Valkyries

The valkyries are Odin's warrior spirits; the Old Norse word means 'choosers of the slain'. Armoured and mounted, they ride above the battlefields, allotting victory and death according to Odin's will, then escort the chosen warriors to Valhalla, where they pour mead for the einherjar. The Grimnismal reels off more than a dozen of their names, among them Hrist, Mist, Hild, Thrud, and Skogul, most built from words for battle, spear, and din. The grimmest picture comes from the Darradarljod, preserved in Njal's saga: twelve valkyries weave the outcome of a battle on a loom strung with human entrails, with swords for beaters and arrows for shuttles.

In the heroic poems they acquire faces, and disobedience has a price. The valkyrie of the Sigrdrifumal gave victory to the wrong king against Odin's decree; he pierced her with a sleep-thorn and penned her within a wall of shields and a ring of fire until the hero Sigurd broke through to wake her, a figure who merges with the legend of Brynhild. In the Volundarkvida, valkyries appear as swan-maidens who shed their feather cloaks to spin flax by a lakeshore.

Wagner's opera Die Walkure, first staged in 1870, and its 'Ride of the Valkyries' made them one of the most recognisable Norse images in the modern world.