Ilmr

Ilmr(Old Norse) is a figure inNorse mythologywho is listed as a goddess and who occurs inskaldickennings.Her associations and original nature are unknown.

Ilmr is attested at two points in the so-calledNafnaþulurappended to theProse EddabookSkáldskaparmál:betweenIðunnandBilin a list ofásynjur,and in a list of words that can be used in kennings for "woman". No further information other than her name is provided.She is not mentioned inEddic poetry,but her name does occur several times inskaldic poetryof the 10th and 11th centuries, particularly in verses byKormákr Ǫgmundarson.

It is impossible to determine the associations of the goddess Ilmr.Jacob Grimmpointed out that while the goddess nameIlmris feminine, the masculine wordilmrmeans "pleasant scent" (suavis odor);an association with scent would be unique among Norse deities. Kormákr, at least, usedvalkyrie-names as well as goddess-names in forming kennings referring to women, and it is possible that he thought of Ilmr as a valkyrie; one other kenning using her name, in a verse preserved inLandnamabókand attributed toHrómundr halti,is of a type (kennings for battle formed with a female name) that is only attested with names of valkyries.In his 1989 etymological dictionary of Icelandic, Ásgeir Blöndal Magnússon suggested that this might indicate the nameIlmrwas related to the nounjalmr(noise) with which it is coupled in the kenning; this is a known type of valkyrie-name.Eir,Þrúðr,and thenornSkuldare other female figures variously identified as valkyries and goddesses within the Old Norse corpus.Alternatively, Ásgeir Blöndal Magnússon suggests Ilmr is a treedís,with a name etymologically related toalmr,elm.The elm is associated in folklore in many nations with death, which might have led to her being classed as a valkyrie.

See also

• Hlín,a Norse goddess whose name some scholars have suggested may mean 'maple tree'
• Sacred trees and groves in Germanic paganism and mythology

References

• Faulkes, Anthony (Trans.) (1995).Edda.Everyman.ISBN0-460-87616-3
• Grimm, Jacob(James Steven Stallybrass Trans.) (1888).Teutonic Mythology.Translated from the Fourth Edition with Notes and Appendix by James Stallybrass. Volume IV. London: George Bell and Sons.
• Hopkins, Joseph S. (2014). "Goddesses Unknown II: On the Apparent Old Norse Goddess Ilmr".RMN Newsletter8 (May 2014). 32–38. ISSN 1799-4497.