NorsePlay.

The short art video Æ'siala ià Skjugge by Danish Heathen  runecrafter  Ræveðis . We love how creepy cryptic this is, with the videography feel of a 1990s industrial music video on VHS, married to Trollhunter /The Blair Witch Project/Marble Hornets horror film aesthetics. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact him .

The Norse Mythos have been part of the  Dungeons & Dragons game from the beginning , and as part of the new Priest class for the 1989's 2nd Edition, this super specific player's accessory came out. We couldn't help but notice that this cleric's hailing of the hammer has probably paid off in a magical +5 version . [ Thor 's in-game stat for his  Mjölnir  actually pounds for 4d8 damage.] #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,...

Extreme NorsePlay: Overthinking It 's essay's extrapolation's that the genre transcending anime Cowboy Bebop has a subtext implying that cyber-eye'd Spike is Odin, and one-handed Jet is Tyr.  We'd blow that off as a ridiculous overlay ... except the author namebombs Georges Dumézil's writings in his first paragraph , and we love that  Dumézil , so we were in for the mental ride just to see where author Stokes decided to bounty hunt this weaving of ideas. Read it here . Carrying this association forward, we would also additionally posit: That greedy grifting free spirit Faye's gold lustful Gullveig. If it were just Jet & Spike, the post-cop (Tyr's justice), post-criminal (Odin's Bölverk) pair would understand each other and quest harmoniously, but throw Faye into the Bebop and suddenly the values & reasons get messy. And our Solar System is made of Nine Worlds. And Jet could be pruning a small bonsai Yggdrasil in an Odinic micromode...

Or Freya versus Sif? These three NorsePlay'd characters  along with different poly/monotheistic choices   are available in Fight of Gods , the fighting game where divinities holmgang off videogame-style . Sif gets oddly fitting golden wheat-related special moves, whereas Freyja's been overly bishōjo'd. Created by Taiwanese indie developer Digital Crafts for Windows & Nintendo Switch. Any of you played this? #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product develop...

Of course we realized that holiday ham, whether for Yule or Ēostre, is the modern Heathen animal sacrifice for the Gods and the feast meat you share with them at your table. And while we already saw the cool little Thoresque hammer pictured above through the lens of our Heathen Worldview, it took Eric "Word-Weaver" Sjerven in his Raven's Call " Yuletide Special " video to connect the action of smashing & sharing the candy peppermint pig to animal sacrifice , which is an American  German  and Pennsylvania Dutch popular holiday ritual adaptation, which we can now also recognize as a symbolic b lót . #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgar...

Examine this NorsePlay with me: Black Metal's signature look is corpsepaint. Black Metal hails from Norway and, if we watch the documentaries about the subgenre's roots, has nothing to do with the press' sensationalistic misconstruals of Satanism, but with reconnecting to a Nordic pre-Christian past. The  often-malign  foraying corpses of Norse Lore are the Draugr. Since Black Metal bands & their followers' ritualistic near-necroshamanic painting practice at least partly stems from a willful feeling for a lost past, this mirrors the Draugr's protectiveness of its valued artifacts, and a postmortem renascence of ancient ideas from within the mound waiting to emerge once again. [photo from Daughters Of Darkness  book by Jeremy Saffer, Draugr logo from Hertfordshire, England band.] #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse...

As of this writing, I've plotted 200 mappoints for my Map Of Midgard Project! This is the first update since the original blog post  as 200's an achievement of remarkable single-handed progress in & of itself. Note in the above screencap that Iceland resembles a cartographic porcupine mostly because they recognize & love their landvættir , and they're saga-riffic about recording their past. There remain 270+ locations left to attempt to map, and this number grows as more source/secondary/tertiary materials are mined for Lore-relevant sites. Subscribe & stay tuned to NorsePlay for more updates & announcements about my Map Of Midgard Project. Description Landvættir .  "There must be ready and generous cooperation between experts in different fields of knowledge if we are to make profitable use of the wealth of new information piling up concerning the pagan religion from which the myths emerged."   ~ H.R. Ellis Davidson #...

Yes,  I built a NorsePlay branded axe throwing target!  So if you know me, come over and bring your hand axe and marksmanship skills. [right in the targets!] (And if you don't know me, bear in mind that I threw that axe into the target with deadly accuracy .) Using only found-on-the-streets of Tucson pallets & discarded lumber, about $9 worth of drywall screws, a four random toggles, wood glue, various cans of leftover clearish coat spraypaints for weatherproofing, some lines of brushed acrylic, and about two weeks of post-dayjob summer evenings to draft & drill it into existence. The small carved bear head I adorned the top with just for bearserker -spiration. Note that coloured pallets tend to be rentals, and by the time I learned that I'd already affixed the blue one inextricably into the project. Whoops. Other urban wood-hunting tip: Do not get pallets that have "MB" stamped on them as they've been fumigated with toxic methyl br...

Alan Lee's Beowulf in Heorot from David Day's  Castles (1984 CE, illustration is verso half of the double page spread). #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact him .

