THE SEVEN PRINCIPLES OF HERMES

 by Mark David on elementamundi.com

Another seven... seven is such a magical number.

“The Principles of Truth are Seven; he who knows these, understandingly, possesses the Magic Key before whose touch all the Doors of the Temple fly open.”

–The Kybalion.

These are the Seven Principles of Hermes:
 
1) Mentalism — “Everything is mental; the Universe is a mental creation of the All.”

2) Correspondence — “As above so below; as below so above; as within so without; as without so within.”

3) Vibration — “Nothing rests; everything moves; everything vibrates.”

4) Polarity — “Everything is dual; everything has poles; everything has its pair of opposites; opposites are identical in nature, but different in degree; extremes meet; all truths are but half truths.”

5) Rhythm — “Everything flows out and in; everything has its tides; all things rise and fall; the pendulum-swing manifests in everything; the measure of the swing to the right is the measure of the swing to the left; rhythm compensates.”

6) Cause and Effect — “Every cause has its effect; every effect has its cause; everything happens according to the law; chance is but the name for a law not recognized; there are many planes of causation, but nothing escapes the law.”

7) Gender : “Gender is in everything; everything has its masculine and feminine principles; gender manifests on all planes.”

Ohr Ein Sof - The Infinite Light

The Ohr Ein Sof - The Infinite Light

Cold night in the desert by KPEKEP on deviant art

The Ein Sof (literally: "Without End"/Limitless/Infinite) is the Kabbalistic term for ‘the Divine essence’. As well as the 10 "lights" of God encapsulated in the Sephirot, Kabbalah describes a more primordial light that shines from the Ein Sof (Infinite) itself. This light, the origin of all Creation, and all lower lights, is called the "Ohr Ein Sof" ("The light of the Infinite", or alternatively, itself "The Infinite Light”).

Ohr ("Light" Ohros/Ohrot "Lights") stems from the "Ma'ohr" ("Luminary"), the source of the light – an analogy of physical light used to describe metaphysical Divine emanations.

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Kabbalah

For those (like myself) new to the esoteric doctrine, the Kabbalah is the ‘hidden church of Israel’, an inward spiritual and mystical church claiming access to ‘light of a secret traditional knowledge preserved among the chosen people’. Derived from Hebrew scripture of old, becoming the written secrets sourced from oral tradition. Mystics are those who sense the reality of the scriptures and the dimensions they represent, while unable to make manifest through word or sign the nature of this ‘hidden reality’.

The metaphorical description of spiritual Divine creative-flow, using the term for physical "light" perceived with the eye, arises from analogous similarities. These include the intangible physicality of light, the delight it inspires and the illumination it gives, its apparently immediate transmission and constant connection with its source. 

Light can be veiled ("Tzimtzum" 'constrictions' in Kabbalah) and reflected ("an ascending light from the Creations" in Kabbalah). White light divides into 7 colours, yet this plurality unites from one source. Divine light divides into the 7 emotional Sephirot, but there is no plurality in the Divine essence. The term Ohr in Kabbalah is contrasted with Ma'ohr, the "luminary", and Kli, the spiritual "vessel" for the light.

Kabbalah describes 10 Sephirot (The 10 Divine emanations or attributes), that reveal the unknowable Godhead to the creations and channel the creative life-force to all levels of existence. However, these 10 attributes of God do not represent the Divine essence. The Kabbalists differentiated between the manifestations of God (forms of "light"), and their origin in the Divine essence (the “Luminary”).

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The Kore Kosmou

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In Heaven the gods dwell with the Architect of all, in the Aether are the stars and the sun, in the Air are souls and the moon, and on Earth are men and living things...

A Greek text called the Kore Kosmou (“The Virgin of the Cosmos") ascribed to Hermes Trismegistus (the name given by the Greeks to the Egyptian god Thoth), names the four elements fire, water, air, and earth.

One of the most famous of all alchemical axioms is ‘as above, so below’ – meaning always that in every small part of reality there is a tiny reflection of the great ‘over-structure’ of reality. And, in the largest structures, are hidden secrets of the smallest. And vice versa.

This is represented pictorially by the 16th-17th century Rosicrucian and Kabbalist, Robert Fludd, in his Utriusque Cosmi Historia (1617) and by Fludd’s contemporary, the alchemist, Johann Daniel Mylius, in the Opus Medico-Chymicum (1618). 

