Before the beginning, only Niflheim—the dark world of the north—and Muspell, the fiery world of the south, existed. Surtr stands at the edge of Muspell, holding a flaming sword, and waiting for Ragnarok so he can burn the world and kill the gods one by one.

A great world of ice formed over time in Ginnungagap—the void between Niflheim and Muspell. Where the fires of Muspell meet the ice, the hermaphroditic progenitor of the giants, Ymir, and an enormous hornless cow, Audhumla, are born. Ymir is nourished by Audhumla’s milk. Audhumla’s “pink tongue licked people from the blocks of ice,” first of whom was Buri, “the ancestor of the gods” (31).

Ymir gives birth to other giants, one of whom Buri takes as a wife; they sire Bor, father of Odin, Vili, and Ve. Wishing to create the universe, Odin and his brothers kill Ymir. The flood of Ymir’s blood kills the other giants, save one. Odin and his brothers fashion the world out of Ymir’s corpse; the oceans are his blood and sweat, and the dome of the sky is the giant’s skull.

The world “is a flat disk, and the sea encircles the perimeter” (33). Odin, Vili, and Ve make a wall of Ymir’s eyelashes to keep the giants at bay; this protected area is called Midgard.