Ymir Fritz (Anime)

This article is about the first of all Titans. For the 104th Cadet Corps graduate, see Ymir (Anime).

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Founding Titans
◄ Preceded by	Ymir Fritz	Followed by ►
None		One of her daughters, eventually Karl Fritz

	You're not a slave. You're not a god. You're just a person. You don't have to serve anyone. You can decide.
— Eren Jaeger urges Ymir to be free[3]

Ymir Fritz (ユミル・フリッツ Yumiru Furittsu^?) was the first person to obtain the power of the Titans.^[4][5] She was a slave of the Eldian king, who abused her power to bring prosperity to Eldia while devastating Marley and the rest of the world. Thirteen years after awakening her power, she died protecting the king; her corpse was then forcibly cannibalized by their daughters, Maria, Rose, and Sina. Her powers then split into what eventually became known as the Nine Titans.^[4][3]

Upon her death, Ymir was transported to the Coordinate, where she molded Titans out of the sands and obeyed the royal family whenever they sought the Founder's power.^[6]

Appearance

Human form

Ymir Fritz was small in stature with blonde hair. She had straight cut bangs with shoulder-length hair that later grew down to her shoulder blades with age. As a slave, she wore tattered clothing with a cloth headband, sash belt, and leather sandals laced above her ankles. After entering the favor of the Eldian King in adolescence and adulthood, Ymir wore a sleeveless dress with thin decorative bands around each arm. Like all slaves of the Eldian tribe, her tongue was cut out when she was captured, though it may have regenerated after acquiring the power of the Titans.

In posthumous illustrations, Ymir Fritz had long, thick, blonde hair and was often shown holding an apple. She was usually depicted in wearing a flowing dress with loose bell sleeves and a tie around the waist, along with a pair of basic flat shoes.^[1]

Titan form

Ymir Fritz's Titan form was enormous in size with blonde hair, a typically female figure, and long, protruding ribs. Her Titan's face possessed no apparent skin, musculature or eyes, leaving only a visible skull.

In posthumous illustrations, Ymir's Titan form is highly romanticized with more human features.

Personality

Being a subject of ancient history, there are various interpretations of who Ymir really was. Frieda Reiss described Ymir as a kind girl who was always thinking of others.^[7][3] Eldians speak of Ymir with great reverence, praising her accomplishments for their people. On the other hand, the Marleyan propaganda maintains that Ymir was a pawn of the Devil, with whom she had made a deal, causing her and all her subjects to be despised by much of the world.

In reality, she was a slave with no will of her own. She submitted to the Eldian king in life, building him his empire, brutally destroying his enemies, and bearing his children as he commanded.^[3] Ymir even went so far as to sacrifice her own life for his. Even in death, her soul remained blindly obedient to the Eldian royal family, creating Titans by hand for about 2,000 years in the unknown land surrounding the Coordinate.^[6]

Despite not being able to fully understand her, Eren states that Ymir loved Fritz despite his poor treatment of her and his responsibility for destroying her hometown which led to the death of her parents. She was also willing to carry out his will for generations while waiting for someone to release her from the agony of love and yearned for that freedom.^[2]

History

Around 2,000 years ago, Ymir's village was attacked and enslaved by the Eldians, who also murdered her parents and cut out the tongues of the survivors.^[3][2]

One night, Ymir opened the gate to a pen, allowing for some pigs to escape.^[2] Later, the tribe's ruler, Fritz, questioned the slaves on the culprit. The slaves pointed to Ymir, who was released only to be hunted down for sport.

Wounded and desperate, Ymir found an unusually large tree with a chasm at its base. Seeking shelter, she stepped inside and, not knowing of the sinkhole beneath, fell down into a pool of liquid. There, a mysterious spine-like creature fused with her and turned her into the first Titan.^[3]

With her newfound power, Ymir returned to serve Fritz and used her Titan to cultivate the land, build bridges, and amass wealth for the Eldians. Under his command, she also vanquished the armies of Eldia's rival, Marley. To "reward" Ymir for her service, Fritz took her as his concubine and together, they had three daughters: Maria, Rose, and Sina.^[3] It was speculated that during this time, Ymir grew to genuinely love and care for Fritz despite his behavior and attitude towards her.^[2]

Thirteen years after acquiring the power of the Titans, Ymir died while thwarting an assassination attempt on Fritz, but then found herself in a mysterious, barren land. King Fritz then forced his daughters to eat their mother's corpse in an attempt to preserve the power of the Titans. He commanded his daughters to continuously reproduce, to have their children eat their spines upon their deaths and perpetuate this ritual from child to child so that Ymir's blood would not die out and Eldia could rule forever with its Titans.

