Misconception 13: Vanir About More Than Fertility
13. The Vanir are fertility deities.
This misconception among (Neo) Heathens is supported in part by Georges Dumezil’s tripartite theory which he presented in his Gods of the Ancient Northmen. In order to make his theory work Dumezil had to narrow and oversimplify the characteristics of the goddesses and the gods. More importantly, he assumed that the Vanir were goddesses and gods of patriarchal Indo-Europeans rather than of those living in Germany and Scandinavia prior to the incursions of the Indo Europeans. In other words, he assumed a tripartite patriarchal culture of male king-priests, warriors and farmers. In his system, he placed the Vanir in the lowest function as goddesses and gods of farmers, and therefore related to fertility.
I am inclined to believe that the Vanir were the goddesses and gods of the gylanic tribes that inhabited Northern Europe prior to the incursions of Indo Europeans. They were associated with non-hierarchical, equalitarian tribes who worshipped both goddesses and gods, but focused primarily on one goddess ot triple goddess as in the Matres and Matrones. Dumezil’s tripartite hierarchy does not apply to equalitarian cultures.
It is not that saying the Vanir were/are fertility goddesses and gods is totally wrong. It is that it is only partially right. The Vanir are fertility goddesses and gods but that is not all. They are far more than that.
Freyja, the Goddess of the Vanir, Goddess with many names, is a goddess of many functions. She has characteristics of all three of Dumezil’s functions. She is the Vanadis, the Goddess or Queen of the Vanir, not in a hierarchical, dominating way; in a partnership, a gylanic way. She is also a goddess connected with war. She receives half of the fallen. She is also connected with fertility and is well-known for the creative and pleasing power of her sexual promiscuity.
Like Freyja, Freyr, God of the Vanir, God of this world, is a god of many functions. He rules Alfheimr, home of the Light Elves. He does do not rule as one who dominates but as one who works in partnership with those he leads. He is a warrior. It is easy to imagine him leading the Vanir in the war against the Aesir. He is also a fertility god. As Snorri writes in the Prose Edda, “Freyr is the most splendid of the gods. He controls the rain and the shining of the sun, and through them the bounty of the earth.”
Njordr, thought by many to be the father of Freyja and Frey, is the king of Noatun. It is easy to imagine him leading, with his son Freyr, the Vanir in battle against the Aesir. As a fertility god he seems more closely related to the fertility and abundance of the sea than the land.
So, it is not that the Vanir are not fertility goddesses and gods. They are. But they are much more. They cannot rightly be reduced to the single function of fertility. They are much too fertile for that.