Vikings: What Was Wrong With Baby Baldur (& Why Ivar Killed Him)
The character of Ivar the Boneless (kind of) had a son in Vikings season 5, but the baby Baldur was left in the forest to die due to a facial deformity. It's the fate that Ivar narrowly avoided as a baby when Ragnar Lothbrok saw that Ivar had a deformity in his legs and took him to the woods to be left to his fate. The season 5 death of Baldur brings Ivar's story full in this way. So, what was wrong with baby Baldur, and why did Ivar kill him?
Ivar was the youngest son of Ragnar and Queen Aslaug, and he was born with a genetic disorder known as osteogenesis imperfect, also known as brittle bone disease. He had narrow odds of even surviving the harsh life of 9th century Norway with this condition, so Ragnar felt that killing Ivar was the best choice. He found himself unable to cut baby Ivar's throat, so he simply abandoned the boy in the woods. Once Aslaug discovered their son was missing, she brought him home, so that Ivar survived against all the odds – going on to eventually become a king, and even a Norse god (albeit self-proclaimed).
Related: Vikings: What Illness Ragnar Lothbrok Had After The Siege of Paris
In addition to his non-working legs, Ivar was also impotent. However, his wife Freydis secretly conceived a child with another man and then convinced Ivar that he had successfully impregnated her when she drank some of his blood. Believing himself to be a god, Ivar decided to name the baby after Odin's beautiful son Baldur. But while Freydis saw the beauty in Baldur after he was born, Ivar saw only a son who was deformed. Despite Baldur's face being never shown, and it's not explicitly said what deformity he had, what was wrong with baby Baldur was probably a cleft lip. This congenital disability results in the
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