The Draugr
Norse Sagas · The mound-dwelling undead possessor of physical power
- First attested
- 13th centuryOld Norse saga manuscripts; Grettis saga Chapter 35 (the fight with Glámr).
Clinging obsessively to earthly riches turns the soul into an undead prisoner of its own grave.
Grettis saga Ásmundarsonar (c. 1320); Eyrbyggja saga.
The formidable physical undead revenant of Norse sagas guarding ancestral burial mounds.
In Old Norse sagas and folklore, the Draugr (plural draugar) is an animated corporeal corpse inhabiting its burial cairn (haugr). Unlike incorporeal ghosts, the Draugr possesses immense physical strength, the ability to increase its mass at will, shape-shifting powers, and immunity to conventional weapons. Guarding its buried grave goods with jealous fury, the Draugr can only be permanently slain by a hero of extraordinary courage who wrestles the corpse and decapitates it.
Light
Courageous confrontation with heavy ancestral baggage and cutting away stagnant decay.
Shadow
Miserly greed, lingering resentment, and being haunted by dead attachments.
