Yggdrasil

Yggdrasill is the great ash that holds the nine worlds of Norse myth together: the gods in its branches, people near the middle, the dead among the roots. Choose a world on the tree to meet its places, beings and stories, and to see what the old sources really say about it, and where they disagree.

One thing to know first. The old texts speak of nine worlds but never list them or draw them, and they do not always agree. The picture below gathers their names onto one tree so you can wander through them; it is a modern arrangement, not an ancient diagram. The story it comes from runs from a gap between ice and fire, to a giant made into a world, to a tree that is always being gnawed and tended, to an end that is not the last word.

Read the whole story: how the worlds came to be →

The tree and its worlds

An illustrated parchment map titled The Nine Norse Worlds, drawn as a great tree. Asgard sits in the crown, Vanaheim and Alfheim on the branches to either side, Midgard on the trunk, Jotunheim and Nidavellir on lower branches, and Niflheim, Hel and Muspelheim among the roots.

Choose a world

Select a dot on the tree, or one of these. Each world has a short introduction here and a longer article below the map.

Not tied to one world

Asgard

Where the gods live

Home of the Æsir, the gods around Odin and Thor. Snorri describes a walled stronghold the gods built for themselves, with a hall for each of them: Odin’s Valhöll, Freyja’s Sessrúmnir, Baldr’s Breiðablik. The rainbow bridge Bifröst links it to the world of people.

Attested places 20

People, beings and events 14

The human connection 5

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Vanaheim

The other family of gods

Home of the Vanir, the second family of gods, among them Njörðr, Freyr and Freyja. The sources name it only a couple of times and never describe it. What they do tell is the story of the war between the Vanir and the Æsir, and of the hostages exchanged to end it.

Attested places 1

People, beings and events 12

The human connection 3

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Alfheim

The world of the elves

Grímnismál says the gods gave Álfheimr to Freyr as a tooth-gift, the kind of present a child gets for a first tooth. Snorri adds that light elves live there and dark elves live under the ground. The poems say very little more.

Attested places 4

People, beings and events 7

The human connection 2

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Midgard

Our world

“The middle enclosure”, the world of people. Snorri says the gods built it from the eyebrows of the first giant, Ymir, and set it in the ring of the encircling sea.

Attested places 2

People, beings and events 3

The human connection 24

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Jotunheim

Land of the giants

The home of the jötnar, the giants, the gods’ oldest neighbours and often their enemies. Giant strongholds such as Útgarðr, where Thor is tested, and Þrymheimr lie in the stories. The well of Mímir sits under the root that reaches toward them.

Attested places 5

People, beings and events 4

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Nidavellir

Where the dwarfs work

Völuspá names a hall of gold there for Sindri’s family, and dwarfs are the master smiths of the myths: the makers of Thor’s hammer, Odin’s ring and Freyr’s ship. Many readers link it with Svartálfaheimr, the land of the dark elves, but no source says they are the same place.

Attested places 5

People, beings and events 8

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Niflheim

The cold world of the beginning

In Snorri it was there before the earth: ice and mist in the north, with the spring Hvergelmir at its centre and rivers running out of it. Where its cold met the heat blowing from Múspell across the empty gap of Ginnungagap, the first giant took shape.

Attested places 3

People, beings and events 3

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Muspelheim

The world of fire

A hot, bright land in the south, guarded by the giant Surtr with his flaming sword in Snorri’s telling. Sparks from it, Snorri says, became the sun, the moon and the stars. At Ragnarök its sons ride out against the gods. The sources give it no towns or halls.

People, beings and events 6

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Hel

The land of the dead

Both a realm and the goddess who rules it. In Snorri, Hel receives those who die of sickness or old age, and the road there crosses the river Gjöll. It is not a place of punishment: the poems set oath-breakers and murderers on Náströnd, a different shore. Warriors go to Odin’s Valhöll or Freyja’s Fólkvangr.

