Icelandic Legends Activity Book

Having returned from Iceland less than 48 hours ago, I am brimming with inspiration and excitement for new projects.  I am very happy that my newest effort is now complete and available on Amazon.  This started out as a simple coloring book focused on the Yule Lads,  with fantastic original drawings by Jessica Krumaluf.

I then added a few games and puzzles, then decided to include four short stories.  These stories introduce new Icelandic mythology and characters.  Only The Guardians is an full Icelandic legend, the rest are original short stories inspired by Icelandic mythology.

I am very excited to be able to offer this new collection!  More stories are coming soon and be on the lookout in coming months for The Icelandic Sagas for Children.  I think the Viking Agnarr may have a talent for narration!

Yule Lads & Other Legends Coloring Book: Icelandic Legends Activity Book.  Buy it from Amazon HERE

Gryla Found! and More

We've been here in Iceland for 6 days...three more before we leave for home.  We have explored a glacier and downtown Reykjavik, shopped and eaten more tasty treats than I can count, and have met fantastic people!

I met and made peace with Gryla!  We've visited the awesome Settlement Center, the Golden Circle, and of course, the Troll Garden.  We still have horseback riding, paragliding, and our training at Elf School to complete!

Until next time!!  We're off to find the Hidden Folk!

Happily Ever After

I came across something today that may just inspire a Viking love story. 

It may be my first happily every after children's fairy tale from a Viking.  Most of the stories I write are based on legends and mythology from Iceland and Scandinavia.  The majority teach a lesson or have a warning to avoid danger or trouble.  Very few I have come across have the "happily ever after" that many of the "traditional" fairy tales contain.  That just might change for me as I can't seem to stop daydreaming about stories behind a weaving knife found in Sweden a few years ago.

The item itself is quite beautiful.  It is currently on display at the Field Museum in Chicago.  The ancient knife has a runic inscription that reads: "Think of me, I think of you. Love me, I love you."

Research Trip To Iceland

Well, we are now 48 hours from our trip to Iceland, which is nearly becoming an annual event.  Last year's trek included visits to Erik the Red's farmstead, the archaeological dig of the original settlement under Reykjavik, the Saga museum (Vikings!) and Reykholt, the home of Snorri Sturlson (Icelandic author of the Sagas), among other places.

This year, we have planned an investigative trip to Lake Lagarfljót in Egilsstaðir to attempt a sighting of the Monster Worm!   If you are unfamiliar with the Monster Worm, he is a dragon-like creature rumored to live  in Lagarfljót.  He is often be sighted raising its back as he swims around.  His home is a freshwater, glacial-fed lake that lies below sea level and is very murky and difficult to see into.  The monster worm is has been described as longer than a bus, or 39 feet (12 m), and has occasionally been reported outside the water, lying coiled up or slithering into the trees.  It is a "many humps" and seems to have a striking likeness to the Loch Ness Monster

According to Wikipedia:  “The Lagarfljót Worm has been sighted several times in modern times, including in 1963 by the head of the Icelandic National Forest Service, Sigurður Blöndal, and in 1998 by a teacher and students at Hallormsstaðir School.  In 1983, contractors laying a telephone cable measured a large shifting mass near the eastern shore when performing preliminary depth measurements, and when they later retrieved the non-functional cable, found that it was broken where it had lain over the anomaly:  "This cable that was specially engineered so it wouldn’t kink was wound in several places and badly torn and damaged in 22 different places . . . . I believe we dragged the cable directly over the belly of the beast. Unless it was through its mouth." "

We are also very excited about the opportunity to attend Elf School to find more stories to bring you!  The Icelandic Elf School, known as Álfaskólinn, is a school in Reykjavik, Iceland that teaches students and visitors about Icelandic folklore.  The school has a certificate curriculum that covers topics about the hidden people and the 13 different kinds of elves that legend says inhabit the country.  Since opening in 1991, over 9,000 people have attended to learn about the mythology!

The school also publishes texts on hidden people, and performs ongoing research on the elves and hidden people of Iceland.   They also collects stories about trolls, fairies, dwarves, and gnomes for the purpose of preservation.  The five hour long educational excursions for visitors finishes with coffee and pancakes at the school and if you’ve ever had these Icelandic goodies, you know that’s something to look forward to!  

