And this the first word that he spoke:
‘Now listen what I tell thee, Loke;
Which neither on earth below is known,
Nor in heaven above: my hammer’s gone.’”
Thrym’s Quida (Herbert’s tr.).
Thor and Thrym.
Loki declared he would try to discover the thief and recover the hammer, if Freya would only lend him her falcon plumes, and immediately hastened off to Folkvang to borrow them. In the form of a bird he then winged his flight across the river Ifing, and over the barren stretches of Jötun-heim, where he shrewdly suspected the thief was to be found. There he saw Thrym, prince of the frost giants and god of the destructive thunder storm, sitting alone on a hillside, and, artfully questioning him, soon learned that he had stolen the hammer, had buried it deep underground, and would never give it up unless Freya were brought to him, in bridal array, ready to become his wife.
“I have the Thunderer’s hammer bound
Fathoms eight beneath the ground;
With it shall no one homeward tread