Thor (deity)

Symbols: hammer

Culture: Norse

Mother: Fjörgyn

Father: Odin

Children: Magni and Modi

Thor, the god of thunder, was one of the most well-known figures in Norse mythology—the set of beliefs, rituals, and legends of ancient Germanic peoples. Especially popular during the Viking Age, Norse mythology flourished in Germany, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Iceland, and the Faroe Islands. Thor was the son of Odin, ruler of Asgard, one of Norse mythology’s Nine Worlds. His mother was the earth goddess Fjörgyn. Despite his parents’ prominent status in the hierarchy of Norse gods, Thor was considered the most well loved of Asgard’s Aesir deities. (In Norse mythology there were two tribes of gods: the Aesir and the Vanir.) Depicted with red hair and beard and a large, brawny build, Thor was the warrior god, viewed by the common soldier as an ideal who embodied the qualities of honor, loyalty, and courage. Thor’s physical strength was unrivaled; he often wore a magical belt that doubled his power. His primary tool, however, was his hammer Mjolnir, a name that means "lightning." Forged by dwarves, Thor’s hammer returned to his hand after he threw it, and it could bring the dead back to life. This aspect made Mjolnir a symbol of life and fertility as well as of war. It also explains why among the Norse, Thor was revered by both farmers and warriors. Thor traveled the skies in a cart pulled by two goats, Tanngiost and Tanngrisnir. These magical animals could be killed and eaten, but then they regenerated overnight—as long as their bones remained intact and wrapped in their skins.

In Mythology

Thor appears as the central figure in many Norse myths. In one popular story, Thor awakened to find that Mjolnir had been stolen. He summoned the trickster god Loki, who took Thor to see the beautiful warrior goddess Freya. Loki asked her if he could borrow her falcon wings so he could go look for the hammer. She agreed, and Loki flew off, eventually landing in Jotunheim, the world of the giants. There, Thrym, one of the race of giants known as the Jotun, admitted to stealing the hammer, boasting that he had hidden it eight miles underground and would only return it if Freya would marry him. When Loki returned with this news, Freya became enraged. The other Aesir gods agreed that Freya must not marry a Jotun, but they insisted that Thor’s hammer must be returned. One god suggested that Thor pretend to be Freya. Thor protested loudly but finally allowed the Aesir to dress him in a bride’s gown, Freya’s necklace, and a veil to hide his face. Loki dressed as the bridesmaid, and the two gods took Thor’s cart to Jotunheim. Thrym prepared a bridal feast, during which Thor as the disguised bride devoured eight salmon and an entire steer—an appetite as legendary as that of the thunder god himself. As the ceremony began, Thrym called for Thor’s hammer to be placed on his bride’s lap to seal the bargain. Immediately, Thor grabbed his hammer, threw off his veil, and smashed Thrym’s hall—and all the Jotuns too. Laughing, he and Loki leapt into the cart and returned to Asgard.

One myth describes how Thor and Loki took another trip to Jotunheim. Upon arriving, they wandered into a mansion and fell asleep. In the morning they discovered that they had actually been sleeping in a finger of the giant Skrymir’s glove. When they emerged, they found Skrymir sleeping, and Thor tried to crush the Jotun’s head with his hammer. But Skymir simply brushed the blow away as if it were nothing. Thor and Loki proceeded to Utgard, the city of the giants. Here, the Jotun challenged Thor to drain their drinking horn and lift their cat. But no matter how much Thor drank, the horn remained full because it connected to the sea. And he could not lift the cat because it was actually Jormungand, the serpent that circles the world.

Thor encountered Jormungand in another myth when the thunder god, in disguise, went fishing with the Jotun Hymir. Thor baited his fishhook with a steer’s head and rowed Hymir and himself out to the middle of the ocean. Thor cast his line and soon hooked Jormungand. The serpent thrashed violently, spitting poison, but before Thor could hammer it, Hymir cut the line and Jormungand escaped. At Ragnarök, the end of the world, Thor and Jormungand are fated to meet in battle, where they will kill each other.

The struggle between Thor and Jormungand is similar to the one that pitted Vedic, or ancient Hindu, deity Indra—a thunderbolt-wielding sky god—against Vritra the demon-serpent. Other storm gods similar to Thor are the Teutonic Donar, the Anglo-Saxon Thunor, and the Baltic Perkunas.

Origins and Cults

The Norse believed that Thor, as a sky god, controlled the storms bringing first the wind and rains and then clear weather, all of which were essential to growing crops. People called on Thor to bless the lands, making them fertile and fruitful. The Norse believed that the golden hair of Sif, Thor’s wife, represented fields of grain and that their marriage was a divine union between earth and sky. Thor’s strength made him the deity of the warrior class. He also became patron of the common people. Especially during the Viking Age, these classes revered Thor over Odin, who was worshipped by kings. The first people who settled Iceland in the ninth century CE were farmers who had fled Norway’s royal tyranny. In eleventh-century Sweden, the priests of Thor offered sacrifices to their god during times of famine. In Scandinavia during the Viking Age, Thor worshippers defended their practices and beliefs against the spread of Christianity, which was intolerant of other gods. Those who refused to abandon Thor wore miniature hammers around their necks—in defiance of Christians who wore the cross.

Artifacts of these pendants have been found in Viking Age burial sites in Sweden, Denmark, and Norway. The swastika has been discovered on memorial stones next to dedications to Thor that date as far back as the third century CE. It also appears on swords and sword belts from the period. Based on this evidence, scholars have identified the swastika as a symbol of Thor.

In Popular Culture

Thor became a popular superhero in the Marvel Comics universe beginning in the 1960s and has enjoyed several runs in comics as well as animations and live-action films. In addition to starring in his own comic-book series, Thor has also appeared in Marvel's Avengers tales and various crossovers with other Marvel superheroes over the decades. Like his Norse namesake, the Marvel character of Thor is a strong thunder god who wields a powerful magic hammer and is a son of Odin; however, his comic-book adventures and misadventures—apart from Ragnarök—often bear little resemblance to those of the deity as recounted in the medieval Scandinavian compilations of Norse mythology, the Poetic Edda and the Prose Edda.

The Marvel stories about Thor were adapted into a successful live-action film franchise in the 2010s, including Thor (2011), Thor: The Dark World (2013), Thor: Ragnarok (2017), and Thor: Love and Thunder (2022). He also featured in Marvel's live-action Avengers franchise (2012–18).

Bibliography

Belk, Patrick Scott. "Thor." Comics through Time: A History of Icons, Idols, and Ideas, edited by M. Keith Booker, ABC-CLIO, 2014, pp. 1795–96.

Buxton, Marc. "Thor Comics Reading Order: Ragnarok for Beginners." Den of Geek!, 5 Apr. 2018, www.denofgeek.com/us/books-comics/thor-ragnarok/268701/thor-comics-reading-order-ragnarok-beginners-guide. Accessed 22 May 2018.

Crawford, Jackson. The Poetic Edda: Stories of the Norse Gods and Heroes. Indianapolis: Hackett, 2015. Print.

D’Aulaire, Ingri, and Edgar Parin d’Aulaire. D’Aulaires’ Book of Norse Myths. New York: New York Review of Books, 1967. Print.

Davidson, H. R. Ellis. Gods and Myths of Northern Europe. London: Penguin, 1964. Print.

Ewing, Thor. Viking Myths: Stories of the Norse Gods and Goddesses. Edinburgh: Welkin, 2014. Print.

Lindow, John. Norse Mythology: A Guide to the Gods, Heroes, Rituals, and Beliefs. New York: Oxford UP, 2001. Print.