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Skaði is the daughter of the Jötun Þjazi, the wife of the Vanir God Njörðr and the mother of Freyr, a goddess of hunting and skiing. The Eddic lays only say that Skaði is the daughter of the giant Þjazi (Hyndlujóð 30) and that she lives in Þrymheimr (Grímninsmál 11); Lokasenna (49, 51, pr) names her as the wife of Njörðr and one of the Æsir.

Snorri is more detailed in his account: in Skáldskaparmál 1 he reports how Skaði arms herself in order to avenge her father Þjazi who has been killed by Þórr. When she arrives to Asgarð fully armed, the gods ask her to accept compensation: she should look for a husband among the Æsir, but she will only see his feet before her choice is made. She chooses the obviously most beautiful (or cleanest) feet, expecting them to be Baldr´s but she chooses the god of the sea Njörðr. In addition it is agreed that as a further atonement the gods must make her laugh; Loki manages this by tying a piece of rope around the beard of a goat and around his testicles and the resulting spectacle makes even Skaði laugh. - From Gylfaginning 22 we learn that the marriage between Skaði and Njörðr is not successful: whilst Njörðr is only happy in his domicile Nóatún beside the sea, Skaði longs to hunt in the snow-covered mountains; therefore, they make an agreement whereby they spend nine days alternately in Nóatún and in Þrymheimr; but Skaði cannot bear Nóatún at all and moves back to the mountains. Njörðr´s children, Freyr and Freyja, appear nonetheless to be hers.

According to the tradition in Snorri´s Ynglinga Saga, after her separation from Njörðr, Skaði had numerous sons by Óðinn, from whom Earl Hakon is descended. Here again it is a case of one of the frequent attempts to trace divine ancestors in personal descendancy myths and as such it is certainly a construction from the High Middle Ages.

Skaði is called Öndurdís ´ski-goddess´by the skalds (Eyvindr, Háleygjatal 4 and Bragi, Ragnarsdrápa 20); She goes hunting armed with a bow and arrow.

Skaði´s relationship to Loki is strange: he is partly to blame for her father´s death, and he must also make her laugh. In the prose text of Lokasenna it is Skaði of all people who hangs the poison-dripping snake over the shackled Loki, yet on the other hand she is accused of adultery with Loki in Lokasenna 52. Perhaps there was a relationship between them in an older myth, but whatever the case, the statements made in Lokasenna are not of great significance because most of the goddesses are accused of adultery or whoring in this lay.

Similarly in Lokasenna there is an obvious reference to cult places connected to Skaði, which could find substantiation in the various Swedish, less frequently Norwegian, place-names which might be derived from Skaði: Skedevi, Skedvi, Skea and place-names based on Ska- and Skada-; admittedly, it is by no means certain that these are really names of cult places. Because of her name, Skaði has even been considered as the eponymous mistress of Sca(n)dia (=Schonen) and thus Scandinavia, but this is, however, not totally convincing. Alternatively, Skaði may be connected with the Old Norse noun skaði ('harm'), source of the Icelandic and Faroese skaði ('harm, damage') and cognate with English scathe (unscathed, scathing).

Description

Skaði is the daughter of the Jötun Þjazi, the wife of the Vanir God Njörðr and the mother of Freyr, a goddess of hunting and skiing. The Eddic lays only say that Skaði is the daughter of the giant Þjazi (Hyndlujóð 30) and that she lives in Þrymheimr (Grímninsmál 11); Lokasenna (49, 51, pr) names her as the wife of Njörðr and one of the Æsir.

Snorri is more detailed in his account: in Skáldskaparmál 1 he reports how Skaði arms herself in order to avenge her father Þjazi who has been killed by Þórr. When she arrives to Asgarð fully armed, the gods ask her to accept compensation: she should look for a husband among the Æsir, but she will only see his feet before her choice is made. She chooses the obviously most beautiful (or cleanest) feet, expecting them to be Baldr´s but she chooses the god of the sea Njörðr. In addition it is agreed that as a further atonement the gods must make her laugh; Loki manages this by tying a piece of rope around the beard of a goat and around his testicles and the resulting spectacle makes even Skaði laugh. - From Gylfaginning 22 we learn that the marriage between Skaði and Njörðr is not successful: whilst Njörðr is only happy in his domicile Nóatún beside the sea, Skaði longs to hunt in the snow-covered mountains; therefore, they make an agreement whereby they spend nine days alternately in Nóatún and in Þrymheimr; but Skaði cannot bear Nóatún at all and moves back to the mountains. Njörðr´s children, Freyr and Freyja, appear nonetheless to be hers.

According to the tradition in Snorri´s Ynglinga Saga, after her separation from Njörðr, Skaði had numerous sons by Óðinn, from whom Earl Hakon is descended. Here again it is a case of one of the frequent attempts to trace divine ancestors in personal descendancy myths and as such it is certainly a construction from the High Middle Ages.

Skaði is called Öndurdís ´ski-goddess´by the skalds (Eyvindr, Háleygjatal 4 and Bragi, Ragnarsdrápa 20); She goes hunting armed with a bow and arrow.

Skaði´s relationship to Loki is strange: he is partly to blame for her father´s death, and he must also make her laugh. In the prose text of Lokasenna it is Skaði of all people who hangs the poison-dripping snake over the shackled Loki, yet on the other hand she is accused of adultery with Loki in Lokasenna 52. Perhaps there was a relationship between them in an older myth, but whatever the case, the statements made in Lokasenna are not of great significance because most of the goddesses are accused of adultery or whoring in this lay.

Similarly in Lokasenna there is an obvious reference to cult places connected to Skaði, which could find substantiation in the various Swedish, less frequently Norwegian, place-names which might be derived from Skaði: Skedevi, Skedvi, Skea and place-names based on Ska- and Skada-; admittedly, it is by no means certain that these are really names of cult places. Because of her name, Skaði has even been considered as the eponymous mistress of Sca(n)dia (=Schonen) and thus Scandinavia, but this is, however, not totally convincing. Alternatively, Skaði may be connected with the Old Norse noun skaði ('harm'), source of the Icelandic and Faroese skaði ('harm, damage') and cognate with English scathe (unscathed, scathing).