The Kore Kosmou

' And Isis answer made: Of living things, my son, some are made friends with fire, and some with water, some with air, and some with earth, and some with two or three of these, and some with all. And, on the contrary, again some are made enemies of fire, and some of water, some of earth, and some of air, and some of two of them, and some of three, and some of all. For instance, son, the locust and all flies flee fire; the eagle and the hawk and all high-flying birds flee water; fish, air and earth; the snake avoids the open air. Whereas snakes and all creeping things love earth; all swimming things love water; winged things, air, of which they are the citizens; while those that fly still higher love the fire and have the habitat near it. Not that some of the animals as well do not love fire; for instance salamanders, for they even have their homes in it. It is because one or another of the elements doth form their bodies' outer envelope. Each soul, accordingly, while it is in its body is weighted and constricted by these four.'

The most essential notions that we see here are creation by the word, the gods acting under the command of a supreme God, the function of created souls to keep nature circulating, the body a prison of the soul, the heavenly types of animals preceding the earthly creation, and the mission of gods on earth.

Besides the Egyptian ideas already mentioned, Greek influence is seen in the characters of gods and in the episode of the earth spirit, and probably Indian influence in the Metempsychosis and the fire-sacrifice of spices, as by Apollonios. There is throughout this cosmology a vigorous and eventful chain of thought, entirely different to the maundering of later writers.

The ideas of this sermon are that the souls of men and animals are all alike, and Metempsychosis is assumed between human and animal bodies; the soul is individual, the work of God's hands and mind; its congress with the body is a concord wrought by God's necessity; at death it returns to its proper region. The reign of souls is between the moon and earth, for above the moon are the gods and stars and providence; the souls pass through air and wind without friction; their reign is divided into the four quarters of earth, higher the eight winds, higher sixteen spaces of subtler air, and highest thirty-two spaces of subtlest air; these are called zones, firmaments, or strata. The kingly souls occupy the highest, and so in order down to the base souls the lowest. There is a warder of souls, and a conductor to and from the bodies. Bodies are a blend of the four elements, each affecting the character.

First published in 1908, the Kybalion: A Study of The Hermetic Philosophy of Ancient Egypt and Greece is a hermetic and pseudo-psychological mish-mash. Authorship is merely and mys-teriously attributed to “Three Initiates” who claim to convey to readers, in concise terms, the philosophy of the legendary wellspring of alchemy, Hermes Trismegistus. The treatise touches upon several points that resonate with historic occult currents such as nothing ever ‘merely happens’; that there is no such thing as Chance; that while there are various planes of Cause and Effect, the higher dominating the lower planes, still nothing ever entirely escapes the Law. The Hermetists understand the art and methods of rising above the ordinary plane of Cause and Effect, to a certain degree, and by mentally rising to a higher plane they become Causers instead of Effects.

The masses (of people) are carried along, obedient to environment; the wills and desires of others stronger than themselves; heredity; suggestion; and other outward causes moving them about like pawns on the Chessboard of Life. But the Masters, rising to the plane above, dominate their moods, characters, qualities, and powers, as well as the environment surrounding them, and become Movers instead of pawns. They help to PLAY THE GAME OF LIFE, instead of being played and moved about by other wills and environment. They USE the Principle instead of being its tools. The Masters obey the Causation of the higher planes, but they help to RULE on their own plane. In this statement there is condensed a wealth of Hermetic knowledge – let him read who can.”

Link to translation of text:

http://yperboreia.org/KoreKosmou.pdf

http://www.sacred-texts.com/egy/woe/woe07.htm

Links to The Elements posts:

https://plus.google.com/+MarkDavidauthor/posts/gojnM5phpyA

The Seven Tablets of Creation

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Image: Chaos monster and sun god

Leonard William Kings (1902) was the authoritative work on the Enuma Elish, the Babylonian creation myth. The etext linked to at the end of this blog includes the complete introduction, and the English text of the Enuma Elish and other related texts, with selected footnotes.

About

Enuma Elish is the earliest written creation myth, in which the God Marduk battles the chaos Goddess Tiamat and her evil minions. It originated in the land of Sumer, or the ‘land of civilized kings’, flourished in Mesopotamia, now modern-day Iraq, around 4500 BC. Sumerians created an advanced civilization with its own system of elaborate language and writing, architecture and arts, astronomy and mathematics. Their religious system was a complex one comprised of hundreds of gods. According to the ancient texts, each Sumerian city was guarded by its own god; and while humans and gods used to live together, the humans were servants to the gods.

