Brewer's: Hugin and Munin

[mind and memory]. The two ravens that sit on the shoulders of Odin or Alfader.

“Perhaps the nursery saying, `A little bird told me that,' is a corruption of Hugo and Munin, and so we have the old Northern superstition lingering among us without our being aware of it.” —JuliaGoddard: Joyce Dormer's Story, ii. 11. (See Bird.)

Source: Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, E. Cobham Brewer, 1894
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