Attested places 8

People, beings and events 5

The human connection 6

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Yggdrasill, the World Tree

The tree that holds everything together

The great ash at the centre of the myths. Three roots reach into three places, wells lie beneath them, and a crowd of creatures lives in and around it: an eagle in the crown, a squirrel carrying words up and down, a serpent gnawing at the roots, and the Norns who tend it and decide fates.

Attested places 3

People, beings and events 7

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Choose a world on the tree to read about it. Point at a dot, or tab to it, for a short note; choose it to read more.

  • Gods and Their Allies
  • Humankind
  • Giants and Dwarves
  • Cold and the Dead
  • Fire
  • The World Tree and Its Places
About this map and the sources

Almost everything we know comes from two Icelandic sources: the poems of the Poetic Edda, and the Prose Edda that Snorri Sturluson wrote in the thirteenth century to explain the old myths. They never draw a map. They give names, a few directions (ice to the north, fire to the south) and a good many contradictions. The picture gathers those names onto one tree so you can wander through them; each entry says what the sources say, where they disagree and what they leave out.

Modern interpretation The picture is an illustration made for this site: the worlds are set among the branches, trunk and roots of the world tree. The old texts mention a number of worlds (Völuspá and Vafþrúðnismál speak of nine) but never list all nine, and no source gives their positions, sizes or roads. The usual list of nine comes from a modern scholar (Henry Adams Bellows, 1923), and lists differ. The sources do say that the tree has three roots, one over Niflheim, one toward the frost giants and one in heaven, and Grímnismál and Gylfaginning differ on the details. Beyond that, where each place sits is the artist’s choice, and the dots only mark the picture.

Under each world we list the places, beings and events most tied to it. The sources do not always say where something lies, so this is a way of browsing, not a claim of location. Markers show approximate associations within an artistic arrangement; descriptions differ between sources. The dashed gold line is the rainbow bridge Bifröst, which Gylfaginning says reaches heaven at Himinbjörg; it shows the connection, not a measured route. The purple dots are places on the world tree; no source says where on a map any of them lies. Mímir’s well is drawn on the Jotunheim side because Gylfaginning puts it under the root toward the frost giants.

† Position or identification is interpretive; the surviving sources do not establish an exact location. A dashed ring marks something the sources describe but give no spot on the map.

Yggdrasil · Gods and Their Allies

Asgard

Where the gods live

Myth and literature · Quotation

In Blackwell’s translation

Then the sons of Bor built in the middle of the universe the city called Asgard, where dwell the gods and their kindred, and from that abode work out so many wondrous things, both on the earth and in the heavens above it.

Myth and literature

What the sources say

In Gylfaginning the sons of Borr build a city in the middle of the universe called Ásgarðr, where the gods and their kin live. Odin’s seat Hlidskjalf is there, and the gods meet in the hall Gladsheim on the plain Iðavöllr. Grímnismál names the separate dwellings of individual gods, among them Þrúðheimr, Ýdalir and Valaskjálf. A later story in Gylfaginning tells how a builder was hired to make a wall around it.

The sources do not say where Ásgarðr lies in relation to the other worlds, beyond “in the middle”.

  • attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), the passage on the building of Ásgarðr and its halls
  • Grímnismál (Poetic Edda), stanzas 4-6, where the list of dwellings begins (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ)
Modern interpretation

Later reception

Asgard is familiar from popular culture, notably Marvel’s Thor comics (from 1962) and the 2011 film Thor, and it appears in games such as God of War: Ragnarök and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla.

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Yggdrasil · Gods and Their Allies

Vanaheim

The other family of gods

Myth and literature · Quotation

In Thorpe’s translation

39. In Vanaheim wise powers him created, and to the gods a hostage gave. At the world's dissolution, he will return to the wise Vanir.

Myth and literature

What the sources say

Vafþrúðnismál says the god Njörðr was created in Vanaheimr and given to the gods as a hostage; at the dissolution of the world he will return to the wise Vanir. Gylfaginning says Njörðr was born and bred in Vanaheimr, that the Vanir gave him as a hostage to the Æsir, and that the Æsir gave Hœnir in exchange, which restored peace between the two families.