The Sumerian creation myth can be found on a tablet in Nippur, an ancient Mesopotamian city founded in approximately 5000 BC.

The creation of Earth (Enuma Elish) according to the Sumerian tablets begins like this:

When in the height heaven was not named,

And the earth beneath did not yet bear a name,

And the primeval Apsu, who begat them,

And chaos, Tiamut, the mother of them both

Their waters were mingled together,

And no field was formed, no marsh was to be seen;

When of the gods none had been called into being,

And none bore a name, and no destinies were ordained;

Then were created the gods in the midst of heaven,

Lahmu and Lahamu were called into being...

In the beginning, Sumerian mythology tells us human-like gods ruled over Earth. When they came to the Earth, there was much work to be done and these gods toiled the soil, digging to make it habitable and mining its minerals. The texts mention that at some point the gods mutinied against their labour:

When the gods like men

Bore the work and suffered the toll

The toil of the gods was great,

The work was heavy, the distress was much.

Anu, the god of gods, agreed that their labour was too great. His son Enki, or Ea, proposed to create man to bear the labour, and so, with the help of his half-sister Ninki, he did. A god was put to death, and his body and blood was mixed with clay. From that material the first human being was created, in likeness to the gods:

You have slaughtered a god together

With his personality

I have removed your heavy work

I have imposed your toil on man.

…

In the clay, god and man

Shall be bound,

To a unity brought together;

So that to the end of days

The Flesh and the Soul

Which in a god have ripened –

That soul in a blood-kinship be bound.

Links to Eden

This first man was created in Eden, a Sumerian word which means ‘flat terrain’. In the Epic of Gilgamesh, Eden is mentioned as the garden of the gods and is located somewhere in Mesopotamia between the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.

Initially human beings were unable to reproduce on their own, but were later modified with the help of Enki and Ninki. Thus, Adapa was created as a fully functional and independent human being. This ‘modification’ was done without the approval of Enki’s brother, Enlil, and a conflict between the gods began. Enlil became the adversary of man, and the Sumerian tablet mentions that men served gods and went through much hardship and suffering.

Adapa, with the help of Enki, ascended to Anu where he failed to answer a question about ‘the bread and water of life’. Opinions vary on the similarities between this creation story and the biblical story of Adam and Eve in Eden.

Sumerian tablet depicting Enki in the creation myth. (world-myth.com)

Origins

The name ‘Enuma Elish’ is derived from the first two words of the myth, meaning ‘When in the Height’. Tiamat takes the form of a gigantic snake, and Marduk battles and defeats her using an arsenal of super-weapons. After his victory Marduk is made the leader of the Gods by acclamation. Marduk divides Tiamat’s corpse into two portions, the upper half becoming the sky and the lower half, the earth. Marduk then creates humanity from his blood and bone.

The Enuma Elish has long been considered by scholars to be primary source material for the book of Genesis. It has also been hypothesized that this is a legend about the overthrow of the matriarchy or records of some cosmic catastrophe. It was discovered in the ancient Royal Library of Ashurbanipal at Nineveh (current day Mosul, Iraq) in 1849.  George Smith translated the text and released his work in 1876 in the book, The Chaldean Account of Genesis.

History

The Assyrian copies of the work are from the great library which was founded at Nineveh by Ashur-bani-pal, king of Assyria from B.C. 668 to about B.C. 626; the Babylonian copies and extracts were inscribed during the period of the kings of the Neo-Babylonian and Persian periods ; and one copy of the Seventh Tablet may probably be assigned to as late a date as the period of the Arsacidae. All the tablets and fragments, which have hitherto been identified as inscribed with portions of the text of the poem, are preserved in the British Museum.

From the time of the first discovery of fragments of the poem considerable attention has been directed towards them, for not only are the legends themselves the principal source of our knowledge of the Babylonian costnogony, but passages in them bear a striking resemblance to the cognate narratives in the Book of Genesis concerning the creation of the world. A suggestion has been made that the prominence given to the word of the Creator in the Hebrew account may have found its parallel in the creation by a word in the Babylonian poem. It is true that the word of Marduk had magical power and could destroy and create alike; but Marduk did not employ his word in any of his acts of creation which are at present known to us. He first conceived a cunning device, and then proceeded to carry it out by hand.

