They searched and fought their whole lives for an opponent good enough to kill them so they could die a glorious death and be chosen for either Freya's great hall Folkvang or Valhalla by the Valkyrie when they fell in battle. One might say, the whole purpose of their lives was to live hard and die well so they could prepare themselves to serve Odin. That's what you call commitment!
Some of you familiar with these stories might wonder why some of the warriors went to Freya's great hall Folkvang instead of Odins Valhalla? I don't really know the answer but I would hazard a guess.... (This paragraph is purely from my imagination) Freya practiced Seidir, a type of shamanistic magic that she introduced to Odin and by extension to mankind as well. Freya is alway described as having falcon feathers upon her shoulders which enable her to shift into a falcon much like the berserkers take on the bear spirit or the Ulfhednar take on the wolf spirit. I think of Freya as queen of the Valkyrie. It's because of this that Freya gets to choose half of the best warriors slain in battle for Folkvang. Also Freya's powers as a Seidir practitioner allows her to see into the future and know when a man is to die. This is how she can send the Valkyrie to collect their spirit at the right time. Perhaps she and Odin are the only 2 that can do this? (Obviously, this is just me thinking out loud regarding Freya. So much information has been lost over the centuries that I can't offer a source to verify this)
Among all of the European cultures the hero who knowingly sacrificed himself by putting himself in harms way so that others might live was considered the bravest among the warriors and worthy of a great afterlife. This 'sacrifice' element of those chosen for Valhalla is rarely talked about when discussing Berserkers and Ulfhednar.
********** One saga tells the story of a Ulfhednar (Wolf skin wearer) called Bjorn. For many years he fights in the shield wall during battle. He challenges any man that he meets to fight but no one ever defeats him. He travels far and wide to find worthy warriors to kill. Many fall by his axe when he wears the spirit of the wolf. Bjorn even crosses the great sea to foreign lands to find a warrior who can defeat him in battle. He answers the call to many a king, hearing their call to arms and raising their banner. One summer's day he felt like there was no fight left in him and questioned his life. Bjorn sits down in a forest to die. He feels sad that he's failed in his life's work to find a warrior worthy of killing him so he might go to Valhalla and Serve Odin. Bjorn doesn't know what else to do.
As he sits there in the forest, days go by and Bjorn starts to fade. As he lay beneath the stars a maiden happens by and takes Bjorn to her home, nursing him back to health. Bjorn is touched by the maidens beauty and kindness for a stranger. Bjorn stays a while and in time they fall in love and have 2 children. For years Bjorn and his family live in peace on their farm. Our hero forgets his angry past. It has been many a year since he has put himself in a battle trance ready to fight. Seidir has become a distant memory for him. One dark year, something sinister came with the spring along with the melting ice and warm sun...... A Jotan, 9 ft tall who consumed all in his path. 9 good local men had already died trying to face the Jotan defending their families.
As the Jotan came towards Bjorns farm he fought the jotan ferociously for longer than any normal man could fight but could not defeat him. Bjorn felt great shame, he had failed his family. As Bjorn lay there with his broken body screaming at him from every fibre of his being that he could not fight on, the Jotan laughed at Bjorn. He sniggered as he told our hero what he would do to his wife and daughters......... Bjorn lay still and prepared his mind, he felt the trance take over and his old friend the wolf returned in his time of need. In a trance like rage, feeling no pain Bjorn flung himself onto the Jotans back where he was impaled on iron spikes that were part of the Jotans armour. As Bjorns blood spewed from his body, with his last breath he swung his axe one more time.
As bjorns spirit began to rise from his body a beautiful but fierce maiden with white wings like a swan swooped down and took him to Valhalla. Bjorn looked confused and asked the Valkyrie why he had been chosen when he had lost his fight and lived a soft normal life for some years now. Why had Odin honoured him? She pointed down to midgard where the Jotan lay in the dirt with his head split in two. You sacrificed yourself so the ones you love could live. Men who fight for love, knowing they will die are warriors with a noble spirit.
*************
Part of the Berserkers and Ulfhednar training was to go into the wilds and kill wild animals to take the wolf or bear spirit into them so they could embrace the more primordial elements of our nature. For milenia man marvelled at how wolves hunted, working together, deceiving their prey just like humans. Taking the wolfs spirit into themselves would allow them to embrace the more primordial elements of human nature without our pesky emotions and instincts getting in the way.
The Ulfhednar and Berserkers would go into a battle trance like state when violence was needed. Taking the animal spirit into them would allow them to keep swinging that axe and keep fighting when the average man would have tired out. The shamanic battle trance would produce a state of fearlessness and enable them to ignore pain fighting like a crazed beast. If the average man did this he would be tired in seconds or at best minutes taking him out of the fight.
In the Ynglinga saga it is said that the Berserkers and Ulfhednar were Odin's men and that they were impervious to iron and fire. They fought without armour and were as crazy as dogs or wolves. They were as strong as bulls. In Eigils Saga the hero had to fight a Berserker who was immune to his weapons of iron. In the end Eigil had to jump on the Berserker and bite his throat, ripping the throats from the Berserkers neck in his teeth!!
