nidhoggr

chained_bear You know, that picture actually makes it look kinda... friendly-like. Dec 12, 2007

bilby I do that too. Some words are worth coming back to. Especially when you only have a faint idea as to what they mean in the first place. Dec 12, 2007

sionnach I just had to come back and visit this word one more time. Dec 11, 2007

bilby I found a graphic representation of a niddhoggr here.

Not that pretty a beastie but if you DO have a nidd infestation of the temporal realms, who ya gonna call? Dec 10, 2007

reesetee Note to self: Don't read this page first thing in the morning. ;-) Dec 10, 2007

sionnach So, is a niddhoggr like some kind of Scandinavian scarab beetle? Dec 10, 2007

bilby I think there's potential here for a tasty range of mythically Nordic insults.
"Hey buddy, you can go and suck my cadaver at the end of the universe." Dec 9, 2007

chained_bear Okay. I'll just go with "necessary balancer of the cosmos" next time this comes up in conversation. Dec 9, 2007

bilby Tree of Life (in these myths) is Yggdrasil and there was a bit of action on that word a few weeks ago. I'm really not sure how to categorise the functionality of cadaver sucking. Dung Beetles Of The End Of Time does have a ring to it, so nidhoggrs have a least one good band name in them. Dec 9, 2007

chained_bear I have a vague memory of hearing about this once. Isn't it true, despicable as the action sounds, that eating the dead at the end of the world is performing a valuable and needed function? What I mean is... do the tellers and re-tellers of these myths don't tell them as if the nidhoggr is some kind of mean bogeyman, but more like a necessary balancer of the cosmos? Dec 9, 2007

bilby Icelandic, cognate with Swedish nidhogg. In Norse myths, the "gnawer from beneath," the serpent which gnaws at the roots of the Tree of Life. Nidhoggr is also the devourer of the dead who sucks cadavers at the end of the world. Dec 9, 2007