Aesir Royal Family: the Ruling Dynasty of Asgard

The Aesir Royal Family was the ruling dynasty of Aesir gods who reigned from Asgard over the Nine Realms. Its most prominent members were Odin the Allfather, his two younger brothers Vili and Ve, and his four sons Thor, Tyr, Heimdall, and Baldur, whom Odin sent out on his business across the realms. (God of War (2018); God of War Ragnarök)

Origins in Ymir's line#

The family's roots ran back to the primordial Jotunn Ymir. The games say little about the generations before Odin: one tribute left on an island in Midgard honours Buri as the first among the gods, from whom the Aesir sprang. In the Norse myth the games draw on, Buri was the father of Borr, and Borr's sons were Odin, Vili, and Ve. Unlike Ymir, Odin held that the Aesir were superior and fit to rule the Nine Realms. Together with his brothers he slew Ymir, and the spilled blood of the giant drowned nearly all the Jotnar, with only Bergelmir and his wife surviving. With Ymir dead, Odin took the title of Allfather, fashioned Midgard from Ymir's torn flesh, and created the first two humans, Ask and Embla. (God of War (2018); Prose Edda)

The founding of Asgard#

Odin became obsessed with a rift in reality, convinced that there was far more beyond the Nine Realms, and he spent ages trying to uncover its secrets. He built Asgard and declared himself King of the Aesir, raising the Great Lodge above the Rift and a research complex beneath it, where he gathered wisdom from across the realms. To expand Asgard's forces he seized control of Valhalla and the Valkyries who oversaw it, using its endless supply of the worthy dead to build an army of superhuman soldiers. This was part of his design to thwart Ragnarok, the prophesied catastrophe he had learned of from the Jotunn seeress Groa, and so only the greatest warriors fallen in battle were permitted into Valhalla, with all others cast into the icy waste of Helheim. (God of War (2018); God of War Ragnarök)

Odin's wives and children#

Odin had children by more than one partner. One of his great loves was the giantess Fjorgyn, mother of Thor, whose death Mimir calls murky at best, and Mimir says Odin was never the same after it. Odin's other sons included Tyr, the God of War, and Heimdall. To end the long war with the Vanir, Odin married their queen Freya, and together they produced Baldur, the youngest of his sons. For a time the couple seemed devoted, and Odin gave the Valkyries some freedom at Freya's wish. When he later demanded the protective magic Freya had placed on Baldur and she refused, his rage drove her away, and he cursed her to remain bound in Midgard, unable to harm any living thing even in her own defense. (God of War (2018); God of War Ragnarök)

Wars on the realms and the genocide of the giants#

After cementing his rule, Odin and the Aesir waged war on the other realms. The Aesir met their match in the Vanir of Vanaheim, and the two tribes fought to a bloody stalemate that ended only with Odin's marriage to Freya. Odin long coveted the secrets of the giants, who could see into the future, and when his son Tyr arranged a summit with them, Odin used it as cover to steal those secrets. The giants caught him and expelled him from Jotunheim, cursing him never to return. In retaliation Odin launched a genocidal campaign against every Jotunn the Aesir could find. The slaughter proved too much for Tyr, who turned against his father and helped the giants. For this betrayal Odin had Tyr imprisoned in secret while the realms believed him dead. (God of War (2018); God of War Ragnarök)