Freya

Blessed be the Goddess of the Sparkling Aurora Freya, Beautiful One, Most Passionate Queen. Teach me the mysteries of the heart's true passion. Show me the secrets of wyrd . Walk with me in starlight. I light this candle in fiery offering to you, Freya, Goddess of Fire.

 

 

Freya is probably the best-known and best-loved of the goddesses today. Her title simply means "Lady," her original name is not known. Freya is the "wild woman" among the deities of the North: free with her sexual favors (though furious when an attempt is made to marry her off against her will); mistress of Odin and several other gods and men; skilled at the form of ecstatic consciousness-altering, and sometimes malicious magic called seidhr; and chooser of half the slain on the battlefield (Odin gets the other half) whom she takes to her hall in Asgard.

Freya's chief attribute is the necklace called Brisingamen, which she bought from four dwarves at the price of four nights of her love. This necklace is sometimes seen today as embodying her power over the four elements

This goddess drives a wagon drawn by two cats, perhaps large forest-cats such as lynxes, and is seen today as the patron goddesses of cats and those who keep them. As a battle-goddess, she also rides on a boar called Hildisvini (Battle-Swine).

Norse mythology associates the aurora with the beautiful goddess, Freya, daughter of Njord and the giantess Skadi. Freya was the goddess of beauty and love as well as battle and death. Friday was named after her.  Her twin brother is the sun god Frey. She is always depicted wearing a famous necklace, called a brisling. It was given to her by the dwarfs in exchange of a night of love with them.


Freya is sometimes seen as a fertility goddess, but there are no sources suggesting that she was called on to bring fruitfulness to fields or wombs. Rather, she is a goddess of riches, whose tears are gold and whose "daughters," in the riddle-poetry of the skalds, are precious objects. However, the giants are always trying to take her away from the gods, and it is clear that this would be a great disaster: she was obviously known to be the embodiment of the holy life-force on some level. Perhaps because of this, Wagner gave her some of Idunna's attributes, making her the keeper of the golden apples without which the folk of Asgard would wither and die.

Old Norse Freyja, Old English Freo, Modern German Frau, Wagnerian Freia, Modern English Frowe.

Šall original material Freya Owlsdottir 1986-1998