Gunnlöð

"War-invitation." The daughter of Suttungr, a jötunn. He father charged her with guarding the mead of poetry, which he had placed in a chamber called Hnitbjörg inside a mountain. Odin, in his guise as Bölverkr, managed to gain access to the room. He lay with her three nights, and then she gave him leave to drink three sips of the mead; instead, he drank every drop of the three containers, turned himself into an eagle, and flew away.

The story is alluded to in the poem Hávamál, which differs in a number of details. Here, Gunnlöð is simply presented as another of Odin's sexual conquests:

106. Gunnlöd gave me,

on her golden seat,

a draught of the precious mead;

a bad recompense

I afterwards made her,

for her whole soul,

her fervent love.

109. 'Tis to me doubtful

that I could have come

from the Jötun's courts,

had not Gunnlöd aided me,

that good damsel,

over whom I laid my arm.

111. Odin, I believe,

a ring-oath gave.

Who in his faith will trust?

Suttung defrauded,

of his drink bereft,

and Gunnlöd made to weep!

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