Солтүстік мифологиясындағы Теңіз руы Ægir

One of various personifications of the sea or ocean in Norse mythology

Ægir (anglicised as Aegir; Old Norse 'sea'), Hlér (Old Norse 'sea'), or Gymir (Old Norse less clearly 'sea, engulfer'), is a jötunn and a personification of the sea in Norse mythology. In the Old Norse record, Ægir hosts the gods in his halls and is associated with brewing ale. Ægir is attested as married to a goddess, Rán, who also personifies the sea, and together the two produced daughters who personify waves, the Nine Daughters of Ægir and Rán, and Ægir's son is Snær, personified snow. Ægir may also be the father of the beautiful jötunn Gerðr, wife of the god Freyr, or these may be two separate figures who share the same name (see below and Gymir (father of Gerðr)). One of Ægir's names, Hlér, is the namesake of the island Læsø (Old Norse Hléysey 'Hlér's island') and perhaps also Lejre in Denmark. Scholars have long analyzed Ægir's role in the Old Norse corpus, and the concept of the figure has had some influence in modern popular culture.

The Old Norse name Ægir ('sea') may stem from a Proto Germanic form *āgwi jaz ('that of the river/water'), itself a derivative of the stem *ahwō ('river'; cf. Gothic aƕa 'body of water, river', Old English ēa 'stream', Old High German aha 'river'). Richard Cleasby and Guðbrandur Vigfússon saw his name as deriving from an ancient Indo European root. Linguist Guus Kroonen argues that the Germanic stem *ahwō is probably of Proto Indo European (PIE) origin, as it may be cognate with Latin aqua (via a common form *h₂ekʷ eh₂ ), and ultimately descend from the PIE root *h₂ep ('water'; cf. Sanskrit áp 'water', Tocharian āp 'water, river'). Linguist Michiel de Vaan notes that the connection between Proto Germanic *ahwō and Old Norse Ægir remains uncertain, and that *ahwō and aqua, if cognates, may also be loanwords from a non Indo European language. The name Ægir is identical to a noun for 'sea' in skaldic poetry, itself a base word in many kennings. For instance, a ship is described as "Ægir's horse" and the waves as the "daughters of Ægir". Poetic kennings in both Hversu Noregr byggðist (How Norway Was Settled) and Skáldskaparmál (The Language of Poetry) treat Ægir and the sea jötunn Hlér, who lives on the Hlésey ('Hlér island', modern Læsø), as the same figure. The meaning of the Old Norse name Gymir is unclear. Proposed translations include 'the earthly' (from Old Norse gumi), 'the wintry one' (from gemla), or 'the protector', the 'engulfer' (from geyma). (For more on this topic, see discussion below)

Ægir is attested in a variety of Old Norse sources.

In what appears to be a Norwegian genealogical tradition, Ægir is portrayed as one of the three elements among the sea, the fire and the wind. The beginning of the Orkneyinga saga ('Saga of the Orkney Islanders') and Hversu Noregr byggdisk ('How Norway Was Settled') tell that the jötunn king Fornjót had three sons: Hlér ('sea'), whom he called Ægir, a second named Logi ('fire'), and a third called Kári ('wind').

Carolyne Larrington says that Ægir's role in Hymiskviða "may reflect Scandinavian royal practices in which the king enforces his authority on his subordinates by visiting their homes and demanding to be feasted". According to Andy Orchard, Ægir's role in Skáldskaparmál, where he attends a banquet rather than hosting it, could be a deliberate inversion of the traditional motif of Ægir as host.

The name Gymir may indicate that Ægir was understood as the father of the beautiful jötunn Gerðr; they may also have been two different figures sharing the same name (see Gymir, father of Gerðr). Both the prose introduction to Lokasenna and Skáldskaparmál state that Ægir is also known as Gymir, the father of the jötunn Gerðr. Rudolf Simek argues that, if understood to be two different entities, this may stem from an erroneous interpretation of kennings in which different jötunn names are used interchangeably.

As highlighted above in Skáldskaparmál, the name of the island Læsø in Denmark references Hlér (Old Norse Hléysey 'Hlér's Island'). Simek speculates that Hlér may therefore have been seen as something of an ancestor of the island. Two sources list the personified snow, Snær (Old Norse 'snow'), as Hlér's son. Book nine of Saxo Grammaticus's 12th century history of Denmark Gesta Danorum contains mention of a figure by the name of Lerus (from Old Norse Hlér) whose son is Snio (from Old Norse Snær 'Snow'). The Danish chronicle of Lejre, Chronicon Lethrense also connects the two, and the name Lejre may, like Læsø, derive from the jötunn.

Scholars have often discussed Ægir's role as host to the gods and his description as a jötunn. Anthony Faulkes observes that Ægir is "often described by modern writers as god of the sea" yet that he is nowhere described as a god in the Prose Edda and appears in a list of jötnar in Skáldskaparmál. According to John Lindow, since his wife Rán is listed among the Ásynjur (goddesses) in the same part of the Prose Edda, and since he had a close and friendly relationship with the Æsir (gods), Ægir's description as a jötunn appears questionable. Andy Orchard argues on the contrary that Ægir's inclusion among the Æsir is probably a late development since his daughters are described as jötnar and some sources mention him as the descendant of the jötunn Fornjót. According to Rudolf Simek, while attested as a jötunn, Ægir "has characteristics" of a sea god.

Ægir has been the subject of a variety of art pieces. These include Nils Blommér's painting Näcken och Ägirs döttrar (1850), Johan Peter Molin's (d. 1874) fountain relief Ægir, and Emil Doepler's Ægir (1901). Ægir is referenced in a variety of others ways in modern popular culture. For example, he is the namesake of a Norwegian corvette produced in 1967 (Ægir), a coastal defense ship in the Imperial German Navy, and of an exoplanet, Epsilon Eridani b.