Laufey ( Old Norse: [ˈlɔuvˌœy]) or Nál [ˈnɑːl] is a figure in Norse mythology and the mother of Loki. The latter is frequently mentioned by the matronymic Loki Laufeyjarson ( Old Norse 'Loki Laufey's son') in the Poetic Edda, rather than the expected traditional patronymic Loki Fárbautason ('son of Fárbauti'), in a mythology where kinship is usually reckoned through male ancestry. [1] [2]
The meaning of the Old Norse name Laufey is not clear, but it is generally taken to be related to lauf (' leaves, foliage'), [3] [1] perhaps attached to the suffix -ey (found in female personal names like Bjargey, Þórey), or deriving from an hypothetical tree-goddess named *lauf-awiaz ('the leafy'). [3] [note 1]
Since the name of her spouse Fárbauti means "dangerous hitter", a possible natural mythological interpretation has been proposed by some scholars, with lightning hitting the leaves, or needles of a tree to give rise to fire. [4] [5]
In Gylfaginning ('The Beguiling of Gylfi'), High introduces Loki as the son of Fárbauti, that "Laufey or Nál" is his mother, and that his brothers are Býleistr and Helblindi. [6] Elsewhere in the same poem, Loki is referred to by the matronymic Laufeyson ('Laufey's son'). [7] This occurs twice more in Gylfaginning and once in Skáldskaparmál. [8]
Skaldskaparmal ('The Language of Poetry') mentions Loki as 'son of Fárbauti' or 'son of Laufey'. [9]
Laufey is listed among Ásynjar (goddesses) in one of the þulur, [1] an ancestry that perhaps led her son Loki to be "enumerated among the Æsir", as Snorri Sturluson puts it in Gylfaginning. [10]
Nál is mentioned twice in the Prose Edda as "Laufey or Nál"; once in Gylfaginning and once in Skáldskaparmál. [11]
In the poem Sörla tháttr, Nál and Laufey are portrayed as the same person: "She was both slender and weak, and for that reason she was called Nál [Needle]." [12] According to scholar John Lindow, however, "the late date of the text makes this piece of information suspect." [10]