OFFERING
Freyja pendant with necklace chain in black velvet drawstring bag.
SIZE
My Freyja pendant is about 1.75" tall x 1.5" across (44mm x 38mm).
It is a heavy duty, double-sided and reversible (same image both sides) pendant with beautoful details.
The SNAKE chains are about 1.2mm diameter (by any length you want)
The FIGARO chains are about 3mm wide x 1mm thick (by any length you want)
The WHEAT chains are about 3mm diameter (by any length you want)
The BOX chains are available in 2.5mm, 3mm or 4mm diameters - add a note to the order with your choice, otherwise I will use 3mm (most popular).
The necklace chains are offered in your choice of length from 16" to 36" (40cm to 91cm)
Most popular sizes are 18" or 20" for women and 20" or 24" for men.
You can choose any chain style that I have, they are priced by the length you select (not different pricing by style).
MATERIALS
All components are made with waterproof and hypo-allergenic Stainless steel. You can sleep, swim or shower in them.
ABOUT
In Norse paganism, Freyja (Old Norse "(the) Lady") is a goddess associated with love, beauty, fertility, sex, war, gold, and seiðr (magic for seeing and influencing the future). Freyja is the owner of the necklace Brísingamen, rides a chariot pulled by two cats, is accompanied by the boar Hildisvíni, and possesses a cloak of falcon feathers. By her husband Óðr, she is the mother of two daughters, Hnoss and Gersemi. Along with her twin brother Freyr, her father Njörðr, and her mother (Njörðr's sister, unnamed in sources), she is a member of the Vanir. Stemming from Old Norse Freyja, modern forms of the name include Freya, Freyia, and Freja.
Freyja rules over her heavenly field, Fólkvangr, where she receives half of those who die in battle. The other half go to the god Odin's hall, Valhalla. Within Fólkvangr lies her hall, Sessrúmnir. Freyja assists other deities by allowing them to use her feathered cloak, is invoked in matters of fertility and love, and is frequently sought after by powerful jötnar who wish to make her their wife. Freyja's husband, the god Óðr, is frequently absent. She cries tears of red gold for him, and searches for him under assumed names. Freyja has numerous names, including Gefn, Hörn, Mardöll, Sýr, Vanadís, and Valfreyja.
Freyja is attested in the Poetic Edda, compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources; in the Prose Edda and Heimskringla, composed by Snorri Sturluson in the 13th century; in several Sagas of Icelanders; in the short story "Sörla þáttr"; in the poetry of skalds; and into the modern age in Scandinavian folklore.
Scholars have debated whether Freyja and the goddess Frigg ultimately stem from a single goddess common among the Germanic peoples. They have connected her to the valkyries, female battlefield choosers of the slain, and analyzed her relation to other goddesses and figures in Germanic mythology, including the thrice-burnt and thrice-reborn Gullveig/Heiðr, the goddesses Gefjon, Skaði, Þorgerðr Hölgabrúðr and Irpa, Menglöð, and the 1st century CE "Isis" of the Suebi. In Scandinavia, Freyja's name frequently appears in the names of plants, especially in southern Sweden. Various plants in Scandinavia once bore her name, but it was replaced with the name of the Virgin Mary during the process of Christianization. Rural Scandinavians continued to acknowledge Freyja as a supernatural figure into the 19th century, and Freyja has inspired various works of art.
Etymology
The name Freyja transparently means 'lady, mistress' in Old Norse. Stemming from the Proto-Germanic feminine noun *frawjon ('lady, mistress'), it is cognate with Old Saxon frua ('lady, mistress') or Old High German frouwa ('lady'; cf. modern German Frau). Freyja is also etymologically close to the name of the god Freyr, meaning 'lord' in Old Norse. The theonym Freyja is thus considered to have been an epithet in origin, replacing a personal name that is now unattested.
