| Celtic jewelry found in Scotland often features a sea
serpent. Most historians think this sea serpent is not Nessie, but
rather the Midgard Serpent of Norse mythology. In the Norse myth,
Loki, the trickster god has three children with the giantess Angrboda.
One of them was Jormungandr, the Midgard Serpent. Jormungandr grew
so big that the gods threw him into the ocean. He continued to grow
until he circled the world and his tail rested in his mouth. Sailors
were afraid to sail the seas because the Midgard Serpent might eat
them.
Then according to the myth, the Norse lightning god Thor cut off the
head of an ox, went out in a fishing boat, and used it as bait. When Jormungandr took the bait,
Thor clubbed the serpent on the head with his magical hammer. This
is the same hammer that Thor used to carve valleys into mountains.
Several versions of this myth disagree as to whether Jormungandr survived
being clubbed on the head with this magical hammer. But people do
see Sea Serpents in lakes on every continent, not in the ocean.
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