Page 2
The
present study forms a sequel to No. 12 (The Edda: Divine Mythology of the
North), to which the reader is referred for introductory matter and for the
general Bibliography. Additional bibliographical references are given, as the
need occurs, in the notes to the present number.
July 1902.
Page 3
Sigemund
the Waelsing and Fitela, Aetla, Eormanric the Goth and Gifica of Burgundy,
Ongendtheow and Theodric, Heorrenda and the Heodenings, and Weland the Smith:
all these heroes of Germanic legend were known to the writers of our earliest
English literature. But in most cases the only evidence of this knowledge is a
word, a name, here and there, with no hint of the story attached. For
circumstances directed the poetical gifts of the Saxons in England towards
legends of the saints and Biblical paraphrase, away from the native heroes of
the race; while later events completed the exclusion of Germanic legend from
our literature, by substituting French and Celtic romance. Nevertheless, these
few brief references in Beowulf and in the small group of heathen
English relics give us the right to a peculiar interest in the hero-poems of
the Edda. Page 4In
studying these heroic poems, therefore, we are confronted by problems entirely
different in character from those which have to be considered in connexion with
the mythical texts. Those are in the main the product of one, the Northern,
branch of the Germanic race, as we have seen (No. 12 of this series), and the
chief question to be determined is whether they represent, however altered in
form, a mythology common to all the Germans, and as such necessarily early; or
whether they are in substance, as well as in form, a specific creation of the
Scandinavians, and therefore late and secondary. The heroic poems of the Edda,
on the contrary, with the exception of the Helgi cycle, have very close
analogues in the literatures of the other great branches of the Germanic race,
and these we are able to compare with the Northern versions.
The
Edda contains poems belonging to the following heroic cycles:
(a)
Weland the Smith.—Anglo-Saxon literature has several references to this
cycle, which must have been a very popular one; and there is also a late
Continental German version preserved in an Icelandic translation. But the poem
in the Edda is the oldest connected form of the story.
(b)
Sigurd and the Nibelungs.—Again the oldest reference is in Anglo-Saxon.
There Page
5are two well-known
Continental German versions in the Nibelungen Lied and the late
Icelandic Thidreks Saga, but the Edda, on the whole, has preserved an earlier
form of the legend. With it is loosely connected
(c)
The Ermanric Cycle.—The oldest references to this are in Latin and
Anglo-Saxon. The Continental German version in the Thidreks Saga is
late, and, like that in the Edda, contaminated with the Sigurd story, with
which it had originally nothing to do.
(d)
Helgi.—This cycle, at least in its present form, is peculiar to the
Scandinavian North.
All
the above-named poems are contained in Codex Regius of the Elder Edda. From
other sources we may add other poems which are Eddic, not Skaldic, in style, in
which other heroic cycles are represented. The great majority of the poems deal
with the favourite story of the Volsungs, which threatens to swamp all the
rest; for one hero after another, Burgundian, Hun, Goth, was absorbed into it.
The poems in this part of the MS. differ far more widely in date and style than
do the mythological ones; many of the Volsung-lays are comparatively late, and
lack the fine simplicity which characterises the older popular poetry.
Völund.—The lay of Völund, the wonderful smith,
the Weland of the Old English poems and Page 6the only Germanic hero who survived for
any considerable time in English popular tradition, stands alone in its cycle,
and is the first heroic poem in the MS. It is in a very fragmentary state, some
of the deficiencies being supplied by short pieces of prose. There are two
motives in the story: the Swan-maids, and the Vengeance of the Captive Smith.
Three brothers, Slagfinn, Egil and Völund, sons of the Finnish King, while out
hunting built themselves a house by the lake in Wolfsdale. There, early one
morning, they saw three Valkyries spinning, their swancoats lying beside them.
The brothers took them home; but after seven years the swan-maidens, wearied of
their life, flew away to battle, and did not return.
“Seven
years they stayed there, but in the eighth longing seized them, and in the
ninth need parted them.” Egil and Slagfinn went to seek their wives, but Völund
stayed where he was and worked at his forge. There Nithud, King of Sweden, took
him captive:
“Men went by night in studded mailcoats; their shields shone by
the waning moon. They dismounted from the saddle at the hall-gable, and went in
along the hall. They saw rings strung on bast which the hero owned, seven
hundred in all; they took them off and put, them on again, all but one. The
keen-eyed archer Völund came in from hunting, from a far road.... He sat on a
bear-skin and counted his rings, and the prince of the elves missed one; he
thought Hlodve's Page 7daughter, the fairy-maid, had come back. He sat
so long that he fell asleep, and awoke powerless: heavy bonds were on his
hands, and fetters clasped on his feet.”
They
took him away and imprisoned him, ham-strung, on an island to forge treasures for
his captors. Then Völund planned vengeance:
”'I see on Nithud's girdle the sword which I knew keenest and
best, and which I forged with all my skill. The glittering blade is taken from
me for ever; I shall not see it borne to Völund's smithy. Now Bödvild wears my
bride's red ring; I expect no atonement.' He sat and slept not, but struck with
his hammer.”
Nithud's
children came to see him in his smithy: the two boys he slew, and made
drinking-cups for Nithud from their skulls; and the daughter Bödvild he
beguiled, and having made himself wings he rose into the air and left her
weeping for her lover and Nithud mourning his sons.
In
the Old English poems allusion is made only to the second part of the story;
there is no reference to the legend of the enchanted brides, which is indeed
distinct in origin, being identical with the common tale of the fairy wife who
is obliged to return to animal shape through some breach of agreement by her
mortal husband. This incident of the compact (i.e., to hide the swan-coat,
to refrain from asking the wife's name, or whatever it may have been) has been
lost in the Völund Page 8tale. The Continental version is told in the late Icelandic Thidreks
Saga, where it is brought into connexion with the Volsung story; in this
the story of the second brother, Egil the archer, is also given, and its
antiquity is supported by the pictures on the Anglo-Saxon carved whale-bone box
known as the Franks Casket, dated by Professor Napier at about 700 A.D. The
adventures of the third brother, Slagfinn, have not survived. The Anglo-Saxon
gives Völund and Bödvild a son, Widia or Wudga, the Wittich who appears as a
follower of Dietrich's in the Continental German sources.
