ns the greatest
Of my deeds."

Lay of Harbard (Thorpe's tr.).

The Goddess of Spring

The physical explanation of this myth is obvious. Idun, the emblem of
vegetation, is forcibly carried away in autumn, when Bragi is absent
and the singing of the birds has ceased. The cold wintry wind, Thiassi,
detains her in the frozen, barren north, where she cannot thrive,
until Loki, the south wind, brings back the seed or the swallow,
which are both precursors of the returning spring. The youth, beauty,
and strength conferred by Idun are symbolical of Nature's resurrection
in spring after winter's sleep, when colour and vigour return to the
earth, which had grown wrinkled and grey.

Idun Falls to the Nether World

As the disappearance of Idun (vegetation) was a yearly occurrence,
we might expect to find other myths dealing with the striking
phenomenon, and there is another favourite of the old scalds which,
unfortunately, has come down to us only in a fragmentary and very
incomplete form. According to this account, Idun was once sitting upon
the branches of the sacred ash Yggdrasil when, growing suddenly faint,
she loosed her hold and dropped to the ground beneath, and down to
the lowest depths of Nifl-heim. There she lay, pale and motionless,
gazing with fixed and horror-struck eyes upon the gruesome sights
of Hel's realm, trembling violently the while, like one overcome by
penetrating cold.

"In the dales dwells
The prescient Dis,
From Yggdrasil's
Ash sunk down,
Of alfen race,
Idun by name,
The youngest of Ivaldi's
Elder children.
She ill brooked
Her descent
Under the hoar tree's
Trunk confined.
She would not happy be
With Norvi's daughter,
Accustomed to a pleasanter
Abode at home."

Odin's Ravens' Song (Thorpe's tr.).

Seeing that she did not return, Odin bade Bragi, Heimdall, and another
of the gods go in search of her, giving them a white wolfskin to
envelop her in, so that she should not suffer from the cold, and
bidding them make every effort to rouse her from the stupor which
his prescience told him had taken possession of her.

"A wolf's skin they gave her,
In which herself she clad."

Odin's Ravens' Song (Thorpe's tr.).

Idun passively allowed the gods to wrap her in the warm wolfskin,
but she persistently refused to speak or move, and from her strange
manner her husban