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130 EELIQION OF THE NORTHMEN.
dering. That he should, from this attribute, be regarded
as the strongest of the Gods, was natural.
His abode was therefore called the Home or Eealm
of Strength (J)ru8heimr, |)ru5vangr, from |)rli5r,
an older form of |)r6ttr, strength, endurance) ; his
hall, however, from the lightnings which rend the
dark clouds, was called the Purifier of Storms
(Bilskirnir, from hilr, storm, and shira, to purify,
make clear). By his driving through the clouds
with bleating goats attached to his car, is expressed
the varied sounds of thunder. His surnames and
his whole fire-like being denote the attributes of the
thunder storm, its terrifying, but beneficial in-
fluences in nature. He is represented as the
"Watcher in Mi6gar5 against the Jotuns, whose
sworn enemy he is. "When Thor is absent in the
East fighting with the Trolls, Mi5gar8 is sorely
beset by the Jotuns ; but when he comes home and
swings his huge hammer Mjolnii-,* they all take
fiight in terror. Thunder belongs to Summer,
which is the enemy of "Winter, and puts the cold to
flight. Thor's combat with the Jotuns was a favor-
ite theme of the Skalds of Antiquity, and many of
the mythological legends of those times had their
real sources in certain local circumstances which it
is difiicult to trace out. Thor's peraonality is always
well maintained in these legends; he steps
forth hot-tempered and violent, but also frank and
good-natured in the extreme. His attendants—the
* Mjoluir, probably from molva, to break in pieces ; melja, to
crush, to pound, or mala, to grind; all cogn. with the Germ, mahlen,
to grind, and Miihle, a mUl ; and prob. with Lat. malleus, a mallet.