Thorns twine                      the stone threshold
Of the home of Jotuns,            the hard highlands
Eastward lying,                   that ever are gripped
By grinding ice,                  by ill etins haunted,
High on flint legs,               these  looming fiends,
Rock hulks                        heaving stones,
Throng to threaten                and twart farers
Through their world,              so wild and uncouth.
Ugly trolls                       to their utmost strive
Against Aesir and Vanir,          and all Their works;
As heedless as iron               of the ire of trees
Who boldly choose                 to chide giants.
They are as briars and brambles   in bitter thickets,
Or prickling hedges               hemming a stead:
Breakers of flesh and bone,       blood-drawers,
Thurse strength                   thrusting thoughtless
Hindering all that frees,         helping all that binds;
He is flayed alive                who fights thorny hooks,
But wariness and care             may outwit them,
Or calling upon Thor,             Who thrashes their ilk,
Comes as storm,                   strikes as lightning,
All that brood,                   banes of holiness,
Of wretched wights                the ways He cleans,
Worse gives than gets,            the Weilder of Mjollner,
Throws down His hammer,           Thundering Holiness.

The vast land of the giants is known as Útgardr. It lies outside the Miðgarðr wall which Odin, Vili, and Vé built of the eyebrows of the Ur-giant Ymir to keep the destructive Jötunar at bay. Jötunheimr is located in the east and the north at a rocky wild sea coast where giants, rimthurses, jotuns and trolls live in mountain caves or in rich country estates surrounded by sky high mountains.