The tribute of the otter or The importance of each compensation Print

The tribute of the otter described by the Edda, and which will be the subject of a true heroic cycle through Sigurd on the continent – Germain at the time, offers a parable of several values ​​and principles :   Compensation is a matter of honour Now the gods Odin, Loki and Hœnir, traveling, came to a waterfall. Loki saw an otter fishing for salmon. He killed her thinking of winning two meals. Asking the Hreidmar dwarf for hospitality, the gods offered the otter as a gift. But the latter recognized his own son Otr, who used to fish in the form of an otter. Wrathful, Hreidmar and his two sons Fafnir and Regin held the gods hostage and claimed compensation for damage caused as much gold as necessary to fill the body. Loki admitted his act and the gods had to pay to the injured protagonists. The exigibility of compensation is recurrent in Nordic mythology. Thus the Gylfaginning relates how a farmer offered a night to Loki and Thor. In exchange, Thor had served his goats for dinner, the latters having to regenerate flesh and skin during the night, getting back thus life and vigor. Thjalfi, the farmer's son, hungry for marrow, broke a bone of one of the goats, leting him lame after his reconstitution. Terrified by Thor's fury, the farmer offered Thor his two children Thjalfi and Roskva in serfdom.