Part 5

It has already been stated that Fridlevus-Njord rescues a princely youth from the power of the giants. According to Saxo, the event was an episode in the feud between Fridlevus-Njord and Anundus (Volund), and Avo, the archer (Orvandil-Egil). This corroborates the theory that the rescued youth was Frey, Volund's and Egil's foster-son. The first one of the gods to be seized by fears on account of the judgment passed on Ivaldi's sons ought, naturally, to be Njord, whose son Frey was at that time in the care and power of Volund and Egil (see No. 109). We also learn from Saxo that Fridlevus took measures to propitiate the two brothers. He first sends messengers, who on his behalf woo the daughter of Anund-Volund, but the messengers do not return. Anund had slain them. Thereupon Fridlevus goes himself, accompanied by others, and among the latter was a "mediator". The name of the mediator was Bjorno, and he was one of those champions who constituted the defence of that citadel, which Fridlevus afterwards captured, and which we have recognised as Asgard (see No. 36). Thus Bjorno is one of the Asas, and there are reasons, which I shall discuss later, for assuming him to be Baldur's brother Höður. The context shows that Fridlevus' journey to Ivaldi's sons and meeting with them takes place while there was yet hope of reconciliation, and before the latter arrived in the inaccessible Wolfdales, which are situated below the Na-gates in the subterranean Jotunheim. On the way thither they must have been overtaken by Fridlevus, and doubtless the event occurred there which Saxo relates, and of which an account in historical form is preserved in the Longobardian migration saga.

The meeting did not lead to reconcilation, but to war. Avo, the archer (Orvandil-Egil; see Nos. 108, 109) appeared on the one side and challenged Fridlevus-Njord to a duel. Bjorno became angry that a person of so humble descent as this Avo dared to challenge the noble-born Fridlevus, and in his wrath he drew his bow to fell "the plebeian" with an arrow. Thus Bjorno also was an archer. But Avo anticipated him, and an arrow from him severed Bjorno's bow-string from the bow. While Bjorno was tying the string again, there came from Avo a second arrow, which passed between his fingers without hurting him, and then there came a third arrow, which shot away Bjorno's arrow just as he was placing it on the string. Then the Ivaldi sons continued their departure. Bjorno let loose a molossus he had with him to pursue them, probably the same giant-dog or giant wolf-dog which Saxo describes in a preceding chapter (Book VI, p. 163) as being in Bjorno's possession, and which before had guarded the giant Offote's herds. But this molossus was not able to prevent those fleeing from reaching their destination in safety. In all probability Frey had already been delivered by his wards to the giants when this happened. This must have occurred on the way between the abode abounding in gold, where Ivaldi's sons had formerly lived in happiness, and the Wolfdales, and so within Jotunheim, where the gods were surrounded by foes.

The story of this adventure on the journey of the emigrating Ivaldi sons reappears in a form easily recognised in Paulus Diaconus, where he tells of the emigration of the Longobardians under Ibor (Orvandil-Egil; see No. 108) and Ajo (Volund). In Saxo Avo-Egil, who belongs to the race of elves, becomes a lowborn champion, while the Vana-god Njord becomes King Fridlevus. In Paulus the saga is not content with making the great archer of the emigrants a plebeian, but he is made a thrall who challenges a chosen free-born warrior among the foes of the Longobardians. In the mythology and in Saxo the duel was fought with bows and arrows, and the plebeian was found to be far superior to his opponent. Paulus does not name the kind of weapons used, but when it had ended with the victory of "the thrall," an oath was taken on an arrow that the thralls were to be freed from their chains by the Longobardians. Consequently the arrow must have been the thrall's weapon of victory. In the mythology, the journey of the Ivaldi sons to the Wolfdales was down to the lower world Jotunheim and northward through Niflhel, inhabited by thurses and monsters. Both in Saxo and Paulus this sort of beings take part in the adventures described. In Saxo, Fridlevus' war-comrade Bjorno sends a monster in the guise of a dog against the sons of Ivaldi. In Paulus, according to the belief of their enemies, the emigrants had as their allies "men with dog-heads".

