[49]. The Dvergar clan of Dvalin, who is not mentioned before, seems to have been the highest among all the Dvergar.
From Alvismal we may infer that the Dvergar were related to the Thursar.
[50]. There seems to be something missing between the stanzas 16 and 17, unless the poet means the host of the Dvergar, who were under the three above-named chiefs.
[51]. It seems that the house in which Ask and Embla were to live was in existence already. Ask means ash-tree, like Yggdrasil; Embla only occurs here in the Völuspa, and it is most difficult consequently to give a meaning to it; the elm-tree is called alm, and perhaps is here meant to be in contrast to the ash.
[52]. Odin, Hœnir, and Lodur gave them life. Hœnir is mentioned in the later Edda. Lodur is only mentioned in the beginning of Heimskringla.
[53]. Jarnvid, or iron forest; the word is only found here and in the Later Edda. The old one means a Jötun woman, Angrboda, by whom Loki begat the Fenrir wolf (‘Later Edda,’ c. 34).
[54]. The son of Fenrir. According to the prose Edda Mánagarm is the name of the son of the Fenrir wolf who swallowed the moon. See Gylfaginning, c. 12.
[55]. A third bird not named lives in the halls of Hel. They represent the Jötnar, the Asar, and the third Hel (the home of the dead), and seem to be the wakers of these three different realms.
[56]. The Asar, after taking Loki, bound him to a rock with fetters made of the entrails of his son, Vali (who must not be confused with his namesake, Baldr’s brother).
“Now Loki was without any truce taken to a cave. They took three slabs, set them on edge, and made a hole in each. They took the sons of Loki, Vali and Nari or Narfi, and changed Vali into a wolf which tore Narfi asunder. Then they took his entrails and with them tied Loki over the three slabs; one was under his shoulders, another under his loins, the third under his knees, and these bands changed into iron. Then Skadi (a goddess) took a poisonous serpent and fastened it above him, so that the poison should drip into his face; but his wife Sigyn stands at his side, and holds a vessel under the poison-drops. When it is full she goes out to pour it down, but in the meanwhile the poison drips into his face; then he shudders so hard that the whole earth trembles; that you call earthquake. There he lies in bands till the doom of the gods” (Gylfaginning, c. 50).