Among the ancient Scandinavians, meals were not counted as starter-main-dessert but as two meals per day: the dagverðr (morning meal) and the náttverðr (evening meal), made of barley porridge, flatbread, dairy, and fish. Above that stood the blótveizla, the great sacrificial feast where the boiled meat of the animal offered to the gods was shared, with mead circulating in the drinking horn. Apart from that, the nestr — dried and salted travel provisions carried on the road to the þing, the assembly where justice was rendered.

Fermented honey is the red thread of this table: it sweetens the morning porridge, it seals oaths sworn on the sacred ring (Eiðsringr), it flows in the horn at the feast. For a god of justice and the given word, mead is not just a drink: it is the very liquid of commitment and truth.