Moddan, Mórmaer of Caithness - Is the orkney saga the only source for him?

Oh and I'm just drooling to find out more about the evil Frakkok - is she more notorious than Gormflaith of Clontarf fame?

On Karl Hundason, see http://en.goldenmap.com/Karl_Hundason. This seems to be a very nice overview of the arguments. If you click Related, or if you do a Google site:en.goldenmap.com search, there is a wealth of related material.

For Frakkok, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Haakonsson. The Orkneyinga Saga itself tells the story much better ;)

As far as I know Frakkok and Moddan appear only in the Orkneyinga Saga. One of the Scandinavian curators might be able to suggest another source.

Oh, I love Frakkok of the poisoned frock (coat) -
Even the name makes you feel sad that you don't have kids to name right now: (I'd have a hard time choosing between 'Thoth" & "Horus' (for a girl :-), but 'Frakkok' - now that's a good contender. Just imagine: "FRAKKKOKKKK! What did I tell you about ... ! !!! :-)

Oh, I love the Orkneying Saga's stories about 'wicked' women generally. Nevermind that Malcolm - Duncan's grandpa- appears to have systematically murdered every male contender for his throne across 3!! generations: he's not depicted as the 'wicked king', but the women..:
Well Gormflaith stands as the Machiavellian manipulator behind the battle of Clontarf - playing 3 men against each other, and then watching from the safety of Dublin castle while every significant Irish aristocrat lineage is killed on the field below.

And i need to go and find the name of the woman in the sagas who happily killed off 3 brothers - who she'd taken as husbands one after the other. (Obviously she wasn't marrying them for their brains :-) The writing about that, if I recall - is understatedly hysterical.

No wonder Shakespeare finds his Lady Macbeth in these sagas. Evil women were never better written... :-) I love it.

More seriously: This link you posted about the identity of the saga's Karl Hundason, is a nicely succinct summary of the debate heretofor (that I will put on the profile):

"The identity of Karl Hundason, unknown to Scots and Irish sources, has long been a matter of dispute.
William Forbes Skene in his Highlanders of Scotland attempted to reconcile the conflicting witnesses of the Irish annals and the sagas. Skene's proposal was that Karl (or Kali) Hundason should be identified with one "Malcolm MacKenneth", a son of Kenneth III of Scotland (Cináed mac Duib), presented as the successor of Malcolm II (Máel Coluim mac Cináeda) in the northern parts of the kingdom while Duncan I (Donnchad mac Crínáin) ruled in the south. This theory was criticised by Robertson as being unnecessarily complex. Instead Robertson proposed that Hundason should be identified with Duncan I. The most popular candidate to be Karl Hundason is King Macbeth (Mac Bethad mac Findláich), whose father may be called "jarl Hundi" in Njál's saga.

However, the existence of Karl Hundason rests solely on the Orkneyinga saga, and more particularly on those elements of Arnórr jarlaskáld's Þórfinnsdrápa which are preserved in the saga. A degree of scepticism has been expressed by many writers from Robertson onwards, some going to so far as to suggest that the whole episode is poetic invention. Most recently Alex Woolf has suggested that the identity of Karl Hundason has been in plain sight all along. The Saga, when dealing with Thorfinn's childhood, mentions a brother named "Hvelp or Hundi" who was taken to Norway by King Olaf Trygvasson and died there. Woolf proposes that Karl Hundason, rather that being some hitherto unknown Scots king, was the son of Thorfinn's brother Hlodver Hundi. However, Thomson had already discussed this possibility in 2001, and urged caution as both Orkenyinga saga and St Olaf's saga suggest he only lived "a short while" and was unlikely to have had a son himself"
http://en.goldenmap.com/Karl_Hundason."

But I have Alex Woolf's book, "From Pictland to Alba" and this possibility is put forward as almost a peripheral comment by him, quite superficially - with not even an acknowledgement that in the saga Sigurd's turning against Christianity (& everything Olaf had forced him to bow down to, by taking his little boy - Hundi- as hostage) is associated with the fact that Hundi dies in Olaf's care (presumably quite young). Nothing in the saga is even suggestive that he becomes the father of the warlord Karl Hundasson before he dies. If the Saga is our only primary source for Woolf's conjecture (& I'll go a & doublecheck that it is) - then his not addressing these other facts from the saga really doesn’the give his theory much room to breathe.

Bill Robertson puts this - to my mind, more plausible, theory forward about the identity of Karl Hundasson - as the son of Crinan, on the Clan Donnachad page - http://www.electricscotland.com/webclans/ntor/rarticles1.html - but without sources SCREAAAMM!

"[http://www.geni.com/people/Cr%C3%ADn%C3%A1n-of-Dunkeld/600000000223... Crinan] was descended from the Tir Conaill royalty of Ireland, in descent from the kin of St. Columba. He was a great chief, and wielded power equal to the Mormears; he was Thane of the Isles and Abthane of Dull. His father was [Duncan, Abthane of Dule, Lay Abbot of Dunkeld, Mormaer of Atholl Duncan Macdonachadh], Abbot of Dunkeld, Archpriest of the Kindred of St. Columba. His Arms consisted of St. Columba enthroned on two wolves. In the Orkeyinua Saga he is called Hundi Jarl Chief of the Dogs, being Chief of the Clan with the fighting qualities of the Wolf. When attack on Dunkeld by Vikings could no longer be avoided he had the bones of St. Columba, which had been kept in Dunkeld Cathedral since 835, moved to safety. The Vikings attacked and sacked Dunkeld in 1045 and [http://www.geni.com/people/Cr%C3%ADn%C3%A1n-of-Dunkeld/600000000223... Crinan] died trying in vain to save the cathedral."

Karl Hundason actually does mean "a man, the son of dogs"

A stricter interpretation is "Churl, son of a b***h" - a very blatant insult.

Oh and Sharon, the lady with the three husbands is Hallgerd, from Njal's Saga. Her first husband was a wife-beater, so she incited her uncle Thjostolf to kill him, and he did. Her second husband was a relatively nice man, but they quarrelled one day, he slapped her, and Thjostolf killed *him* without Hallgerd asking him to (she was very angry with Thjostolf about that)

By the time she was ready for a third husband, Thjostolf was out of the picture (got himself killed in a quarrel, as I recall). This was Gunnar, the good friend whom Njal tried to advise on avoiding his fate. The short of it is, they quarrelled (over her high-handed behavior to the neighbors), he slapped her, she swore to pay him back, the neighbors ganged up on him, and he kept them off till his bowstring broke, and he asked her for some strands of her hair to replace it. She said no.... Read the story anyway, it's extraordinary writing.

there is no substitute for reading, however some good coverage here

https://youtu.be/74JhshYgP2A