Yggdrasil · Gods and Their Allies
Sökkvabekkr
The home of the goddess Sága, named in Grímnismál and Gylfaginning.
In Thorpe’s translation
7. Sökkvabekk the fourth is named o’er which the gelid waves resound; Odin and Saga there, joyful each day, from golden beakers quaff.
- Benjamin Thorpe (translator), The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson (the Poetic Edda) (opens in a new tab) (19th c.; Norroena ed. 1906), Grímnismál, stanza 7 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ) Rights: Public domain. Nineteenth-century translation, in the public domain. Text as published online by Project Gutenberg (ebook #14726).
In Blackwell’s translation
The second is Saga, who dwells at Sokkvabekk, a very large and stately abode.
- I. A. Blackwell (translator), The Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson (the Prose Edda) (opens in a new tab) (19th c.; Norroena ed. 1906), Gylfaginning, the list of goddesses (Blackwell’s translation) Rights: Public domain. Nineteenth-century translation, in the public domain. Text as published online by Project Gutenberg (ebook #14726).
What the sources say
Grímnismál calls Sökkvabekkr the fourth of the gods’ dwellings, with cold waves sounding over it. There Odin and Sága drink every day, glad, from golden beakers. The poem gives no more than that: no hall, no walls, only the water and the shared cup.
Gylfaginning names Sága as the second goddess, after Frigg, and says she lives at Sökkvabekkr, “a very large and stately abode”. Snorri says nothing about what she does there and does not mention Odin drinking with her.
- Grímnismál (Poetic Edda), stanza 7
- attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), Gylfaginning
Names and background
The name is read as “sinking brook” or “sinking stream”. The Norroena glossary gives “sinking-brook” and adds that the word can also mean an estuary or a shore. The Old Norse sökkva means “to sink”.
The same glossary explains Sága as “the personified saga or narration”, from the verb meaning “to say”. Both sources here treat her as a goddess in her own right, and the name of her home suggests a place by water.
- Grímnismál (Poetic Edda), stanza 7
- attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), Gylfaginning
Where the sources attest it
Sökkvabekkr is named in Grímnismál, stanza 7 in Thorpe’s numbering, and in Gylfaginning, where it appears in Snorri’s list of the goddesses. Both are medieval Icelandic texts written down long after the pagan age.
No archaeological or pictorial evidence for a place of this name is known, and the texts do not describe it further. The two accounts differ in what they say: the poem pairs Sága with Odin, while Snorri lists her among the goddesses.
- Grímnismál (Poetic Edda), stanza 7
- attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), Gylfaginning