Skip to main content
Mythos Atlas

Norse PantheonRealm

Nidavellir

Illustration of Nidavellir, a realm of the Norse Pantheon
Illustrative imageIllustration of Nidavellir. Generated with an AI image model; not a historical artifact. About our images

Niðavellir, 'dark fields', named in the Völuspá as a place of the dwarves and a hall of gold; modern retellings often treat it as the dwarves' forge-realm and equate it with Svartalfheim.

About Nidavellir

Dwarf-fields, overlapping Svartalfheim

Voluspa mentions Niðavellir, "dark fields," as a dwarf-place (and a hall of gold). Snorri prefers Svartalfheim for underground smiths. English Nidavellir is a modern convenience for the same workshop: Draupnir, Mjolnir, Gleipnir's makers. There is no separate cult. Admit the overlap rather than invent two kingdoms with flags. The poems need a dark address for skilled beings who are not Aesir.

Sources and further reading

Source notes

These references are recorded in the catalog. Their passage wording and translation have not been checked, so quotations are not displayed here.

  • Poetic Edda, Voluspa

    Catalog date: c. 10th c. CE

About this entry

By Elizabeth Stein for Mythos Atlas. . Editorial notes are grounded in the site's cited sources and can be challenged through the contact page.

Coordinates mark where the myths place a site, or where the tradition locates it today. Mythic realms are left off the map or marked as symbolic placements.

Keep exploring

One myth a week, with its sources in a short email. The sign-up form is just below.

Free to read, no ads. Optional support.