NorsePlay Investigates: Meili, the Norse God of Travel?
Meili, the God of Travel, is such an amazingly obscure catch within the Æsir Gods list. Yet there's a chance that Meili, one translation meaning “the lovely one”, is only a kenning for Baldr who tends to always get the epithet as being the brightest (read handsome/attractive) of the Gods. One of the few references is Thor claims " Meili" is his brother, though the obvious point-of-reference would be Baldr, and this reading of the word might only indicate that. Odin alone has dozens of names, so it might reason that popular Baldr would have a few other proper names & epithets to his credit as well. This association's a Viktor Rydberg connection though, and while I love to entertain Rydberg's romanticist associations generally, he sometimes gets farwheeling in reaching to glue things together (but man, is it neat to think about). Also Rudolf Simek doesn't put this association in his Dictionary of Northern Mythology which tends to be a good reference &