The
Volsungs.—No story
better illustrates the growth of heroic legend than the Volsung cycle. It is
composite, four or five mythical motives combining to form the nucleus; and as
it took possession more and more strongly of the imagination of the early
Germans, and still more of the Scandinavians, other heroic cycles were brought
into dependence on it. None of the Eddic poems on the subject are quite equal
in poetic value to the Helgi lays; many are fragmentary, several late, and only
one attempts a review of the whole story. The outline is as follows: Sigurd the
Volsung, son of Sigmund and brother of Sinfjötli, slays the dragon who guards
the Nibelungs' hoard on the Glittering Heath, and thus inherits the curse which
Page
9accompanies the
treasure; he finds and wakens Brynhild the Valkyrie, lying in an enchanted
sleep guarded by a ring of fire, loves her and plights troth with her;
Grimhild, wife of the Burgundian Giuki, by enchantment causes him to forget the
Valkyrie, to love her own daughter Gudrun, and, since he alone can cross the
fire, to win Brynhild for her son Gunnar. After the marriage, Brynhild
discovers the trick, and incites her husband and his brothers to kill Sigurd.
The
series begins with a prose piece on the Death of Sinfjötli, which says that
after Sinfjötli, son of Sigmund, Volsung's son (which should be Valsi's son,
Volsung being a tribal, not a personal, name), had been poisoned by his
stepmother Borghild, Sigmund married Hjördis, Eylimi's daughter, had a son
Sigurd, and fell in battle against the race of Hunding. Sigmund, as in all
other Norse sources, is said to be king in Frankland, which, like the Niderlant
of the Nibelungen Lied, means the low lands on the
Gripisspa (the Prophecy of Gripi), which follows,
is appropriately placed first of the Volsung poems, since it gives a summary of
the whole story. Sigurd rides to see his mother's brother, Gripi, the wisest of
men, to ask about his destiny, and the soothsayer Page 10prophesies his adventures and early
death. This poem makes clear some original features of the legend which are
obscured elsewhere, especially in the Gudrun set; Grimhild's treachery, and
Sigurd's unintentional breach of faith to Brynhild. In the speeches of both
Gripi and Sigurd, the poet shows clearly that Brynhild had the first right to
Sigurd's faith, while the seer repeatedly protests his innocence in breaking
it: “Thou shalt never be blamed though thou didst betray the royal maid.... No
better man shall come on earth beneath the sun than thou, Sigurd.” On the other
hand, the poet gives no indication that Brynhild and the sleeping Valkyrie are
the same, which is a sign of confusion. Like all poems in this form, Gripisspa
is a late composition embodying earlier tradition.
The
other poems are mostly episodical, though arranged so as to form a continued
narrative. Gripisspa is followed by a compilation from two or more poems
in different metres, generally divided into three parts in the editions: Reginsmal
gives the early history of the treasure and the dragon, and Sigurd's battle
with Hunding's sons; Fafnismal, the slaying of the dragon and the advice
of the talking birds; Sigrdrifumal, the awakening of the Valkyrie. Then
follows a fragment on the death of Sigurd. All the rest, except the poem
generally called the Third, or Short, Sigurd Lay (which tells of
the marriage with Gudrun and Sigurd's wooing Page 11of Brynhild for Gunnar) continue the
story after Sigurd's death, taking up the death of Brynhild, Gudrun's mourning,
and the fates of the other heroes who became connected with the legend of the
treasure.
In
addition to the poems in the Elder Edda, an account of the story is given by
Snorri in Skaldskaparmal, but it is founded almost entirely on the
surviving lays. Völsunga Saga is also a paraphrase, but more valuable,
since parts of it are founded on lost poems, and it therefore, to some extent,
represents independent tradition. It was, unfortunately from a literary point
of view, compiled after the great saga-time was over, in the decadent
fourteenth century, when material of all kinds, classical, biblical, romantic,
mythological, was hastily cast into saga-form. It is not, like the Nibelungen
Lied, a work of art, but it has what in this case is perhaps of greater
importance, the one great virtue of fidelity. The compiler did not, like the
author of the German masterpiece, boldly recast his material in the spirit of
his own time; he clung closely to his originals, only trying with hesitating
hand to copy the favourite literary form of the Icelander. As a saga,
therefore, Völsunga is far behind not only such great works as Njala,
but also many of the smaller sagas. It lacks form, and is marred by
inconsistencies; it is often careless in grammar and diction; it is full of
traces of the decadent Page 12romantic age. Sigurd, in the true spirit of romance, is endowed
with magic weapons and supernatural powers, which are no improvement on the
heroic tradition, “Courage is better than a good sword.” At every turn, Odin is
at hand to help him, which tends to efface the older and truer picture of the
hero with all the fates against him; such heroes, found again and again in the
historic sagas, more truly represent the heathen heroic age and that belief in
the selfishness and caprice of the Gods on which the whole idea of sacrifice
rests. There is also the inevitable deterioration in the character of Brynhild,
without the compensating elevation in that of her rival by which the Nibelungen
Lied places Chriemhild on a height as lofty and unapproachable as that
occupied by the Norse Valkyrie; the Brynhild of Völsunga Saga is
something of a virago, the Gudrun is jealous and shrewish. But for actual
material, the compiler is absolutely to be trusted; and Völsunga Saga is
therefore, in spite of artistic faults, a priceless treasure-house for the real
features of the legend.
There
are two main elements in the Volsung story: the slaying of the dragon, and the
awakening and desertion of Brynhild. The latter is brought into close connexion
with the former, which becomes the real centre of the action. In the
Anglo-Saxon reference, the fragment in Beowulf, the second episode does
not appear. Page 13
In
this, the oldest version of the story, which, except for a vague reference to
early feats by Sigmund and Sinfjötli, consists solely of the dragon adventure,
the hero is not Sigurd, but Sigemund the Waelsing. All that it tells is that
Sigemund, Fitela (Sinfjötli) not being with him, killed the dragon, the guardian
of the hoard, and loaded a ship with the treasure. The few preceding lines only
mention the war which Sigmund and Sinfjötli waged on their foes. They are there
uncle and nephew, and there is no suggestion of the closer relationship
assigned to them by Völsunga Saga, which tells their story in full.
