The Genre of Trolls - Doria

110
Jag har av gammalt folk hört en historia om bergtroll. Det var en barnmorska, som
förde korna till skogen. Då kom ett bergtroll fram till henne och bad om hennes hjälp,
men hon ville icke gå med trollet, förrän hon fick löfte om att bliva förd tillbaka till
samma ställe. Trollet förde henne genom en mängd underjordiska gångar och rum.
Sedan hon uträttat sitt ärende, fick hon en skjorta och en silversked, och sedan blev hon
förd till samma ställe, där hon varit. Skjortan hade den egenskapen, att den icke blev
annorlunda, blott hon inte talade om varifrån den kommit. Men hennes man begynte
att förundra sig, när skjortan aldrig härdades … och tvingade hustrun att bekänna, varifrån
hon tagit den. Då blev skjortan precis som andra skjortor: den härdades och tog
slut. (Hembygden 1911: 114)
I have heard a story of hill trolls from old folks. There was a midwife bringing her cows
into the forest. Then a hill troll came up to her and asked for her help, but she did not
want to go with the troll, before she got a promise to be brought back to the same place.
The troll led her through a number of subterranean tunnels and chambers. When she
had done her work, she received a shirt and a silver spoon, and then she was brought to
the same place in which she had been. The shirt had such a quality that it did not
change, if only she did not say whence it had come. But her husband began to wonder
when the shirt never got worn out … and forced his wife to confess where she had
taken it. Then the shirt became like any other shirt: it got worn out and was finished.
In those cases when an injunction of silence applies, it usually ends this
way: the receiver is too talkative, or is forced to divulge the secret, as in
this example sent in by Uno Sandvik. Sometimes speech is truly silver and
silence gold as the saying goes, especially when one fails to live up to it.
The trolls may ask for other services as well. Snåfsfrun (‘the Snåfs mistress’)
in the parish of Solf exchanged letters with several other trolls, and
people passing by her hill were sometimes entreated to deliver her mail. A
man was once travelling by boat to Sweden, and on the coast he met a troll
which wanted to send a letter to its sister living in the Snoffs hill in his
home village. He was supposed to deposit the letter by a mill, whence the
troll would take it. So it did, when he followed the instructions he was
given (SLS 65: 97). Another female troll is said to live in Öjberget in the
village of Sundom. The road passed by both hills, and the troll in Öjberget
once sent a letter with people going to Snåfs, saying that they should place
the letter at the base of the hill, which they did (SLS 280: 129).
Trolls can be very kind to men in financial difficulties. A peasant once
went to his brothers-in-law to ask for a loan, but when they refused, he
decided to try his luck with a troll living nearby. He cried the troll’s name,
called it lord and used many other fine titles, but no-one was to be seen.
Then he started abusing it, and that tactic certainly worked. The troll
Description of the Troll Tradition