The text of Grougaldr, ‘Groa’s Incantation’, and its partner text, Fjolvinnsmal, ‘Fjolvinn’s Speech’ (together known as Svipdagsmal), has come down to us in texts dating from the C17th.
Bridal Quest romances became popular in Scandinavia in the early Middle Ages and it seems to me that here an older myth has been reworked in a more fashionable guise. (This can be compared to the sagas of the warrior poets, such as The Saga of Gunnlaug Serpent-tongue, where the older themes of heroism met the new, European themes of romantic love.) A clear indication of this is seen when Menglath, in her penultimate stanza, says ‘ath thu ert aftr kominn mogr til minna sala’ – ‘that you are returned to my hall’, implying he has already been there before. … Read more