Nanna

The Faithful Wife

Domain: Love, Devotion & Mourning
Alignment: Neutral Good
Element: Light
Relics of Power: Mantle of Mourning

Speak with Nanna

The full Codex

5 sections of this entry are open to everyone: the summary, the people, the symbols, the lineage and the sources. The other 9 (Name and epithets, In the ancient sources, The myths, Worship and archaeology, How the god was depicted, What scholars debate, After antiquity, Did you know?, Codex relic) are part of the full Codex: PRO opens the whole study of all 500 deities, and without a subscription you can read one full entry a day, just like in the app.

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The People

People

Norse & Germanic peoples

Region

Scandinavia & northern Europe

Period

Viking Age, 8th–11th c.

The gods of Asgard were worshipped by the Norse peoples of Scandinavia and by the Germanic tribes, especially during the Viking Age. Warriors sought to die in battle to reach Odin's Valhalla, and the myths were preserved in the Icelandic Eddas. The cult declined with the region's Christianization around the year 1000.

The Norse celebrated blóts, seasonal sacrifices with feasts of meat and mead, such as the Yule of the winter solstice. The great temple at Uppsala, in Sweden, hosted every nine years one of the largest sacrificial festivals of the Viking world.

At a glance

Nanna appears in three different traditions in the open sources read. In Snorri Sturluson's Prose Edda she is Baldr's wife and Forseti's mother, and she dies of grief at her husband's funeral pyre. In the Hyndluljóð a Nanna, daughter of Nokkvi, appears only as a name in a genealogical list. In Saxo Grammaticus's Danish History, Nanna is the daughter of King Gevar, courted by both Baldr and Hother, and ends up married to Hother. The texts do not agree with each other, and this study shows where each version says what it says, without merging them into a single story.

8 min read · Reviewed on October 14, 2026 · How we research

Sacred symbols

The faithful heart, the funeral pyre, the mantle and the flower

Family

Parents

Nep (Nef in §33 in Blackwell), per Snorri; Nokkvi in the Hyndluljóð and Gevar in Saxo, in separate traditions

Nanna

Unions

BaldurHother (Saxo)

Children

Forseti

Genealogy according to Edda em Prosa, Gylfaginning §33 e §59 (Blackwell) e caps. 32 e 51 (Anderson); Hyndluljóð 20 (Bellows); Saxo, livro 3 (Elton).

Sources and further reading

Primary sources

Snorri Sturluson, The Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson (Gylfaginning), em The Elder Eddas ... and the Younger Eddas, Norroena Society, 1906. translation: I. A. Blackwell. read
Snorri Sturluson, The Younger Edda, also called Snorre's Edda or The Prose Edda. translation: Rasmus B. Anderson. read
Anônimo, The Poetic Edda (Hyndluljóð e notas). translation: Henry Adams Bellows. read
Saxo Grammaticus, The Danish History, Books I-IX. translation: Oliver Elton. read

Name and epithets

Nanna Baldr's wife: Role the Prose Edda gives her. In the pyre account she is called Baldr's wife, and her death follows his.. Daughter of Nep: Parentage given by Snorri in both old translations read.

In the ancient sources

Prose Edda, Gylfaginning (translated by I. A. Blackwell, Norroena edition, 1906), 13th century, work attributed to Snorri Sturluson (general dating). Main source.

The myths

Baldr's pyre and Nanna's death. After Baldr died, the Æsir carried the body to the seashore. There stood the ship Hringhorn, held to be the largest in the world.

Worship and archaeology

The open sources read (the two translations of the Prose Edda, Bellows's note on the Poetic Edda and book 3 of Saxo) do not describe any cult of Nanna.

How the god was depicted

None of the sources read describes an image, visual attribute or sacred object of Nanna. What the text attributes to her are gift objects: the cassock or kerchief sent to Frigga and the gold ring sent to Fulla.

What scholars debate

Nep or Nef. Blackwell's translation writes Nanna's father as Nef in §33 and as Nep in §59. Anderson writes Nep in both places, and Bellows quotes the same passage of Snorri with Nep.

After antiquity

The modern reception of Nanna passes largely through the translations used here. Blackwell's (1906) and Anderson's (1879) gave the English-language reader the pyre scene, and Bellows (1923) and Elton (1905) gave the Poe…

Did you know?

The gifts she sends from Hel go to two goddesses: Frigga and Fulla. In Saxo she refuses Baldr, saying that gods and mortals do not form firm bonds, and marries Hother.

Codex relic

Mantle of Mourning. The symbol of her devotion, which led her to follow her beloved Baldur into death itself and the world of the dead.

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