Níð

Literary/ Cultural Context Essay

Sean Lawing (Bryn Athyn College of the New Church)

A-A A+

Ed. by Ármann Jakobsson, University of Iceland
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.3.4: Icelandic Writing and Culture.
Vol. editors: Ármann Jakobsson (University of Iceland), Nicole Kennedy (University of Newcastle), Sven Hakon Rossel (Universitat Wien), Herbert Rowland (Purdue University), Jakob Stougaard-Nielsen (University College London)

Domains

Language & Linguistics

Dates

Date of occurrence c.1200

Places

Iceland (Location)

Resources

Save to Bookshelf

Níð

is the Old Norse term for an insult tradition in medieval Norse society.

Níð

means “scorn, libel, calumny”, and indicates a particular form of ritual defamation that manifests in both verbal and sculptural forms. Verbal or tongue

níð

(

tunguníð

) comprises scandalous verses,

níðvísur

, sexually defaming or libelous in nature such as that a man has borne children or becomes a mare every ninth night. Sculptural

níð

(

tréníð

), literally “timber-

níð

”, occurs when a pole, a

níðstöng

, is varyingly carved with runes or persons in sexually compromising positions. A horse’s head or even an entire horse may be impaled on the pole and the resulting apparatus turned towards an enemy. Raising the

níð

-pole is accompanied by an incantation, formula, or libelous verse…

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

3071 words

Citation: Lawing, Sean. "Níð". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 27 September 2023 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/stopics.php?rec=true&UID=19661, accessed 01 April 2025.]