Galdr

Galdr (Old Norse galdr, plural galdrar) is the Norse magical art of incantation — power worked through the human voice, shaped into sound and directed with intention. The word derives from gala, “to crow” or “to sing,” sharing a root with the Old English galan (to sing). Unlike seiðr, which operates through trance and spirit-contact, galdr works through deliberate, trained vocalization: the practitioner chants the runes or charms into effect.

Odin and the eighteen galdrar

Hávamál stanzas 146 through 163 — the Ljóðatal section — list eighteen galdrar that Odin knows, ranging from charms for healing and binding to charms for speaking with the dead and calming storms at sea. The section opens with Odin’s account of how he received the runes: hanging nine nights on Yggdrasil, “screaming” as he took them up (st. 139). That first cry is itself the first galdr — the rune’s power released through the voice before it is traced in form.

Galdr in the Poetic Edda

Grógaldr presents one of the most moving galdr scenes in the corpus. The dead völva Gróa sings nine protective charms over her son Svipdagr from beyond the grave — each charm a voiced gift of protection: against cold, against drowning, against enemies, against false accusation. The fact that she speaks them from death underscores that galdr’s power resides in the sound itself, not the physical state of the speaker.

Sigrdrifumál extends the tradition into practical instruction: the valkyrie Sigrdrífa teaches Sigurðr to carve and chant sigurrúnar (victory runes) on a sword, alrúnar (ale runes) on a drinking vessel, bjargrúnar (birth runes), líknargaldrar (healing charms). Carving without chanting is incomplete; the rune is not alive until given voice.

Voice as creative force

The Norse understanding behind galdr is that sound participates in the same creative force that shaped the cosmos: fire and ice meeting in Ginnungagap produced the primordial conditions; Odin and his brothers shaped Ymir; the gods named things and gave them their natures. Galdr is a practitioner’s participation in that same creative naming.