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Norse Mythology (R. B. Anderson). The Parting of Nioerd and Skadi For some time, Nioerd and Skadi, who are the personifications of summer and winter, alternated thus, the wife spending the three short summer months by the sea, and he reluctantly remaining with her in Thrym-heim during the nine long winter months. But, concluding at last that their tastes would never agree, they decided to part for ever, and returned to their respective homes, where each could follow the occupations which custom had endeared to them. "Thrym-heim it's called, Where Thjasse dwelled, That stream-mighty giant; But Skade now dwells, Pure bride of the gods, In her father's old mansion." Norse Mythology (R. B. Anderson). Skadi now resumed her wonted pastime of hunting, leaving her realm again only to marry the semi-historical Odin, to whom she bore a son called Saeming, the first king of Norway, and the supposed founder of the royal race which long ruled that country. According to other accounts, however, Skadi eventually married Uller, the winter-god. As Skadi was a skilful marksman, she is represented with bow and arrow, and, as goddess of the chase, she is generally accompanied by one of the wolf-like Eskimo dogs so common in the North. Skadi was invoked by hunters and by winter travellers, whose sleighs she would guide over the snow and ice, thus helping them to reach their destination in safety. Skadi's anger against the gods, who had slain her father, the storm giant, is an emblem of the unbending rigidity of the ice-enveloped earth, which, softened at last by the frolicsome play of Loki (the heat lightning), smiles, and permits the embrace of Nioerd (summer). His love, however, cannot hold her for more than three months of the year (typified in the myth by nights), as she is always secretly longing for the wintry storms and for her wonted activities among the mountains. The Worship of Nioerd Nioerd was supposed to bless the vessels passing in and out of port, and his temples were situated by the seashore; there oaths in his name were commonly sworn, and his health was drunk at every banquet, where he was invariably named with his son Frey. As all aquatic plants were supposed to belong to him, the marine sponge was known in the North as "Nioerd's glove," a name which was retained until lately, when the same plant has been popularly re-named the "Virgin's h
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