The World and Thorinn

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In the days of King Alf there was a house in windy Hovenskar at the hub of the world, where the sky turns round the Pipe of Snorri. The house was of sods, with a stone roof, for no other sort of roof can stand against the winds that blow, this way and that way, over cold Hovenskar as the sky turns.

Now Hovenskar is like a yellow bowl, and from this side of it to that side is three days' journey.Long is the spoon with which the gods eat porridge from that bowl! Northward can be seen the half of Snorri's Pipe, a gray-green column three leagues in thickness, yet so tall that it seems to prick the sky like a needle; and around it the sky swings, half light and half dark. Therefore at high noon there is an eye of darkness peering over the rim of Hovenskar, and at midnight an eye of brightness. And the wind blows from the dark to the light, this way and that way over Hovenskar.

In this unlucky place, in the days of King Alf, lived a man called Goryat and his three sons, who were outlaws driven out of Kjelsland. Goryat and the two elder sons were gray-skinned Lowlanders, four ells tall, with tusks like daggers; but the youngest son was pink as a Highland man, and stood no taller than Goryat's belt-buckle. Though he had a withered leg, he was sturdy and quick, and could jump higher than his own head. Thus he was called Thorinn, which is a kind of flea.

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