Sigmund,
one of the ten sons of Volsung (who is himself of miraculous birth) and the
Wishmaiden Hlod, is one of the chosen heroes of Odin. His twin-sister Signy is
married against her will to Siggeir, an hereditary enemy, and at the
wedding-feast Odin enters and thrusts a sword up to the hilt into the tree
growing in the middle of the hall. All try to draw it, but only the chosen
Sigmund succeeds. Siggeir, on returning to his own home with his unwilling
bride, invites her father and brothers to a feast. Though suspecting treachery,
they come, and are killed one after another, except Sigmund who is secretly
saved by his sister and hidden in the wood. She meditates revenge, and as her
two sons grow up to the age of ten, she tests their courage, and finding it
wanting makes Page 14Sigmund kill both: the expected hero must be a Volsung through
both parents. She therefore visits Sigmund in disguise, and her third son,
Sinfjötli, is the child of the Volsung pair. At ten years old, she sends him to
live in the wood with Sigmund, who only knows him as Signy's son. For years
they live as wer-wolves in the wood, till the time comes for vengeance. They
set fire to Siggeir's hall; and Signy, after revealing Sinfjötli's real parentage,
goes back into the fire and dies there, her vengeance achieved:
“I killed my children, because I thought them too weak to avenge
our father; Sinfjötli has a warrior's might because he is both son's son and
daughter's son to King Volsung. I have laboured to this end, that King Siggeir
should meet his death; I have so toiled for the achieving of revenge that I am
now on no condition fit for life. As I lived by force with King Siggeir, of
free will shall I die with him.”
Though
no poem survives on this subject, the story is certainly primitive; its savage
character vouches for its antiquity. Völsunga then reproduces the
substance of the prose Death of Sinfjötli mentioned above, the object of
which, as a part of the cycle, seems to be to remove Sinfjötli and leave the
field clear for Sigurd. It preserves a touch which may be original in
Sinfjötli's burial, which resembles that of Scyld in Beowulf: his father
lays him in a boat steered by an old man, which immediately disappears. Page 15
Sigmund
and Sinfjötli are always close comrades, “need-companions” as the Anglo-Saxon
calls them. They are indivisible and form one story. Sigurd, on the other hand,
is only born after his father Sigmund's death. Völsunga says that
Sigmund fell in battle against Hunding, through the interference of Odin, who,
justifying Loki's taunt that he “knew not how to give the victory fairly,”
shattered with his spear the sword he had given to the Volsung. For this again
we have to depend entirely on the prose, except for one line in Hyndluljod:
“The Father of Hosts gives gold to his followers;... he gave Sigmund a sword.”
And from the poems too, Sigurd's fatherless childhood is only to be inferred
from an isolated reference, where giving himself a false name he says to Fafni:
“I came a motherless child; I have no father like the sons of men.” Sigmund,
dying, left the fragments of the sword to be given to his unborn son, and
Sigurd's fosterfather Regin forged them anew for the future dragon-slayer. But
Sigurd's first deed was to avenge on Hunding's race the death of his father and
his mother's father. Völsunga tells this story first of Helgi and
Sinfjötli, then of Sigurd, to whom the poems also attribute the deed. It is
followed by the dragon-slaying.
Up to
this point, the story of Sigurd consists roughly of the same features which
mark that of Sigmund and Sinfjötli. Both are probably, like Page 16Helgi, versions of a race-hero myth. In
each case there is the usual irregular birth, in different forms, both
familiar; a third type, the miraculous or supernatural birth, is attributed by Völsunga
to Sigmund's father Volsung. Each story again includes a deed of vengeance, and
a dragon and treasure. The sword which the hero alone could draw, and the
wer-wolf, appear only in the Sigmund and Sinfjötli version. Among those
Germanic races which brought the legend to full perfection, Sigurd's version
soon became the sole one, and Sigmund and Sinfjötli practically drop out.
The
Dragon legend of the Edda is much fuller and more elaborate than that of any
other mythology. As a rule tradition is satisfied with the existence of the
monster “old and proud of his treasure,” but here we are told its full previous
history, certain features of which (such as the shape-shifting) are signs of
antiquity, whether it was originally connected with the Volsungs or not.
As
usual, Völsunga gives the fullest account, in the form of a story told
by Regin to his foster-son Sigurd, to incite him to slay the dragon. Regin was
one of three brothers, the sons of Hreidmar; one of the three, Otr, while in
the water in otter's shape, was seen by three of the Aesir, Odin, Loki and
Hoeni, and killed by Loki. Hreidmar demanded as wergild enough gold to fill the
otter's Page 17skin,
and Loki obtained it by catching the dwarf Andvari, who lived in a waterfall in
the form of a fish, and allowing him to ransom his head by giving up his
wealth. One ring the dwarf tried to keep back, but in vain; and thereupon he
laid a curse upon it: that the ring with the rest of the gold should be the death
of whoever should get possession of it. In giving the gold to Hreidmar, Odin
also tried to keep back the ring, but had to give it up to cover the last hair.
Then Fafni, one of the two remaining sons, killed his father, first victim of
the curse, for the sake of the gold. He carried it away and lay guarding it in
the shape of a snake. But Regin the smith did not give up his hopes of
possessing the hoard: he adopted as his foster-son Sigurd the Volsung, thus
getting into his power the hero fated to slay the dragon.
The
curse thus becomes the centre of the action, and the link between the two parts
of the story, since it directly accounts for Sigurd's unconscious treachery and
his separation from Brynhild, and absolves the hero from blame by making him a
victim of fate. It destroys in turn Hreidmar, the Dragon, his brother Regin,
the dragon-slayer himself, Brynhild (to whom he gave the ring), and the
Giukings, who claimed inheritance after Sigurd's death. Later writers carried
its effects still further.
This
narrative is also told in the pieces of prose Page 18interspersed through Reginsmal.