Nothing in these texts describes the land or its halls.

  • Vafþrúðnismál (Poetic Edda), stanza 39 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ)
  • attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), the passage on Njörðr

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Yggdrasil · Gods and Their Allies

Alfheim

The world of the elves

Myth and literature · Quotation

In Thorpe’s translation

5. Ydalir it is called, where Ullr has himself a dwelling made. Alfheim the gods to Frey gave in days of yore for a tooth-gift.

Myth and literature

What the sources say

Grímnismál says the gods gave Álfheimr to Freyr in days of old as a tooth-gift, the present given to a child on its first tooth. Gylfaginning lists Álfheimr among the homesteads of heaven and says the “light elves” live there, while the “dark elves” live under the earth and differ from them still more in their ways than in their looks.

Neither source says what the place looks like.

  • Grímnismál (Poetic Edda), stanza 5 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ)
  • attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), the passage on the homesteads of heaven (the light and dark elves)

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Yggdrasil · Humankind

Midgard

Our world

Myth and literature · Quotation

In Thorpe’s translation

41. And of his brows the gentle powers formed Midgard for the sons of men; but of his brain the heavy clouds are all created.

Myth and literature

What the sources say

Miðgarðr is the world where people live. Grímnismál says the gods made it from the brows of the giant Ymir, and Gylfaginning says the same: with Ymir’s eyebrows the gods built Miðgarðr for the sons of men. In Gylfaginning the serpent Jörmungandr, Loki’s child, is thrown into the deep sea that surrounds the earth, grows until he circles it, and bites his own tail.

The name is often rendered “middle enclosure”.

  • Grímnismál (Poetic Edda), stanza 41 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ)
  • attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), the creation passage and the passage on Loki’s children
Modern interpretation

Later reception

The Old English form middangeard lies behind J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth. Wikipedia’s article also warns against confusing the name with Midgar, the city in Final Fantasy VII.

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Yggdrasil · Giants and Dwarves

Jotunheim

Land of the giants

Myth and literature · Quotation

In Thorpe’s translation

31. Three roots stand on three ways under Yggdrasil's ash: Hel under one abides, under the second the Hrimthursar, under the third mankind.

Myth and literature

What the sources say

Jötunheimr is the giants’ land. Gylfaginning says Loki’s children by a giantess of Jötunheimr, the wolf Fenrir, the serpent Jörmungandr and Hel, were bred up there until the gods sent for them, and Þrymskviða has Thor drive there to recover his hammer. Grímnismál says one of the three roots of the world tree stands over the frost giants (Hrímþursar), and Gylfaginning places Mímir’s well under the root that stretches toward them.

The sources give no consistent geography, and no source fixes its position.

  • attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), the passages on Loki’s children and on the three roots
  • Grímnismál (Poetic Edda), stanza 31 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ)
  • Þrymskviða (Poetic Edda)
Modern interpretation

Later reception

Jotunheimen National Park in Norway is named after the mythological place.

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Yggdrasil · Giants and Dwarves

Nidavellir

Where the dwarfs work

Myth and literature · Quotation

In Thorpe’s translation

41. On the north there stood, on Nida-fells, a hall of gold, for Sindri's race; and another stood in Okôlnir, the Jötuns beer-hall which Brîmir hight.

Myth and literature

What the sources say

Völuspá names a hall of gold for Sindri’s race on the north, at Niðavellir (“Nida-fells” in Thorpe’s translation). Gylfaginning has a hall of ruddy gold called Sindri on the mountains of Niða (Niðafjöll), where righteous men will live after Ragnarök. Elsewhere the prose says the dwarves bred in Ymir’s flesh and live in rocks and caverns, and speaks of a land of the dark elves, Svartálfaheimr, where dwarves make Gleipnir.

The sources do not say whether these are one place. That Nidavellir is one of the “nine worlds” comes from modern lists, not from the old texts: the poems never list the nine.

  • Völuspá (Poetic Edda), stanza 41 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ)
  • attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), the passages on the dwarves, Gleipnir and the new world
  • Wikipedia contributors, Nine Worlds (opens in a new tab)

Open the full page for Nidavellir

Yggdrasil · Cold and the Dead

Niflheim

The cold world of the beginning

Myth and literature · Quotation

In Blackwell’s translation

…was Niflheim formed, in the middle of which lies the spring called Hvergelmir, from which flow twelve rivers, Gjoll being the nearest to the gate of the abode of death.

Myth and literature

What the sources say

Gylfaginning says Niflheimr was formed many ages before the earth, with the spring Hvergelmir in the middle of it and twelve rivers flowing from it. The northern part of the empty gap Ginnungagap was filled with ice and frost from Niflheimr, while the southern part was lit by sparks from Muspellsheimr. One of the three roots of the world tree stands over Niflheimr, and under it Níðhöggr gnaws.

Whether Niflheimr and the land of the dead are the same place is not clear. Gylfaginning says Odin cast Hel into Niflheimr to rule, and that the wicked go to Hel and from there to Niflhel, below, in the ninth world. Vafþrúðnismál speaks of nine worlds and of “Niflhel beneath”.

  • attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), the creation passage and the passage on the three roots
  • Vafþrúðnismál (Poetic Edda), stanza 43 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ)

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Yggdrasil · Fire

Muspelheim

The world of fire

Myth and literature · Quotation

In Blackwell’s translation

…there was in the southern region (sphere) the world called Muspell. It is a world too luminous and glowing to be entered by those who are not indigenous there. He who sitteth on its borders (or the land's-end) to guard it is named Surtur. In his hand he beareth a flaming falchion, and at the end of the world shall issue forth to combat, and shall vanquish all the gods, and consume the universe with fire.

Myth and literature

What the sources say

In Gylfaginning, Múspellsheimr lies in the south of the creation, too bright and glowing for anyone not born there to enter. Surtr sits at its border to guard it, with a flaming sword, and at the end of the world he will go out to fight the gods and burn the universe. Sparks from it, meeting the frost from Niflheimr in Ginnungagap, begin the making of the world.

At Ragnarök the “sons of Muspell” ride through the broken sky, as Gylfaginning says, and Völuspá has Muspell’s people come over the sea on a ship from the east.

  • attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), the creation passage and the passage on Ragnarök
  • Völuspá (Poetic Edda), stanza 50 (Thorpe’s numbering; other editions differ)
Modern interpretation

Later reception

Muspelheim appears in Marvel comics and films (Thor: The Dark World, 2013; Thor: Ragnarok, 2017) and in games including God of War and Assassin’s Creed Valhalla (Dawn of Ragnarök).

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Yggdrasil · Cold and the Dead

Hel

The land of the dead

Myth and literature · Quotation

In Blackwell’s translation

Hela he cast into Nifelheim, and gave her power over nine worlds (regions), into which she distributes those who are sent to her, that is to say, all who die through sickness or old age.

Myth and literature

What the sources say

In Gylfaginning, Hel is Loki’s daughter by a giantess of Jötunheimr. Odin casts her into Niflheimr and gives her power over nine worlds, so that she can share out lodging among those who are sent to her: all who die of sickness or old age. Her dwelling has very high walls and strong gates, and her hall is called Éljúðnir.

The name Hel is both the goddess and the place. The “nine worlds” in that sentence are not named, and need not be the nine realms of the map: the old texts never list the nine.

  • attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), the passage on Loki’s children
  • Wikipedia contributors, Nine Worlds (opens in a new tab)

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Yggdrasil · The World Tree and Its Places

Yggdrasill, the World Tree

The tree that holds everything together

Myth and literature · Quotation

In Blackwell’s translation

Its branches spread over the whole world, and even reach above heaven. It has three roots very wide asunder. One of them extends to the Æsir, another to the Frost-giants in that very place where was formerly Ginnungagap, and the third stands over Nifelheim, and under this root, which is constantly gnawed by Nidhogg, is Hvergelmir.

