Baldr

In the Norse mythic corpus Baldr is presented as a son of Odin and Frigg, brother to gods including Thor and the blind Höðr, husband to Nanna and father of Forseti. Mythic narratives (Poetic Edda and Prose Edda summaries) relate that Baldr began to have ill omens and prophetic dreams; despite Frigg extracting oaths from almost all things not to harm him, Loki tricked Höðr into slaying Baldr by directing a mistletoe projectile. Baldr's death is followed by the birth of Váli to avenge him; his death is portrayed as both a great tragedy for the Æsir and a harbinger of Ragnarök, with later prophecy (Völuspá) envisioning Baldr's return in the renewed, peaceful world.

Primary Eddic poems and summaries offer no consistent, detailed physical portrait; sources emphasize his being beloved and, in medieval prose summaries and later scholarly tradition, associate him with beauty and a shining aspect. Snorri's prose tradition and older scholarship link Baldr with shining/white attributes inferred from name-derivation theories, but the Poetic Edda itself provides no extended bodily description.

Baldr's powers are expressed chiefly as moral and social authority: he is universally loved by gods and mortals and occupies beautiful possessions such as the ship Hringhorni and the hall Breiðablik. He is central in prophetic and cosmological motifs — his death and promised return shape eschatological narrative — rather than shown performing explicit magical feats in the supplied materials. The Merseburg Incantation (continental Germanic) names Balder(es) in a healing charm context (though identification is debated), indicating that his name could appear in therapeutic/song-ritual settings.