The verse consists only of scraps of dialogue. The first of these comprises
question and answer between Loki and the dwarf Andvari in the form of the old
riddle-poems, and seems to result from the confusion of two ideas: the
question-and-answer wager, and the captive's ransom by treasure. Then follows
the curse, in less general terms than in the prose: “My gold shall be the death
of two brothers, and cause strife among eight kings; no one shall rejoice in
the possession of my treasure.” Next comes a short dialogue between Loki and
Hreidmar, in which the former warns his host of the risk he runs in taking the
hoard. In the next fragment Hreidmar calls on his daughters to avenge him;
Lyngheid replies that they cannot do so on their own brother, and her father
bids her bear a daughter whose son may avenge him. This has given rise to a
suggestion that Hjördis, Sigurd's mother, was daughter to Lyngheid, but if that
is intended, it may only be due to the Norse passion for genealogy. The next
fragment brings Regin and Sigurd together, and the smith takes the young
Volsung for his foster-son. A speech of Sigurd's follows, in which he refuses
to seek the treasure till he has avenged his father on Hunding's sons. The rest
of the poem is concerned with the battle with Hunding's race, and Sigurd's
meeting with Odin by the way. Page 19
The
fight with Fafni is not described in verse, very little of this poetry being in
narrative form; but Fafnismal gives a dialogue between the wounded
dragon and his slayer. Fafni warns the Volsung against the hoard: “The ringing
gold and the glowing treasure, the rings shall be thy death.” Sigurd disregards
the warning with the maxim “Every man must die some time,” and asks questions
of the dragon in the manner of Vafthrudnismal. Fafni, after repeating
his warning, speaks of his brother's intended treachery: “Regin betrayed me, he
will betray thee; he will be the death of both of us,” and dies. Regin returning
bids Sigurd roast Fafni's heart, while he sleeps. A prose-piece tells that
Sigurd burnt his fingers by touching the heart, put them in his mouth, and
understood the speech of birds. The advice given him by the birds is taken from
two different poems, and partly repeats itself; the substance is a warning to
Sigurd against the treachery plotted by Regin, and a counsel to prevent it by
killing him, and so become sole owner of the hoard. Sigurd takes advantage of
the warning: “Fate shall not be so strong that Regin shall give my
death-sentence: both brothers shall go quickly hence to Hel.” Regin's enjoyment
of the hoard is therefore short. The second half of the story begins when one
of the birds, after a reference to Gudrun, guides Sigurd to the sleeping Valkyrie:
Page
20
“Bind up the red rings, Sigurd; it is not kingly to fear. I know a
maid, fairest of all, decked with gold, if thou couldst get her. Green roads
lead to Giuki's, fate guides the wanderer forward. There a mighty king has a
daughter; Sigurd will buy her with a dowry. There is a hall high on Hindarfell;
all without it is swept with fire.... I know a battle-maid who sleeps on the
fell, and the flame plays over her; Odin touched the maid with a thorn, because
she laid low others than those he wished to fall. Thou shalt see, boy, the
helmed maid who rode Vingskorni from the fight; Sigrdrifa's sleep cannot be
broken, son of heroes, by the Norns' decrees.”
Sigrdrifa
(dispenser of victory) is, of course, Brynhild; the name may have been
originally an epithet of the Valkyrie, and it was probably such passages as
this that misled the author of Gripisspa into differentiating the
Valkyrie and Brynhild. The last lines have been differently interpreted as a
warning to Sigurd not to seek Brynhild and an attempt to incite him to do so by
emphasising the difficulty of the deed; they may merely mean that her sleep
cannot be broken except by one, namely, the one who knows no fear. Brynhild's
supernatural origin is clearly shown here, and also in the prose in Sigrdrifumal.
Völsunga Saga, though it paraphrases in full the passages relating to the
magic sleep, removes much of the mystery surrounding her by providing her with
a genealogy and family connections; while the Nibelungen Lied goes
further still in the same direction by leaving out Page 21the magic sleep. The change is a natural
result of Christian ideas, to which Odin's Wishmaidens would become
incomprehensible.
Thus
far the story is that of the release of the enchanted princess, popularly most
familiar in the nursery tale of the Sleeping Beauty. After her broken questions
to her deliverer, “What cut my mail? How have I broken from sleep? Who has
flung from me the dark spells?” and his answer, “Sigmund's son and Sigurd's
sword,” she bursts into the famous “Greeting to the World”:
“Long have I slept, long was I sunk in sleep, long are men's
misfortunes. It was Odin's doing that I could not break the runes of sleep.
Hail, day! hail, sons of day! hail, night! Look on us two with gracious eyes,
and give victory to us who sit here. Hail, Aesir! hail, Asynjor! hail, Earth,
mother of all! give eloquence and wisdom to us the wonderful pair, and hands of
healing while we live.”
She
then becomes Sigurd's guardian and protectress and the source of his wisdom, as
she speaks the runes and counsels which are to help him in all difficulties;
and from this point corresponds to the maiden who is the hero's benefactress,
but whom he deserts through sorcery: the “Mastermaid” of the fairy-tales, the
Medeia of Greek myth. Gudrun is always an innocent instrument in drawing Sigurd
away from his real bride, the actual agent being her witch-mother Grimhild.
This part of the story is summarised in Gripisspa, except that the Page 22writer seems unaware that the Wishmaiden
who teaches Sigurd “every mystery that men would know” and the princess he
betrays are the same:
“A king's daughter bright in mail sleeps on the fell; thou shalt
hew with thy sharp sword, and cut the mail with Fafni's slayer.... She will
teach thee every mystery that men would know, and to speak in every man's
tongue.... Thou shalt visit Heimi's dwelling and be the great king's joyous
guest.... There is a maid fair to see at Heimi's; men call her Brynhild,
Budli's daughter, but the great king Heimi fosters the proud maid.... Heimi's
fair foster-daughter will rob thee of all joy; thou shalt sleep no sleep, and
judge no cause, and care for no man unless thou see the maiden. ... Ye shall
swear all binding oaths but keep few when thou hast been one night Giuki's
guest, thou shalt not remember Heimi's brave foster-daughter.... Thou shalt
suffer treachery from another and pay the price of Grimhild's plots. The
bright-haired lady will offer thee her daughter.”
