Part 3

When Halfdan secured Groa, she was already the bride of Orvandel the brave, and the first son she bore in Halfdan's house was not his, but Orvandel's. The son's name is Svipdag. He develops into a hero who, like Halfdan himself, is the most brilliant and most beloved of those celebrated in Teutonic songs. We have devoted a special part of this work to him (see Nos. 96-107). There we have given proofs of various mythological facts, which I now already must incorporate with the following series of events in order that the epic thread may not be wanting:

(a) Groa bears with Halfdan the son Guthorm (Saxo, Hist. Dan. 34).
(b) Groa is rejected by Halfdan (Saxo, Hist. Dan., 33). She returns to Orvandel, and brings with her her own and his son Svipdag.
(c) Halfdan marries Signý-Alveig (Hyndluljóð 15; Prose Edda, i. 516; Saxo, Hist., 33), and with her becomes the father of the son Hadding (Saxo, Hist. Dan. 34).
(d) Groa dies, and Orvandel marries again (Gróugaldr 3). Before her death Groa has told her son that if he needs her help he must go to her grave and invoke her (Gróugaldr 1).
(e) It is Svipdag's duty to revenge on Halfdan the disgrace done to his mother and the murder of his mother's father Sigtrygg. But his stepmother bids Svipdag seek Menglad, "the one loving ornaments" (Gróugaldr 3).
(f) Under the weight of these tasks Svipdag goes to his mother's grave, bids her awake from her sleep of death, and from her he receives protecting incantations (Gróugaldr).
(g) Before Svipdag enters upon the adventurous expedition to find Menglad, he undertakes, at the head of the giants, the allies of the Ívaldi sons (see Fjölsvinnsmál 1, where Svipdag is called þursa þjóðar sjólr [dubious!]), a war of revenge against Halfdan (Saxo, 33 ff., 325; cp. Nos. 102, 103). The host of giants is defeated, and Svipdag, who has entered into a duel with his stepfather, is overcome by the latter. Halfdan offers to spare his life and adopt him as his son. But Svipdag refuses to accept life as a gift from him, and answers a defiant no to the proffered father-hand. Then Halfdan binds him to a tree and leaves him to his fate (Saxo, Hist., 325 ; cp. No. 103).
(h) Svipdag is freed from his bonds through one of the incantations sung over him by his mother (Gróugaldr 10).
(i) Svipdag wanders about sorrowing in the land of the giants. Gevarr-Nökkvi, god of the moon (see Nos. 90, 91), tells him how he is to find an irresistible sword, which is always attended by victory (see No. 101). The sword is forged by Þjazi, who intended to destroy the world of the gods with it; but just at the moment when the smith had finished his weapon he was surprised in his sleep by Mimir, who put him in chains and took the sword. The latter is now concealed in the lower world (see Nos. 98, 101, 103).
(j) Following Gevarr-Nökkvi's directions, Svipdag goes to the northernmost edge of the world, and finds there a descent to the lower world; he conquers the guard of the gates of Hades, sees the wonderful regions down there, and succeeds in securing the sword of victory (see Nos. 53, 97, 98, 101, 103, 112).
(k) Svipdag begins a new war with Halfdan. Thor fights on his son's side, but the irresistible sword cleaves the hammer Mjölnir; the Asa-god himself must yield. The war ends with Halfdan's defeat. He dies of the wounds he has received in the battle (see Nos. 101, 103; cp. Saxo, Hist., 34).
(l) Svipdag seeks and finds Menglad, who is Freyja who was robbed by the giants. He liberates her and sends her pure and undefiled to Asgard (see Nos. 96, 98, 100, 102).
(m) Iðunn is brought back to Asgard by Loki. Þjazi, who is freed from his prison at Mimir's, pursues, in the guise of an eagle, Loki to the walls of Asgard, where he is slain by the gods (see the Eddas).
(n) Svipdag, armed with the sword of victory, goes to Asgard, is received joyfully by Freyja, becomes her husband, and presents his sword of victory to Frey. Reconciliation between the gods and the Ívaldi race. Njord marries Þjazi's daughter Skaði. Orvandel's second son Ullr, Svipdag's half-brother (see No. 102), is adopted in Valhall. A sister of Svipdag is married to Forseti (Hyndluljóð 20). The gods honour the memory of Þjazi by connecting his name with certain stars (Hárbarðsljóð 19). A similar honour had already been paid to his brother Orvandel (Prose Edda).

From this series of events we find that, although the Teutonic patriarch finally succumbs in the war which he waged against the Þjazi-race and the frost-powers led by Þjazi's kinsmen, still the results of his work are permanent. When the crisis had reached its culminating point; when the giant hosts of the fimbul-winter had received as their leader the son of Orvandel, armed with the irresistible sword; when Halfdan's fate is settled; when Thor himself, Miðgarðs véurr (Völuspá), the mighty protector of earth and the human race, must retreat with his lightning hammer broken into pieces, then the power of love suddenly prevails and saves the world. Svipdag, who, under the spell of his deceased mother's incantations from the grave, obeyed the command of his stepmother to find and rescue Freyja from the power of the giants, thereby wins her heart and earns the gratitude of the gods. He has himself learned to love her, and is at last compelled by his longing to seek her in Asgard. The end of the power of the fimbul-winter is marked by Freyja's and Iðunn's return to the gods by Þjazi's death, by the presentation of the invincible sword to the god of harvests (Frey), by the adoption of Þjazi's kinsmen, Svipdag, Ull, and Skadi in Asgard, and by several marriage ties celebrated in commemoration of the reconciliation between Asgard's gods and the kinsmen of the great artist of antiquity.