Over and under me
Were the Jötun’s ways:
Thus I my head did peril.”
Hávamál (Thorpe’s tr.).
The Rape of the Draught
Having reached the interior of the mountain, Odin reassumed his usual godlike form and starry mantle, and then presented himself in the stalactite-hung cave before the beautiful Gunlod. He intended to win her love as a means of inducing her to grant him a sip from each of the vessels confided to her care.
Won by his passionate wooing, Gunlod consented to become his wife, and after he had spent three whole days with her in this retreat, she brought out the vessels from their secret hiding-place, and told him he might take a sip from each.
“And a draught obtained
Of the precious mead,
Drawn from Od-hroerir.”