Völsunga gives additional details: Brynhild knows
her deliverer to be Sigurd Sigmundsson and the slayer of Fafni, and they swear
oaths to each other. The description of their second meeting, when he finds her
among her maidens, and she prophesies that he will marry Giuki's daughter, and
also the meeting between her and Gudrun before the latter's marriage, represent
a later development of the story, inconsistent with the older conception of the
Shield-maiden. Sigurd gives Brynhild the ring Andvaranaut, which belonged to
the hoard, as a pledge, and takes it from her again Page 23later when he woos her in Gunnar's form.
It is the sight of the ring afterwards on Gudrun's hand which reveals to her
the deception; but the episode has also a deeper significance, since it brings
her into connection with the central action by passing the curse on to her.
According to Snorri's paraphrase, Sigurd gives the ring to Brynhild when he
goes to her in Gunnar's form.
For
the rest of the story we must depend chiefly on Gripisspa and Völsunga.
The latter tells that Grimhild, the mother of the Giukings, gave Sigurd a magic
drink by which he forgot Brynhild and fell in love with Giuki's daughter.
Gudrun's brothers swore oaths of friendship with him, and he agreed to ride
through the waverlowe, or ring of fire, disguised and win Brynhild for the eldest
brother Gunnar. After the two bridals, he remembered his first passing through
the flame, and his love for Brynhild returned. The Shield-maiden too
remembered, but thinking that Gunnar had fairly won her, accepted her fate
until Gudrun in spite and jealousy revealed the trick that had been played on
her. Of the treachery of the Giukings Brynhild takes little heed; but death
alone can pay for Sigurd's unconscious betrayal. She tells Gunnar that Sigurd
has broken faith with him, and the Giukings with some reluctance murder their
sister's husband. Brynhild springs on to the funeral pyre, and dies with
Sigurd. Völsunga makes the murder take place in Page 24Sigurd's chamber, and one poem, the Short
Sigurd Lay, agrees. The fragment which follows Sigrdrifumal, on the
other hand, places the scene in the open air:
“Sigurd was slain south of the Rhine; a raven on a tree called
aloud: 'On you will Atli redden the sword; your broken oaths shall destroy
you.' Gudrun Giuki's daughter stood without, and these were the first words she
spoke: 'Where is now Sigurd, the lord of men, that my kinsmen ride first?'
Högni alone made answer: 'We have hewn Sigurd asunder with the sword; the grey
horse still stoops over his dead lord.'”
This
agrees with the Old Gudrun Lay and with the Continental German version,
as a prose epilogue points out.
Of
the Giuking brothers, Gunnar appears only in a contemptible light: he gains his
bride by treachery, and keeps his oath to Sigurd by a quibble. Högni, who has
little but his name in common with Hagen von Tronje of the Nibelungen Lied,
advises Gunnar against breaking his oath, but it is he who taunts Gudrun
afterwards. The later poems of the cycle try to make heroes out of both; the
same discrepancy exists between the first and second halves of the Nibelungen
Lied. Their half-brother, Gutthorm, plays no part in the story except as
the actual murderer of Sigurd.
The
chief effect of the influences of Christianity and Romance on the legend is a
loss of sympathy Page 25with the heroic type of Brynhild, and an attempt to give more
dignity to the figure of Gudrun. The Shield-maiden of divine origin and
unearthly wisdom, with her unrelenting vengeance on her beloved, and her
contempt for her slighter rival (“Fitter would it be for Gudrun to die with
Sigurd, if she had a soul like mine”), is a figure out of harmony with the new
religion, and beyond the comprehension of a time coloured by romance; while
both the sentiment and the morality of the age would be on the side of Gudrun
as the formally wedded wife. So the poem known as the Short Sigurd Lay,
which has many marks of lateness, such as the elaborate description of the
funeral pyre and the exaggeration of the signs of mourning, says nothing of
Sigurd's love for Brynhild, nor do his last words to Gudrun give any hint of
it. The Nibelungen Lied suppresses Sigurd's love to Brynhild, and the
magic drink, and altogether lowers Brynhild, but elevates Gudrun (under her
mother's name); her slow but terrible vengeance, and absolute forgetfulness of
the ties of blood in pursuit of it, are equal to anything in the original
version. The later heroic poems of the Edda make a less successful attempt to
create sympathy for Gudrun; some, such as the so-called First Gudrun Lay,
which is entirely romantic in character, try to make her pathetic by the
abundance of tears she sheds; others, to make her heroic, though the result is
only a spurious savagery. Page 26
The
remaining poems of the cycle, all late in style and tone, deal with the fates
of Gudrun and her brothers, and owe their existence to a narrator's
unwillingness to let a favourite story end. The curse makes continuation easy,
since the Giukings inherit it with the hoard. Gudrun was married at the wish of
her kinsmen to Atli the Hun, said to be Brynhild's brother. He invited Gunnar
and Högni to his court and killed them for the sake of the treasure, in
vengeance for which Gudrun killed her own two sons and Atli; this latter
incident being possibly an imitation of Signy. If we may believe that Gudrun,
like Chriemhild in the Nibelungen Lied, married Atli in order to gain
vengeance for Sigurd, we might suppose that there was confusion here: that she
herself incited the murder of her brothers, and killed Atli when he had served
his purpose. This would strengthen the part of Gudrun, who as the tale stands
is rather a futile character. But in all probability the episode is due to a
confusion of Signy's story with that of the German Chriemhild and Etzel.
One
point has still to be considered: the place of the Nibelungs in the story. In
the Edda, the Hniflungs are always the Giukings, Gunnar and Högni, and Snorri
gives it as the name of an heroic family. The title of the first aventiure
of the Nibelungen Lied also apparently uses the word of the Burgundians.
