Odin Fact — October 30, 2026

Today's Fact

Verified against independent sources. Issues cited below.

ODIN LET HIS OWN FATHER TURN TO SNOW — AND NEVER SENT THE SORCERERS BOR BEGGED FOR!

The Featured Fact

Before he was All-Father, Odin rode to war beside his own father, Bor, first king of Asgard. When Bor chased a fleeing Frost Giant into a trap, a waiting sorcerer struck him with a spell no sword could answer: Bor was turned into living snow, scattering on the wind while his son watched, and with his last breaths he begged Odin to find the mightiest sorcerers alive and restore him.

Odin never sent them. Bor had cursed humankind with every suffering he could devise as punishment for Odin creating mortals in the first place, and the old king stood squarely in his son’s path. So the one-eyed prince let the snow blow away, took the throne of Asgard for himself, and kept the confession buried until he finally told it to Thor in Thor Vol. 3 #7 (2008), by J. Michael Straczynski and Olivier Coipel.

The cruellest layer surfaced later: the unnamed sorcerer in that ancient trap was a time-travelling Loki in disguise. Loki then posed as Bor’s vengeful ghost for years, tormenting Odin with guilt until the All-Father agreed to raise a fallen king’s son as his own — meaning Loki used his grandfather’s fate to engineer his own adoption. When Loki finally undid the spell in the modern era, a maddened Bor rampaged through Broxton and Thor killed him without ever learning he had struck down his own grandfather.

Why It's Obscure

Every king of Asgard since owes the throne to a snowfall, a guilty conscience, and a son who decided not to help.

2008

Thor Vol. 3 #7 — a wounded Odin, fighting Surtur in the borderland of death, finally tells Thor the story he had hidden for eons.

The grudge

Bor punished mankind — enraged that Odin had breathed life into mortals, Bor visited every pain and curse he could devise upon the young human race.

The choice

No rescue came — Odin admits he could have sought out great sorcerers, as Bor pleaded, and simply chose the crown instead.

The sorcerer

It was Loki all along — the trap was set by a Loki from the future, who then impersonated Bor’s spirit to manipulate Odin for years.

The return

Thor Vol. 3 #12 (2009) — Loki revives Bor in modern Oklahoma; Thor defeats the rampaging king, learns who he was too late, and is banished for the killing.

Gallery

Comic art of the character.

Odin with his eyepatch, comic art — **The one-eyed king**Odin in later years, his missing eye covered — the gaze that once watched his father dissolve into snow and chose to do nothing.

Thor enthroned in Asgard, comic art — **The son who heard it**Thor enthroned in Asgard — the god Odin finally told, from the borderland of death, what he had done to earn the crown his son would inherit.

Bor, father of Odin, comic art — **Bor, the first king**Bor Burison, Odin’s father — the king whose dying request for sorcerers his own son quietly ignored.

Sources

Every claim above is verified against at least two of these independent sources.

Bullpen Bulletins

Bor Burison (Earth-616) — Marvel DatabaseRecords Bor turned to snow by a disguised time-travelling Loki, Odin’s failure to attempt a rescue, and Loki’s modern-day resurrection of the ancient king.
Thor Vol. 3 #7 — Marvel DatabaseSummarises Odin’s deathbed confession: Bor cursed mankind over Odin’s creation of mortals, was turned into living snow, and was left unrestored because he was in the way.