Entertaining and sometimes horrifying legends of gods and goddesses, heroes and heroines, monsters and giants survive from pagan Scandinavia, even though the Norsemen were unable to write them down. Odin and Thor, Freyja and Loki, Sigurd the Volsung, Gudrun and Brynhild are the most famous of these mythical characters, whose stories were eventually recorded. With authority and wit, Professor Page retells the Norse legends and shows how complex and sometimes contradictory their traditions are. Yet it is through these ancient myths that we know how the Norsemen visualized the creation of mankind and the final ending of the world.
