Attack on Titan Timeline Explained
The Attack on Titan timeline spans roughly two thousand years, but the story only shows you about a dozen of them directly, and it shows them out of order on purpose. Here is the full chronology laid out straight, from Ymir’s contract to the final page, so every reveal lands where it actually belongs.
The full timeline at a glance
| Era | When | What happens |
|---|---|---|
| Ymir’s era | About 2,000 years before the story | Ymir gains the titan power, serves King Fritz, dies, her soul splits into nine |
| Eldian Empire | The next 1,700 years | The nine titan families conquer the world under the Fritz line |
| Great Titan War | Ending in year 743 | Marley turns the titans on each other, Karl Fritz retreats to Paradis and raises the walls |
| The walls era | 743 to 845 | A century of manufactured peace behind wiped memories |
| Grisha’s two lives | Roughly 817 to 845 | Marley, the Restorationists, the Attack Titan, a new family on Paradis |
| Fall of Wall Maria | Year 845 | The Colossal and Armored break the gate, Eren watches his mother die |
| The main story | 845 to 854 | Training, the battles for the walls, the basement, the sea |
| The Rumbling | Year 854 | Eren’s endgame, the alliance, the end of the power of the titans |
| After | 857 and far beyond | Rebuilding, Historia’s child, and a boy finding a tree |
Two thousand years ago: the girl who started everything
Ymir was a slave of the ancient Eldians. Hunted into a giant tree, she fell into water and touched the source of all organic matter, becoming the first titan. King Fritz used her power to crush his enemies, made her his concubine, and gave her nothing, not even a kind word. When she died shielding him from a spear, she simply chose not to get up again. Her soul split into the Nine Titans, her daughters were forced to eat her body, and the curse began: every holder of her power dies thirteen years after receiving it, because Ymir only lived thirteen years after touching the source. Everything in Attack on Titan, all of it, runs on the broken heart of one enslaved girl waiting in the Paths for someone to tell her she is free.
Year 743: the empire ends and the lie begins
After seventeen centuries of Eldian dominance, Marley engineered the Great Titan War by turning the titan families against each other. Karl Fritz, the 145th king, had grown to despise his own empire’s history. He took the Founding Titan and most Eldians to the island of Paradis, raised three walls made of millions of Colossal Titans, and erased the memories of nearly everyone inside. He then made a vow renouncing war, binding every royal successor to pacifism, and left the world a message: touch us and the titans in the walls will flatten you. The people of the walls lived a hundred years inside a lie so complete they thought they were the last humans alive.
817 to 845: Grisha’s two lives
On the mainland, Eldians survived in Marleyan internment zones. Grisha Yeager watched his sister fed to dogs for the crime of walking outside the zone, joined the Restorationists, married the royal blooded Dina Fritz, and raised his first son Zeke to be a spy who betrayed them all. Sent to the border as titan fodder, Grisha was saved by the Owl, Eren Kruger, who gave him the Attack Titan and a mission: get inside the walls, take the Founding. Grisha remarried on Paradis, and in year 835 his second son was born. He named him Eren.
845 to 850: the story you watched
Year 845: the Colossal Titan appears over Shiganshina, Wall Maria falls, and refugee Eren swears extermination. That same night Grisha injects his son with the Attack and Founding Titans and is eaten by him, a fact the story hides for three seasons. 847: Eren, Mikasa and Armin enter training with the 104th. 850: Trost, the female titan hunt, the coup that unseats the false crown, and the retaking of Shiganshina, where the basement finally opens and the entire scale of the world snaps into place. The tragedy of the timeline is that by 850, every disaster was already scheduled by choices made before Eren was born.
854: the Rumbling and the end
Four years of cold war follow the basement reveal. Eren infiltrates Marley, triggers war, and uses the Founding Titan’s full power to unharden the walls and march millions of Colossal Titans across the planet. The alliance of former enemies stops him at the cost of most of the world beyond the sea. Mikasa’s final act frees Ymir at last, the power of the titans leaves the world, and every shifter still alive returns to being human. Eren dies at nineteen, having chosen the role of the monster so his friends could be the heroes who slay it.
After 854: the long epilogue
Paradis rebuilds under Queen Historia, whose child begins the first generation born free of the curse. The epilogue pages leap forward through decades and then centuries, showing peace, then new wars, then a ruined city, and finally a boy and a dog finding a great tree that looks exactly like the one Ymir fell into. Whether that ending is a circle or just an echo is the fandom’s favorite argument, and the manga refuses to settle it.
Should you ever watch it in timeline order?
No, and it is worth saying plainly, because timeline viewing orders float around for other franchises. Attack on Titan is a mystery box built in reverse: the story works because you live inside the walls’ ignorance and lose it at the exact speed the characters do. Watching Grisha’s Marley years before season one would defuse the basement, the single greatest reveal in modern anime, and knowing Ymir’s origin early turns the Paths reveals into homework. Watch in release order, then come back to a chronology like this one afterward. The second viewing, with the timeline in your head, is nearly a different show: every early scene is full of things the animators placed for people who already know.
Questions fans keep asking
How long is the entire Attack on Titan timeline?
About two thousand years from Ymir’s contract to the finale, but the main story covers only nine years, 845 to 854, and Eren’s active role covers barely five.
Why did Karl Fritz erase everyone’s memories?
Guilt and design. He believed Eldia deserved punishment for its empire, so he built a sanctuary that was also a trap: a peaceful cattle pen whose people could not even remember the world that hated them. His vow renouncing war made sure no successor could undo it.
When does Eren get the Founding Titan?
Year 845, the night Wall Maria falls, when Grisha steals it from Frieda Reiss and passes both his titans to Eren. Neither Eren nor the audience learns this until the basement reveal in year 850.
For the deeper lore, our breakdown of all nine titans and their holders pairs directly with this timeline, and the explainers hub covers the rest of the series piece by piece.
My take: Attack on Titan is the rare story that gets better when you flatten it into order, because the chronology reveals the thesis: nobody in it is free. Ymir obeys for two thousand years, Karl hides for a hundred, Grisha is a weapon of two masters, and Eren becomes a slave to the future he saw. The timeline is not background. It is the villain.
