Important Numbers in Norse mythology

Many cultures have assigned meanings to their numbers, and this was of course also the case for the Nordic cultures. The numbers and their meanings are reflected in books such as the Poetic Edda, but also in many of the Old Norse Icelandic sagas from the Viking age.

These ancient stories have many hidden messages and meanings in them, and today we will take a look at the numbers in these books and try to decode the symbolic meaning of these numbers in Norse mythology as best as we can.

Find the links to the books on the website:

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#ImportantNumbers #NorseMythology #Secrets

[Skjalden]

To Clarify: Somehow I skipped a line when I read my script, what I meant to say was: Loki is also part of the number three, Loki has three children with Angrboda...

[colinp]

The raeson for 3 Norns is that they represent time in the aspects of past, present and future.

[Gram]

Fascinating, I knew about the numbers 3 and 9 as being important to the Norse people, I didn't know about the Icelanders Vikings though 7 as having nor have did I know about 8 being a bad luck number. Thank you and Hope to see new videos on the Vikings.

[MagnusItland]

There were 8 upvotes when I finished watching the video, so I changed it to a 9. Hopefully the trailing zeros will come with time. Thank you for your tireless work!

[DPSCrush]

Hej! thank you this helped tremendously, gott nytt år friend! skål 🍻

[thenorroenasociety]

I believe that the sanctity of three comes from the three Underworld wells, and the three creative powers of fire, water, and air/spirit. Earth is the created power. As these creative powers are the source of existence, so to is their number of three the source as well. The etymology of names such as Odin/Hoenir/Lodur; Aegir/Kari/Logi; etc. supports this. Great video!

[falcon]

Love your video's. - I think, through the pursuit of satisfying their artistic hunger, to produce increasingly more and more pleasing works of art, like many ancient cultures, the Vikings found themselves fascinated with geometry, and it's implications once understood. When the Poetic Edda tells us, when Odin gave himself, to himself the Runes were revealed to him, I can't help but feel like this was an analogous way of explaining how a powerful and wise figure from our past, discovered universal, potent, beautiful and sacred truths in geometry, what we would call now the mathematical truths that govern everything. For example the "Triple Horns of Odin". In my personal opinion, when you consider the beautiful and elaborate decorations the Vikings created, I can't help but think that the geometric pattern was discovered first, then from that pattern the Myth was created, not the other way around. Perhaps the Myth's are one part historical fairy tale of a culture, a spirituality, but also a way of worshiping the numbers that seemed to create exceptionally beautiful patterns and art.

[crowsbaneful]

Norse numerology...what's weird to me is I've always since childhood been fascinated with the number 9, I read many years ago that it is attached to my birth sign of Aries and therefore also Mars but I mostly associate it with Thor than anything else. Now that you have made a video focusing on Viking symbolism of numbers let's hope this will encourage the Iceland team to do extra well in the coming games right now! I'm not being a traitor to my U.K. homeland, I'm just really happy for their achievements so far. Oh and Takk for the interesting vid Skjalden

[hopeforested]

2:31 what is the name of this picture? I love it!

[Jojn]

Excellent channel. I subscribe 👍 where are you from? Your accent sounds a bit german?

[Trailerglotzer]

Talking about numbers. Are there runes for numbers or did they just write them in words? I tried to search for futhark numbers but all I found was wild speculation and theories. The most common one seems to be just counting the runes in their order. Like A=1 B= 2 here it's F=1 U=2 T=3 and so on. I don't think it makes any sense. Did they even have a certain order like our alphabet back then?

[FriePresse]

you do well but how about the pre Viking area any chance you make a video about the preViking Age
i most note do much of the Viking mythology is starlore

[jeffstrong]

In Christendom, the number 13 is not an unlucky number it is a number of completion, as in the return of Christ

[larryhamilton]

8 was the most magical number every 8 years sacrifice 8 humans 8 of each species animal to Odin..

[olelarsen]

What about 2 ? Sun and Moon. Frej and Freja. The god Tvisto, described by Tacitus. Tvisto means something dualistic. Personally I dont care about numbers, but Palle Lauring, a very clever and famous historian, had an interresting theory, that people in old times belived in cycles of 7 and 9 years, and multiplications of 7 or 9: 14, 18, 21, 27, and so on. Palle Lauring wrote a book called: Danmarks håb og horn, describing the theory. I have bought the book second-hand for 500 kr. Other historians hated the theory, but Palle Lauring was so clever that it did not matter.