Hel

Hel, in Northern Mythology, the goddess of the dead, the sister of the wolf Fenrir, and daughter of the evil-hearted Loki (q.v.), by the giantess Angurboda. The All-father hurled her down into Niflheim, and gave her authority over the lower world, where she received all who died of sickness and old age. She was of fierce aspect, and had a half black, half flesh-coloured skin. To her were assigned the characteristics of insatiable greed and pitilessness. After the introduction and diffusion of Christianity the ideas personified in Hel gradually merged, among all the races of Scandinavian and German descent, in the local conception of a Hell (q.v.), or dark abode of the dead.