Norns

In medieval Norse mythology the Norns are the Fates. Snorri Sturluson, who at the beginning of the thirteenth century brought order to the scattered Northern myths, tells us that the Norns are three and that their names are Urth (the past), Verthandi (the present),and Skuld (the future). These three heavenly Norns ruled the fate of the world, while at the birth of every man three individual Norns were present, casting the weird of his life. It may be suspected that the names of the Norns are a refinement or addition of a theological nature; ancient Germanic tribes were incapable of such abstract thinking. Snorri shows us three maidens by a fountain at the base of the World Tree, Yggdrasil. Inexorably, they weave our fate.

Time (of which they are made) seemed to have quite forgotten them, but around I606 William Shakespeare wrote the tragedy of Macbeth, in whose first scene they appear. They are the three witches who predict what fate holds in store for Banquo and Macbeth. Shakespeare calls them the weird sisters (I, iii):

The weird sisters, hand in hand, Posters of the seas and land,

Thus do go about, about . . .

Wyrd among the Anglo-Saxons was the silent goddess who presided over the destiny of gods and men.