The only occasion on which he did employ his word to destroy and to create is in the Fourth Tablet, 11. 19-26,2 when, at the invitation of the gods, he tested his power by making a garment disappear and then appear again at the word of his mouth. The parallelism between the two accounts under this heading is not very close.

The order of the separate acts of creation is also not quite the same in the two accounts, for, while in the Babylonian poem the heavenly bodies are created immediately after the formation of the firmament, in the Hebrew account their creation is postponed until after the earth and vegetation have been made. It is possible that the creation of the earth and plants has been displaced by the writer to whom the present form of the Hebrew account is due, and that the order of creation was precisely the same in the original forms of the two narratives. But even according to the present arrangement of the Hebrew account, there are several striking points of resemblance to the Babylonian poem. These may be seen in the existence of light before the creation of the heavenly bodies ; in the dividing of the waters of the primeval flood by means of a firmament also before the creation of the heavenly bodies ; and in the culminating act of creation being that of man.

It would be tempting to trace the framework of the Seven Days of Creation, upon which the narrative in Genesis is stretched, to the influence of the Seven Tablets of Creation, of which we now know that the great Creation Series was composed. The reasons for the employment of the Seven Days in the Hebrew account are, however, not the same which led to the arrangement of the Babylonian poem upon Seven Tablets. In the one the writer's intention is to give the original authority for the observance of the Sabbath; in the other there appears to have been no special reason for this arrangement of the poem beyond the mystical nature of the number "seven." Moreover, acts of creation are recorded on all of the first six Days in the Hebrew narrative, while in the Babylonian poem the creation only begins at the end of the Fourth Tablet.

In Exilic and post-Exilic times the account of the Creation most prevalent in Babylonia was that in the poem Enuma edir, the text of which was at this time absolutely fixed and its arrangement upon Seven Tablets invariable. That the late revival of mythology among the Jews was partly due to their actual study of the Babylonian legends at this period is sufficiently proved by the minute points of resemblance between the accounts of the Deluge in Genesis and in the poem of Gilgamesh.' It is probable, therefore, that the writer who was responsible for the final form of Gen. i - ii, 4a, was familiar with the Babylonian legend of Creation in the form in which it has come down to us.

Links
http://www.sacred-texts.com/ane/stc/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Chaos_Monster_and_Sun_God.png
http://www.ancient-origins.net/human-origins-folklore/origins-human-beings-according-ancient-sumerian-texts-0065
http://www.etana.org/sites/default/files/coretexts/14907.pdf
http://www.world-myth.com/mesopotamian/sumerian-creation-myth

The Saga of Hromund Gripsson

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Illustrated by Photos by Mark David. Taken in and around Scandinavia. The saga of Romund Gripsson is used in The Elements.

Historical Background: Wiki: Olaf I of Denmark (Danish: Oluf I Hunger) (c. 1050–1095), was king of Denmark following his brother Canute IV starting from 1086. He was a natural son of king Sweyn Estridson and married Ingegard, princess of Norway, the daughter of Harald Hårdråde.

Chapter 1

Hromund Gripsson was the son of Gnodar-Asmund, and he was a famous man. Two brothers, Kari and Arnulf, were the king's land-wardens and great warriors. There was a powerful farmer named Grip who married a woman named Gunnlod, the daughter of Hrok the Black, and they had nine sons, named Hrolf, Haki, Gaut, Throst, Angantyr, Logi, Hromund, Helgi, and Hrok. They were all promising men, though Hromund was greater than the rest. He knew no fear, and was handsome, fair-haired and mighty, great and strong, much like Hrok, his uncle. With the king were two men, one named Bild, the other Vali. They were evil and crafty. The king was mighty.

One time, Olaf sailed east to Norway with his fleet, and sailed to the Ulfar Skerries, harrying until he laid anchor at an island. The king told Kari and Arnulf to go up to the island and see if they could see any warships. They went ashore, and soon saw six warships. There was one most magnificent dragon-ship. Kari called to the occupants and asked who was in charge of the ships. An ugly man stood up in the dragon-ship and said that he was named Hrongvid, - 'and what is your name?' Kari said to him and his brother: 'I know none worse than you, and moreover, I shall cut you into tiny pieces.' Hrongvid said: 'I have harried summer and winter for thirty-three years, fighting sixty battles and always had the victory. My sword is named Brynthvari, and it never goes blunt. Come here tomorrow morning, Kari, and I shall sheath him in your breast.' Kari said he would not fail, and Hrongvid might choose the day to face the sword's point.

