Seiðr is believed to come from Proto-Germanic saiðaz, cognate with Lithuanian saitas, "sign, soothsaying" and Proto-Celtic soito- "sorcery", all derived from Proto-Indo-European soi-to- "string, rope", ultimately from the Proto-Indo-European root seH2i- "to bind".
Seidr was a type of sorcery practiced in Norse society concerned with discerning the course of fate and working within its structure to bring about change, which was done by symbolically weaving new events into being. Connected with Norse religion, its origins are largely unknown, although it became gradually eroded following the Christianization of Scandinavia.
Accounts of seidr later made it into sagas and other literary sources, while further evidence has been unearthed by archaeologists. Various scholars have debated the nature of seidr, some arguing that it was shamanic in context, involving visionary journeys by its practitioners.
Practitioners of seidr were predominantly women. A woman practising Seidr would sometimes be called völva (old Norse vǫlva means "wand carrier" or "carrier of a magic staff). She would also sometimes be described as Spá-kona or Seið-kona, meaning prophecy-woman and magic-woman, respectively.
There were also accounts of male practitioners, known as seidmenn, but because Seidr was viewed as a feminine practice, men who engaged in it were associated with a concept called ergi, the designation of a man in Norse society who was dishonest, slothful, soft, cowardly, unmanly, feminine and possibly homosexual. That is to say, all the things a man was not supposed to be, according to Norse notions of gender, and were sometimes persecuted as a result.
Surprisingly the feminine form örg, does not mean “lesbian”, but “nymphomaniac”. When women are accused of ergi, it is because of lacking sexual self-control or loyalty, not any apparent magical association – as the case is with men.
Strength and traditionally manly qualities were highly valued in Old Norse societies. This is exemplified in the attitudes surrounding Seidr and its place as a feminine craft.
Sometimes, female practitioners of the craft would take on young male apprentices, and those who became mothers would teach the practice to their sons. Though not seen as a respectable thing, it wasn't rare for men to be involved in Seidr magic.
Male seidr-practitioners were worthy of suspicion and contempt, and they tend to be presented as antagonists in the sagas, as if their competency in magic underlined their apparent wickedness, and they are often made examples of by means of humiliating and torturous execution.
These female practitioners were religious leaders of the Viking community and usually required the help of other practitioners to invoke their deities, gods or spirits. The seidr ritual required not just the powers of a female spiritual medium but of the spiritual participation of other women within the Norse community: it was a communal effort.
But she could also perform the seidr alone, which was called útiseta (literally, "sitting out"). This practice appears to have involved meditation or introspection, possibly for the purpose of divination.
As they are described in a number of other Scandinavian sagas, Saga of Erik the Red in particular, the female practitioners connected with the spiritual realm through chanting and prayer. Viking texts suggest that the seidr ritual was used in times of inherent crisis, as a tool used in the process of seeing into the future, and for cursing and hexing one's enemies. It is ascribed to the conjuring of storms, making people vulnerable (or invincible), invisibility, killing, and even driving whole groups of people to suicide. With that said, it could have been used for great good or destructive evil, as well as for daily guidance. They were not considered to be harmless. The goddess who was most skilled in magic was Freyja, and she was not only a goddess of love, but also a warlike divinity who caused screams of anguish, blood and death.
Excerpt from Saga of Erik the Red about The Practice:
The seeress seems generally to have sat on a special platform or chair and to have used a staff or wand and a drum. The ritual began with a call to the appropriate spirits, inviting them to participate in the rite. The magic seems to have begun when the seeress yawned, after which questions could be put to her.
A distaff possessed magical powers, and in the world of the gods, the Norns twined the threads of fate.
In theory, invisible fetters and bonds could be controlled from a loom, and if a lady loosened a knot in the woof, she could liberate the leg of her hero. But if she tied a knot, she could stop the enemy from moving. The men may have fought on the battle field in sweat and blood, but in a spiritual way, their women took part, and for this reason that archaeologists find weaving tools and weapons side by side.
Many of the wands that have been excavated have a basket-like shape in the top, and they are very similar to distaffs used for spinning linen. One theory for the origin of the word seidr is "thread spun with a distaff", and according to this theory, practicing magic was to send out spiritual threads. Since the Norsemen believed that the Norns controlled people's fate by spinning, it is very likely that they considered individual fates to be controllable with the same method.
Some wands that have been excavated cannot be associated with distaffs, but instead appear to represent a phallus, and moreover the use of magic had close associations with sexuality in Old Norse society.
As early as 1902, an anonymous German scholar (he did not dare publish in his own name) wrote on how seidr was connected with sex. He argued that the wand was an obvious phallic symbol and why magic should otherwise be considered taboo for men. It was possible that the magic practices included sexual rites.
The vǫlur were known for their art of seduction, which was one of the reasons why they were considered dangerous. One of the stanzas in Hávamál warns against sexual intercourse with a woman who is skilled in magic, because the one who does so runs the risk of being caught in a magic bond and also risks getting ill.
Freyja and perhaps some of the other goddesses of Norse mythology were seidr practitioners.
Freyja is identified in Ynglinga saga as an adept of the mysteries of seidr. In the Ynglinga saga (c.1225), written by Icelandic poet Snorri Sturluson, it is stated that seidr had originally been a practice among the Vanir, but that Freyja, who was herself a member of the Vanir, had introduced it to the Aesir when she joined them.
It is said that it was she who taught it to Odin. Loki accuses Odin of practising seidr, condemning it as an unmanly art (ergi). A justification for this may be found in the Ynglinga saga, where Snorri opines that following the practice of seidr rendered the practitioner weak and helpless.
In modern times Seidr is interpreted differently by different groups and practitioners, but usually taken to indicate altered consciousness or even total loss of physical control. Diana L. Paxson and her group Hrafnar have attempted reconstructions of seidr (particularly the oracular form) from historical material. Jan Fries regards seidr as a form of "shamanic trembling", which he relates to "seething", used as a shamanic technique, the idea being his own and developed through experimentation. According to Blain, seidr is an intrinsic part of spiritual practice connecting practitioners to the wider cosmology in British Germanic Neopaganism.