Yet the treasure is always the Page 27Nibelungs' hoard, which clearly means
that they were the original owners; and when Hagen von Tronje tells the story
later in the poem, he speaks of the Nibelungs correctly as the dwarfs from whom
Siegfried won it. On this point, therefore, the German preserves the older
tradition: the Norse Andvari, the river-dwarf, is the German Alberich the
Nibelung. In the Nibelungen Lied the winning of the treasure forms no
part of the action: it is merely narrated by Hagen. This accounts for the
shortening of the episode and the omission of the intermediate steps: the
robbing of the dwarf, the curse, and the dragon-slaying. * * * * *
Ermanric.—The two poems of Gudrun's Lament
and Hamthismal, in the Edda attached to the Volsung cycle, belong correctly
to that of the Gothic hero Ermanric. According to these poems, Gudrun, Giuki's
daughter, married a third time, and had three sons, Sörli, Hamthi and Erp. She
married Svanhild, her own and Sigurd's daughter, to Jörmunrek, king of the
Goths; but Svanhild was slandered, and her husband had her trodden to death by
horses' hoofs. The description of Svanhild is a good example of the style of
the romantic poems:
“The bondmaids sat round Svanhild, dearest of my children;
Svanhild was like a glorious sunbeam in my hall. I dowered her with gold and
goodly fabrics Page 28when I married her into Gothland. That was the
hardest of my griefs, when they trod Svanhild's fair hair into the dust beneath
the horses' hoofs.”
Gudrun
sent her three sons to avenge their sister; two of them slew Erp by the way,
and were killed themselves in their attack on Jörmunrek for want of his help.
So died, as Snorri says, all who were of Giuking descent; and only Aslaug,
daughter of Sigurd and Brynhild, survived. Heimskringla, a thirteenth
century history of the royal races of Scandinavia, traces the descent of the
Norse kings from her.
This
Ermanric story, which belongs to legendary history rather than myth, is in
reality quite independent of the Volsung or Nibelung cycle. The connection is
loose and inartistic, the legend being probably linked to Gudrun's name because
she had become a favourite character and Icelandic narrators were unwilling to
let her die. The historic Ermanric was conquered by the Huns in 374; the sixth
century historian Jornandes is the earliest authority for the tradition that he
was murdered by Sarus and Ammius in revenge for their sister's death by wild
horses. Saxo also tells the story, with greater similarity of names. It seems
hardly necessary to assume, with many scholars, the existence of two heroes of
the name Ermanric, an historic and a mythical one. A simpler explanation is
that a legendary story Page 29became connected with the name of a real personage. The slaying of
Erp introduces a common folk-tale incident, familiar in stories like the Golden
Bird, told by both Asbjörnsen and Grimm. * * * * *
Helgi.—The Helgi-lays, three in number, are the
best of the heroic poems. Nominally they tell two stories, Helgi Hjörvardsson
being sandwiched between the two poems of Helgi Hundingsbane; but essentially
the stories are the same.
In Helyi
Hjörvardsson, Helgi, son of Hjörvard and Sigrlinn, was dumb and nameless
until a certain day when, while sitting on a howe, he saw a troop of nine
Valkyries. The fairest, Svava, Eylimi's daughter, named him, and bidding him
avenge his grandfather on Hrodmar (a former wooer of Sigrlinn's, and her
father's slayer), sent him to find a magic sword. Helgi slew Hrodmar and
married Svava, having escaped from the sea-giantess Hrimgerd through the
protection of his Valkyrie bride and the wit of a faithful servant. His brother
Hedin, through the spells of a troll-wife, swore to wed Helgi's bride.
Repenting, he told his brother, who, dying in a fight with Hrodmar's son,
charged Svava to marry Hedin. A note by the collector adds “Helgi and Svava are
said to have been born again.”
In Helgi
Hundingsbane I., Helgi is the son of Sigmund and Borghild. He fought and
slew Page
30Hunding, and
afterwards met in battle Hunding's sons at Logafell, where the Valkyrie Sigrun,
Högni's daughter, protected him, and challenged him to fight Hödbrodd to whom
her father had plighted her. She protected his ships in the storm which
overtook them as they sailed to meet Hödbrodd, and watched over him in the battle,
in which he slew his rival and was greeted as victor by Sigrun: “Hail, hero of
Yngvi's race ... thou shalt have both the red rings and the mighty maid: thine
are Högni's daughter and Hringstad, the victory and the land.”
Helgi
Hundingsbane II.,
besides giving additional details of the hero's early life, completes the
story. In the battle with Hödbrodd, Helgi killed all Sigrun's kinsmen except
one brother, Dag, who slew him later in vengeance. But Helgi returned from the
grave, awakened by Sigrun's weeping, and she went into the howe with him. The
collector again adds a note: “Helgi and Sigrun are said to have been born
again: he was then called Helgi Haddingjaskati, and she Kara Halfdan's
daughter, as it is told in the Kara-ljod, and she was a Valkyrie.”
This
third Helgi legend does not survive in verse, the Kara-ljod having
perished. It is told in prose in the late saga of Hromund Gripsson, according
to which Kara was a Valkyrie and swan-maid: while she was hovering over Helgi,
he killed her accidentally in swinging his sword. Page 31
There
can be little doubt that these three are merely variants of the same story; the
foundation is the same, though incidents and names differ. The three Helgis are
one hero, and the three versions of his legend probably come from different
localities. The collector could not but feel their identity, and the similarity
was too fundamental to be overlooked; he therefore accounted for it by the old
idea of re-birth, and thus linked the three together. In each Helgi has an hereditary
foe (Hrodmar, Hunding, or Hadding); in each his bride is a Valkyrie, who
protects him and gives him victory; each ends in tragedy, though differently.
The
two variants in the Poetic Edda have evident marks of contamination with the
Volsung cycle, and some points of superficial resemblance. Helgi Hjörvardsson's
mother is Sigrlinn, Helgi Hundings-bane's father is Sigmund, as in the Nibelungen
Lied Siegfried is the son of Sigemunt and Sigelint. Helgi Hundingsbane is a
Volsung and Wolfing (Ylfing), and brother to Sinfjötli; his first fight, like
Sigurd's, is against the race of Hunding; his rival, Hödbrodd, is a Hniflung;
he first meets the Valkyrie on Loga-fell (Flame-hill); he is killed by his
brother-in-law, who has sworn friendship. But there is no parallel to the
essential features of the Volsung cycle, and such likenesses between the two
stories as are not accidental are due to the influence of the more favoured
legend; this is especially true Page 32of the names. The prose-piece Sinfjötli's
Death also makes Helgi half-brother to Sinfjötli; it is followed in this by
Völsunga Saga, which devotes a chapter to Helgi, paraphrasing Helyi
Hundingsbane I. There is, of course, confusion over the Hunding episode;
the saga is obliged to reconcile its conflicting authorities by making Helgi
kill Hunding and some of his sons, and Sigurd kill the rest.
