What is Bifrost (aka Asgard Rainbow Bridge)?
The Bifröst is the burning rainbow bridge of Norse mythology. Snorri Sturluson says the gods built it from earth to heaven, that it has three colours and that the red in it is burning fire. The god Heimdall guards it from his home Himinbjörg, where it reaches heaven, and strong as it is, it will break at Ragnarök when the sons of Múspell ride over it.
- Bifrost Rainbow Bridge Name Origins
- Heimdallr, the Guardian of Bifrost Rainbow Bridge
- Bifrost Rainbow Bridge in the Eddas
- Bifrost Rainbow Bridge in Popular Culture
- Summing-Up
Throughout human history, humans have been wondering about the place where the Gods live. In some cultures the location was known but was deemed unapproachable, such is the case with Greek mythology and mount Olympus. For other cultures, such as Christian for example, Heaven is a place that exists in the spiritual realm and not in physical form.
Nordic mythology is different.
In the Norse myths the home of the gods has a physical form. Snorri says the gods built their stronghold, Asgard, in the middle of the world, yet he also places many of their halls, and the court where they meet every day, up in heaven.
So, how did the gods get from the earth, where humans live inside the wall of Midgard, up to heaven? Snorri’s Gylfaginning asks exactly that, when the disguised king Gangleri wants to know what road leads from earth to heaven.
The answer is Bifrost.
Bifrost Rainbow Bridge Name Origins
The name comes in two forms. Snorri Sturluson, writing his Prose Edda around 1220, calls the bridge Bifröst, while the Eddic poems Grímnismál (stanza 44) and Fáfnismál (stanza 15) call it Bilröst. Scholars still argue over which form is older.
Both forms end in röst, a ‘league’ or stretch of road, usually read here as ‘way’. The first part of Bifröst is taken from bifa, ‘to shake, tremble’, so the name may mean ‘the trembling (or swaying) way’. The first part of Bilröst is bil, ‘a moment’ or ‘a weak point’, which may make it ‘the fleeting way’.
None of these meanings is certain. What is certain is that Snorri tied the bridge to the rainbow. ‘You will have seen it,’ his High One tells Gangleri. ‘It may be that you call it the rainbow.’
Additionally, the bridge has another name. Grímnismál (stanza 29) and Snorri both call it Ásbrú, ‘the bridge of the Aesir’, the gods who ride over it.
Heimdallr, the Guardian of Bifrost Rainbow Bridge
Heimdal, the guardian of Asgard rainbow bridge - Bifrost
The story of Bifrost Bridge wouldn’t be complete without the story of its guardian, the Aesir God Heimdallr, or as he is better known in English, Heimdall.
Snorri says Heimdallr was born of nine mothers, all of them sisters, and in another passage he calls him a son of Odin as well. The Short Völuspá, a poem preserved inside Hyndluljóð, says nine giant maidens bore him; the modern idea that they stand for the waves of the sea has no medieval source. He is the owner of Gulltoppr, ‘gold-top’, a horse with a golden mane, and possesses Gjallarhorn, the horn whose blast is heard in all worlds. At Ragnarok he blows it to wake all the gods.
Snorri calls him ‘the white god’, and the poem Þrymskviða calls him the whitest of the Aesir; neither says what the whiteness means. His teeth were of gold. He lives at Himinbjörg, ‘heaven’s cliffs’, which Snorri places at the edge of heaven by the bridgehead, where Bifrost comes to heaven, and there he guards the bridge against the mountain giants.
The Short Völuspá says he was strengthened with the might of the earth, the ice-cold sea and the blood of a boar, and Þrymskviða says he could see the future well, like the Vanir. Everything about him makes him a better guardian of the bridge. Snorri says he needs less sleep than a bird, sees a hundred leagues around him by night as well as by day, and hears the grass growing on the earth and the wool on sheep. Heimdallr is also tied to Yggdrasil in one obscure line: Völuspá (stanza 27) says that his hljóð, his hearing or perhaps his horn, lies hidden under the holy tree.
The meaning of his name is uncertain. The first half is generally taken as heimr, ‘world’, and the whole is sometimes read as ‘the one who illuminates the world’. Like most of the gods of the Nordic pantheon, Heimdallr is known by various names: Vindlér, whose meaning is unclear, Gullintanni (‘golden-tooth’) and Hallinskíði, which has no agreed translation.
Heimdallr is one of the most important Gods of the Nordic pantheon, but the main problem with him is that many of the myths about Heimdallr are lost or survive only in fragments, like the poem Heimdallargaldr, of which Snorri quotes just two lines, so scholars can’t really decide on a clear picture of Heimdallr, and most of our resources about Heimdallr come from the Poetic Edda and Prose Edda which are, after all, our main sources on the entire Nordic mythology.
Besides protecting Bifrost Rainbow Bridge, the most important role of Heimdallr is related to Ragnarok. We already said that he blows his horn to wake the gods when Ragnarok begins; what we didn’t say is his role in the battle itself. He and Loki kill each other, and Loki is no minor foe: in Völuspá (stanza 51) he steers the ship that brings the people of Múspell, and in Snorri’s account all of Hel’s host follows him.
Bifrost Rainbow Bridge in the Eddas
Everything we know about Bifrost comes from a few texts written down in medieval Iceland, more than a century after the Viking Age ended.
