The two ravens are his companion ravens Huginn and Muninn (thought and memory).īehind the burial mound there is also shown a warrior hanging from a tree.
The man with the spear is almost certainly Odin, carrying his enchanted spear Gungnir. Standing nearby is a man with a spear, accompanied by another raven. The stone shows the image of the Valknut above what seems to be a burial mound, and below a raven. The Gotland memorial stone is the best example of an association between Odin and the Valknut. There they were said to drink, fight and make merry until the arrival of Ragnarok, when they would be called on to fight again, this time alongside the gods in the final battle. The Vikings also believed that warriors who died bravely in battle were taken by Odin’s servants, the Valkyrie, to live in Valhalla, Odin’s hall in Asgard. Odin was the god of war and was thought to be responsible for granting victory or causing defeat. Similar symbols also appear on contemporary Anglo-Saxon funeral urns and on the grave goods of some Germanic people closely related to the Vikings, confirming the association between the Valknut symbol and death.īut more than being associated with just death, it appears to have been associated with a warrior’s death, as the Valknut almost always appears alongside images of Odin, or symbols of Odin. It appears on a pictorial memorial stone found on the Swedish island of Gotland, and on grave goods included in the Oseberg ship burial in Norway, where it is inscribed on a bedpost, and appears on a tapestry, though the surviving image is extremely fragmentary. The Valknut and the DeadĮxamples of the Valknut mainly survive on a number of Viking runestones, and in association with burials. This name was chosen as the Valknut appears to be associated with the dead, and with Odin, the god of war and the dead. It combines the words for slain warrior, “valr”, and knot “knut”, to mean “knot of slain warriors”. The name Valknut is not a traditional Viking name, but a modern Norwegian title given to the symbol.
It is generally though that these are variations of the same symbol, as archaeologically, they appear in the same contexts. The Borromean form is three interlocking but separate triangles, while the unicursal form is drawn using a single line. It is known from the Viking world in two forms. The Valknut symbol involves three interlocking triangles.
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