Vǫluspá tells of collapsing order, released enemies, the deaths of major gods, and a world in fire and water. A renewed earth then rises; survival and return belong to the poem as much as destruction.
Snorri’s Prose Edda organises scattered poetic motifs into a continuous sequence. This version shapes modern retellings but is a medieval synthesis, not automatically the uniform belief of all Viking-Age people.
Fenrir, the Midgard Serpent, Surtr, and Loki face the gods. Earlier myths prepare the conflicts: bonds will break, old deceptions demand payment, and even divine order is finite.
Christian images of an ending world may have affected the written account, while the motif also has older Nordic roots. Rather than claim one origin, scholarship asks how oral tradition and Christian literary culture interacted.