Gleipnir: A Ribbon Stronger Than Iron

“So Alfather sent the youth, who is called Skirner, and is Frey’s messenger, to some dwarfs in Svartalfaheim, and had them make the fetter which is called Gleipner. It was made of six things: of the footfall of cats, of the beard of woman, of the roots of the mountain, of the sinews of the bear, of the breath of the fish, and of the spittle of the birds.”

“...let some one of you lay his hand in my mouth as a pledge that this is done without deceit.”

“...Tyr held out his right hand and laid it in the wolf’s mouth. But when the wolf now began to spurn against it the band grew stiffer, and the more he strained the tighter it got. They all laughed except Tyr; he lost his hand.”

In Gylfaginning, as Anderson translates it, the gods raise the wolf Fenrir at home, and only Týr dares feed him. Seeing him grow, and knowing the prophecies, they make a strong fetter called Lading. He bursts it. A second, half again as strong, called Drome, breaks the same way, and the sayings “to get loose out of Lading” and “to dash out of Drome” are said to come from this.

Odin then sends Skírnir, Freyr’s messenger, to dwarfs in Svartálfaheimr, who make Gleipnir from six things that, the text says, do not exist or cannot be heard or felt. It is smooth and soft as a silken string. The gods take Fenrir out to the island Lyngvi in the lake Ámsvartnir and challenge him to break it. He suspects a trick and asks one of them to put a hand in his mouth as a pledge. Only Týr does. When Fenrir cannot break the band, the gods laugh, and Týr loses his hand. They fasten the band to a chain, Gelgja, and fix it deep in the earth. Fenrir is to lie there until Ragnarök.

Anderson’s index calls Gleipner the last fetter with which the wolf was bound. Scholars have offered several readings of the name, and none is certain enough to state here as fact.

The tale involves separate settings, which the source keeps apart. The dwarfs who make the ribbon are placed in Svartálfaheimr, and the binding happens on the island of Lyngvi and Ámsvartnir. This entry is listed under Nidavellir only because dwarfs made the ribbon; the passage does not say that Nidavellir is where it was forged, and it gives no route between the dwarfs and the lake. Gleipnir is described only by its materials and its feel, and no craftsman is named.