Bjorno is an Asa-god; and he is described as an archer who had confidence in his weapon, though he proved to be inferior to Avo in the use of it. Among the gods of Asgard only two archers are mentioned - Höður and Ullur. At the time when this event occurred Ull had not yet been adopted in Asgard. As has been shown above (see No. 102), he is the son of Orvandil-Egil and Sif. His abode is still with his parents when Svipdag, his half-brother, receives instructions from Sif to seek Frey and Freyja in Jotunheim (see No. 102), and he faithfully accompanies Svipdag through his adventures on this journey. Thus Ull is out of the question - the more so as he would in that case be opposing his own father. Hodur (Höður) is mentioned as an archer both in the Beowulf poem, where he, under the name Hædcyn, shoots Baldur-Herebeald accidentally with his "horn-bow," and in Saxo (arcus peritia pollebat - Book III, p. 69), and in Christian tales based on myths, where he appears by the name Héðinn. That Bjorno, mentioned by Saxo as a beautiful youth, is Hodur is confirmed by another circumstance. He is said to be sequestris ordinis vir (Book VI), an expression so difficult to interpret that scholars have proposed to change it into sequioris or equestris ordinis vir. The word shows that Bjorno in Saxo's mythological authorities belonged to a group of persons whose functions were such that they together might be designated as a sequestris ordo. Sequester means a mediator in general, and in the law language of Rome it meant an impartial arbitrator to whom a dispute might be referred. The Norse word which Saxo, accordingly, translated with sequestris ordo, "the mediators," "the arbitrators," can have been none other than the plural ljónar, a mythological word, and also an old legal term, of which it is said in Skáldskaparmál 82: Ljónar heita þeir menn, er ganga um sættir manna, "ljónar are called those men whose business it is to settle disputes". That this word ljónar originally designated a certain group of Asa-gods whose special duty it was to act as arbitrators is manifest from the phrase ljóna kindir, "the children of the peacemakers," an expression inherited from heathendom and applied to mankind far down in Christian times; it is an expression to be compared with the phrase megir Heimdallar, "Heimdal's sons," which also was used to designate mankind. In Christian times the phrase "children of men" was translated with the heathen expression ljóna kindir, and when the recollection of the original meaning of ljónar was obliterated, the word, on account of this usage, came to mean men in general (viri, homines), a signification which it never had in the days of heathendom.

Three Asa-gods are mentioned in our mythological records as peacemakers - Baldur, Hodur, and Baldur's son, Forseti. Baldur is mentioned as judge in Gylfaginning 22. As such he is líknsamastur - that is, "the most influential peacemaker". Of Forseti, who inherits his father's qualities as judge, it is said in Grímnismál 15 that he svæfir allar sakir, "settles all disputes". Hodur, who both in name and character appears to be a most violent and thoughtless person, seems to be the one least qualified for this calling. Nevertheless he performed the duties of an arbitrator by the side of Baldur and probably under his influence. Saxo (Book III, p. 71) speaks of him as a judge to whom men referred their disputes - consueverat consulenti populo plebiscita depromere - and describes him as gifted with great talents of persuasion. He had eloquentiæ suavitatem, and was able to subdue stubborn minds with benignissimo sermone (p. 69). In Völuspá 60 the human race which peoples the renewed earth is called burir bræðra tveggja, "the sons of the two brothers," and the two brothers mentioned in the preceding strophe are Baldur and Hodur. Herewith is to be compared ljóna kindir in Völuspá 14. In Hárbarðsljóð 42 the insolent mocker of the gods, Harbard, refers to the miserable issue of an effort made by jafnendur, "the arbitrators," to reconcile gods with certain ones of their foes. I think it both possible and probable that the passage refers to the mythic event above described, and that it contains an allusion to the fact that the effort to make peace concerned the recovery of Frey and Freyja, who were delivered as "brides" to naughty giants, and for which "brides" the peacemakers received arrows and blows as compensation. Compare the expression bæta mundi baugi and Thor's astonishment, expressed in the next strophe, at the insulting words, the worst of the kind he ever heard. Saxo describes the giant in whose power Frey is, when he is rescued by his father, as a cowardly and enervated monster whose enormous body is a moles destituta rubore (Book VI, p. 167). In this manner ended the effort of the gods to make peace. The three sons of Ivaldi continue their journey to the Wolfdales, inaccessible to the gods, in order that they thence might send ruin upon the world.