He smote his brow, his beard he shook,
The son of earth ’gan round him look;
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 lend him her falcon plumes, and he immediately hastened off to Folkvang to borrow them. His errand was successful and 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 suspected that the thief would be found. There he saw Thrym, prince of the frost giants and god of the destructive thunder-storm, sitting alone on a hill-side. Artfully questioning him, he soon learned that Thrym had stolen the hammer and had buried it deep underground. Moreover, he found that there was little hope of its being restored unless Freya were brought to him arrayed as a bride.
“I have the Thunderer’s hammer bound