[4] In Saxo, as in other sources of about the same time, aspirated names do not usually occur with aspiration. I have already referred to the examples Handuuanus, Andvani, Helias, Elias, Hersbernus, Esbjörn, Hevindus, Eyvindr, Horvendillus, Orvandill, Hestia, Estland, Holandia, Oland.
[5] According to Gheysmer's synopsis. Saxo himself says nothing of the kind. The present reading of the passage in Saxo is distinctly mutilated.
[6] This Bugge, too, has observed, and he rightly assumes that the episode concerning the sword has been interpolated from some other source.
[7] This analysis will be given in the second part of this work in the treatise on the Balder-myth.
[8] As Jordanes confounded the mythological Gudhorm-Jormunrek with the historical Ermanarek, and connected with the history of the latter the heroic saga of Ammius-Hamdir, it lay close at hand to confound Hamdir with Heimdal, who, like Hamdir, is the foe of the mythical Jormunrek.
[9] Runic Monuments, by George Stephens.
[10] See for example Th. Wisén's investigations and Finnur Jonsson's Krit. Stud. (Copenhagen, 1884).
[11] The editions have changed Urdar to Urdr, and thereby converted the above-cited passage into nonsense, for which in turn the author of Forspjallsljod was blamed, and it was presented as an argument to prove that the poem is spurious.
[12] Holtzmann and Bergmann have long since pointed out that Harbard is identical with Loke. The idea that Harbard, who in every trait is Loke in Lokasenna, and, like him, appears as a mocker of the gods and boasts of his evil deeds and of his success with the fair sex, should be Odin, is one of the proofs showing how an unmethodical symbolic interpretation could go astray. In the second part of this work I shall fully discuss Harbardsljod. Proofs are to be found from the last days of heathendom in Iceland that it was then well known that the Harbard who is mentioned in this poem was a foe of the gods.
[13] When I come to consider the Balder-myth in the second part of this work, I shall point out the source from which the author of Gylfaginning, misunderstandingly, has drawn the conclusion that the man of exploits, the warrior, the archer, and the hunter Hoder was blind. The misunderstanding gave welcome support to the symbolic interpretation, which, in the blind Hoder, found among other things a symbol of night (but night has "many eyes").