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should resemble humans and transformed a maggot
into Motsognir. Next they made Durinn (1).
Together, these two dwarfs themselves created
many more dwarfs, all in the likeness of man. This
story is told first in the V oluspa , part of the P oetic
E dda , which contains a lengthy list of dwarf names.
Snorri Sturluson retells it in G ylfaginning .
M undilfari (Turner) A man from Midgard
who named his daughter Sol (Sun) and his son Mani
(Moon). The gods stole the children and set them
to driving the chariots of the Sun and the Moon
eternally through the heavens (see “Sun and Moon,”
under creation; Sun and Moon).
M unin (Memory) One of the god Odin’s two
ravens. The other was Hugin (Thought). Each
morning Odin sent the two ravens to fly about the
Nine Worlds. Then they returned to Hlidskjalf,
Odin’s high seat, perched on his shoulders, and told
him what they had seen.
M uspell
A group of people or creatures from
the fiery lands of Muspellheim, who would ride their
horses against the gods at Ragnarok, the battle at the
end of time. Snorri Sturluson tells of “the sons of
Muspell” and “the people of Muspell” in the P rose
E dda . He also says that N aglfar is Muspell’s ship.
The fact that the name Muspell is also used to
refer to the same groups in some works of the P oetic
E dda suggests to modern experts that Muspell was
an important figure in ancient Norse myths. Some
say Muspell was apparently a giant who ruled over
a vast world of evil creatures. He may have ruled a
land of heat and flame and thrown fire as his weapon
in battle. Surviving stories do not contain enough
information to answer these questions.
Muspell’s sons are many—enough to form a vast
army or a horde of warriors at the end battle between
the gods and giants. They fight with the weapons of
the land in which they lived: fire, light, and heat.
In the early 20th century, scholars believed Mus-
pell referred to a place and that that place was named
after this old mythical giant.
M uspellheim (Home of Destruction) The realm
of fire. Heat from Muspell’s fires and ice from
Niflheim helped to form the first living beings at the
creation of the world.
Muspellheim was ruled by the fire giant, Surt,
who guarded it with a flaming sword. At Ragnarok,
the end of the world, Surt burst through a crack in
the dome of the sky and destroyed the world by fire.
The forces of evil that fought the gods at Ragnarok
came from Muspellheim and are called the sons of
Muspell.