What is the Mother Goose rhyme about Loki?
~ Despite the frequent assumption that there is a Mother Goose rhyme about Loki, there doesn’t seem to be one. ~ Loki was a god in Norse and German mythology. Briefly, he is considered a problematical figure, father of the cosmic serpent, of the wolf Fenrir, and of the goddess Hel of the underworld. His deliberate acts of mischief or malice seem to menace the security and self-satisfaction of the gods. His one irreparable act was to cause the death of Baldr (Balder), whom all things had promised to spare, save only the mistletoe. Hel offered to surrender Baldr if all creatures would weep for him , but Loki, in disguise, refused. As a punishment, he was chained in torment by the gods (his anguished writhing was said to be the cause of earthquakes until he broke loose of them). Though some say Loki’s evil character has roots in Christian conceptions of the Devil, the complexity of his satirical and disastrous nature must already have been well-developed in heathen times. (Source: condens