I'll come back with all new stories and will be working on several new projects!

Terrifying Ogress or Hoax?

In mythology, Norse magic was inherently a woman's art, however, the sagas do record men as well as women practicing magic.  The woman of the Viking Age often had a magic spindle and distaff, and she would weave special clothing for her family.  She would create thread laced with magic spells and then use it to make her cloth.  This inspired me to think of Grýla and wonder perhaps this is where part of her power came from - the ability to terrorize generations and have such an evil and terrifying reputation. 

What if instead of concealing the truth, she used her spindle and wove a magic spell that made people just think they were seeing something horrifying when in reality she was just an average ugly trollwife?  How fun if she was a seið-witch and just used her impressive magical talent to create the image of a hideous visage?  And, what might have happened that she lost so much power to terrify?  It made a wonderful inspiration for a new short story!

A specific type of magic is used to affect the mind, called seiðr .  Typical symptoms include forgetfulness, delusion, illusion, or fear.  In mythology, a sudden mental or even a physical fog is a common attribute of this type of magic.  This type of magic is called sjónhverfing, a  delusion or "deceiving of the sight" where the victim cannot see things as they truly are, but instead sees what the seið-witch wants them to see.    In Jón Árnason's writings of the Icelandic folk stories, his description of Grýla is hideous:  “Grýla has three heads and three eyes in each head ... Horribly long, curved fingernails, icy blue eyes at the back of the head and horns like a goat, her ears dangle down to her shoulders and are attached to the nose in front. She has a beard on her chin that is like knotted yarn on a weave with tangles hanging from it, while her teeth are like burnt rocks in a grate.”

The sagas have many stories where a seið-witch uses a magical illusion to conceal a person or confuse a pursuer.  The Viking Answer Lady (http://www.vikinganswerlady.com/seidhr.shtml) has a wonderful account of such a story: 

Eyrbyggja saga (ch. 20) uses this idea. A woman called Katla, skilled in seiðr, wished to save her son Odd from a band of men determined to kill him. As the men approached the house, Katla told Odd to sit beside her without moving, while she sat spinning yarn. Arnkell and his men searched the house, but saw nothing beside Katla but a distaff. They returned a second time, to find Katla in the porch; she was combing Odd's hair, but it seemed to them that she was grooming her goat. The third time Odd was lying in a heap of ashes, and they thought it was Katla's boar sleeping there.

Each time they left the house they realized that a trick had been played on them, or ‘a goatskin waved round our heads,' as Arnkell put it, so that Katla could not try the same deception twice. Finally Geirríðr, another woman skilled in seiðr and a bitter enemy of Katla came with the men to help them cut through the deceptions. When Katla saw the rival seið-kona's blue cloak through her window, she knew that sjónhverfing or illusion would no longer work. She hid Odd inside the dais, but Geirríðr popped a sealskin bag over Katla's head, negating her spell casting abilities, and both Odd and Katla were taken and killed.

An essential portion of this technique seems to have involved wrapping an enchanted goatskin around the head of the victim (Reykdoela saga, ch. 14), or over the witch's own head (Njáls saga, ch. 12). A related magic was the magical technique called thehuliðshjálmr, the helmet of hiding or invisibility. The method for invoking the huliðshjálmrvaried, from placing hands atop the head of the person to be concealed, to throwing magical powders over them or other means (Ellis-Davidson, 21-24). In another instance, the special hood worn by the seið-witch was used to render another person invisible while wearing it (Vatnsdoela saga, ch 44).

Was Thor afraid of Gryla?

This story has been around since the 1300s....Thor himself may have hid under the covers as a child - terrified of the trolls and ogres!  The hideous Gryla was mother to the famous Yule Lads.

The Legend of the Icelandic Yule Lads is the start of a new series - Children's stories based in Scandinavian mythology.  This first book centers around the Icelandic legend of thirteen trolls that cause mischief and havoc around the holidays.  Haven't read it yet?

