Which Old Norse literary form celebrated heroes and gods in alliterative verse?

The Old Norse literary form that celebrated heroes and gods in alliterative verse was Eddaic poetry.

Eddaic poetry is the traditional name for a body of anonymous Old Norse poems about Norse mythology and heroic legend. Many of the best-known examples survive in the medieval manuscript called the Codex Regius, written in Iceland around the late 13th century. The poems themselves are generally older than the manuscript and were transmitted orally before being recorded.

The mythological poems include Völuspá, which presents a seeress’s account of the world’s creation, destruction, and renewal, and Hávamál, which contains sayings attributed to Odin. Heroic poems tell stories connected with figures such as Sigurd and the Völsung family. Their verse relies on alliteration, compact imagery, and formulas suited to oral performance.

Eddaic poetry differs from skaldic poetry, which was usually composed by named poets and often praised specific rulers in more technically intricate meters. The term “Eddaic” is a modern scholarly label, not a name that Viking poets necessarily used for their own work.