Friesland. In early times the Frisians occupied a much greater extent of coast than now, reaching from the boundary between Holland and Belgium on one side to beyond the mouth of the Weser on the other—apart from the Frisians inhabiting the west coast of Slesvig.
The 'blood-eagle' was a form of vengeance practised by the heathen Scandinavians in battle when anyone captured the slayer of his father. The ribs were cut in the shape of an eagle, and the lungs torn out through the opening. The Northumbrian King Ella (Ælla) is said to have been put to death in this way by the sons of Ragnar Lothbrók. Cf. the Saga of Ragnar Loðbrók and his sons, ch. 18; also the Tháttr of Ragnar's Sons, ch. 3.
Hugin and Munin were Othin's attendant ravens who gave him information. See Grímnismál, str. 20; Gylfaginning, ch. 38; Ynglingasaga (Heimskringla), ch. 7.
The story of Sigurth Fafnisbani. The whole story of the loves of Sigurth and Brynhild is related in the Völsunga Saga, ch. 20-32. It is uncertain whether the reference here is to the Völsunga Saga as we have it or to an earlier form of the story.
VII.[°] Gjuki is mentioned under the form Gebica in the Lex Burgundionum (c. 500 a.d.). Nothing more is known of him from historical sources; but he is mentioned in Skáldskaparmál, ch. 41, Völsunga Saga ch. 25, and in the Edda Poems, as the father of Gunnar and Guthrún. His name appears also (as Gifica, Gibicho, etc.) in the Anglo-Saxon poem Widsiþ, the Latin poem Waltharius, and in several early German poems.
Sigurth Hring, a legendary king of Sweden and Denmark, and the father of Ragnar Loðbrók. His story is related at length in a fragment of the Skjöldunga Saga; and he is probably identical with the Sigifridus who is mentioned in several Frankish Chronicles under the year 812 as carrying on hostilities against another Danish King Anulo.
The sons of Gandalf were in constant hostility with King Harold the Fairhaired and his father. They owned Alfheimar and Vingulmörk along the Swedish coast of the Kattegat. Cf. the Story of Halfdan the Black (Heimskringla), ch. 1, 4; also the Story of Harold the Fairhaired (Heimskringla), ch. 1 etc.
Gunnar and Högni. The story of the relations of Gunnar and Högni with Sigurth is told in Völsunga Saga, ch. 26 f.