#frige

Who are the Handmaidens?

In the Prose Edda, twelve Goddesses are listed after Frigga as Ásynjur: Fulla, Gefjon, Hlín, Syn, Eir, Sága, Gná, Vár or Vór, Snotra, Vör, Lofn and Sjöfn. Modern Heathens sometimes refer to Them as Frigga's Handmaidens. (This is a piece of shared gnosis, not an historically attested term.) For many of the Twelve, this is all that survives in the way of attestations.

What is the Project?

Gradually over several years, and more intentionally recently, I have been building a devotional cultus around these Goddesses. As part of that, I've been putting together primers on each of the Twelve on my longform blog -- detailing Their surviving attestations, Old English God-names and epithets for Them, my own personal experiences and upg, a prayer, and devotional icon art -- as well as essays and modern myths exploring other aspects of Them and my cultus to Them.

Although I use Old English names for Them and honour Them in a syncretic heathen practice drawing on influences from across the British and Irish Isles, I hope these may be useful and/or interesting for practitioners working in a Norse, Continental, or other context. Or for anyone worshipping and building cultus to lesser-known and lesser-attested Gods!

I will update this post periodically, but if you like you can subscribe to my longform Wordpress blog for updates when I post.

Primers

Fulla

Geofen (Gefjon)

Hlēowen (Hlin)

Ār (Eir)

Saga

Lofen & Siofen (Lofn & Sjöfn)

Snotor (Snotra)

Wearn, or Syn (Syn)

Wær (Vör)

Gnæ (Gnā)

Āþ (Vár)

Essays and other posts

Introduction to the Project

Essay on abundance, ānanda, and Fulla

Essay on Frīg and Her importance to my cosmology

The Wren and her sister: a myth of Frīg feat. Ār and Gnæ

Queen of Osgeard,

I call to you.

Spin my soul on your distaff,

weave my woes from my heart,

straighten the string of my being,

She who Rules over All,

rule over the relationships of my heart,

guide my goings into love,

An Altar Tile for Frige. Frige is an Anglo Saxon Goddess of the Hearth and an important deity in my home. The Altar Tile has been posted on my website!

Mythology Aesthetics → Frige

Frige, or Frig, was the presumed Old English name for a goddess found in Anglo-Saxon paganism, the religion that dominated Anglo-Saxon England from the 5th to the 7th centuries CE.There are no direct descriptions of this deity in surviving literary sources, but historians have drawn together indirect evidence from a variety of other sources, arguing that she was probably associated with sexuality and fertility by her worshippers.

Following the Christianisation of England in the 7th and 8th centuries, Frige's worship was eradicated, but she left an influence on the English language. She lent her name to the Modern English word "Friday", which came from the Old English word Frigedæg, meaning "Frige's Day". She also provided the basis for a number of place names across the country, including villages like Froyle, Freefolk, and Fretherne.