ungir saman varom i árdaga, vel mættim tvæir truasc.
SVIPDAG'S GRANDFATHER IS IVALDE. ORVANDEL, VOLUND, AND SLAGFIN THEREFORE IDENTICAL WITH IVALDE'S SONS.
In the mythology we read that elves smithied splendid treasures for Frey (Grimnersmal, 42; Younger Edda, i. 140, 340). Among these treasures were the remarkable ship _Skidbladnir_ and the gold-glittering boar _Slidrugtanni_, also called Gullinbursti (Younger Edda, i. 176, 264, 340-344), both clearly symbols of vegetation. The elves that smithied these treasures are called Ivalde's sons, and constitute the same group of brothers whose gifts to the gods, at the instigation of Loke, are subjected to a public examination by the Asas and by them found wanting as compared with Sindre's products. It would be most surprising, nay, quite incredible, if, when other artists made useful presents to Frey, the elf-prince Volund and his brothers did not do likewise, inasmuch as he is the chief smith of them all, and inasmuch as he, with his brother Orvandel-Egil, has taken upon himself the duties of a foster-father toward the young harvest-god, among which duties one was certainly to care for his good and enable him to perform the important task devolving on him in the administration of the world.
From this standpoint already it is more than probable that the same artist who in the heroic saga of the Teutonic tribes, under the name Volund, Wieland, Weland, by the side of Mimer, plays the part of the foremost smith that antiquity knew is the same one as in the mythology was the most excellent smith; that is, the most skilful one among Ivalde's sons. This view is perfectly confirmed as to its correctness by the proofs which I shall now present.
Of Ivalde, Fornspjallsljod says that he had two groups of children, and that Idun, the goddess of vegetation, belonged to one of these groups:
Álfa ættar Ithunni heto Ivallds ellri ýngsta barna.
Idun is, therefore, a sister of the celebrated artists, the sons of Ivalde. In Volundarkvida, Volund and Slagfin are brothers or half-brothers of the dises of vegetation, who are together with them in the Wolfdales (see str. 2). According to Fornspjallsljod, Idun was for a time absent from Asgard, and stayed in a winter-cold land near Narfe-Mimer's daughter Nat, and in company with persons whose names and epithets indicate that they were smiths, primeval artists (_Rögnir_ and _Regin_; see Nos. 113, 115, and the epithet _viggiar_, a synonym of _smidar_--Younger Edda, i. 587). Thus we read precisely the same of Idun as of the swan-maids and vegetation-dises who dwelt for a time in the Wolfdales with Volund and his brothers. Further on it shall be demonstrated that the name of Volund's father in the introduction of Volundarkvida and the name given to the father of Volund's and Slagfin's swan-maids are synonyms, and refer to one and the same person. But if we for the present leave this proof out, and confine ourselves to the evidences already presented, then the question concerning the identity of the Ivalde sons with the group of brothers Volund, Egil, and Slagfin assumes the following form: