Walking Among the Dead: Death, Ancestry, and Afterlife in Heathen Worldview

Walking Among the Dead: Death, Ancestry, and the Afterlife in the Heathen Worldview is a grounded, historically informed exploration of how pre-Christian Germanic peoples understood death, and how those understandings can be meaningfully reclaimed today.Drawing on saga literature, eddic poetry, archaeology, and comparative scholarship, Fjordfolk Kindred examines the complex web of beliefs surrounding the soul, the grave, the ancestral dead, and the realms beyond this life. Far from presenting a single "heaven" or "hell," the Heathen worldview reveals a layered afterlife shaped by reputation, kinship, oath, and memory.This book explores: - The multiple parts of the soul and their fate after death- Burial mounds, grave goods, and the cult of the dead- Hel, Valhǫll, Fólkvangr, and other posthumous destinations- Ancestor veneration and household cults- Funerary rites, memorial customs, and seasonal remembrance- The ethical weight of legacy and reputation- The continuing presence of the dead among the livingRejecting modern spiritual romanticism and New Age reinterpretations, Walking Among the Dead presents Heathen death belief as it was lived: practical, relational, and rooted in responsibility to family, community, and future generations.Written for both practitioners and serious students of Germanic religion, this work bridges academic research with lived religious practice. It invites readers not to escape mortality, but to face it with clarity, courage, and reverence.In walking among the dead, we learn how to live.

Pagina's: 379, Paperback, Independently published