Alternative names
In addition to Freyja, Old Norse sources refer to the goddess by the following names:
- Gef 'the giver'
- Hörn 'flaxen'
- Mardöll Potentially 'sea-brightener' by way of mar ('sea') combined with a second element that may be related to Dellingr, indicating light. The name may otherwise mean 'the one who makes the sea swell'.
- Skjálf 'shaker'
- Sýr 'sow'
- Thröng 'throng'
- Thrungva 'throng'
- Valfreyja 'Freyja of the slain', 'lady of the slain'
- Vanadís 'the dís of the vanir'
Later Scandinavian folklore
Although the Christianization of Scandinavia sought to demonize the native gods, belief and reverence in the gods, including Freyja, remained into the modern period and melded into Scandinavian folklore. Britt-Mari Näsström comments that Freyja became a particular target under Christianization:
"Freyja's erotic qualities became an easy target for the new religion, in which an asexual virgin was the ideal woman. Freyja is called "a whore" and "a harlot" by the holy men and missionaries, whereas many of her functions in the everyday lives of men and women, such as protecting the vegetation and supplying assistance in childbirth were transferred to the Virgin Mary."
However, Freyja did not disappear. In Iceland, Freyja was called upon for assistance by way of Icelandic magical staves as late as the 18th century; and as late as the 19th century, Freyja is recorded as retaining elements of her role as a fertility goddess among rural Swedes.
In Värend, Sweden, Freyja could also arrive at Christmas night and she used to shake the apple trees for the sake of a good harvest and consequently people left some apples in the trees for her sake. However, it was dangerous to leave the plough outdoors, because if Freyja sat on it, it would no longer be of any use.
Many Asatru practitioners today mostly honor Freyja as a goddess of fertility, abundance and beauty. A common rite for modern Freya worshippers is to bake foods that have some connection to love in one way or another, such as chocolate. Freyja is also called upon for protection, usually when it comes to a domestic violence situation.
Eponyms
Several plants were named after Freyja, such as Freyja's tears and Freyja's hair (Polygala vulgaris), but during the process of Christianization, the name of the goddess was replaced with that of the Virgin Mary. In the pre-Christian period, the Orion constellation was called either Frigg's distaff or Freyja's distaff (Swedish Frejerock).
Place names in Norway and Sweden reflect devotion to the goddess, including the Norwegian place name Frøihov (originally *Freyjuhof, literally "Freyja's hof") and Swedish place names such as Frövi (from *Freyjuvé, literally "Freyja's vé"). In a survey of toponyms in Norway, M. Olsen tallies at least 20 to 30 location names compounded with Freyja. Three of these place names appear to derive from *Freyjuhof ('Freyja's hof'), whereas the goddess's name is frequently otherwise compounded with words for 'meadow' (such as -þveit, -land) and similar land formations. These toponyms are attested most commonly on the west coast though a high frequency is found in the southeast.
Place names containing Freyja are yet more numerous and varied in Sweden, where they are widely distributed. A particular concentration is recorded in Uppland, among which a number derive from the above-mentioned *Freyjuvé and also *Freyjulundr ('Freyja's sacred grove'), place names that indicate public worship of Freyja. A variety of place names (such as Frøal and Fröale) have been seen as containing an element cognate to Gothic alhs and Old English ealh ("temple"), although these place names may be otherwise interpreted. In addition, Frejya appears as a compound element with a variety of words for geographic features such as fields, meadows, lakes and natural objects such as rocks.
The Freyja name Hörn appears in the Swedish place names Härnevi and Järnevi, stemming from the reconstructed Old Norse place name *Hörnar-vé (meaning "Hörn's vé").
Archaeological record and historic depictions
A priestess was buried c. 1000 with considerable splendour in Hagebyhöga in Östergötland. In addition to being buried with her wand, she had received great riches which included horses, a wagon and an Arabian bronze pitcher. There was also a silver pendant, which represents a woman with a broad necklace around her neck. This kind of necklace was only worn by the most prominent women during the Iron Age and some have interpreted it as Freyja's necklace Brísingamen. The pendant may represent Freyja herself.
A 7th-century phalara found in a "warrior grave" in what is now Eschwege in northwestern Germany features a female figure with two large braids flanked by two "cat-like" beings and holding a staff-like object. This figure has been interpreted as Freyja. This image may be connected to various B-type bracteates, referred to as the Fürstenberg-type, that may also depict the goddess; they "show a female figure, in a short skirt and double-looped hair, holding a stave or sceptre in her right hand and a double-cross feature in the left".
Upon its discovery, the 10th century Oseberg ship burial was found to contain a ceremonial wagon. One side of the ornate wagon features a depiction of nine cats. Scholars have linked this depiction to Freyja's cat-led chariot and a broader associations between the Vanir and wagons.
A 12th century depiction of a cloaked but otherwise nude woman riding a large cat appears on a wall in the Schleswig Cathedral in Schleswig-Holstein, Northern Germany. Beside her is similarly a cloaked yet otherwise nude woman riding a distaff. Due to iconographic similarities to the literary record, these figures have been theorized as depictions of Freyja and Frigg respectively.
Relation to Frigg and other goddesses and figures
Due to numerous similarities, scholars have frequently connected Freyja with the goddess Frigg. The connection with Frigg and question of possible earlier identification of Freyja with Frigg in the Proto-Germanic period (Frigg and Freyja origin hypothesis) remains a matter of scholarly discourse. Regarding a Freyja-Frigg common origin hypothesis, scholar Stephan Grundy comments, "the problem of whether Frigg or Freyja may have been a single goddess originally is a difficult one, made more so by the scantiness of pre-Viking Age references to Germanic goddesses, and the diverse quality of the sources. The best that can be done is to survey the arguments for and against their identity, and to see how well each can be supported."
Like the name of the group of gods to which Freyja belongs, the Vanir, the name Freyja is not attested outside of Scandinavia, as opposed to the name of the goddess Frigg, who is attested as a goddess common among the Germanic peoples, and whose name is reconstructed as Proto-Germanic *Frijjo. Similar proof for the existence of a common Germanic goddess from which Freyja descends does not exist, but scholars have commented that this may simply be due to lack of evidence.
In the Poetic Edda poem Völuspá, a figure by the name of Gullveig is burnt three times yet is three times reborn. After her third rebirth, she is known as Heiðr. This event is generally accepted as precipitating the Æsir–Vanir War. Starting with scholar Gabriel Turville-Petre, scholars such as Rudolf Simek, Andy Orchard, and John Lindow have theorized that Gullveig/Heiðr is the same figure as Freyja, and that her involvement with the Æsir somehow led to the events of the Æsir–Vanir War.
Outside of theories connecting Freyja with the goddess Frigg, some scholars, such as Hilda Ellis Davidson and Britt-Mari Näsström , have theorized that other goddesses in Norse mythology, such as Gefjon, Gerðr, and Skaði, may be forms of Freyja in different roles or ages.
The Oriental hypothesis
Gustav Neckel, writing in 1920, connects Freyja to the Phrygian goddess Cybele. According to Neckel, both goddesses can be interpreted as "fertility goddesses" and other potential resemblances have been noted. Some scholars have suggested that the image of Cybele subsequently influenced the iconography of Freyja, the lions drawing the former's chariot becoming large cats. These observations became an extremely common observation in works regarding Old Norse religion until at least the early 1990s. In her book-length study of scholarship on the topic of Freyja, Britt-Mari Näsström (1995) is highly critical of this deduction; Näsström says that "these 'parallels' are due to sheer ignorance about the characteristics of Cybele; scholars have not troubled to look into the resemblances and differences between the two goddesses, if any, in support for their arguments for a common origin."
In popular culture
Starting in the early 1990s, derivatives of Freyja began to appear as a given name for girls. According to the Norwegian name database from the Central Statistics Bureau, around 500 women are listed with the first name Frøya (the modern Norwegian spelling of the goddess's name) in the country. There are also several similar names, such as the first element of the dithematic personal name Frøydis.