A thrall was a slave or serf in Scandinavian lands during the Viking Age. The status of slave (þræll, þēow) contrasts with that of the freeman (karl, ceorl) and the nobleman (jarl, eorl).
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👉 Thrall in the context of Fróði
Fróði (Old Norse: Frōði; Old English: Frōda; Middle High German: Vruote) is the name of a number of legendary Danish kings in various texts including Beowulf, Snorri Sturluson's Prose Edda and his Ynglinga saga, Saxo Grammaticus' Gesta Danorum, and the Grottasǫngr. A Danish king by this name also appears as a minor character in the Middle High German epic Rabenschlacht. The name is possibly an eponym for the god Freyr.
- The Fróði of the Grottasǫngr is said to be the son of Fridleif, the son of Skjǫldr. According to Ynglinga saga it was in this Fróði's beer that King Fjǫlnir drowned. Snorri Sturluson here and in the Skáldskaparmál make this Fróði the contemporary of Roman emperor Augustus and comments on the peacefulness of his reign, referred to as Fróði's Peace, suggesting a relationship to the birth of Christ. Though Icelandic sources make this Fróði a very early Danish king, in Gesta Danorum (Book 5), Saxo puts him late in his series of rulers, though including the chronological equation with Augustus and mentioning the birth of Christ.
- The Fróði who, according to Ynglinga saga and Gesta Danorum, was the father of Halfdan. He would have lived in the 5th or 6th century. He appears to be the same king who later in the Ynglinga saga aided the Swedish king Ongenþeow in defeating the thrall Tunni. Because of this, Egil and his son Ottar (Ohthere) became tributaries to the Danish king.
- Fróði the father of Ingjald, who in Beowulf is Froda the father of Ingeld and king of the Heathobards. The existence of the Heathobards has been forgotten in Norse texts and this Fróði there sometimes appears as the brother of Halfdan with the long hostility between Heathobards and Danes becoming a family feud between Halfdan and his brother Fróði. Fróði kills Halfdan and is himself slain by Halfdan's sons Helgi (Halga) and Hroar (Hrothgar). (In Arngrímur Jónsson's Latin summary to the lost Skjöldunga saga the names Fróði and Ingjald are interchanged. Saxo Grammaticus (Book 6) makes this Fróði instead to be a very late legendary king, the son of Fridleif son of Saxo's late peaceful Fróði. Saxo knows some of the story of this feud but nothing of any relationship to Halfdan. Instead Saxo relates how this Fróði was slain by Saxons and how, after a marriage alliance between his son Ingel and a Saxon princess to heal the feud, Ingel opened it again at the urging of an old warrior, just as the hero Beowulf prophesies of Ingjald in the poem Beowulf.
- A legend from Ydre in the South Swedish highlands tells that a king known as Frode was killed by Urkon, the same cow that created Lake Sommen.
The form Fróði is still in use in Icelandic and Faroese and appears Latinized as Frotho or Frodo. The latter form of the name is used by J. R. R. Tolkien in The Lord of the Rings for the main character of the story, Frodo Baggins. Alternative anglicizations are Frode, Fródi, Fróthi and Frodhi. The Danish, Norwegian and Swedish form is Frode. The meaning of the name is "clever, learned, wise".
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Thrall in the context of Iceland
Iceland is a Nordic island country between the Arctic Ocean and the North Atlantic Ocean, located on the Mid-Atlantic Ridge between Europe and North America. It is culturally and politically linked with Europe and is the region's westernmost and most sparsely populated country. Its capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which is home to about 36% of the country's roughly 390,000 residents (excluding nearby towns/suburbs, which are separate municipalities). The official language of the country is Icelandic. Iceland is on a rift between tectonic plates, and its geologic activity includes geysers and frequent volcanic eruptions. The interior consists of a volcanic plateau with sand and lava fields, mountains and glaciers, and many glacial rivers flow to the sea through the lowlands. Iceland is warmed by the Gulf Stream and has a temperate climate, despite being at a latitude just south of the Arctic Circle. Its latitude and marine influence keep summers chilly, and most of its islands have a polar climate.
According to the Landnámabók, an ancient manuscript, the settlement of Iceland began in 874 AD, when the Norwegian chieftain Ingólfr Arnarson became the island's first permanent settler. In following centuries, Norwegians and to a lesser extent other Scandinavians, immigrated to Iceland, bringing with them thralls (i.e., slaves or serfs) of Gaelic origin. The island was governed as an independent commonwealth under the native parliament, the Althing, one of the world's oldest functioning legislative assemblies. After a period of civil strife, Iceland acceded to Norwegian rule in the 13th century. In 1397, Iceland followed Norway's integration into the Kalmar Union along with the kingdoms of Denmark and Sweden, coming under de facto Danish rule upon its dissolution in 1523. The Danish kingdom introduced Lutheranism by force in 1550, and the Treaty of Kiel formally ceded Iceland to Denmark in 1814.
Thrall in the context of Faroe Islands
The Faroe Islands (/ˈfɛəroʊ/ FAIR-oh) (alt. the Faroes) are an archipelago in the North Atlantic Ocean and an autonomous territory of the Kingdom of Denmark. Located between Iceland, Norway, and the Hebrides and Shetland isles of Scotland, the islands have a population of 54,885 as of September 2025 and a land area of 1,393 km². The official language is Faroese, which is partially mutually intelligible with Icelandic. The terrain is rugged, dominated by fjords and cliffs with sparse vegetation and few trees. As a result of their proximity to the Arctic Circle, the islands experience perpetual civil twilight during summer nights and very short winter days; nevertheless, they experience a subpolar oceanic climate and mild temperatures year-round due to the Gulf Stream. The capital, Tórshavn, receives the fewest recorded hours of sunshine of any city in the world at only 840 per year.
Færeyinga saga and the writings of Dicuil place initial Norse settlement in the early 9th century, with Grímur Kamban recorded as the first permanent settler. As with the subsequent settlement of Iceland, the islands were mainly settled by Norwegians and Norse-Gaels who also brought thralls (i.e. slaves or serfs) of Gaelic origin. However, new study has found that Viking colonizers of the Faroe Islands and nearby Iceland had different origins.
Thrall in the context of Hjörleifr Hróðmarsson
Hjǫrleifr Hróðmarsson (Old Norse: [ˈhjɔrˌlɛivz̠ ˈhroːðˌmɑrsˌson]; Modern Icelandic: Hjörleifur Hróðmarsson [ˈçœrˌleiːvʏr ˈr̥ouðˌmar̥sˌsɔːn]; Modern Norwegian: Leif Rodmarsson) was an early settler in Iceland. The story of the early settlement of Iceland is told in the compilation known as Landnámabók.
Hjörleifr was the blood brother of Ingólfr Arnarson, the first settler of Iceland in the late 9th century. While raiding in Ireland, he found an underground passage and killed a man to take his sword. From this event his original name Leifr was lengthened to Hjǫrleifr (Old Norse hjǫrr: 'sword'). Hjörleifr settled on land on the mountain Hjörleifshöfði (east of Vík) which was named after him. He was later murdered by his thralls, many of whom were Irish or Scottish. The fugitive slaves were killed by Ingólfr Arnarson, thereby saving all the women who were held captive by the slaves.