Chapter 2

The brothers came back to the king and told him the news. The king decided to accept the challenge, and so it was done. They met, and there they received hard battle. The brothers went well forward. Kari always felled eight or twelve men in each stroke. Hrongvid saw that. He ran up to the king’s ship, to Kari and thrust his sword through him. As soon as Kari had taken a wound, he said to the king: “Live well, sire, I go to be the guest of Odin.” Hrongvid fought Arnulf, felling Kari’s brother with his spear. Then Hrongvid told them all that they should give up. An evil murmur came from the king’s troop. Iron did not bite Hrongvid.

Now the saga says that Hromund Gripsson was in the king’s following. He took a club in his hand, bound to himself a long goat-beard and put a hood on his head, then stormed forward to find both the brothers dead. Then he took up the king’s standard and beat the black men to death with his club. Hrongvid asked, who he was, “— or was Kari your father that you are so wrathful?” Hromund gave his name and said he would avenge the brothers, —”Kari was not my father. All the same, I shall kill you.” Then he gave Hrongvid so great a blow that he bowed his head and said: “I have been widely in battle and never taken such a stroke.” Hromund gave to Hrongvid another stroke, so that his skull broke. In the third stroke, he lost his life. After that they went, those who lived, to the king, and so the battle ended.

Chapter 3

Now Hromund searched the ship and he found one man hiding up in the prow. He asked this man his name. The man said he was called Helgi the Valiant, and that he was the brother of Hrongvid, —”and I cannot bear to sue for peace.” Hromund allowed Helgi the Valiant time to heal his wounds, and later he sailed to Sweden and became a land-warder there.

King Olaf sailed west to the Hebrides with his fleet, and here they went ashore and rounded up a herd of cattle. A farmer lived nearby. The king’s men took his cow and drove it down to the ships. He was greatly grieved by that loss. Hromund came and asked him where he dwelt. The man said that his name was Mani, and that he lived a short way away, and added that it would be a greater deed for them to break into a barrow and rob the drow’s wealth. Hromund asked him to tell him if he knew anything about that. Mani said that certainly he knew and added: “Thrain, who conquered Gaul and was king there, he who was a great and mighty berserk, and an excellent sorcerer — he entered a barrow with his sword, armour and much wealth. But you must go there quickly.”

Hromund asked how long it would take them to sail there. Mani said that they should sail due south for six days. Hromund thanked the man for this information, gave him his wealth and let him take back his cow. Then they sailed as the man had advised them, and in six days’ time they saw the barrow before the prow of the ship.

Chapter 4

They sailed west to Gaul and soon found the barrow. And after six days had passed, they came to an opening in the barrow. They saw a great ugly man sitting in a chair, blue-skinned and stout, all clad in gold, so that it glittered. He chattered much and blew on the fire.

Hromund asked now who would enter the barrow, and said that whoever did should choose three treasures for himself.

Vali said: “No one would willingly give his life for that. There are sixty men here, and that troll will kill us all.”

Hromund said: “Kari would have dared to do this, if he was alive,” —and added that he was prepared to descend into the barrow, although it would be better if he went with others. Hromund went down on a chain. It was night-time by then. And when he reached the bottom, he found much wealth and gathered it together.

In previous days Thrain had been king over Gaul, and he had accomplished everything by sorcery. He did much evil, until he was so old that he no longer wanted to know adversity any longer, so he went alive into the barrow and took much wealth with him.

Now Hromund saw where a sword hung up from a pillar. He took it down, belted it to himself and went forward and said: “I will speak with you before I leave the barrow, since you do not stop me. What is wrong with you, you there, old one? Do you not agree that while I gathered your wealth together you sat silent, hated dog? Was something in your eyes, that you looked on as I took your sword and jewellery and many of your other treasures?”

Thrain said to himself that he would seem worth little if he allowed himself to sit silently in his chair, — “I have little wish to fight. But I must have become a great coward, if you can rob my wealth. I refuse you my treasure. You will see me dead first.”

Then Hromund said: “It would be seemly if you rose, cowardly and craven one, and took your sword back from me, if you dare.’’

The drow said: “That is no deed, to bear a sword against me, who am weaponless. I will test my strength with you and wrestle.”

Hromund threw down the sword and trusted in his own strength. Thrain saw that and got up from his cauldron. He blew on the fire, and now he was ready to eat out of the cauldron. A great fire lay between his feet, and the cauldron was full of goat-meat. He wore a gold-painted hide. Both his hands were gnarled, and his nails were crooked over the tips of his fingers.

Hromund said: “Rise from the chair, cowardly slave, and take your wealth.” Then the drow said: “Now will we have fitting speech, now you challenge my courage.”

Day passed, and dusk fell, and it grew dark in the barrow. Then the drow went to wrestle with Hromund, but he cast down his cauldron. Hromund had the advantage of strength, and so they went hard at it, so that rocks and stones sprang up. Then the drow fell to his left knee and said: “You knock me down, and certainly you are a brave man.”

Hromund said: “Stand without support to your back. You are as great a coward as Máni the farmer said.”

Thrain went crazy, and he filled the barrow with an evil reek. Then he set his claws to the back of Hromund’s head and broke hold of the bone to his loins and said: “Do not complain about it, although the game grows coarse and I have wounded your throat, so that now I shall tear you apart still alive.’’

“I do not know,” said Hromund, “from where such cat-kin has come to this barrow.”

The drow said: “You were born to Gunnlod. All your like are so.”

“Evil will it be,” said Hromund, “that you scratch me long.” They wrestled hard and long, so that everything around them shook, until Hromund felled the drow with a foot-trick. By then it had become very dark.

Then the drow said: “Now you want my advice having obtained my sword. I have lived long in my barrow and gloated over my wealth, but no good came from that treasure, although you think it good. I never intended that you would use Mistiltein, my good sword, to harm me.”

Hromund then loosed the sword and rested it on his knee, and said: “Tell me now, how many men did you defeat in duels with Mistiltein.”

“Four hundred and twenty,” said the drow, “and I never received a graze. I tested my skill with King Seming, who ruled in Sweden, and he saw that I would soon be the victor.”

“Long have you,” said Hromund, “ been harmful to men, and I will work it that you die first.”

He struck the head off the drow, and burned him up in the fire, then went out of the barrow. Then the men asked how Thrain and he had parted. He said that he went in choice, —”then I struck off his head.”

Hromund kept three treasures that he found in the barrow, a ring, a necklace and Mistiltein. All of the others got money. Then King Olaf sailed away from there, north to his kingdom, and afterwards his land was well renowned.

Chapter 5

Following this, Hromund was very famous, and popular and generous. He gave a man named Hrok his good gold ring, which weighed eight ounces. Vali got to know this and he killed Hrok one night, but took the ring. The king learnt of this and said that some time he would reward Vali for his trick.

The king had two sisters, one named Dagny, and the other Svanhvit. Svanhvit was foremost of all women, and there was no one like her throughout Sweden and Halogaland. Hromund Gripsson now stayed at home, seeing much of Svanhvit, and avoiding neither Vali nor Bild. Svanhvit told Hromund that Vali and Bild would slander him to the king.

He said “I am not afraid of such cowardly paltry fellows, and as long as you love me, then I will speak with you.”

But this slander grew so great that Hromund and his brothers abandoned the king’s retinue and went home to their father. A little while later, Svanhvit spoke with King Olaf and said:

“Now Hromund has abandoned your retinue, through whom my honour was greatly increased, and in his place you have those two who have neither courage nor renown.”

The king said: “I have heard it said that he had fooled you, and that your love shall know the sword.”

“You remember little now,” she said, “but he went into the barrow when no one else dared. But before long Vali and Bild will be slain,” she added, and afterwards went away quickly.

Chapter 6

Some time later, two Swedish kings, both named Halding, came to the land. With them was Helgi, Hrongvid’s brother. They invited King Olaf to fight with them in the west, at Vaenisis. He was mightier than they, and would not flee his kingdom. He sent word to Hromund and his brothers to accompany him in the fight. But Hromund would go nowhere, and he said that Bild and Vali would help the king achieve everything. The king went to that place of battle with his army. Svanhvit left and went to Hromund, who received her well.

“Consider my prayer,” she said, “Go to aid my brother and join the army. I will give you a shield with a garter that was his aid. You will receive no injury while you have that.”

