1 The stories themselves were what tied people together in the communal religion, despite the great diversity of the interpretations people who belonged to that community had of their shared stories. The same was surely true for the Norse in relation to their own sacred stories. THE STRUCTURE OF NORSE MYTHOLOGY Theres no indication that Norse mythology was ever given an overarching, rationally coherent structure in the Viking Age. Given all of the other instances weve found of the lack of systematization in Norse religion as a whole, it would be strange if the Vikings mythology alone was rigidly and precisely codified. In the words of historian H.R. Ellis Davidson, Some scholars have persevered in the hope that a convincing structure could be built up from the scattered clues, accepting all as of equal val

All that can be claimed is that certain conceptions concerning the Otherworld were generally accepted, and that the most powerful myths were enacted against this vivid but [by

2 Our modern zeal for rational structure cant reasonably be projected onto societies far removed from ours, especially when they have given us no indication of sharing that value. Thus, while the lack of systematization in Norse mythology might be a deficiency to us, the Vikings seem to have been utterly untroubled by it. Perhaps they even saw it as giving the myths a certain vitality that kept them swept up in the dynamic flows of lived experience, rather than isolated and static fossils. In keeping with the Vikings linear view of time ( Four), Norse mythology does seem to have had a clear beginning in the creation of the cosmos, and a clear end in Ragnarok, the destruction of the cosmos. However, everything that was said to take place in between these two points doesnt seem to have been thought to have occurred in any particular chronological order. Instances in which myth A assumes that the events of myth B have already taken place, but myth B

To someone hearing any one of these stories (or something much like it) in the Viking Age, the tale would have been recognized as both a standalone narrative and part of a greater whole, but its precise position in that greater whole simply wasnt of much interest, as far as we can tell. The s that follow retell the entire body of the most significant Norse myths contained in the literary sources described in One. Each of these stories about the deeds of gods and human heroes begins with a brief introduction that notes the sources for that specific tale and provides evidencebased guesses as to whether or not (or to what degree) that story is an authentic pre-Christian myth, and if so, how widespread it may have been. The retellings make a point to be faithful to the sources from which they come, while fleshing out some scenes in minor ways that dont alter the plots themselves. Where possible and relevant, Ive provid