saga makes Sæming the ancestor of Earl Håkon, who used the myth to support his claim to power.
Skadi in Heathenry today
The Troth writes that some find her stern, but “those who do know Skadi see in her the stark beauty of the farthest North”. Heathens call on her for luck in hunting and skiing and for help in travels through the wilderness, and because she accepted compensation for her father’s death and kept the peace, the Troth says, she can be called on for justice and fair settlement of conflict.
Read next
- Next in Norse gods and their symbolsHelHel is the ruler of the Norse world of the dead, which is also called Hel: Loki’s daughter, half blue-black like a corpse and half flesh-coloured. She receives those who die of sickness and old age, and her name lives on in the word hell.
- The same shape in Andean and Inca symbolsInti Raymi (festival of the sun)The Inca festival of the sun, held at the June solstice in Cusco. Banned under Spanish rule, it was revived in 1944 and is staged every 24 June at the Coricancha, the main square and Sacsayhuamán.
See also
Loki, Njord, Ullr, Idun, Odin, Frigg.
Sources
- Skade – i norrøn mytologi (Store norske leksikon), Ellen Næss, Store norske leksikon, whole article and picture caption
- Skade (Lex), Jens Peter Schjødt, Finn Stefánsson, Lex, Danmarks Nationalleksikon, whole article
- The Prose Edda (Brodeur translation), Arthur Gilchrist Brodeur (trans.), 1916, American-Scandinavian Foundation (Internet Archive), Gylfaginning, chapters XXIII, XXXI and L; Skáldskaparmál (“The Poesy of Skalds”), chapter I
- The Poetic Edda (Bellows translation), Henry Adams Bellows (trans.), 1923, American-Scandinavian Foundation (Project Gutenberg), Grimnismol, stanza 11; Lokasenna, stanzas 49–51
- Skade – vildmarkens gudinna (Historiska museet), collection entry 107070_HST, Swedish History Museum (Statens historiska museer), introduction; object caption: Skida (107070_HST)
- Skadi (The Troth), Our Troth, vol. 2 (edited for the web), The Troth, whole page
- The old religion, National Museum of Denmark, Written sources
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols formed from curves and waves or lines.
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 10, 2026. How we research
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