Ward off the fearsome wolf Fenrir by honoring him with the Thor's Hammer flanked by a pair of ferocious wolves!
Design Details
The Thor's Hammer is suspend from a hand forged yoke, held fast by two linked wolves, all attached to a chain. The entire necklace is about 26" (66 cm) long (there is no clasp). It is available in both bronze and silver. The hammer itself is approximately 1.5” by 1.75” (38 x 44 mm).
The Thor's Hammer is also available without the chain - click here
Historical Inspiration
Fenrir was a gigantic wolf, one of three monstrous children of the god Loki and the giantess Angrboða. It was prophesied that these three siblings would bring about great misfortune among the gods, and so Odin commanded that they should be brought before him.
And so Fenrir was brought before Odin, along with his brother Jörmungandr and his sister Hel, and Odin decided to banished them to remote places. Odin cast the serpent Jörmungandr into the deep sea. There the serpent grew so greatly that he lies coiled about all the land, biting upon his own tail, and he became known as the Midgard Serpent. Odin then cast Hel down to the underworld and gave her authority over all those in the nine worlds who do not die gloriously in battle but of sickness or of old age.
Odin had the wolf raised among the gods, but only the god Týr was daring enough to feed the growing monster. The gods, urged by the wolf’s increasing strength and by prophecies that he would be their destruction, attempted to bind the great beast. Twice he agreed to be chained and twice easily burst out of two successive fetters of iron.
Odin then had the dwarfs forge the chain Gleipnir (“deceiver” or “entangler”). It appeared to be only a silken ribbon but was made of six wondrous ingredients: the sound of a cat’s footfall, the beard of a woman, the roots of a mountain, bear’s sinews, fish’s breath, and bird’s spittle. Then the gods challenged Fenrir to break this. But the wolf noted the thinness and fineness of construction of Gleipnir and suspected a trick. He agreed to make the test only if one of the gods was willing to place his hand in the wolf’s mouth during the binding as a pledge to free him if he failed to break the chain. No god was willing to do this, until Týr stood forth and placed his hand in the wolf’s mouth. Fenrir strained to burst the chain, but the more he struggled the tighter he was held. When the gods would not free him, Fenrir bit off Týr’s hand at the wrist, and this joint afterwards became known as “the wolf joint”.
When the gods saw that the Wolf was fully bound, they took the chain and passed it through a great rock called Gjöll (“Scream”), and fixed the rock deep down into the earth. Fenrir snarled terribly, and thrashed about and strove to bite them, and so they thrust into his mouth a sword. The guards caught in his lower jaw and the point in the upper, and he was gagged. Fenrir howled, and slaver ran out of his mouth, forming a river called Ván (“Hope”). There he lies till the Twilight of the Gods.
It is prophesied that at Ragnarök Fenrir will at last break free and join forces with the enemies of the gods and will then swallow Odin himself whole.
