Sublime

Odin’s hall, and Freyja’s, hold “all men who have fallen in battle since the beginning”, but they will be too few “when the wolf comes”, as Fenrir inevitably will at the Ragnarök. Kings and their retinues are therefore especially welcome, with the Valkyries serving wine for such a royal entrance.

It is clear that in Valhöll are all the trappings of hall life in Midgard, but writ large. Servants gather kindling for the fires; there are pigs to be fed; horses graze outside; and hunting dogs are at the ready. The einherjar—the immortal warrior dead—drink, play board games, and fight. If they are killed, they rise again each evening in time for

At Mammen in Denmark, one of the richest chamber graves of the whole Viking Age was made c. 970 for a man whose clothing has enabled us to reconstruct the dress of society’s highest echelons. The chamber itself resembled a hall and even had a pitched roof, all concealed under a great mound. The man was interred with a magnificent axe decorated in a

Asgard,