![]() The leader of the Fire Giants, Surtr, is often described as “guarding” Muspelheim, sitting at its gates. The Fire giants appear to be trapped there, unable to enter other realms. For example, Odin traveled to the region of the giants in order to steal the Mead of Poetry, while Thor traveled there in order to reclaim his hammer Mjolnir, which one of the giants stole, presumably from Asgard.īut Muspelheim seems to be different. In most of the stories of Norse mythology, the gods seem to interact with the giants of Jotunheim, and the Aesir are known to have visited their realm. ![]() ![]() Those that lived in the fiery land were called Fire Giants, and those that lived in the land of ice, Frost Giants. There was Jotunheim, a realm of the giants that seems to have resembled that of Asgard and Midgard in terms of environment, but other giants lived in Muspelheim and Niflheim. The Jotun lived in a number of different realms across the Norse cosmos. Thor himself was the son of Odin with the giantess Jord. Though, this didn’t stop the Aesir and the Jotun from mating on a regular basis. As such, they were considered the antithesis of the Aesir gods.Īs a result, they are often portrayed as the enemies of the Aesir in the stories of Norse mythology. The children of Ymir, the Jotun, were superhuman beings that lived to create chaos. The god Odin and his two brothers so feared the number of giants that were emerging from Ymir that they slew the giant and used his body to create some of the other worlds of the Norse cosmos, including Midgard, the realm of men. It was from him that all future giants emerged, springing from his armpits. The first entity to emerge from the primordial goop was Ymir, the primordial giant. In the middle of the abyss where the ice of Niflheim and the heat of Muspelheim met, it formed a primordial goop from which the rest of creation began.Īt around the same time, sparks from Muspelheim also jumped into the sky, creating the sun, moon, and stars. These two primordial worlds existed alone in Ginnungagap, the “gaping abyss”. This makes a kind of sense, as at the beginning of the universe, Niflheim, the world of mist, is described as being in the north, and Muspelheim, the world of fire, in the south. Yggdrasil pieces in the VKNG Collection Origins of Muspelheim There are arguments that the map orientation has had a huge impact on how we view the world and international politics. They imagined northern worlds as sitting among the roots of the tree, and southern worlds as behind its highest branches.Ĭlearly, the Vikings were early advocates of the south-up map movement. The Vikings believed that the nine worlds that formed their cosmos were all nestled somewhere in Yggdrasil, the tree of life. The Vikings also believed that it was in the south, which makes sense as the Vikings often described cold worlds as being in the north, and warm ones in the south.īut north also meant downwards, and south upwards. They describe it as hot and bright, and the conditions rendered the realm so harsh that it is impassable to those who are not of the realm itself. Muspell, or Muspelheim, means “realm of fire” in Old Norse, and the Vikings believed that it was a realm of fire and brimstone. They were led by the mighty giant Surtr, whom the Vikings held in awe and fear. Muspelheim was the home of the Fire Giants, an old enemy of the Aesir gods led by Odin. One of the nine worlds that formed the cosmos in Norse mythology, Muspelheim, the realm of fire, plays an important role in both the creation of the Norse universe and its final destruction at Ragnarok.
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