Baldur

Baldur (pronounced “BALD-er;” Old Norse Baldr, Old English and Old High German Balder) is one of the Aesir gods.

 

He’s the son of Odin and Frigg, the husband of the obscure goddess Nanna, and the father of the god Forseti.

 

 

While we know relatively little about Baldur due to the fragmentary nature of the sources...

He’s loved by all the gods, goddesses, and beings of a more physical nature. So handsome, gracious, and cheerful is he that he actually gives off light.[1]

When Baldur began to have dreams of his death, Frigg went around to everything in the world and secured from each of them an oath to not harm her son. Confident in Baldur’s invincibility, the gods amused themselves by throwing weapons and any random thing they could find at Baldur and watching them bounce off of him, leaving him utterly unscathed.

Loki, the guileful trickster of the gods, sensed an opportunity for mischief. He inquired of Frigg whether she had overlooked anything whatsoever in her quest to obtain oaths. She casually answered that she had thought the mistletoe to be too small and harmless a thing to bother asking for such a promise. Loki straightaway made a spear from the mistletoe and convinced the blind god Hodr to throw it at Baldur. The projectile pierced the god, and he fell down dead.

The anguished gods then ordained that one of them should go to the underworld to see if there was any way Baldur could be retrieved from the clutches of the death goddess, Hel. Hermod, another one of Odin’s many sons, agreed to make this journey, and, mounting Odin’s steed, Sleipnir, he rode down the world-tree until he came to its dark and damp roots, wherein lies Hel’s abode. When he arrived, he found his brother, pale and grim, sitting in the seat of honor next to Hel. Hermod implored the dreadful goddess to release Baldur, and after much persuasion, she replied that she would give him up if and only if everything in the world would weep for Baldur – to prove, in other words, that he was as universally beloved as Hermod claimed.

The whole world did indeed weep for the generous son of Odin – all, that is, save one creature. The giantess Þökk (“Thanks”[4]), generally assumed to be Loki in disguise, callously refused to perform the act that would secure Baldur’s return. And so Baldur was doomed to remain with Hel in her joyless realm.[5]

However, whether out of ignorance or a desire to portray Baldur as a martyr-like figure,

Snorri likely omitted a key element of Baldur’s character: a warlike disposition. There’s one other literary account of Baldur’s death, that told by the medieval Danish historian Saxo Grammaticus.

As confused and historicized as this version is, one of the characteristics that stands out is Baldur’s constant eagerness to engage in battle.

He’s even depicted as something of a warlord.