Hromund thanked her for this gift, and she was glad. He and his eight brothers prepared for the journey.

Now the king came to Vaenisis with his army. The Swedish army was there. That morning, as soon as battle commenced, they went armed onto the ice, and the Swedes charged forward. Bild was slain the moment the battle began, but there was no sign of Vali. King Olaf and King Halding were both wounded.

Hromund had pitched tents beside the water. His brothers put on their armour early in the morning.

Hromund said: ‘I have had bad dreams this night, and have no wish to enter the battle today.”

His brothers said that it would be a great shame that they dared not fight in the king’s army, and it was better to go on this errand. They entered the battle and charged forward, but each fell about the other when they encountered the troop of Halding.

A witch was there in the form of a swan. She cast magic with so many spells that no one among King Olaf’s men noticed her. She flew over the sons of Grip, singing loudly. Her name was Lara. Helgi the Valiant met the brothers then, and killed all eight together.

Chapter 7

At that moment, Hromund entered the battle. Helgi the Valiant saw this and said: “Now is he come here, who fought Hrongvid my brother. You may now see him with his sword that he sought in the barrow. Now you must flee. I slew your brothers.”

Hromund said: “Helgi, you need not question my courage. Either you or I will now fall.”

Helgi said: “Mistiltein is so heavy a weapon, that you cannot control it. I will lend you another sword that you will be able to control.”

Hromund said: “You need not test my strength. You will remember the stroke that I gave Hrongvid, and crushed his skull.”

Helgi said: “Hromund, you have bound about your hand a maiden’s garter. You know that it will shield you when you bear it. You will get no wound while you bear that, and so you will always be true to that maid.”

Hromund would not suffer these provocative words, and he cast down the shield. Helgi the Valiant always won victory but achieved everything by magic. His mistress was named Lara, who was there in the form of a swan. Helgi swung his sword so hard above himself that he accidentally cut off her leg, and the sword sank into the ground up to the hilt.

He said:

‘Now has my luck gone, and it goes badly for me that you will succeed.”

Hromund said: “Helgi, you are defeated. It was very bad luck when you slew your own mistress, and your health will go.”

Lara fell down dead. But with the stroke Helgi struck Hromund, the sword ran to the hilt, and the sword point slid into Hromund’s belly, but Helgi stooped to strike again. Hromund made no delay and hewed Helgi’s head with Mistiltein, cleaving helmet and skull, so that it sank into his shoulders. Then the notch in the sword broke. Hromund took his belt-knife and pierced his belly where it was ripped, pushed so the paunch-fat hung out, tore his belly and with the garter bound his clothes together.

Then he fought so fiercely and felled men so they fell each across the other, and fought on into the middle of the night. Then that army fled, along with the Haldings. There the fight ended.

Then Hromund saw that a man was standing there on the ice. He knew well that sorcery could turn the ice to water, and he noticed that it was Vali. He said that he was obliged to reward him, ran to him, swung Mistiltein and would have struck him. But Vali blew the sword out of his hand, and it flew over an opening in the ice and sank down to the bottom. Then Vali laughed and said:

“Now you are doomed, now you have lost Mistiltein from out of your hand.”

Hromund said: “But before that you will die.”

Then he ran to Vali and lifted him up, then dashed him down on the ice, so his neck broke. This wizard lay there, dead, but Hromund sat down on the ice. He said:

“I had no good advice from the maiden. I have now sent fourteen men under, and though my eight brothers also fell, and my sword Mistiltein fell in the water, and this loss I can never make good, that I lost my sword.”

Afterwards he went away from there, went home to his tent and took some rest.

Chapter 8

Now the king’s sisters searched the battlefield. Svanhvit found Hromund wounded and sewed his belly together, and searched his wounds. She sent him to a healer named Hagall. Hagall’s wife was very cunning. They took him in and healed his wounds. Hromund discovered that this household was very knowledgeable.

The man often went fishing, and one day when he was at his fishing he caught a pike, and when he came home and cut it open he found in its mouth Mistiltein, Hromund’s sword, and took it to him. Hromund was glad at that, and he kissed the hilt of the sword and was instantly well.

There was a man in King Halding’s host who was called Blind the Evil. He told the king that Hromund was alive, healthy, and living with the farmer Hagall and his wife. The king said that this was false, that they would not dare to keep him in ignorance. But he told Blind to search for Hromund.

