A personification of the sea, Ran is one of the most powerful Norse goddess. She and her husband, Aegir, are the divine powers of the ocean. She creates all the sea storms and is the cause of death for many unfortunate seafarers.
Short Facts
Tribe: Vanir
Goddess of: Depths, freshwater, lakes, rivers, sea storms, springs, the drowned dead, and the sea
Wife of: Aegir
Mother of: Nine Daughters (personification of the waves)
Sister of: Fjorgyn and Hertha
Other names: Rana, Ranar
Ran responsibilities
Catching sailors with her fishing net and drowning them, causing shipwrecks, disappearances at sea, lakes, making sea storms, rivers, springs, and the sea.
Associated Animals with Ran
An arctic grayling, a common loon, and a great blue heron.
Ran weapon/domain of power
Any body of water, sea storms, the net with which she traps and drowns sailors dragging them to her hall, and waves.
Mother Nature of freshwater
Ran is the goddess of the sea. She not only embodies the sea, but also every piece of freshwater. Ran is also associated with sea storms and the drowned dead. The jotunn Aegir, god of the ocean, is her husband. Together they have nine daughters that are said to personify the waves. Ran’s name means ‘robber’ in Old Norse, and she is often referred to as the Mother of the sea.
Ran and Aegir live in their splendid hall called Aegirheim, situated on the bottom of the sea. There the divine couple feasts with the souls of the drowned seafarers. While Aegir is portrayed as a benevolent deity, Ran tends to demonstrate opposite features. She is depicted as a beautiful mermaid only to lure unlucky sailors. Once close enough, her sharp, pointed teeth and clawed fingers appear and the end is imminent.
But, Ran often uses her large fishing net to catch mariners. With that, she pulls them underwater and drowns them. The souls of the drowned then join Ran and Aegir in their magnificent hall. Hence, sailors would fill their pockets with gold to gain Ran’s favor lest they didn’t return to dry land.
Aegir and Ran are on good terms with the rest of the gods, especially the old ones. Ran, in particular, is an ally to Hel and Loki. She hands over the souls of the drowned she doesn’t need to Hel. And one time she even lent her net to Loki.
In the old texts
Ran appears in the poem Sonatorrek having claimed the life of a man who drowned during a sea storm.
In the Poetic Edda, she is mentioned in several poems. Both the poems Helgakviða Hundingsbana I, Helgakviða Hjörvarðssonar, and Reginsmal.
In the Prose Edda, Ran is also referred to many times in Skaldskaparmal and Hattatal.
She also appears one time in the Volsunga saga.
FAQs
In the old days, Vikings would never travel with at least one piece of gold in their pockets. It even was a custom to distribute gold among the sailors when a sea storm was about. Ran was considered a treacherous goddess, preying on everyone at sea. However, that doesn’t necessarily show that she was evil. A simpler explanation would be that Aegir and Ran represented the two faces of the sea. Aegir was the calm waters and fish, while Ran was the wild tides; death hidden in the sea storms.
Because of her connection with Hel, the goddess of death, Ran would often be called a death goddess as well. At some point, she must have been named the goddess of Death due to her killing men at sea. She is a sinister goddess associated with the dark and dangerous sea.
Nine Mothers did Heimdall have. Could those have been the nine daughters of Ran? Some scholars say that her daughters were Heimdall’s mothers. One can say that she is likely Heimdall’s grandmother. There is nothing that seems to contradict this view.
Featured Image Credit: Friedrich Wilhelm Heine (1845-1921) after an original by Friedrich Wilhelm Engelhard (1813-1902)., Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
