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this kind are frequent enough in all remote ages.
With regard to the time when this Poem was composed, if we may judge from the language of the original as we have it at present, it should seem to be of the thirteenth or fourteenth century: but it certainly must be of a far more distant period; since the manners described in it, and the Pagan religion, which is more than once alluded to, incontestibly belong to times preceding the tenth century. It is therefore very probable, that the language and stile of this Poem have been occasionally reformed and modernized, as often as was necessary to render it intelligible. It’s being so general a favourite throughout the north, must have invited more Poets than one to do the public this acceptable service. Mr. Biorner informs us, that he himself had heard it sung in his youth, with some slight alterations, by the Peasants of Medelpadia and Angermania, Provinces which lie to the north of Stockholm. As to what he asserts farther, that the Heroes celebrated in it must have lived in the third century, it is a point very difficult to maintain with any certainty.
