FREYJA

Freyja, whose name means “Lady”, “Woman”, or “Mistress”, is a major deity in Norse cosmology. She was worshiped in all of Scandinavia and in the Germanic tribes, as well as by many of the Celtic tribes. The Viking Age was approximately 790 CE – 1100 CE during which Freyja was widely worshiped. Because Her name in Old Norse translates to such a general title or noun, it is believed that Her real name is lost in time. She was one of the most powerful deities in all those regions and throughout those centuries – and even beyond.
From the epic poems called The Eddas, written over the course of 50 years between 1220 CE and 1270 CE come all the stories we know now of the Norse Gods and Goddesses. The Viking culture was almost evenly divided between exploring, battling, and farming. The were astonishing sailors and terrifyingly fierce warriors. And they had a strong spirituality in every aspect of their lives. Of course, their spiritual concepts included shamanism and magic. Even their writing, the Runes, are magic and can be used for all manner of purposes from healing to protection to attracting wealth to blessing the family unit, and so much more.
Freyja is the Goddess of Love, Fertility, Marriages, All things Sexual including Sex Magic. She is the Source of Treasure, fine material possessions, and Wealth. She is Goddess of Abundance, the Harvest. She is Goddess of the Sea, and as such was invoked by the Viking sailors who set out on years-long journeys of discovery and looting. She is Goddess of Warriors, Battle and the Battlefield. Freyja is the Goddess of Fate, Destiny, and Death. She and the All-Father God Odin each take half of all fallen warriors to their respective halls of happy afterlife. Freyja's hall is Sessrumnir. Odin's is Valhalla. Freyja's difference in Her hall is that when the families of the warriors She has chosen come to their deaths, She brings those souls to reunite with their husbands, fathers, brothers. Or in the case the warrior was a woman, her children, husband, etc. Otherwise these souls would go to the dark Underworld ruled by the Goddess Hel.
There are two tribes of Norse Gods: the Vanir and the Aesir. Freyja is of the tribe of the Vanir, but was given honorary membership in the Aesir, as well. She was Leader of the Valkyrie, the three supernatural beings who flew over the battlefields and took the souls of the dead to their happy afterlife after they had proved their bravery and courage there.
Freyja is also the source of half the Runes. She is the Source of, and the archetype of the practitioner of, Norse shamanic magic called Seidr. Women who practiced this magic, Seidr, were called Volva (pronounced vuul-vuh). They were what we would call today shamans, sorceresses, seers, witches. Because She devised it, Freyja was the ultimate expert in this practice, manipulating and controlling the desires, health, and prosperity of humans. As such, this reflects her role as Fate Goddess. As an emanation of Her in this role, Germanic war chieftains' wives were diviners, and manifestors by means of magic. They held a cup of liquor distilled with magic and runes from which all the warband drank before going into battle.
Freyja holds objects and possessions of great power. She has a cloak made of falcon plumes which allows the wearer to shapeshift into a falcon. She created flax which when made into linen wedding dresses made the wearer fertile. She drives a chariot drawn by two large cats named Bygul and Trjegul. She rides a boar named Hildisvini, which is a shape of Her mortal lover Ottar whom She helped find his parentage in the Giants. And of course, Brisingamen, the fabulously beautiful and magical necklace She wore always after She acquired it from the dwarves who crafted it.
She had temples and shrines built to Her whose place names are preserved to this day in Sweden and Norway. Horses were kept at Her temples as they were also sacred to Her, along with cats and boars. She was said to have had a hand in creating the magical horse Sleipnir with eight legs on which Odin rides.
Some of Freyja's other names were:
- Gefn which means “Giver” which points to Her being the Goddess of plenty and abundance.
- Horn, which means “flax”
- Syr, which means “to protect” or “to shield.”
She was married to a God named Odr whose role is unclear but He was gone from their home often as he had the wanderlust and roamed far and wide. She always cried when He left. If Her tears fell on land they turned into gold. If Her tears fell on the water, they became pieces of amber. There is some well grounded speculation that Odr and Odin are one and the same, but it is not certain. Freyja and Odr had two daughters, Hnoss and Gersimi. Both of those names are translated as “treasure” or “preciousness”. This reflects Freyja's role as Goddess of Treasure, Wealth, and fine material possessions.
Even though Freyja was married and loved Her husband, She had a very independent sexual nature and would follow her sexual desires however and whenever She wanted. The trickster God Loki accused Her once of having slept with, had sex with, every God and dwarf. Clearly this was an insult, but Freyja just laughed. She was particularly lusted after by the Giants and one of those, Thrym, tried everything to get Her to marry him, to no avail. The story of how She acquired the necklace Brisingamen is an illustration of how She sometimes used Her sexuality as a kind of currency. When She passed by the cave of four dwarves, She noticed they made adornments for the body. She ducked into the cave and asked to see their work. When they showed Her the dazzling Brisingamen, She immediately wanted it for Her own. The dwarves at first said that it was not for sale because of the time it had taken to create it and the power it contained. It could not be duplicated; it was one-of-a-kind. She was determined to get them to sell it to Her and after beginning to haggle about a price, the dwarves huddled. The result was they told Her She could have the necklace if She spent the night with each of them in four consecutive nights. She immediately agreed and afterward She had Her signature piece which She rarely removes from Her neck.
To the Norse and Germanic peoples, Freyja was also in the stars. The prominent constellation we now identify as Orion, they saw as Freyja. She was actively worshiped even as Christianity got a foothold in Scandinavia as late as 1000 CE, and beyond. There is one documented story of a Christian man speaking disparagingly of Her in public who was clapped into jail and charged with the equivalent of heresy in the 1100's. Indeed rural Scandinavians knew Her as a supernatural being well into the 19th century. And now, as the Pagan pantheon of the Norse are again being worshiped in places such as Norway, Sweden, and Denmark there are holy places being dedicated to Her once again. Further evidence of Her lasting presence is that She is mentioned in the first stanza of the national anthem of Denmark.
If you would like to know Freyja in a personal way, sing to Her. She is captivated by love songs and they please Her very much. She loves Her people with Her whole heart and seeks to protect them from harm, famine, and lack. It is She who brings back the Spring each year. The Goddess never dies. She is always there for those who honor Her.