Huginn and Muninn- Norse CreatureCreature · Beast"Odin's Ravens"

The Dawn Flight

Every morning, before the light reaches the lower worlds, two ravens leave Odin's shoulders. Snorri writes in Gylfaginning that Odin gave them speech so they could tell him what they saw, and each day he sends them out at dawn to fly over all the worlds. By evening they return and perch beside his seat, and he learns from them everything of consequence that has happened. For this the gods call him Hrafnaguð, the Raven God.

The Grímnismál names them: Huginn and Muninn, Thought and Memory. They are Odin's means of knowing what even Hliðskjálf, his high seat, cannot show him. What the ravens carry back is not vague impression but report, spoken in words, delivered into the ear of a god who acts on what he hears.

Odin's Fear

In Grímnismál 20, Odin speaks of the ravens himself: "Huginn and Muninn fly every day over the wide world. I fear for Huginn, that he may not return, yet I fear more for Muninn."

The Ynglinga saga describes how Odin could send his spirit abroad while his body lay as if asleep or dead, taking the shape of bird or beast to travel where his body could not. The ravens may be this practice given permanent form: Odin's thought and memory loosed into the sky each morning, returning each night to make him whole again. His fear is the fear of a man who has let the essential parts of himself fly beyond his reach. Thought might be rebuilt. Memory, once gone, takes everything it carried with it.

The Raven God

Across the Viking world, the raven meant Odin was watching. Ninth-century fragments from the Oseberg ship burial include tapestry scenes with birds flanking a central figure, and helmets, brooches, and amulets from across Scandinavia pair the god with his ravens in a pairing any Norseman would have recognized on sight.

The Raven Banner carried this association into battle. Several sagas describe a flag bearing a raven that Viking armies bore before them. When victory was coming, the raven on the banner appeared to flap its wings. When defeat waited, it hung limp and still. Whether the banners were real cloth or legendary embellishment, the image persisted: two black birds overhead meant the Allfather's attention had turned toward the field, and fates were about to be decided.