Chapter XXV: Section VI: Odin and Mimer

In the lay of Vegtam, Odin goes to Hel, and wakes the prophetess to learn the fate of his son Balder. He also takes counsel from the utmost sources of the ocean, and listens to the voice from the deep. Some myths refer to Odin’s pawning his eye with Mimer, others to his talking with Mimer’s head.

The Younger Edda, having stated that Mimer’s well is situated under that root of the world-ash Ygdrasil that extends to Jotunheim, adds that wisdom and wit lie concealed in it, and that Odin came to Mimer one day and asked for a drink of water from the fountain. He obtained the drink, but was obliged to leave one of his eyes in pawn for it. To this myth refers the following passage from the Völuspá in the Elder Edda:

Alone she[38] sat without,
When came that ancient
Dreaded prince[39] of the gods,
And in his eye she gazed.

The vala to Odin:

Of what wouldst thou ask me?
Odin! I know all,
Where thou thine eye didst sink
In the pure well of Mimer.

Mimer drinks mead each morn
From Valfather’s pledge.
Understand ye yet, or what?

This myth was given in connection with Ygdrasil, but it is repeated here to shed a ray of light upon the character of Odin, and in this wise Mimer is brought into a clearer sunlight also.

In regard to Odin’s speaking with Mimer’s head, we have the following passage in the lay of Sigdrifa:

On the rock he[40] stood
With edged sword,
A helm on his head he bore.
_Then spake Mimer’s head_
Its first wise word,
And true sayings uttered.

And in Völuspá, when Ragnarok is impending:

Mimer’s sons dance,
But the central tree takes fire
At the resounding
Gjallarhorn,
Loud blows Heimdal,
His horn is raised;
_Odin speaks
With Mimer’s head_.

Odin’s eye is the sun. Mimer’s fountain is the utmost sources of the ocean. Into it, Odin’s eye, the sun sinks every evening to search the secrets of the deep, and every morning Mimer drinks the gold-brown mead (aurora). When the dawn colors the sea with crimson and scarlet, then Mimer’s white fountain is changed to golden mead; it is then Mimer, the watcher of the fountain of knowledge, drinks with his golden horn the clear mead which flows over Odin’s pledge. But Mimer means memory[41] (Anglo-Saxon _meomor_), and as we know that our ancestors paid deep reverence to the memories of the past, and that the fallen heroes, who enjoyed the happiness of Valhal with Odin, reveled in the memory of their deeds done on earth, it is proper to add that Mimer is an impersonation of memory. Our spirit (Odin, _od_, _aand_) sinks down into the depths of the past (memory, the sea, Odin’s fountain), and brings back golden thoughts, which are developed by the knowledge which we obtained from the depths beneath the sea of past history and experience. What a vast ocean is the history and experience of our race!