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I had no good of the old man's son alive or dead; let Hel keep what she has." Grimnismal assigns a hall to Baldr among the Gods. On the Eddic version and on Saxo's depend the theories of Golther, Detter, Niedner and other German scholars on the one hand, and Dr. Frazer on the other.
Omitting the heroic poems, there are in Codex Regius the following: Of a more or less comprehensive character, Völuspa, Vafthrudnismal, Grimnismal, Lokasenna, Harbardsljod; dealing with episodes, Hymiskvida, Thrymskvida, Skirnisför.
There are similar lines in Eyvind's dirge on Hakon the Good. In this way a host was collected ready for Ragnarök: for Grimnismal says: "There are five hundred doors and eighty in Valhalla; eight hundred Einherjar will go out from each door, when they go to fight the wolf."
The belief in another world for the dead is, however, by no means exclusively Christian, and a reference in Grimnismal suggests the older system out of which, under the influence of the Ragnarök idea, Valhalla was developed.
In the third poem of this class, Grimnismal, a prose introduction relates that Odin and Frigg quarrelled over the merits of their respective foster-children. To settle the question, Odin goes disguised as Grimni, "the Hooded One," to visit his foster-son Geirröd; but Frigg, to justify her charge of inhospitality against Geirröd, sends her maiden Fulla to warn him against the coming stranger.
Grimnismal says that the Gods go every day to hold judgment by the ash, and describes it further: "Three roots lie three ways under Yggdrasil's ash: Hel dwells under one, the frost-giants under the second, mortal men under the third. The squirrel is called Ratatosk who shall run over Yggdrasil's ash; he shall carry down the eagle's words, and tell them to Nidhögg below.
She advised them to make their wives tie their hair round their faces like beards, and go with them to meet Wodan in the morning. They did so, and Wodan exclaimed, "Who are these Long-beards?" As in Grimnismal, Odin and Frigg are represented as supporting rival claims, and Frigg gains the day for her favourites by superior cunning. This legend also shows Odin as the giver of victory.
All warriors who fall in battle are taken to Odin's hall of the slain, Valhalla. According to Grimnismal, he "chooses every day men dead by the sword"; his Valkyries ride to battle to give the victory and bring in the fallen. Hence Odin is the giver of victory. Loki in Lokasenna taunts him with giving victory to the wrong side: "Thou hast never known how to decide the battle among men.
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