Ymir's power was divided into the Nine Titans; and she continued to serve her descendants, building them Titans whenever they invoked the power of the Titans.^[6][3]

Mythology

By the Eldians, Ymir's existence is hailed as a god-given miracle.^[4] The Restorationists claimed that she and all Subjects of Ymir are "the chosen children of God"^[4] and that any atrocities Marley claims Eldia had committed could not have been possible because Ymir would not have allowed it. There was even an Eldian cult that worshiped Ymir as a goddess.^[8]

On the other hand, the Marleyans believe she received her powers from a deal with the "Devil of All Earth"^[4] and used this to ostracize the Eldians.

There are also those who believe that Ymir contacted the "source of all living matter" to gain her power. This theory is relatively unheard of, as Grisha Jaeger was unaware of it until Eren Kruger told him.^[5]

Many centuries later, Frieda Reiss would visit her half-sister Historia Reiss on the farm where she was raised. During some of her visits, Frieda told Historia the story of Ymir's deal with the Devil; however, in the book she showed her, Ymir is named "Christa". Frieda advised Historia that she must be lady-like, as "Christa" was. She spoke of "Christa" as being an altruistic girl and urged Historia to be loving and beloved like her when she is grown. However, Historia did not remember these visits since Frieda used the Founding Titan's power to erase her memories after every visit. Historia would only recall vague images of "Christa" in the years to come.^[1]

Legacy

Return to Shiganshina arc

Some years later, when the Scout Regiment discovers Grisha Jaeger's basement, they find three journals.^[9] Within Grisha's writings, he recounts his childhood when he was told the story of Ymir and her people by his father. Grisha writes of joining the Restorationists in the nation of Marley several years afterward, learning of the supposed great accomplishments achieved in Ymir's time. Together with the resistance, Grisha declares that they must venture to Paradis Island, where Ymir's descendants had fled eighty years ago, in order to retrieve the Founding Titan and bring back the nation of Eldia.^[4]

War for Paradis arc

While on the verge of death after using a Thunder Spear on himself that Levi Ackermann placed on him, Zeke Jaeger would awaken in an unknown land to discover Ymir resculpting his damaged body with earth. Shortly after, he is found by Jaegerists led by Floch; he states that he was in the Paths.^[10]

During the assault on Shiganshina, Zeke and his younger half-brother Eren Jaeger are able to make contact with each other and activate the Founder before awakening in the Paths. As Ymir approaches, Eren notices her presence. Zeke explains that she is in fact the Founder herself. He then asks Eren to go ahead with the euthanasia plan. Eren refuses and demands that Ymir lend him her strength, but his pleas are ignored. Zeke subsequently reveals he has nullified the vow to renounce war through Ymir, who obeys only the royal family, her descendants. Under Zeke's order, Ymir promptly restrains Eren with chains.^[6]

After Zeke shows Eren the memories of their father Grisha, Zeke realizes that Eren was responsible for Grisha's actions against the Reiss family and that his ultimate goal is inevitable. In a panic, Zeke orders Ymir to sterilize the Subjects of Ymir; and Ymir approaches the Coordinate of converging paths to fulfill Zeke's will.

Eren manages to break free from his chains and reach Ymir before Zeke. Realizing that Ymir has a will of her own, Eren embraces her and asks her to help him rather than try to order her. As Zeke desperately tries to stop them, Eren asks Ymir if she was the one who led him to the Coordinate, musing that she has been waiting 2000 years for someone to arrive. Ymir begins crying.

Back in Shiganshina, Eren's head is reconnected to his body. As everyone looks on in shock, the Wall crumbles, releasing a horde of Colossal Titans as Eren forms a new Titan body, one that towers over even the Wall Titans.^[3]

A while later, as Eren leads the Titans in the Rumbling, an apparition of Ymir is seen by a boy in the moment he is crushed to death under a Titan's foot.

