lived. King Helge fell in a war expedition; and Rolf Krake, who was then eight years old, was taken to be king in Leidre. King Adils had many disputes with a king called Ali of the Uplands; and these kings had a battle on the ice of the Venner lake, in which King Ali fell, and King Adils won the battle. There is a long account of this battle in the Skioldunga Saga, and also about Rolf Krake's coming to Adds, and sowing gold upon the Fyrisvold. King Adils was a great lover of good horses, and had the best horses of these times. One of his horses was called Slongvir, and another Raven. This horse he had taken from Ali on his death, and bred from him a horse, also called Raven, which the king sent in a present to King Godgest in Hllogaland, When Godgest mounted the horse he was not able to manage him, and fell off, and was killed. This accident happened at Omd in Halogaiand.[1] King Adils was at a Disa[2] sacrifice; and as he rode around the Disa hall his horse Raven stumbled and fell, and the king was thrown forward upon his head, and his scull was split, and his brains dashed out against a stone. Adils died at Upsal, and was buried there in a mound. The Swedes called him a great king. Thiodolf speaks thus of him:—
Witch-demons, I have heard men say,
Have taken Adils' life away.
The son of kings of Frey's great race,
First in the fray, the fight, the chase,
Fell from his steed—his clotted brains
Lie mixed with mire on Upsal's plains.
Such death (grim Fate has willed it so)
Has struck down Ali's deadly foe."
- ↑ Halogaland is the province of Norway now called Nordland, extending from the Namsin river north to Westfiord, where it joins the province of Finmark.
- ↑ Disar was the name given to the goddesses of the northern mythology; and Disa is supposed to have been Freya, in whose honour a great sacrifice, called Disa Blot, was held in mid-winter.
