(ancient) work of giants’.^74 A champion builder engaged by the Norse gods to
build their fortifications turned out to be a giant (Gylf. 42).
In Baltic and Slavonic legend giants of a past age are cited in explanation
of outsize skeletal remains and of geological features such as lakes and
mountains. Latvian has the expressions milzen ̧u kauli‘giant’s bones’,milzˇu
kapi‘giants’ graveyard’. The east Slavs told of giants called asilki or osilki who
uprooted trees, smashed rocks, and shaped the hills and rivers.^75
Strange meetingLet us return briefly to the Ossetic story of how certain wandering Narts
bedded down in a giant’s shoulderblade or skull, which in the dark they had
taken to be a cave. I have described how they then encountered the giant
himself and questioned him about giants’ sports. After the rock-throwing
episode they ask him further about what giants used to eat. He takes a huge
fistful of earth and squeezes the juice out of it: that was the giants’ food. He
then rubs some of it on their brows and those of their horses, whereupon they
fall into a deep sleep. On waking they pray to God to turn the giant back into
a skeleton, and the Deity obliges.^76
The tale bears a curious similarity to part of Snorri’s narrative in Gylfagin-
ning (45–7). Thor and Loki, with two human attendants, travel to the country
of the Giants, which seems to be located in Finland. They walk all day through
a great forest, and when night falls they occupy what appears to be an oddly
designed hall, open at one end and with a side-chamber halfway down. In
the morning Thor goes out and finds a huge giant lying asleep. He realizes
that they have been sleeping in the giant’s mitten. The giant, Skrýmir, wakes
up and they converse. First they all have breakfast, Skrýmir from his own food
and the others from theirs. They travel on together through the day and pass
another night. Then Skrýmir sends Thor and his companions on to the castle
Útgarðr, where the giant king Útgarða-loki has his court. (It is later revealed
that Skrýmir was Útgarða-loki in disguise.) Útgarða-loki greets them and
enquires what feats they can perform. A series of contests takes place, in all of
which the visitors find themselves unexpectedly outclassed. The next day they
(^74) Beowulf 2717, 2774, Andreas 1237, 1497, The Wanderer 87, The Ruin 2; cf. Grimm (1883–8),
534, 547–52, 1020 f., 1444, 1446; J. de Vries, The Problem of Loki (FF [=Folklore Fellows]
Communications 110; Helsinki 1933), 66–78.
(^75) Mannhardt (1936), 629; Biezais–Balys (1973), 428; Vánˇa (1992), 60, 107.
(^76) In the version translated by Sikojev (cf. n. 67) the discussion of diet precedes that about
sports. The giant lets Soslan drink some of the juice, and he immediately feels sated and
invigorated. ‘Now you won’t need to eat so often’, the giant remarks.
- Nymphs and Gnomes 301