Níðhöggr

"Nidhogg" redirects here. For the video game, see Nidhogg (video game).

Níðhöggr (Old Norse: Níðhǫggr, [ˈniːðˌhɔɡːz̠], lit. 'Níð-Hewer', "Malice Biter/Striker"?), often anglicized Nidhogg, is a wyrm dragon in Norse mythology who is said to gnaw at the roots of the world tree, Yggdrasil, and is likewise associated with the dead in Hel and Niflheim.

Níðhǫggr gnaws the roots of Yggdrasill in this illustration from a 17th-century Icelandic manuscript.

Etymology

While the suffix of the name, -höggr, literally "hewer", clearly means "biter, striker", etc, the prefix is not as clear. In particular, the length of the first vowel is not determined in the original sources. Some scholars prefer the reading "Striker in the Dark".

In historical Viking society, níð was a term for a social stigma, implying the loss of honor and the status of a villain. Thus, its name might refer to its role as a horrific monster in its action of chewing the corpses of the inhabitants of Niflheim: those guilty of murder, adultery, and oath-breaking, thus something akin to "Malice Biter".

Orthography

In the standardized Old Norse orthography, the name is spelled Níðhǫggr, but the letter ǫ is frequently replaced with the Modern Icelandic ö for reasons of familiarity or technical expediency.

The name can be represented in English texts with i for í; th, d or (rarely) dh for ð; o for ǫ and optionally without r as in Modern Scandinavian reflexes. The Modern Icelandic form Níðhöggur is also sometimes seen, with special characters or similarly anglicized. The Danish forms Nidhug and Nidhøg can also be encountered; or Norwegian Nidhogg and Swedish Nidhögg. The English cognate would be Nithhewer.

Prose Edda

According to the Gylfaginning part of Snorri Sturluson's Prose Edda, Níðhǫggr is a being which gnaws one of the three roots of Yggdrasill. It is sometimes believed that the roots are trapping the beast from the world. This root is placed over Niflheimr and Níðhǫggr gnaws it from beneath. The same source also says that "[t]he squirrel called Ratatoskr runs up and down the length of the Ash, bearing envious words between the eagle and Nídhǫggr [the snake]."^[1]

In the Skáldskaparmál section of the Prose Edda Snorri specifies Níðhǫggr as a serpent in a list of names of such creatures:

These are names for serpents: dragon, Fafnir, Jormungand, adder, Nidhogg, snake, viper, Goinn, Moinn, Grafvitnir, Grabak, Ofnir, Svafnir, masked one.^[2]

Snorri's knowledge of Níðhǫggr seems to come from two of the Eddic poems: Grímnismál and Völuspá.

Later in Skáldskaparmál, Snorri includes Níðhǫggr in a list of various terms and names for swords.^[3]

Poetic Edda

The poem Grímnismál identifies a number of beings which live in Yggdrasill. The tree suffers great hardship from all the creatures which live on it. The poem identifies Níðhǫggr as tearing at the tree from beneath and also mentions Ratatoskr as carrying messages between Níðhǫggr and the eagle who lives at the top of the tree. Snorri Sturluson often quotes Grímnismál and clearly used it as his source for this information.

The poem Völuspá mentions Níðhöggr/Níðhǫggr twice. The first instance is in its description of Náströnd.

Eysteinn Björnsson's edition	Bellows' translation	Dronke's translation
Sal sá hon standa sólu fjarri Náströndu á, norðr horfa dyrr. Fellu eitrdropar inn um ljóra, sá er undinn salr orma hryggjum. Sá hon þar vaða þunga strauma menn meinsvara ok morðvarga ok þanns annars glepr eyrarúnu. Þar saug Niðhöggr nái framgengna, sleit vargr vera— vituð ér enn, eða hvat ?	A hall I saw, far from the sun, On Nastrond it stands, and the doors face north, Venom drops through the smoke-vent down, For around the walls do serpents wind. I there saw wading through rivers wild treacherous men and murderers too, And workers of ill with the wives of men; There Nithhogg sucked the blood of the slain, And the wolf tore men; would you know yet more?	A hall she saw standing remote from the sun on Dead Body Shore. Its door looks north. There fell drops of venom in through the roof vent. That hall is woven of serpents' spines. She saw there wading onerous streams men perjured and wolfish murderers and the one who seduces another's close-trusted wife. There Malice Striker sucked corpses of the dead, the wolf tore men. Do you still seek to know? And what?

Níðhöggr/Níðhǫggr is also mentioned at the end of Völuspá, where he is identified as a dragon and a serpent.

Eysteinn Björnsson's edition	Bellows' translation	Dronke's translation
Þar kømr inn dimmi dreki fljúgandi, naðr fránn, neðan frá Niðafjöllum. Berr sér í fjöðrum —flýgr völl yfir— Níðhöggr nái— nú mun hon søkkvask.	From below the dragon dark comes forth, Nithhogg flying from Nithafjoll; The bodies of men on his wings he bears, The serpent bright: but now must I sink.	There comes the shadowy dragon flying, glittering serpent, up from Dark of the Moon Hills. He carries in his pinions —he flies over the field— Malice Striker, corpses. Now will she sink.

The context and meaning of this stanza are disputed. The most prevalent opinion is that the arrival of Níðhǫggr heralds Ragnarök and thus that the poem ends on a tone of ominous warning. It could be, however, as the prevalent themes of Norse mythology are those of change and renewal, that this could be a 'redemption' of the serpent, 'shedding' the corpses and beginning life anew, much like a macabre Phoenix, or perhaps, lifting the bodies of the righteous rulers mentioned two stanzas before (the stanza immediately before is considered spurious by translator Henry Adam Bellows), so that they can dwell in Gimle, and then either Níðhǫggr sinks, or the völva sinks, depending on the translation, and the poem ends.

Níðhǫggr is not mentioned elsewhere in any ancient source.

Comparisons to Celtic culture

At least one Irish story, that of Conneda, tells of a man journeying into the otherworld and having to work his way past several giant snakes with names of different sins and transgressions.^[4] This would imply snakes consume, torment or punish the bad souls in Celtic culture. Similarly, Nidhogg is seen as the parent of all the snakes of the Norse underworld realm of Náströnd, separated from the rest of Helheim by the river Gjallar, which is made up of their acidic poison. This is where souls that are denied crossing on the Gjallarbrú wind up and where Loki is eventually imprisoned.^[5] This is probably a reasonable explanation for his name.^{[independent source needed]}