What We Know About Aang's Parents In The Last Airbender
Mia Walsh Not much is known about Aang’s life before the events of Avatar: The Last Airbender, including his family. Here's what we know about his parents.
Not much is known about Aang’s life before he was frozen in an iceberg. While Avatar: The Last Airbender did show snippets of his past with the Air Nomads, the identity of his parents wasn’t explored. The lack of information might be due to the Air Nomad culture and how they dealt with the existence of the Avatar among their numbers. Unlike the other three nations, the Air Nomads were a monastic order with a specific set of traditions and beliefs, and this shaped Aang’s past and his relationship with his parents (or lack thereof).
Just like real-life martial arts inspired Avatar's bending powers in the show, the Air Nomads were based on Hindu and Tibetan monks. Before they were wiped out by the Fire Nation, they were a pacifist society run by monks and nuns. When they were not out flying around the world on their bisons, they stayed in their four temples. Each temple had a Council of Elders, which ruled over its citizens. At their core, air nomads believed in equality, pacifism, preserving nature, and fostering detachment from the physical world. Their strong spirituality also provides a hint as to why Aang’s parents weren’t present during his childhood.
It’s possible that once an Air Nomad baby was born and reached a certain age, he or she was taken to another air temple to be raised by either monks or nuns, depending on the baby’s gender. This would help the children learn air bending techniques by letting go of earthly attachments and focusing on their spiritual journey. In the case of Aang, this separation would be even more important because of his identity as the Avatar. As a baby, he selected the Avatar relics from thousands of toys, proving he was Roku’s successor. After the test, he was taken away to be trained by the monk Gyatso, who became Aang’s guardian.
Aang and Gyatso were very close, forming a bond similar to father and son. They played games together and Gyatso helped Aang during difficult times. However, it was their closeness that led to tragedy. Because Gyatso was against accelerating Aang’s training, the Council of Elders decreed that he was too attached to the boy and that they had to be separated from each other. Once Aang heard this, he ran away, ending up trapped in an iceberg for a hundred years. The council reaction to Gyatso and Aang’s bond proves Air Nomads do not approve of close relationships, especially if they are affecting a child’s training.
So, what else is known about Aang’s parents? They were definitely airbenders, as all air nomads were born with bending powers. His mother either lived in the Eastern Air Temple or Western Air Temple, because both of those exclusively housed nuns and female Air Nomads. Meanwhile, his father was likely living in the Northern Air Temple, the other male-only monastery, since the Council of Elders would likely want to keep him separated from Aang, who spent most of his childhood in the Southern Air Temple.