 Get your copy now from Amazon.com

The Legend of Katla Volcano in Iceland

I truly enjoy updating the Icelandic legends into modern stories, but it is fun to share versions written by others as I come across them.  I hope this brings a smile to your face as it did mine.  This was originally posted on 10/27/13 by Liz in Adventures, Destinations, Europe, Iceland

Once upon a time there was a monastery nestled among the jurassic green hills of southern Iceland. Nearby was the impressive Mýrdalsjökull Glacier, a mountain of ice looming over the south coast of this unforgiving land.

Run by a friendly abbot, the monastery thrived with villagers and locals coming to work together and chip in, a community of people working hard to survive the harsh arctic winters. Among them was the housekeeper, Katla. Powerful and frightening, it was whispered that she was a witch, though none dared speak of it to her face.

It was rumored that she used her black powers to create a magical pair of panties, and whoever wore them could run as fast as the wind and never get tired.

Feared by all, including the Abbot, Katla had a terrifying temper and most avoided her when possible.

The hardest worker in the abbey was a shepherd named Barði. Simple-minded but friendly to all, Barði’s usual duties were to take care of the sheep, which if you have ever been to Iceland, you know are EVERYWHERE.

Terrified of Katla, Barði was careful to never offend her, but sometimes he couldn’t find all the sheep to herd and she punished him. Voicing his fears to the Abbot, he was told not to worry, that he had no reason to be afraid of the housekeeper.

“I know I shouldn’t say anything sir, but it’s Katla. She really, really scares me,” said Barði in secret one day.

“Don’t worry, my child. We are all God’s creatures, and everyone can be saved,” the kindly old Abbot replied. Little did he know how much he would come to regret those worlds. Dun, dun, dun.

One day he returned home from a long day of working in the fields to find Katla waiting for him. Shaking down to his very boots in terror, Barði stood silent while Katla yelled that one sheep was missing. Getting ready to leave for a party with the Abbot, Katla warned poor Barði that he better find the missing sheep before they returned….OR ELSE!

“If you don’t have that missing lamb back in its pen before I return, don’t bother coming back!” She cackled!

Scampering off in fear, Barði panicked about what to do. He spent all day looking and couldn’t find that one sheep. What to do? What to do?

“If only I had a horse or someway to find that stupid sheep,” thought Barði to himself.

The sun was starting to set and fearing he would be out at night looking high and low in the dark, Barði began to panic.

Suddenly the lightbulb clicked on in Barði’s mind. Katla’s magic panties! If he could find them and wear them, he was sure to find the missing sheep like THAT!

Running to her room, Barði searched high and low until he found the magical black undies. Pulling them on, he ran like a bat of hell all over the farms and fields until he found the missing little lamb.

Hightailing it back to the monastery sheep in tow, he quickly put Katla’s panties back where he found them and waited for them to return, pleased with his quick thinking.

Little did he know that Katla was all-powerful, and knew immediately what he had done. Livid with Barði for both stealing her underwear and trying to outwit him, Katla lured the poor shepherd down to the wine cellar (though, let’s be honest here, I would be pretty peeved if some guy wore my undies, magical or otherwise!)

“You stole my magical panties, I know it!” Shrieked Katla at the cowering shepherd among dusty bottled of red wine and mead. “No one could find a sheep like that so fast in the dark!”

Shoving poor Barði into a giant vat of wine, Katla drowned the shepherd in a fit of rage. Leaving him inside the vat til spring, she went back to work as if nothing happened. The Abbot and everyone else at the monastery thought he disappeared while looking for the sheep.

After a few months, the weather grew warmer and the level of wine was dropping so low Katla was sure the Abbot would find Barði’s body sooner rather than later. Fearing discovery, Katla ran away from the monastery as fast as she could towards the Mýrdalsjökull Glacier.

Jumping into a crack in the ice, Katla the witch wormed her way below, discovering a dormant volcano beneath the glacier. Searching for the entrance, she finally found her way inside, burrowing her way into the volcano. Shortly after there was a huge eruption, causing a tidal wave glacial flood all over the south coast of Iceland, destroying everything in its path.

Since that day, the volatile volcano that sleeps beneath Mýrdalsjökull has been known as Katla, and even now she causes fear among foreigners and Icelanders alike.