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King Rolf could not go himself by reason of a war that he had against the Saxons; but he sent to Adils his twelve Berserks, of whom were Bödvar Bjarki, Hjalti Stoutheart, Whiteserk Bold, Vött, Vidseti, and the brothers Svipdag and Beigud. In the battle then fought fell King Ali and a great part of his host. And King Adils took from the dead prince the helmet Battleboar and his horse Raven.
Frazer gives examples in the Golden Bough. Alien Wives. The Sister's Son. See Mr. Gummere's article in the English Miscellany; and Professor Rhys' Presidential Address to the Anthropological Section of the British Association, 1900. Swanmaids. See Hartland, Science of Fairy-Tales. The Waverlowe. Dr. For Svipdag and Menglad, see Study No. 12 of this series.
The waverlowe of the Volsung myth may be traced back to the midsummer fires; the wooing of Brynhild by Sigurd's crossing the fire would thus, like the similar bridal of Menglad and Svipdag and the winning of Gerd for Frey, be based on the marriages which formed a part of agricultural rites.
On this ground, she has been identified with the heroine of Svipdag and Menglad, a poem undoubtedly old, though it has only come down in paper MSS. It is in two parts, the first telling how Svipdag aroused the Sibyl Groa, his mother, to give him spells to guard him on his journey; the second describing his crossing the wall of fire which surrounded his fated bride Menglad.
If Rydberg, as seems very probable, is right in identifying Menglad and Svipdag with Freyja and the mortal lover who wins her and whom she afterwards loses, the story would be a parallel to those of Venus and Adonis, Ishtar and Tammuz, &c., which Frazer derives from the ritual marriage of human sacrifices to the Goddess of fertility.
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