Part 5

The conversation between Fjolsvith and Svipdag ends when the latter gives his name, and requests the former to ask Menglad if she wishes to possess his love. Menglad then hastens to meet him, but before she shows what she feels for him, he must confirm with his own name and that of his father's that he really is the one he pretends to be - the one she has long been longing for. The young hero then says: Svipdagur eg heiti, Sólbjartur hét minn faðir (47).

When Fjolsvith asked Svipdag what the name of his father was, he answered: Springcold, Várkaldur (6); and I have already stated the reason why he was so called. Now he gives another name of his father - Sólbjartur - which also is a mere epithet, but still, as Svipdag must here speak plainly, it has to be such a name as can refer to his father in a distinct and definite manner.

Svipdag's mother, Groa, was married to Örvandill hinn frækni (Skáldskaparmál 25). The epithet Sólbjartur, "he who has a brightness like that of the sun," if it really refers to Orvandil, must be justified and explained by something that the mythology had to report of him. Of Orvandil, we know from the Skáldskaparmál that he and Groa had at least for a time been good friends of Thor; that on one of his expeditions in Jotunheim, north of the Elivogar rivers, the latter had met Orvandil and had carried him in his provision-basket across the water to his home; that Orvandil there froze his toe; that Thor broke this off, and, in honour of Orvandil, threw it up into the heavens, where it became that star which is called Orvandil's toe. Of ancient Teutonic star-names but very few have been handed down to our time, and it is natural that those now extant must be those of constellations or separate stars, which attracted attention on account of their appearance, or particularly on account of the strength of their light. One of them was "Orvandil's toe". By the name Orvandil (Earendel) a star was also known among the Teutons in Great Britain. After being converted to Christianity they regarded the Earendel star as a symbol of Christ. The Church had already sanctified such a view by applying to Christ the second epistle of Peter i. 19: "We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day-star arise in your hearts". The morning star became, as we read in a Latin hymn, "typus Christi".

But it would be a too hasty conclusion to assume that Orvandil's star and the morning star were identical in heathen times. All that we can assert with certainty is that the former must have been one of the brightest, for the very name Earendel gradually became in the Old English an abstract word meaning "splendour".

Codex Exoniensis has preserved a hymn to Christ, the introductory stanzas of which appear to be borrowed from the memory of a heathen hymn to Orvandil, and to have been adapted to Christ with a slight change:

From this Old English song it appears as if the Orvandil epithet Sólbjartur was in vogue among the Saxon tribes in England. We there find an apparent interpretation of the epithet in the phrases adapted to Earendel, "brightest (beorhtast) of angels" and "true beam of the sun". That Svipdag's name was well known in England, and that a Saxon royal dynasty counted him among their mythical forefathers, can be demonstrated by the genealogy of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. That Svipdag with sufficient distinctness might characterise his father as Sólbjartur is accordingly explained by the fact that Orvandil is a star-hero, and that the star bearing his name was one of the "brightest" in the heavens, and in brilliancy was like "a beam from the sun".