If
the theory stated below as to the original Helgi legend be correct, the feud
with Hunding's race, as told in these poems, must be extraneous. I conjecture
that it belonged originally to the Volsung cycle, and to the wer-wolf
Sinfjötli. It must not be forgotten that, though he passes out of the Volsung
story altogether in the later versions, both Scandinavian and German, he is in
the main action in the earliest one (that in Beowulf), where even Sigurd
does not appear. The feud might easily have been transferred from him to Helgi
as well as to Sigurd, for invention is limited as regards episodes, and a
narrator who wishes to elaborate the story of a favourite hero is often forced
to borrow adventures. In the original story, Helgi's blood-feud was probably
with the kindred of Sigrun or Svava.
The
origin of the Helgi legend must be sought outside of the Volsung cycle. Some
writers are of opinion that the name should be Holgi, and there are two stories
in which a hero Holgi appears. Page 33With the legend of Thorgerd Holgabrud,
told by Saxo, who identified it with that of Helgi Hundingsbane, it has nothing
in common; and the connection which has been sought with the legend of Holger
Danske is equally difficult to establish. The essence of this latter story is
the hero's disappearance into fairyland, and the expectation of his return
sometime in the future: a motive which has been very fruitful in Irish romance,
and in the traditions of Arthur, Tryggvason, and Barbarossa, among countless
others. But it is absent from the Helgi poems; and the “old wives' tales” of
Helgi's re-birth have nothing to do with his legend, but are merely a bookman's
attempt to connect stories which he felt to be the same though different.
The
essential feature of the story told in these poems is the motive familiar in
that class of ballads of which the Douglas Tragedy is a type: the hero
loves the daughter of his enemy's house, her kinsmen kill him, and she dies of
grief. This is the story told in both the lays of Helgi Hundingsbane,
complete in one, unfinished in the other. No single poem preserves all the
incidents of the legend; some survive in one version, some in another, as usual
in ballad literature.
Like
Sinfjötli and Sigurd, Helgi is brought up in obscurity. He spends his childhood
disguised in his enemy's household, and on leaving it, sends a message to tell
his foes whom they have fostered. Page 34They pursue him, and he is obliged, like
Gude Wallace in the Scottish ballad, to disguise himself in a bondmaid's dress:
“Piercing are the eyes of Hagal's bondmaid; it is no peasant's kin
who stands at the mill: the stones are split, the bin springs in two. It is a
hard fate for a warrior to grind the barley; the sword-hilt is better fitted
for those hands than the mill-handle.”
Sigrun
is present at the battle, in which, as in the English and Scottish ballads,
Helgi slays all her kindred except one brother. He tells her the fortunes of
the fight, and she chooses between lover and kinsmen:
Helgi. “Good luck is not granted thee, maid, in all things, though the
Norns are partly to blame. Bragi and Högni fell to-day at Frekastein, and I was
their slayer;... most of thy kindred lie low. Thou couldst not hinder the
battle: it was thy fate to be a cause of strife to heroes. Weep not, Sigrun,
thou hast been Hild to us; heroes must meet their fate.”
Sigrun. “I could wish those alive who are fallen, and yet rest in thy
arms.”
The
surviving brother, Dag, swears oaths of reconciliation to Helgi, but remembers
the feud. The end comes, as in the Norse Sigmund tale, through Odin's
interference: he lends his spear to Dag, who stabs Helgi in a grove, and rides
home to tell his sister. Sigrun is inconsolable, and curses the murderer with a
rare power and directness: Page 35
“May the oaths pierce thee that thou hast sworn to Helgi.... May
the ship sail not that sails under thee, though a fair wind lie behind. May the
horse run not that runs under thee, though thou art fleeing from thy foes. May
the sword bite not that thou drawest, unless it sing round thine own head. If
thou wert an outlaw in the woods, Helgi's death were avenged.... Never again
while I live, by night or day, shall I sit happy at Sevafell, if I see not the
light play on my hero's company, nor the gold-bitted War-breeze run thither
with the warrior.”
But
Helgi returns from the grave, unable to rest because of Sigrun's weeping, and
she goes down into the howe with him:
Sigrun. “Thy hair is covered with frost, Helgi; thou art drenched with
deadly dew, thy hands are cold and wet. How shall I get thee help, my hero?”
Helgi. “Thou alone hast caused it, Sigrun from Sevafell, that Helgi is
drenched with deadly dew. Thou weepest bitter tears before thou goest to sleep,
gold-decked, sunbright, Southern maid; each one falls on my breast, bloody,
cold and wet, cruel, heavy with grief....”
Sigrun. “I have made thee here a painless bed, Helgi, son of the
Wolfings. I will sleep in thy arms, my warrior, as if thou wert alive.”
Helgi. “There shall be no stranger thing at Sevafell, early or late,
than that thou, king-born, Högni's fair daughter, shouldst be alive in the
grave and sleep in a dead man's arms.”
The
lay of Helgi Hjörvardsson is furthest from the original, for there is no feud
with Svava's kindred, nor does Helgi die at their hands; but it Page 36preserves a feature omitted elsewhere, in
his leaving his bride to his brother's protection. Like the wife in the English
ballad of Earl Brand, and the heroine of the Danish Ribold and
Guldborg, Svava refuses, but Hedin's last words seem to imply that he is to
return and marry her after avenging Helgi. This would be contrary to all
parallels, according to which Svava should die with Helgi.
The
alternative ending of the Helgi and Kara version is interesting as
providing the possible source of another Scottish ballad dealing with the same
type of story. In The Cruel Knight, as here, the hero slays his bride,
who is of a hostile family, by mistake. One passage of Helgi Hundingsbane
II. describes Helgi's entrance into Valhalla, which, taken with the
incident of Sigrun's joining him in the howe, supplies an instance of the
survival side by side of inconsistent notions as to the state of the dead. The
lover's return from the grave is the subject of Clerk Saunders (the
second part) and several other Scottish ballads.
