Description: The survivors of Ragnarök discovering
the skeleton of Níðhöggr. This scene
is from Louis Moe's Ragnarok: En
Billeddigtning.
Source: Ragnarok: En Billeddigtning
Folio or Page: [111]
Medium: Not known
Date: 1929
Dimensions (mm): 130 x 180
Provenance:
Gift of Estate of Richard Beck to Special Collections at the
University of Victoria. This illustration from Den Ældre Eddas Gudesange was photographed by
P. A. Baer in August 2011.
Call number: NE962 N67M64
Rights:
This illustration from Ragnarok: En
Billeddigtning is in the public domain.
Research notes, early print reviews, etc.:
Some of the illustrations in Ragnarok: En
Billeddigtning have two digit numbers, along with Louis Moe's name,
within the illustration. This one has the number 27, likely indicating the year
1927.
Bibliography:
Primary Sources
Moe,
Louis Maria Niels Peder
Halling. Ragnarok: En
Billeddigtning. København, A.F.
Høst, 1929.
Secondary Sources
Cleasby, Richard
and
Vigfússon
Guðbrandur
. An Icelandic-English Dictionary.
Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1957.
Simek,
Rudolf.
Angela
Hall
. Dictionary of Northern Mythology. W
Woodbridge: D. S. Brewer,
2007.
Miðgarðsormr (non.)
Midgard
Serpent (en.)
A monstrous serpent who is the progeny of Loki and the giantess
Angrboða. This serpent is also known as Jörmungandr and in English as
the Midgard Serpent.
Níðhöggr (non.)
Nidhoggr (en.)
A being which appears in both the Poetic and
the Prose Edda where it gnaws on the roots of
Yggdrasil and causes dissent in its interaction with the eagle who sits
at the top of Yggdrasil. Níðhöggr also appears at the end of Völuspá
where it gnaws on the corpses of the dead in a hall called Náströnd.
Níðhöggr is referred to as a snake in the Prose Edda and Grímnismál but
in Vóluspá it is also referred to as a dragon.
Mythological Events
Ragnarök (non.)
Ragnarok (en.)
The final great battle between the gods and the giants.
Ragnarok: En Billeddigtning (da.)
Louis Moe's illustrated retelling of the Battle of Ragnarok and the
events that preceded it.
Source Persons
Moe,
Louis (no.)
b. 1857
d. 1945
Nationality: Norwegian/Danish.
Occupation: illustrator
Residence: Copenhagen
Moe was an illustrator who was born in Norway but became a Danish
citizen in 1919.
