[Footnote 4]: Baldur, the son of Odin, was slain by Hother, a Danish warrior, his rival in the affections of Nanna, a Norwegian princess.
[Footnote 5]: Fragment of an old Danish ballad entitled "Agneté and the Merman."
[Footnote 6]: One of the most ancient and characteristic ballads of the north. It is the subject of one of M. Ohlenschlager's most popular tragedies.
[Footnote 7]: The superstitious belief in the existence of mermen, prevailed in Denmark at no very remote period. It seems probable that the pirates or Vikings of the north availed themselves of this superstition, by assuming the disguise of mermen to scare the inhabitants from those coasts it was important they should possess. The adventures of some Scandinavian pirate and maiden probably gave rise to the curious old ballad of Agneté and the Merman. See the Danish "Kjæmpe Viser."--Translator.
[Footnote 8]: Fragment of an heroic ballad.
[Footnote 9]: Varulve (Manwolf) according to ancient superstition, a man who had been metamorphosed for a certain time into a wolf. The superstitions of the Scandinavians, as handed down in the Sagas and Kempe Vise (heroic ballads), partake so much of the character of Eastern fable, that there can be little doubt of their Asiatic origin.--Translator.
[Footnote 10]: Nidaros, the ancient name of Drontheim in Norway.
[Footnote 11]: "Vola's qvad," or "The Song of the Prophetess," is one of the most imaginative poems in the Elder Edda. It opens with an account of the springing forth of creation from chaos, and after announcing death as the final doom of all physical nature, ends by foretelling the rise of a better and brighter world, from the ocean in which the first had been engulphed.--Translator.
[Footnote 12]: The name of the ancient castle of Copenhagen, built by Bishop Absalon in the thirteenth century as a defence against pirates.