Jump to content

Gullfaxi

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

This is an old revision of this page, as edited by 98.15.167.6 (talk) at 05:59, 29 January 2016. The present address (URL) is a permanent link to this revision, which may differ significantly from the current revision.

Gullfaxi.

Gullfaxi is a horse in Norse mythology. Its name means Golden mane.

It was originally owned by Hrungnir, and was later given to Magni by Thor as a reward for lifting off the leg of Hrungnir, which lay over the unconscious Thor and strangled him:

'And I will give thee,' he said, the horse Gold-Mane, which Hrungnir possessed.'
Then Odin spake and said that Thor did wrong to give the good horse to the son of a giantess, and not to his father.
Skáldskaparmál (17), [1]

Guldfaxe is equally fast on land, in the air and on the water, but not quite as fast as Sleipnir, Odin's horse.

Folk tale

Gullfaxi is also the name of a horse in the modern Icelandic folk-tale The Horse Gullfaxi and the Sword Gunnfoder collected by Jón Árnason, translated into German by Josef Poestion [de], then rendered into English and included in the Crimson Fairy Book (1903) compiled by Andrew Lang.