Thursday, January 27, 2022

Daily Deities: Boreas

     We've been experiencing some very cold weather where I live. So I decided to talk about Boreas, the Greek god of the north wind and the god of winter.

    Boreas is one of the Anemoi (roman Venti), who are the four gods of the four winds: north, east, south, west. They are the sons of Eos and Astraeus, dawn and dusk respectively. They're one of the historically oldest Greek gods to exist, proving the importance or significance of the wind to the Greeks. Have you ever looked at an old-fashioned map and seen men in the four directions made of wind and blowing wind? Those are the Anemoi.

    Boreas, aside from being the Northwind, was also the god of winter. He was said to have a quick temper. Sometimes he was said to have wings, and sometimes he was said to have a snake tail. He once fell in love with a princess named Orithyia, who was the daughter of Erechtheus, the mythical founder of Athens. He attempted to woo her but failed. So, he abducted her and made her his wife. She turned into the goddess of cold mountains winds. They had two sons, Calais and Zetes, who both had wings and became heroes. They also had a daughter, Khione, who became the goddess of snow.

    Due to having married into the Athenian royal family, Athens always considered Boreas to be a relative of sorts. They would pray to Boreas and Orithyia to give them good winds, or to deflect enemies with bad winds.

    That's basically it for Boreas. Is winter bad where you are too? What do you think of the Anemoi? Comment below! (Please comment responsibly. Constructive criticism is welcome.)

Friday, January 7, 2022

Daily Deities: Skadi

    With all the snow and cold weather, I decided to talk about Skadi, the Norse goddess of winter and skiing.
    Skadi is a bit different from the other Norse gods. She is neither Aesir nor Vanir but is a Jotunn/giantess. Skadi's story starts off with her dad, Thjazi, who pisses off Loki and begins carrying him in the form of an eagle. Loki begs to be put down and Thjazi agrees, on the condition that Loki should lead Idunn, the goddess of youth, out of Asgard. Loki agrees, leads Idunn out of Asgard (as well as her apples of youth), and Thjazi kidnaps her and carries her to Jotunheim (the realm of the dwarves). Without her apples, the gods began to grow old and they had last seen her with Loki, so they confronted him and threatened him to rescue her. So, Loki borrowed Freya's falcon jacket/cloak, became a falcon, and flew to Jotunheim. He rescues Idunn, and Thjazi turns into an eagle to chase them. The other gods see Loki coming with Thjazi at his tail and so they kill him.
    To celebrate, The gods have a party, but Skadi crashes the party because she wants revenge for her father's death. But before she does something drastic, the gods calm her down, apologize, and say that they'll make her a goddess just like them. They also say that they'll let her choose a god to be her husband. But, she has to choose them by looking at their feet. So, she looks at all their feet and sees a pair of beautiful feet. Assuming they belong to Baldr, she chooses the man with the beautiful feet. But it isn't Baldr. It's Njord, the god of the sea and fishing. So they get married and seem to have had a good relationship, but for some reason, they split later on. Skadi doesn't really have many stories outside of that, but she was the one who placed a snake overtop Loki to drip poison on him for all eternity until Ragnarok. That's really it.
    What do you really think about Njord and Skadi? Any thoughts? Comment below! (Please comment responsibly. Constructive criticism is welcome.)