Two poems of the Poetic Edda, Grímnismál and Fáfnismál, and Snorri Sturluson’s Gylfaginning, part of his Prose Edda, provide our main information regarding Bifrost. When we combine them, we can come to some conclusions.
The gods use it every day. Snorri says the Aesir ride up over Bifrost to hold their court at the well of Urðr, under the root of Yggdrasil that stands in heaven. Thor is the exception. Grímnismál (stanza 29) says that every day he must wade the rivers Körmt and Örmt and the two Kerlaugar when he goes to sit in judgment at the ash Yggdrasil, because the bridge of the Aesir burns all in flame. Why the fire keeps Thor off the bridge but not the other gods, the poem does not say.
If we take the word of the Prose Edda, and its figure High, who is one of the three who tell the story to Gangleri, Bifrost has three colours and it burns. When Gangleri asks whether fire burns over Bifrost, High answers that the red you see in the bow is burning fire: if everyone who wished could cross, the frost giants and mountain giants would climb up into heaven. It is also the best of bridges, made with more skill than any other work, and Grímnismál (stanza 44) ranks it first among bridges.
Yet High also foretells that, strong as it is, it will break when the sons of Múspell ride over it, and their horses swim great rivers. Múspell is Snorri’s name for the hot, bright world in the south, which he also calls Muspelheim. At Ragnarok, he says, the sky splits, the sons of Múspell ride out with Surtr at their head, and when they ride over Bifrost it breaks. Fáfnismál (stanza 15) also has Bilröst break when they cross it, on the day Surtr and the gods meet in battle.
Gangleri objects that the gods did not build the bridge in good faith if it can break, since they can make whatever they wish. High replies that the gods deserve no blame for the work: Bifrost is a good bridge, but nothing in this world can be relied on when the sons of Múspell go to war.
Some modern scholars have suggested that the bridge was originally the Milky Way rather than the rainbow, since it runs across the night sky like a road. That is a modern theory, though: no medieval text makes the link, and Snorri himself says people call the bridge the rainbow.
A parallel may be drawn as well between Bifrost, the gods’ bridge to heaven, and Gjallarbrú, the gold-roofed bridge over the river Gjöll on the road to Hel, a realm of death. A similar parallel could be drawn between Heimdallr and Móðguðr, the maiden who guards the Gjöll bridge in Snorri’s story of Hermóðr’s ride to Hel. The comparison is a modern one; no source sets the two bridges side by side.
Bifrost Rainbow Bridge in Popular Culture
The most known example of Bifrost Bridge in popular culture is through the Marvel cinematic universe. There it is not a bridge at all but a beam of light that carries travellers between the realms. Its guardian is Heimdall, portrayed by Idris Elba, who in Avengers: Infinity War calls up its power with dark magic one last time. Stormbreaker, the axe forged for Thor in that film by the dwarf Eitri, can summon it too. In the sources, by contrast, Bifröst is a bridge the gods ride across on horseback.
Eitri can be used to connect this to another reference to Bifrost in popular culture, the video game God of War (2018). Its dwarf smiths are the brothers Brok and Sindri, named after the brothers who forge Thor’s hammer in Snorri’s Edda, Brokkr and Eitri (Sindri in some versions of the text). The game borrows the name Bifrost too, but not for a bridge: it belongs to the game’s own magic for travelling between the realms of the World Tree, Yggdrasil.
Additionally, there are countless unique Viking accessories featuring Bifrost that are an essential part of Viking outfit for many people in love with Norse heritage.
Also, there is a borough in Norway named after the guardian of Asgard's rainbow bridge, Heimdal.
Summing-up
Entrance to the realm of Gods (or God, whatever suits you) has always been and always will remain one of the main unanswered questions for humans. Whether it is a spiritual realm, a top of the mountain or something third, people will always ask themselves what is over the rainbow.
The story of Bifrost Rainbow Bridge tells us that exactly.
So, the next time you see a rainbow on your way home from an honest day’s work, remember that Snorri’s High One would have called it Bifrost, the burning bridge the gods ride over to heaven every day.
Until next seeing, we leave you in good health.
Skål!
Bifröst, FAQ
What is the Bifröst?
The bridge the gods built from earth to heaven. Snorri Sturluson says people call it the rainbow, that it has three colours and that the red in it is burning fire. The gods ride over it every day to their court at the well of Urðr, and Heimdall guards it.
Who guards the Bifröst?
Heimdall, the watchman of the gods. He lives at Himinbjörg, where the bridge reaches heaven, and guards it against the mountain giants. He needs less sleep than a bird, sees a hundred leagues by night as well as by day and hears grass grow. At Ragnarök he blows the horn Gjallarhorn to wake the gods.
What is the Bifröst made of?
No source says. Snorri says only that the gods built it with more skill than any other work, that it has three colours, and that the red in it is burning fire, which keeps the frost giants and mountain giants from climbing into heaven. The popular idea that it was made of fire, air and water has no medieval source.
Does the Bifröst break?
Yes. At Ragnarök the sky splits, the sons of Múspell ride out with Surtr at their head, and when they ride over Bifröst it breaks. The poem Fáfnismál also says that Bilröst breaks.
Is the Bifröst the same as a rainbow?
Snorri thought so: he says it may be that you call it the rainbow. The idea that it was the Milky Way is a modern theory with no medieval source. Its name may mean the trembling way, and the Eddic poems call it Bilröst, perhaps the fleeting way.
Keep exploring: Asgard, its watchman Heimdall, the Nine Realms, or shop Norse jewelry.