The bearded axe gets a serious tactical modern NorsePlay upgrade by American Kami . We love DJ Urbanovsky's practical design, military aesthetic, and Viking re-visioning. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact him .

Norse Mythology family tree by Humon Comics. The style of this is iconically reductivist, yet still charmingly winning, though we believe Ymir should be more ancient sleeping mountain as opposed to an infant and the infanticide that would falsely imply. What's always interesting to note in these is how closely related the different factions are. Thor the jotun slayer is himself half-giant as many Aesir, and the Aesir marry often from the select of jotun maidens, yet despite familial ties the enmity overrides that, and defines the nonusversal conflict of entropic forces wanting to breakdown everything because that's just what they do, versus creators' constant struggle & vision to preserve an established existence for everyone. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by th...

The  BBC School Radio Viking Sagas  are simplified and slightly compromised versions of Norse Mythology made for children. We're delighted to see this presented in terms of an elementary curriculum package with activities and songs. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact him .

The Marvel geography of Asgard re-imagined by MovieManiacsDesign on Etsy. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact him .

Muscovite cosplayer Darina Rarog NorsePlays the drama as a shieldmaiden . The blood at the hairline begs the question if an arrow winged her, or if it's arterial spray from an archer left in her trail of death. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact him .

Actress Zita Johann as The Viking Maiden from the cut sequence known as The Saxon Warrior . This flashback has the Austrian film star's character sacrificing one of her past incarnations before the events of the famous Universal horror film, The Mummy (1932). The footage has been lost. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact him .

Take Conan , Icelandic Sagas, the cartoon styling of Bone , shading of Mignola , and you have Barbarian Lord . We just read this, and if you like anything in the above list, the cross-pollinated tropes of berserker s, trolls , witches, farmstead neighbor feuds, and Viking poetry will totally win you. And like a saga, there's a no-nonsense plot point-to-point presentation that keeps the pace lean and satisfying at the same time. Go read this. It rules. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field rese...

Skade from The Last Kingdom 's Season 3!  Actress Thea Sofie Loch Næss opens the show as a merciless magical threat, gouging eyes, and stilling tongues on the edge of her seax. Appropriately named after the Goddess Skaði whose etymology comes from damage/harm/injury/wound, she addresses the powers and remote people as though they haven't any distance from her, which is both frighting, impressive, and grimly alluring. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product...

Sideshow Collectibles has a Court of the Dead property of which we're not quite sure whether its focus is supposed to be high-end statuary, boardgames, or comic books. Somewhere in this commercial construct's a stunning dark fantasy NorsePlay: Kier,  Valkyrie of the Dead . The idea of a more deathly chooser of the slain jibes with the  Darraðarljoð 's grim imagery of the Valkyries weaving the unfolding of an upcoming battle with the entrails of men on a loom. This style choice also agrees with the compromised Valkyries in the recent God of War 's side missions, and the sexy death experienced referred to in The Odin Brotherhood . #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launch...

A clue to the one ring of Norse Lore's current whereabouts could be this NorsePlay sign once available on Amazon, but now's a broken link. [Perhaps Jeff Bezos wears it?] #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the Map of Midgard project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer, do contact him .

Grimfrost provides a modern-day Megingjord so you can heft the workout hammer! #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the Map of Midgard project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer, do contact him.

NorsePlay:  Creative explorations, variants, and additions to Norse Lore & Myth. The Lore's been a sandbox since hearthfires and skalds in the hall, and once Tolkien got ahold of it with the intention of making an open-source world, it's also been fair game in modern days. Our Lore's stories attract creativity because they are the ur-stories, our Gods are bad arses, the adversaries are felt as a real/metaphorical yet inevitable threat, and all that carries a useable weight that narratively, artistically, musically, and cinematically cannot be ignored. To acknowledge the historicity of this concept, Norse Language expert Jackson Crawford states that NorsePlay in terms of variation & fanon started pretty much from the get-go. As we desire & request more Norse-inspired narratives, so did the arch-Heathens & subsequent generations ask the fireside skalds for sequels & team-ups, and they delivered audience-satisfying new stories, very much like comics...

NorsePlay donates books to a nearby Little Free Library. Because we're supercool with our Deeds like that, and we hope that the Norse Lore with whichever creative pollination it may be in, will find its wondrously truthful way to others. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the Map of Midgard project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay. If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer, do contact him.

Cloth map exclusive to the God of War Stone Mason Edition with annotations deciphering the runic script. In game, dwarven mastercrafters Sindri & Brokk create this very map for Faye. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact him .

Gaïa Weiss kitted out as shieldmaiden Þorunn from Vikings Season 3's an obvious NorsePlay choice, and we're taking a moment to admire the detail in her costume. #    #    # Guillermo Maytorena IV knew there was something special in  the Norse Lore when he picked up a copy of the d'Aulaires'  Norse Gods and Giants  at age seven. Since t hen he's been fascinated by the truthful potency of Norse Mythology, passionately read & studied, embraced Ásatrú, launched the  Map of Midgard  project, and spearheaded the neologism/brand NorsePlay.   If you have e mployment/ opportunities in  investigative mythology,  field research, or product development to offer,  do contact him .