#zelda lore

Unified Timeline

The Hero of the Sky - Skyward Sword He tempers the Goddess Sword into the Master Sword and tempers his soul into the Spirit of the Hero in order to wield the full might of the Triforce against Demon King Demise; is cursed by Demise which begins the endless cycle of reincarnation bound together with the Blood of the Goddess and Demise’s Malice

The Hero of the Minish - The Minish Cap He tempers the Picori Blade into the Four Sword; he also sees the permanent change and fall of Vaati from Minish to man to monster

Honorable mention - The Hero of Men A Hero spoken about during the Minish Cap who was first gifted the Picori Blade to seal great evil; we only see him depicted in a stained glass window during a couple of backstory dives, he sports a green headband like the one the Smithy wears in LU

The Four Who Are One - Four Swords Game coupled with the updated port of ALTTP on the GameBoy Advance. Not the same Hero as Minish Cap in official canon, some time has elapsed since Vaati was first sealed away, enough that in the opening scene this Zelda tells this Link the legend of the Hero of the Minish and explains to him what the Four Sword is said to do. In LU, the three Links from The Minish Cap, Four Swords, and Four Swords Adventures are all condensed into the character of the Smithy

*The Hero of Time - Ocarina of Time & more We’ll get to the “more” in a minute; he and his Zelda see the first transformation of Ganondorf into Ganon and also split the timeline

Adult Timeline

The Hero of Time is sent back to his childhood once Ganon is defeated (after losing seven years of it to being sealed asleep in the Sacred Realm by the will of the Master Sword), leaving this timeline behind. Zelda has to pick up the pieces of a destroyed Hyrule with the newly awakened Sages after they sealed Ganondorf together. The seal does not hold long though, and Ganon returns. The Hero of Time is gone, however, and when he was sent back the Triforce of Courage shattered into 8 pieces with his sudden departure from the timeline. The cycle was disrupted long enough that there was no Hero to counter Ganon. The Golden Three flood Hyrule in response, the goddesses preserve the kingdom in a sort of stasis

The Hero of Winds - The Wind Waker & Phantom Hourglass Known as the Sailor in LU, he slaps the Triforce of Courage back together with some duct tape and fixes the Master Sword (lost its power bc Ganondorf shenanigans) after his sister is stolen away. He dons the green tunic in a coming-of-age tradition influenced by the Hero of Time’s efforts and later sees a massive statue of the Hero of Time in Hyrule Castle; a lot to look up to & live up to! Later wields the Phantom Sword after the Master Sword is left at the bottom of the Great Sea

*The Royal Engineer - Spirit Tracks This takes place a century after the Wind Waker in New Hyrule. Don’t think this game has any influence in LU as far as I can tell. He wears the green tunic because it’s become the guard uniform at New Hyrule Castle, based on the Hero of Winds tunic that was based on the Hero of Time’s tunic lol I adore this detail

Child Timeline

The Hero of Time is sent back to his childhood by Zelda to make up for his lost seven years. When he returns to the moment before he ever pulled the Master Sword from its pedestal, his fairy companion Navi leaves him through the back most window of the Temple of Time - interestingly the entrance to the Temple of Time dungeon in Twilight Princess. Presumably confused by this unspoken departure, he first returns to Zelda, most likely to warn her of what happened after he gained access to the Sacred Realm, and it’s assumed they then tell the King about what Ganondorf had already done and what he plans to do. This time, the King must be convinced of Gandondorf’s ill intentions (he did not believe Zelda before this) because this leads to the Gerudo’s arrest before he can do any more harm. There’s an attempted execution, but the Triforce of Power decides to choose Ganondorf in that moment anyway and the execution fails. Ganondorf is then banished to the Twilight Realm by the ancient Sages in an effort to contain him. There’s a lot of assumptions here as we do see Link return to Zelda in-game, and we do see Ganondorf’s failed execution in-game, but how exactly we get from point A to point B is all between game/off screen and is not fully explained