A great way to describe this in modern terms would be to think of a boxer after a few rounds, he looks set to give up because he cant get oxygen and blood to his arms anymore. Our mind knows if we carry on we will damage ourselves so it tries to make us stop. Every fibre of our being wants us to stop!
Now imagine a boxer in a shamanic trance who has taken the spirit of the wolf into himself. Our more primordial wild nature knows that if we dont carry on fighting we will die so in this state of being we can push ourselves even past the line where our body is damaged. A damaged body is better than a dead one.
********** I always remember the story of a Berserker at the battle of Stamford bridge. One Berserker stayed on the bridge as the defeated heathen army retreated over the bridge. It was his job to delay the Anglo Saxons who had just kicked the viking army's ass, giving them a chance to get away. He stood on that bridge with a huge Dane axe. He kept swinging it again and again, tirelessly keeping the Anglo Saxons from crossing the bridge. He killed many men and seemed to carry on swinging his axe even though his arms must have been useless by now? In the end they sent a spearman under the bridge in a boat to spear him from underneath. It was the only way they could kill him!
********
In battle, the natural human instincts that we have learned over the eons can be described as fight or flight. The sudden dump of adrenaline and fear causes blood to leave our arms and shoulders and go into our legs / central body so we can run! When in a shamanic trance the Berserker is able to bypass these instincts giving him what observers might see as super human strength for a short while because they can swing their arms and weapons for longer than the average man.
In one of the Sagas a father and son actually become wolves and go into the forest to live and avoid their enemies who have just killed their family. In another saga an Ulfhednar fights a glorious battle killing more of his enemy than is humanly possible. He is so consumed by his wolf spirit and rage that he turns into a wolf and lives in the forests for years to come. In the end a woman who loved him faced his wolf and changed him to a man again. That night they lay together. The men of the town came upon them in the morning and killed a wolf that lay next to her...... In nine months time she gave birth to 2 healthy boys. These boys became ulfhednar and served Iceland's kings living storied lives. This is probably where the werewolf legends come from that we see on our tv screens today.
Many of the old Icelandic sagas state that only men in certain families can become berserkers or Ulfhednar. In old norse and other Germanic traditions there are 3 levels to the human spirit. The middle level is concerned with the choices we make as freemen, devotion to skills, our honour in making oaths etc. This level of spirit also has a spirit animal attached to it. It is only family lines who have bears and wolves attached to their family spirit that can ever become berserkers and Ulfhednar.
With some folk who fail in life and with their own spirit this spirit animal can lose interest in its human and wander off to live in the forest. Whilst in the forest the spirit animal grows increasingly angry that it can't gain physical form. Over the years it feeds on the fear of travelers in the woods, using their energy to gain physical form until it is able to kill and feed upon people. When it finally gains physical form we call these creatures Trolls. This is why some folk wear an iron troll cross for protection when walking in the forest. The spirit animal that has become a Troll can only touch iron back when in their original form with their human.
Berserkers and Ulfhednar lived hard lives to prepare their minds and bodies for battle and service to Odin. At times they would wonder out into the wilds with just the cloths on their back. They would have to kill, hunt and do anything to survive. They wouldn't just kill animals though. They would randomly attack villages near the forest edge and survive the harsh wilderness on their own. This preparation and training made them unique on the battlefield. In the cartoonesque retelling of our history people talk of berserkers biting their shields and the displays of crazed behaviour. The biting of shields and other nervous behaviour was common among warriors eager to get on with the battle. It wasn't just reserved for Berserkers. As for this idea that they took magic mushrooms...... Anyone who has taken the odd shroom will tell you (so I'm told....) that if anything shrooms have a sedative type affect on a man. I suspect that xtians just didn't understand the concept of a shamanic trance. They talked about the behavior being caused by magic mushrooms because they had no other words to describe something they didn't understand.
It seems this is the very thing that bought their time to an end on this earth, a few of the sagas talked about how kings and war lords grew displeased with them when the nobles learned the advantages of fighting in formation. They couldn't control the berserkers to keep them in battle formation. They would just charge off into the fray!! A lot of them ended up fighting duels for nobles as their champions over land disagreements etc with other nobles. They also refused to convert to xtianity as they were hardcore Odinists! The whole point of their lives was to die heroically so they could serve Odin and their people. Whenever I read the later Saga's I always smile when I see how negatively the writer talks about the Berserkers. The Berserkers basically terrorised the countryside on a wild killing spree rather than convert to xtianity lol. Throughout Britain, France and other areas xtians literally hunted bears and wolves to extinction due to how important they were to our ancestors and their connection to Odin.
************ These are just my thoughts, Hope it was useful to you I'll add some sources regarding Berserkers and Ulfhednar so you can read them and come to your own conclusions. Please feel free to add your knowledge in the comments. Admin Gary
Some sources for you to read:- Skjöldunga saga The Royal Ideology and Genre of Hrólfs saga kraka Hálfs saga and Hrólfs saga Fragments of Danish History.” Translated by Clarence H. Miller Blaney, Benjamin. “The Berserk Suitor The Saga of King Hrolf kraki. London: Penguin, 1998. Vǫlsunga saga Davidson, Hilda E. "Shape-changing in the Old Norse Sagas The saga of Hord and the People of Holm.” Snorri Sturluson. Heimskringla: History of the Kings of Norway
