Professor Wellendorf’s research focuses on the interface between vernacular Old Norse literature and the Latin tradition. He is particularly interested in learned literature, broadly defined, mythography, historiography, and Old Norse treatises on grammar and poetics. He also takes a great interest in Norse mythology and pre-Christian Scandinavian religion.
His doctoral dissertation (Bergen, 2017) concentrated on Old Norse vision literature. Since then, he has published extensively on Medieval Scandinavian Literature, consistently situating Old Norse texts within the broader context of the classical and medieval Latin tradition.
In his most recent book, The Lives and Deaths of the Norse Gods (D. S. Brewer, 2025), Wellendorf explores the mortality of the Æsir and their pre-history. His earlier monograph, Gods and Humans in Medieval Scandinavia: Retying the Bonds (Cambridge UP, 2018) traces changing perceptions of pre-Christian Scandinavian myth and religion from ca. 1200 to 1700.
Wellendorf teaches classes in Old Norse Language, Viking and Medieval Scandinavia, Scandinavian myth and religion, Medieval Scandinavian Latin, and graduate seminars on a wide range of topics including law and literature, the Global Middle Ages, the kings’ sagas, Scandinavian legendary history, and the sagas of Möðruvallabók.
Recent publications:
— The Lives and Deaths of the Norse Gods. Cambridge: D.S. Brewer, 2025.
— “Scandinavia.” In The Cambridge Guide to Global Medieval Travel Writing, edited by Sebastian Sobecki, 217–236. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2025.
