Vedrfolnir's Eagle- Norse CreatureCreature · Beast"Eagle at the Top of Yggdrasil"
Also known as: Veðrfölnir's Eagle
Titles & Epithets
Domains
Description
No poem names it. The eagle perches at Yggdrasil's crown with the hawk Veðrfölnir between its eyes, while far below Níðhöggr gnaws at the roots. Between them, the squirrel Ratatoskr carries insults that never end.
Mythology & Lore
The Crown of Yggdrasil
At the top of Yggdrasil sits an eagle. No source gives it a name. Between its eyes perches a hawk called Veðrfölnir, "wind-bleached," and together they occupy the highest point anything living can reach. The Grímnismál places them there in stanza 32, above the goats that strip the branches, above the stags that browse the shoots, above everything except the sky itself.
Snorri adds in the Gylfaginning that the eagle possesses great knowledge. What it knows, or what it does with that knowledge, he does not say.
Ratatoskr's Errands
The squirrel Ratatoskr runs up and down Yggdrasil's trunk carrying words of spite between the eagle above and the dragon Níðhöggr coiled among the roots below. Grímnismál 32–34 lays out the arrangement: eagle at the crown, serpent at the base, squirrel in between. Snorri says Ratatoskr carries tales meant to stoke hatred between the two.
The eagle never descends. Níðhöggr never climbs. The insults travel, but the enemies never meet.
Relationships
- Enemy of