Zacrey Hansen, Utah Valley University
Humanities
Within Old Norse myth lurks Hildolf, whose name means Battle-Wolf. He only appears in the Medieval Norse poems twice: in a name list of Odin’s sons in the Prose Edda, and then is off-handedly mentioned by Odin himself, in the Poetic Edda. Since the mythic stories make no other mention of Hildolf, the general scholarly consensus is that Hildolf is simply another of Odin’s many aliases. Indeed, Odin’s association with wolves, especially those that attend him, makes this a likely conclusion. This thesis, however, takes a different approach; that the Poetic Edda reinforces Hildolf’s status as Odin’s son by listing Thor and Hildolf’s names together. Moreover, a closer look at speech ascribed to Odin places Hildolf’s domain of Rathsey’s Sound within the river that separates Jotunheim and Asgard. Further analysis of cultural context also reveals symbolic and etymological parallels between Hildolf and the Ulfhednar, or Wolf-Coats, Norse warriors famously known for taking on the aspect of the wolf during battle. Through the synthesis of these disparate connections, this paper develops a clearer picture of Hildolf’s place in Norse mythology. Asgardian by birth, though not by station, Hildolf stands as the connection between gods and giants, between man and beast, and as Thor guides men to defend against enemies from without, Hildolf guides them to defend against the enemies from within. The conference presentation of this research stems from a longer work planned for submission to The Journal of Contemporary Heathen Thought.