Blind went with some men to Hagall’s house and asked if Hromund was concealed there. Hagall’s wife said he would not find him there. Blind searched carefully and could not find him, because the woman had concealed Hromund in her boiling cauldron.

Blind and his fellows departed, but after they had gone some way, Blind said:

“That was not the journey I foresaw. We must turn back.”

They did so, went back and found the woman. Blind said she was crafty, and she had concealed Hromund in the cauldron.

“Look there and take him, then,” she said. But she said that because as soon as they had left she had dressed Hromund in women’s clothes and set him to grind corn and turn the quern. And as soon as they came there, the maid turned the quern. They searched all around, but again they found nothing, and so they went away.

But as they were heading off, Blind said that the woman must have magically seen them and he thought that Hromund must have been the one who turned the quern in women’s clothes, “and I see she has outdone us. I can do nothing against that woman, since she is so cunning.” They wished her evil and went back to the king.

Chapter 9

That winter, Blind saw much in his sleep, and he recounted one of his dreams to the king, saying:

“It seemed to me a wolf ran eastward. He bit you, king, and gave you a blow.”

The king interpreted the dream.

“The king of another country will come here, and when we first meet he will harm me, but later we will be at peace.”

Then Blind said that he had dreamed that it seemed to him that many hawks were sitting in a house, “and I noticed in there your spirit, sire. He was all featherless and stripped of his coat.”

The king said:

“A wind will come from the skies and shake my stronghold.”

A third dream recounted Blind.

“Many swine ran south of the king’s hall, rooting up earth with their tusks.”

The king said:

“That means that the swell rushes over the beach, and the land will be flooded with water while the sun shines in the brightness of the sky.”

Blind recounted a fourth dream.

‘It seemed to me a furious giant came east. He bit you, which was a great wonder.”

The king said:

‘The messengers of some king will come to my hall. They will bite up all his weapons, and then ride away.”

“I had a fifth dream,” said Blind, “and it seemed that about me lay a grim serpent.”

“There will come to land,” said the king, “a handsome dragon-ship, laden with treasure.”

“Sixth I dreamed,” said Blind, “that it seemed that a black cloud with claws and wings came to the kingdom, and it flew away with you, king. Then I dreamed that a serpent was beside the farmer Hagall. It bit men furiously. It ate up you, and me, and all the retainers. What does that signify?”

The king said:

‘I have heard that not far from Hagall’s house lies a hibernating bear. I will go against that bear, and he will bristle greatly.”

“Next I dreamed that a dragon-spirit was drawn about your hall, and it was thick with Hromund’s shields.”

The king said:

“You know that Hromund lost his sword and shield in the water. Or are you afraid of Hromund now?”

Blind dreamed more dreams, and each he recounted to the king, but the king interpreted them all favourably, and saw no omens in them. Now Blind recounted another dream, in which he felt himself touched, and he said: “It seemed to me that an iron ring was set about my neck.”

The king said:

“This dream means that you will be hanged, and with that we are both doomed.”

Chapter 10

After that, King Olaf gathered his troop, and afterwards sailed to Sweden. Hromund went with him. They surprised King Halding’s hall. The king was in an outbuilding. He was unaware of the attack until the door of the building was broken down. Halding called to his men and asked them about this night attack. Hromund spoke to him.

The king said: “You will avenge your brothers.”

Hromund said he should say little about the fall of his brothers, “Now you will pay, and here dispense with your life.”

Then up ran one of King Halding’s warriors who was as big as a giant. Hromund killed him. King Halding was the worst for sorcery, and got no wounds, so that whenever Hromund struck him, the flat of his sword struck the king. The Hromund took a club, laid about King Halding and sent him to Hell. Then Hromund said:

“Here I have felled King Halding, and I have never seen so valiant a man.”

The man Blind, who was also named Bavis, was bound and hanged, and so fulfilled his dream. There they took great gold and other wealth, then afterwards sailed home.

King Olaf gave Svanhvit in marriage to Hromund. They loved each other greatly, and had sons and daughters together who were excellent people. From them, royal dynasties and great warriors trace their lineage.

Here ends the saga of Hromund Gripsson.

You can follow Mark David on Twitter @authorMarkDavid. You can read more about what he is up to on mark-david.com or on medium.

If you want, contribute to developing the collection Stories To Imagine, working with elements of the imagination from the real world. More on The Elements.