Auðr

In Snorri Sturluson's Prose Edda Auðr is named as the child born to Nótt (the personified Night) and Naglfari (Gylfaginning, ch. 10). This placement makes Auðr part of Snorri's genealogical network of personified cosmic elements and, by those family ties in Snorri's account, an uncle of Thor. Auðr is also referenced in Skáldskaparmál (ch. 32) in kenning contexts and is mentioned in a skaldic verse attributed to the tenth-century skald Hallfreðr vandræðaskáld. Modern scholarship (Rudolf Simek) has suggested that Auðr may be an invention or systematic insertion by Snorri, and also notes that the name Auðr occurs as a female name in other medieval Icelandic sources, complicating the picture of independent attestation.

No physical description or iconography of Auðr is preserved in the surviving attestations. In the Prose Edda and the cited skaldic verse Auðr survives only as a name within genealogical lists and poetic references; there are no descriptive details of bodily form, dress, or visual attributes in the cited material.

The sources provide no accounts of powers, deeds, or characteristic behaviors for Auðr. In the surviving material Auðr's role is genealogical (named as a child of Nótt and Naglfari in Gylfaginning) and poetic (used in kennings such as 'sister of Auðr' to refer to Jörð in Skáldskaparmál). Beyond these referential functions there are no recorded abilities or functions in the cited texts.