Ynglingatal reports, as we have seen, that a certain Svegdir was deceived, when he was outside of the door of the hall of the kinsmen of Durner-Sokmimer. He who deceived him was the doorkeeper of the hall. The door appeared to be already open, and the "giant-inhabited" hall "yawned" festively illuminated (bjartr) toward Svegder. If we may believe Ynglingatal's commentary on the strophe, the hall-ward had called to him and said that Odin was inside. The strophe represents Svegder as running after the hall-ward, that is to say, toward the door in the rock, eager to get in. What afterwards happened Ynglingatal does not state; but that Svegder did not gain the point he desired, but fell into some snare laid by the doorkeeper, follows from the expression that he was deceived by him, and that this caused his death follows from the fact that the purpose of the strophe is to tell how his life ended. Ynglingasaga says that he got into the rock, but never out of it. The rest that this saga has to say of Svegder—that he was on a journey to the old Asgard in "Tyrkland," to find "Odin the old," Gylfaginning's King Priam—has nothing to do with the mythology and with Ynglingatal, but is of course important in regard to the Euhemeristic hypothesis in regard to the descent of the Asas from Tyrkland (Troy), on which the author of Ynglingatal, like that of Gylfaginning, bases his work.
The variations Svegdir, Svidgir, and Sveigdir are used interchangeably in regard to the same person (cp. Ynglingatal, 14, 15; Fornald., ii. 2; Fornm., i. 29; and Egilsson, 796, 801). Svigdir seems to be the oldest of these forms. The words means the great drinker (Egilsson, 801). Svigdir was one of the most popular heroes of mythology (see the treatise on the "Ivalde race"), and was already in heathen times regarded as a race-hero of the Swedes. In Ynglingatal (14) Svithiod is called geiri Svigdis, "Svigdir's domain." At the same time, Svegdir is an epithet of Odin. But it should be borne in mind that several of the names by which Odin is designated belong to him only in a secondary and transferred sense, and he has assumed them on occasions when he did not want to be recognised, and wanted to represent some one else (cp. Grimnersm., 49) whose name he then assumed.
When Odin visits the abode of Durinn-Sökkmimir, where the precious mead is preserved, he calls himself, according to Grimnersmal, Svidurr, Svidrir. Now it is the case with this name as with Svigdir, that it was connected with Svithiod. Skaldskaparmal (65) says that Svithiod var kallat af nafni Svidurs, "Svithiod was named after the name of Svidur."
Hence (1) the name Svidurr, like Svegdir-Svigdir, belongs to Odin, but only in a secondary sense, as one assumed or borrowed from another person; (2) Svidurr, like Svegdir-Svigdir, was originally a mythic person, whom tradition connected as a race hero with Svithiod.
From all this it appears that the names, facts, and the chain of events connect partly the strophes of Grimnersmal and Ynglingatal with each other, and partly both of these with Havamál's account of Odin's adventure to secure the mead, and this connection furnishes indubitable evidence that they concern the same episode in the mythological epic.
In the mythic fragments handed down to our time are found other epithets, which like Svigdir, refer to some mythical person who played the part of a champion drinker, and was connected with the myth concerning mead and brewing. These epithets are Ölvaldi, Ölmódr, and Sumbl finnakonungr, Sumblus phinnorum rex in Saxo. Sumbl, as a common noun, means ale, feast. In the "Finn-king" Sumbl these ideas are personified, just as the soma-drink in the Veda songs is personified in King Soma. In my treatise on the Ivalde race, I shall revert to the person who had these epithets, in order to make his mythological position clear. Here I shall simply point out the following: Havamál (110) makes one of the rimthurses, Suttung's guests, say:
Baugeith Odinn
hygg ec at unnit hafi;
hvat scal hans trygdom trua?
Suttung svikinn
han let sumbli fra
oc grætta Gunnlaudo.
The strophe makes the one who says this blame Odin for breaking the oath he took on the ring, and thus showing himself unworthy of being trusted in the promises and oaths he might give in the future, whereupon it is stated that he left Suttung deceitfully robbed of sumbl (Sumbl), and Gunlad in tears over a lost kinsman.
The expression that Suttung was deceitfully robbed of sumbl, to be intelligible, requires no other interpretation than the one which lies near at hand, that Suttung was treacherously deprived of the mead. But as the skald might have designated the drink lost by Suttung in a more definite manner than with the word sumbl, and as he still chose this word, which to his hearers, familiar with the mythology, must have called to mind the personal Sumbl (Ölvaldi Svigdir), it is not only possible, but, as it seems to me, even probable, that he purposely chose an ambiguous word, and wanted thereby to refer at the same time to the deceitfully captured mead, and to the intended son-in-law deceitfully lost; and this seems to me to be corroborated by the juxtaposition of Suttung's and Gunlad's loss. The common noun sumbl's double meaning as mead and "drink-feast" has also led M. B. Richert (page 14 in his treatise mentioned above) to assume that "the expression was purposely chosen in such a manner that the meaning should not be entirely limited and definite," and he adds: "A similar indefiniteness of statement, which may give rise to ambiguity and play of words, is frequently found in the old songs." Meanwhile, I do not include this probability in my evidence, and do not present it as the basis of any conclusions.
The name Suttung shows in its very form that it is a patronymic, and although we can furnish no linguistic evidence that the original form was Surtungr and characterised its possessor as son of Surtr, still there are other facts which prove that such was actually the case. The very circumstance that the skaldic drink which came into Suttung's possession is paraphrased with the expression sylgr Surts ættar, "the drink of Surt's race" (Fornmanna, iii. 3), points that way and the question is settled completely by the half-strophe quoted in the Younger Edda (i. 242), and composed by Eyvind Skaldaspiller, where the skaldic potion is called—