*The Hero of Time Continued - Majora’s Mask Meanwhile, Link has grown a little older and decides to set out to find Navi. He offers Zelda his goodbyes and off he goes to fall into Termina to deal with all the horrors there, stuck in a three-day loop (for an unspecified amount of time, possibly weeks, months) until he can free the four Giants and stop Majora’s moon from falling. We don’t exactly know his fate after Termina, but considering the state we see in him next, it’s widely assumed his death later in life is not a peaceful one

*The Hero of Twilight - Twilight Princess Lot of debate on whether this Link is directly related to the Hero of Time due to this being stated in Hyrule Encyclopedia. Some consider the Dark Horse companion books as faithful canon and some don’t. I personally do to a certain extent. In this case, I do adhere to this Link being a descendant of the Hero of Time. During this Link’s adventure, the Hero’s Shade shows himself to our young Hero in the forms of a one-eyed golden wolf and a ghostly skeletal warrior in decayed and mossy armor, appearing to teach this Link swordsmanship and discipline - the Hero’s Shade being the spirit of the late Hero of Time himself. This is also debated, bc again it’s stated in the aforementioned book, but I feel like the game itself speaks to this a little better. He doesn’t always wear a scabbard, but it does appear during at least one of the hidden skill lessons - it’s the Master Sword’s scabbard, be it also decayed. You could say this is any ancient Hero then, sure. But then, most of the songs the Hero of Twilight howls to call the Hero’s Shade are specifically known by the Hero of Time, from both OOT & MM. Already knowing Time’s regretful and regret-filled fate, Twilight shows a lot of anxiety regarding his ancestor in LU

*The Hero of Light - Four Swords Adventures Many hundreds, possibly thousands of years after his second sealing, Vaati breaks out again (this Link is tricked into pulling the Four Sword which was acting as the seal, oops), and we also see Ganon reincarnated for the first time! Bc up to this point Ganondorf has all been the same man who just refuses to let go, but this is his first true rebirth. Both are defeated and an extra strength crystal seal is put on the Four Sword this time to keep all of that locked down

Downfall Timeline

An alternate timeline rather than a true split. The Hero of Time fails here. Ganon steals the two remaining Triforce pieces from Link and Zelda, and Zelda and the sages have to banish Ganon and the full Triforce to the Sacred Realm, a last resort move when no other options are left available - it’s not said outright but it’s widely assumed the Hero of Time is killed. This leads to the original Imprisoning War, until the sages seal off the Sacred Realm. Left to his devices, Ganon uses the Triforce to turn the Sacred Ream into the Dark World

*The Hero of Legend - A Link to the Past, Oracle of Ages & Oracle of Seasons, Link’s Awakening He’s called a veteran in LU for good reason with the most games under his belt, but in Zelda canon it’s only the four… at least, according to the original intent. It’s debatable now whether the Hero in the Oracle games is considered the same Hero in ALTTP and LA, but it’s pretty clear they were meant to be the same looking at the Oracle games’ ending. The true linked ending shows Link getting on a ship, it’s very similar to the start of Link’s Awakening. However, in the Oracle games Zelda acts as if she’s meeting Link for the first time. This is possibly why Nintendo swapped things around, however I don’t think shuffling the timeline was necessary. At the end of ALTTP Link makes a wish on the Triforce to undo all of the harm Ganon had done to Hyrule. The King and Link’s uncle are both returned to life, amongst several other events that are reversed. It’s not explained how the logistics of this wish are completed, but I could see it causing Zelda to forget Link, depending on how the Triforce decided to pull this off. Zelda lore is like soup sometimes ngl you can stir it as little or as much as you want

Note: The Hero of Legend, the Hero of Winds, and the Hero of Twilight all defeat the same Ganondorf/Ganon in separate timelines around the same distance of time from the end of OOT as a result of whatever the Hero of Time did or did not do in their respective timelines

