Before Brokkr and Sindri forged the hammer, others were at work: the sons of Ívaldi. Three wonders came out of their forge – and the pride they took in their craft set off the most famous smithing contest of the mythology.
The sons of Ívaldi (Old Norse Ívalda synir) are artful dwarves from the underworld of the dwarves. Little is handed down about their father Ívaldi; the sons are famous for their works. Dvalin, one of the best-known dwarves of the Edda, is often counted among them.
When Loki had cut off the golden hair of the goddess Sif out of spite, he had to fetch a replacement. He went to the sons of Ívaldi, and they made three masterpieces:
The golden hair for Sif – real gold that grows like natural hair the moment it touches her head. Skíðblaðnir – the best of all ships, which always has a fair wind, holds all the gods with their armour, and yet can be folded up like a cloth and tucked into a pocket; it belongs to the god Freyr. And Gungnir – Odin’s spear, which never misses its mark.
The sons of Ivaldi are in Norse mythology a group of dwarves who are among the most skilful smiths of all nine worlds. From their workshops come some of the most precious treasures that gods and heroes ever possessed.
The sons of Ivaldi created, among other things, the folding ship Skidbladnir for Freyr, the spear Gungnir for Odin and the golden hair of the goddess Sif, which Loki had once cut off. Works of unsurpassed art and magic power.
Famous is the contest into which Loki brought the sons of Ivaldi against the dwarf brothers Brokkr and Sindri. Both sides made three treasures each – a contest from which in the end Thor's hammer Mjölnir also emerged.
The sons of Ivaldi embody the ideal of craft in Norse thought: skill that borders on magic. For a craft like engraving this is a fine echo – the old stories honour the masters of the material.
With these three treasures in hand, Loki grew overconfident. He wagered his own head with the dwarves Brokkr and Sindri that they could never forge anything as good. Out of that wager then came the three greatest treasures of all – the boar Gullinborsti, the ring Draupnir and Thor’s hammer Mjöllnir. So the sons of Ívaldi stand at the beginning of the whole treasure legend: it was their craft that first provoked the contest.
Sindri & Brokkr · The dwarves · The treasures of the gods · Gungnir · Sif.
Poetic Edda: Grímnismál (Skíðblaðnir). Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda (Skáldskaparmál: sons of Ívaldi, the three works, the contest), c. 1220. English public domain: Henry Adams Bellows (1923). Scholarship: Rudolf Simek, Dictionary of Northern Mythology; John Lindow, Norse Mythology (2001).
All Beings & Creatures articles →
Far below, where the roots of the World Tree reach down into cold and darkness, lies a creature that never rests …
Read more →Between crown and root of the World Ash Yggdrasil scurries a small, restless creature: Ratatoskr, the squirrel. It …
Read more →Without the giants there would be no Norse world – in the most literal sense. Out of a giant it arose, against the …
Read more →In Valhalla an eternal feast holds sway – provided by a single animal that never runs out: the boar Sæhrimnir.
Read more →