Myth and literature

What the sources say

Both Eddas describe Yggdrasill as an immense ash. The name is usually understood as “Odin’s horse”, from Yggr, a name of Odin, though other explanations have been proposed. The tree is described in the poems Völuspá and Grímnismál and in the Gylfaginning part of the Prose Edda.

Three roots hold the tree up, according to Grímnismál and Gylfaginning, but the two sources say different things about what lies by each root. The sources do not give one consistent picture of the tree, so this site’s drawing sets the places out for readability and does not claim to show where anything lies.

  • Völuspá (Poetic Edda)
  • Grímnismál (Poetic Edda)
  • attributed to Snorri Sturluson, Prose Edda: Gylfaginning (13th century), chapters XV-XVI (Brodeur translation)
  • Wikipedia contributors, Yggdrasil (opens in a new tab)
Modern interpretation

Later reception

Thomas Carlyle made Igdrasil a favourite symbol, and John Ruskin also referred to it. Visual treatments include Karl Ehrenberg's painting of the Norns (1888), Axel Revold's fresco at the University of Oslo (1933) and a relief by Dagfin Werenskiold on Oslo City Hall (1938). The tree also turns up in the Marvel films and in the light novel series Overlord.

Open the full page for Yggdrasill, the World Tree

Follow a story

Prefer to follow a theme across the worlds? Choose a story, or search for a name. A dashed ring marks something the sources describe but give no spot on the map.

How the World Began 10

Before earth, sky or sea, Snorri says, there was only a gap with ice at one side and fire at the other. Where the two met, the first giant and the first cow appeared, and from the giant’s body the gods shaped the world.

The World Tree and Its Keepers 14

Three wells lie under the ash, and a crowd of creatures lives around it. The Norns tend it and decide fates, a serpent gnaws it, a squirrel carries words up and down it, and Odin once hung on a windswept tree for nine nights to win the runes.

Halls and Homes of the Gods 22

Odin’s riddling lecture in Grímnismál is a tour of the gods’ homes, and Snorri adds more. Each hall tells you something about its owner: a god who settles every quarrel, a hall where no crime is done, a home beside the sea.

The Road to the Land of the Dead 12

When Baldr dies, his brother Hermóðr rides nine nights on Odin’s horse to ask Hel to let him go. No single source draws the whole route, so this story pieces it together from Snorri, Völuspá and Baldrs draumar.

Giants and Dwarfs 27

Outside the gods’ walls live giants who test and outwit them, and dwarfs who forge their treasures. Many of the best-known objects in the myths, from Thor’s hammer to the mead of poetry, pass through their hands.

Elves 14

Elves are named beside the gods in the poems and almost never described. What the sources do say is small and sometimes puzzling: a land given as a tooth-gift, a name for the sun, a smith called a lord of elves, a household sacrifice behind closed doors.

The Æsir and the Vanir 10

The first war in the world was fought between two families of gods. It ended in a truce, an exchange of hostages and a new being made from the pledge of peace.

Goddesses, Servants and Companions 15

The poems and Snorri name many lesser-known divine figures, often in a sentence or two: a healer, a keeper of secrets, the goddess of oaths, Odin’s ravens, Freyr’s boar, the sea’s net, a woman who holds a bowl over a bound god. The entries here stay as short as the sources are.

People Behind the Myths 40

Real people, graves, monuments and households that show how the old beliefs were lived: a poet turned away from a door, a family calling on Thor, a woman buried with a staff, a king changing his people’s religion, a father mourning his sons, a household seeking answers from a seeress, a chieftain bound by his own vow. None of them is a place in the myths.

The End of the World 13

Ragnarök: fire from the south, the wolf unbound, the gods’ last battle on the plain of Vígríðr, and then, in the poems, a green world rising again with two people who survived in a wood.

More Places 2

Other names from the sources that do not belong to one of the stories above.