*The Hero of Worlds - A Link Between Worlds & Tri Force Heroes This Link is not the same one as Legend, at least in regard to official Zelda canon. Some time has elapsed between canon Legend’s games and this Link’s games, we see that the Master Sword is a new concept to this Link, but in LU they’ve been compressed into one character, the Veteran. This Link is more often known as The New Hero of Hyrule, but that title is confusing with The Hero of Hyrule running around later down the timeline, so I don’t personally like to adhere to it

The Hero of Might - Echoes of Wisdom The rift walker! No bearing on LU at this time, this game didn’t exist when the lore/characters were established for the comic

*The Hero of Hyrule - The Hyrule Fantasy (Z1) & The Adventure of Link (Z2) Ganon is reawakened. This would be after his two, two, defeats by Legend; first in ALTTP, then again after a highly botched resurrection at the linked end of OOA & OOS. This is still the same Ganon from all the way back in OOT. But, at least in this timeline, he’s finally vanquished here by who we know as the Traveler in LU. Nintendo also refers to him as The Last Hero, in regard to this alternate timeline

The Wild Era

*The Hero of the Wild - Breath of the Wild & Tears of the Kingdom Many millennia separated from the others, and with more considerable gaps in lore/history between, we get Wild’s games, the Champion in LU. Tears of the Kingdom has very little bearing on LU as the Champion that we see in LU is between his two canon adventures. When LU started, Tears of the Kingdom didn’t exist yet, and so wasn’t written into his character or the lore at this point. You can summon Wolf Link (Twilight) via amiibo in BOTW as a travel companion, but he vanishes if you try to enter a town with him, his presence feels spirit-like. And this Ganondorf/Ganon is… maybe the third we’ve seen? The way Wild’s games fit with the rest of the timeline is questionable and non-specified. The main talking point is whether they overlap with any/all previous games or not. I personally adhere mostly to the Refounding Theory, which basically states Hyrule was destroyed in some prior cataclysm (the original great flood or maybe a second one perchance? Zelda Notes and Age of Imprisonment really hint that Wild Era Hyrule used to be at the bottom of a sea) and later on was refounded by King Rauru and Queen Sonia. I can also see points for the Original Founding theory, though I think it’s the weaker of the two

Non-Canon

*The Hero of War - Hyrule Warriors (the original one) This game is non-canon and it creates a whole messier mess of the timeline all on its own, but who we know in LU as the Captain is a very interesting and recognizable Link, and I’m glad JoJo included him. Post Majora’s Mask young Time (sometimes referred to as Mask) and post Wind Waker Wind (sometimes referred to as Tune) are guests in this game, among many other characters across the series bc severe time travel/portal shenanigans

The First Hero Another non-canon but fan fav Link is from the Pre-Skyward Sword manga found in Hyrule Hystoria. He knew Hylia before she shed her godhood, and he helped to forge the Goddess Sword that would later become the Master Sword at Sky’s hand. He’s a lionheart recognizable by his bold red cape. A diamond in the rough, you might say

* = This Link has seen something in reference to or has directly faced a Dark or Shadow Link (not counting the Echoes from EOW)

And there we go! I'm skipping over the CD-i games and the 80’s Zelda cartoon. The Link in the cartoon is technically Hyrule/Traveler as the cartoon was made to promote Zelda II, but his personality is about as faaar as it could be from the Hyrule we see in LU, so I wouldn’t really recommend if you’re a heavy LU ‘Rule fan. I do highly recommend all Zelda manga by Akira Himekawa, but bear in mind they’re all non-canon. Very fun though

Okay I’ve rambled enough. If this is helpful to even one person then that’s fantastic, otherwise if this is redundant or too long then I at least had fun writing it out. If you have any Zelda lore questions I’m down to help, I own all of the mainline and spin-off games (sans the CD-i games), the 80s cartoon, all of the Akira Himekawa manga, the Dark Horse companion books, plus a variety of extra materials, so if I don’t know something immediately I can mostly likely help you find the answer

Edit: Please also check comments for additional notes/corrections