As Eren converses with his friends in the Paths, Ymir emerges next to Eren in the Coordinate, symbolizing their cooperation.^[11]

As the Warriors along with members of Scout Regiment engage numerous Titans on top the Founding Titan in an attempt to reach Eren at Fort Salta, Ymir appears and is briefly seen by Armin Arlelt who speculates she is the one summoning the previous incarnations of the Nine Titans.

After Mikasa Ackermann kills Eren, Ymir appears behind her, smiling as she watches Mikasa kiss Eren farewell.

Immediately afterwards, Ymir relinquishes the Power of the Titans from the world. Watching Mikasa kill the one she loves was enough to release Ymir from the love she had for Fritz who only wanted to exploit her power.

As Mikasa departs from the battlefield, Ymir appears to her. Mikasa understands that Ymir's love for Fritz was a nightmare that she cannot undo, she instead thanks Ymir for bringing the life into the world which allowed for her to be born. Ymir then envisions a different outcome where she lets King Fritz get impaled by the spear, consoling her three daughters, before vanishing, at last.^[12]

Abilities

Power of the Titans

Ymir was the very first Titan and the only one to ever possess the complete power of the Titans; all who came after her merely possessed fragments of her power. Her Titan body was immense, even by Titan standards, and easily towered above the treeline. Using her immense strength, she effortlessly wiped out Marley's forces. She was also very skilled at controlling her Titan, as she performed complex tasks such as building bridges across mountains and cultivating the fields.^[3]

It was said that nobody could surpass Ymir and that because Ymir died 13 years after awakening her powers, no one was allowed to live beyond that; this phenomenon was known as the "Curse of Ymir."^[5]

After Ymir's death, her spirit lived on in a world where the Coordinate resides. She was responsible for all Titan transformations throughout history: whenever the power of the Titans was invoked, she built the Titan bodies out of the otherworldly sand.^[6] She was also responsible for regeneration and re-sculpted Zeke's body after he was blown up.^[10] It reportedly took Ymir a very long time to create these bodies: Zeke said it took her "years" to build him a single human body, but because the world in which she lived transcends time, the process was almost an instant in the physical world. According to Zeke, Ymir could create anything, even chains that represent the "vow of renouncing war".^[6]

Ymir was also the source of the Founding Titan's power. From controlling other Titans to creating the Wall Titans to altering the bodies of the Subjects of Ymir, all of the Founding Titan's feats were done by Ymir after she was given the order, either by a scream or in person through the world where Ymir resided. However, because Ymir was Fritz's slave, she only listened to the commands of the royal family; thus, only the royal family could use the Founder's power.^[6]

Eren Jaeger became the exception to this, as he invoked the Founder on two occasions. The first was when he punched Dina Fritz's Pure Titan and commanded Ymir to make the surrounding Titans attack Dina; and after she was killed, he turned them against Reiner Braun.^[13] The second was when Eren convinced Ymir that she has a will of her own, freeing her from the royal family's control, and she lent her power to Eren instead of Zeke.^[3]

People killed

• Numerous Marleyan soldiers^[3]

Indirectly

• Countless lives numbering more than triple the world's current population as of 854^[14]

Trivia

• Ymir/"Christa" is on the cover of the book Historia Reiss used to read when she was a child.^[7]
• Before her introduction in the story, Ymir can be seen at the beginning of Season 2's ending theme, Yuugure no Tori, and briefly in Season 3's second opening theme, Shoukei to Shikabane no Michi.
• Ymir is a primeval being in Norse mythology who is the progenitor of all jötnar (giants). "Ymir" also means "the scream." Both are appropriate to Ymir Fritz, as she was the progenitor of all Titans ("giants" in the original Japanese) and possessed the power of the Founding Titan, which is used by screaming.
  • Ymir gained her powers by touching the "source of all living matter."^[5] In Norse mythology, Ymir was born from Eitr, the source of all life.
• Ymir, Abel Reiss and Fay Jaeger share the same Japanese voice actress.
• Ymir and child Louise share the same English voice actress.

References

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