'Finn', son of
Folcwald, was a legendary
Frisian lord. He is mentioned in
Widsith, in ''
Beowulf'', and in the
Finnsburg Fragment. There is also a Finn mentioned in
Historia Britonum.
He was married to
Hildeburh, a sister of the
Danish lord
Hnæf, and was killed in a fight with Hnæf's lieutenant
Hengest after Hnæf was himself killed by Frisians.
Here we reproduce a passage from ''Beowulf'' as translated by
Seamus Heaney (lines 1089–1090):
::''Finn, son of Folcwald,''
:''should honor the Danes,''
A possible reference to a lost tradition on Finn appears in
Snorri Sturluson's ''
Skáldskaparmál''. Snorri talks of the animosity between
Eadgils and
Onela (which also appears in ''
Beowulf''), and writes that Aðils (Eadgils) was in war with a Norwegian king named Áli (Onela). Áli died in the war, and Aðils took Áli's helmet ''Battle-boar'' and his horse Raven. The Danish berserkers who had helped him win the war demanded three pounds of gold each in pay, and two pieces of armour that nothing could pierce: the helmet battle-boar and the mailcoat ''Finn's heritage''. They also wanted the famous ring Svíagris. Aðils considered the pay outrageous and refused.
Finn is also a central character in ""Finn and Hengest"," a study by
J.R.R Tolkien, edited by
Alan Bliss and published posthumously in book form in
1982.