The
Song of the Mill.—The
magic mill is best known in the folk-tale, “Why the sea is salt”; but this is
not the oldest part of the story, though it took most hold of the popular
imagination which loves legendary explanations of natural phenomena. The hero,
Frodi, a mythical Page 37Danish king, is the northern Croesus. His reign was marked by a
world-peace, and the peace, the wealth, the liberality of Frodi became
proverbial. The motive of his tale is again the curse that follows gold. It is
told by Snorri, in whose work Grottasöngr is embodied.
Frodi
possessed two magic quern-stones, from which the grinder could grind out
whatever he wished; but he had no one strong enough to turn them until he
bought in Sweden two bondmaids of giant-race, Menja and Fenja. He set them to
grind at the quern by day, and by night when all slept, and as they ground him
gold, and peace, and prosperity, they sang:
“We grind wealth for Frodi, all bliss we grind, and abundance of
riches in the fortunate bin. May he sit on wealth, may he sleep on down, may he
wake to delight; then the grinding were good. Here shall no man hurt another,
prepare evil nor work death, nor hew with the keen sword though he find his
brother's slayer bound.”
But
when they wearied of their toil and asked for a little rest, Frodi answered:
“Ye shall sleep no longer than the cuckoo is silent, or while I speak one
stave.” Then the giant-maids grew angry, and sang:
“Thou wert not wise, Frodi, in buying thy bondmaids: thou didst
choose us for our strength and size but asked not our race. Bold were Hrungni
and his father, and mightier Thiazi; Idi and Orni were our Page 38ancestors, from them are
we daughters of the mountain-giants sprung.... We maids wrought mighty deeds,
we moved the mountains from their places, we rolled rocks over the court of the
giants, so that the earth shook.... Now we are come to the king's house,
meeting no mercy and held in bondage, mud beneath our feet and cold over our
heads, we grind the Peace-maker. It is dreary at Frodi's.”
As
they sang of their wrongs by night, their mood changed, and instead of grinding
peace and wealth, they ground war, fire and sword:
“Waken, Frodi! waken, Frodi! if thou wilt hear our songs.... I see
fire burn at the east of the citadel, the voice of war awakes, the signal is
given. A host will come hither in speed, and burn the hall over the king.”
So
the bondmaids ground on in giant-wrath, while the sea-king Mysing sailed nearer
with his host, until the quern-stones split; and then the daughters of the
mountain-giants spoke once more: “We have ground to our pleasure, Frodi; we
maids have stood long at the mill.”
A
Norseman was rarely content to allow a fortunate ending to any hero, and a
continuation of the story therefore makes the mill bring disaster on Mysing
also. After slaying Frodi and burning his hall, he took the stones and the
bondmaids on board his ship, and bade them grind salt. They ground till the
weight sank the ship to the bottom of the sea, where the mill is grinding
still. This is not in the song, though it has lived longer popularly Page 39than the earlier part. Dr. Rydberg
identities Frodi with Frey, the God of fertility.
The
Everlasting Battle.—No
Eddic poem survives on the battle of the Hjathnings, the story of which is told
in prose by Snorri. It must, however, be an ancient legend; and the hero Hedin
belongs to one of the old Germanic heroic races, for the minstrel Deor is a
dependent of the Heodenings in the Old English poem to which reference will be
made later. The legend is that Hild, daughter of Högni, was carried away by
Hedin the Hjathning, Hjarrandi's son. Högni pursued, and overtook them near the
Orkneys. Then Hild went to her father and offered atonement from Hedin, but
said also that he was quite ready to fight, and Högni need expect no mercy.
Högni answered shortly, and Hild returning told Hedin that her father would
accept no atonement but bade him prepare to fight. Both kings landed on an
island, followed by their men. Hedin called to Högni and offered atonement and
much gold, but Högni said it was too late, his sword was already drawn. They
fought till evening, and then returned to their ships; but Hild went on shore
and woke up all the slain by sorcery, so that the battle began again next day
just as before. Every day they fight, and every night the dead are recalled to
life, and so it will go on till Ragnarök. Page 40
In
the German poem, Gudrun, the Continental version of this legend occurs
in the story of the second Hilde. She is carried away by the minstrel Horant
(who thus plays a more active part than the Norse Hjarrandi), as envoy from
King Hettel, Hedin's German counterpart. Her father Hagen pursues, and after a
battle with Hettel agrees to a reconciliation. The story is duplicated in the
abduction of Hilde's daughter Gudrun, and the battle on the Wülpensand.
Another
reference may probably be supplied by the much debated lines 14–16 from the
Anglo-Saxon Deor, of which the most satisfactory translation seems to
be: “Many of us have heard of the harm of Hild; the Jute's loves were
unbounded, so that the care of love took from him sleep altogether.” Saxo, it
is true, makes Hild's father a Jute, instead of her lover, and Snorri
apparently agrees with him in making Hedin Norwegian; but in the Gudrun
Hettel is Frisian or Jutish. The Anglo-Saxon Widsith mentions in one
line Hagena, king of the Holmrygas (a Norwegian province), and Heoden, king of
the Glommas (not identified), who may be the Högni and Hedin of this tale.
The
Anglo-Saxon and German agree on another point where both differ from the Norse.
The Anglo-Saxon poem Deor is supposed to be spoken by a scop or
court poet who has been ousted from the favour of his lord, a Heodening, by
Heorrenda, Page 41another
singer: “Once I was the Heodenings' scop, dear to my lord: Deor was my name.
Many a year I had a good service and a gracious lord, until the song-skilled
Hoerrenda received the rights which the protector of men once granted me.” Like
Heorrenda, Horant in the Gudrun is a singer in the service of the
Heathnings. The Norse version keeps the name, and its connection with the
Heathnings, but gives Hjarrandi, as the hero's father, no active part to play.
In both points, arguing from the probable Frisian origin of the story, the
Anglo-Saxon and German are more likely to have the correct form.
The
legend is, like those of Walter and Hildigund, Helgi and Sigrun, founded on the
primary instincts of love and war. In the Norse story of the Heathnings,
however, the former element is almost eliminated. It is from no love to Hedin
that Hild accompanies him, though Saxo would have it so. Nothing is clearer
than that strife is her only object. It is her mediation which brings about the
battle, when apparently both heroes would be quite willing to make peace; and
her arts which cause the daily renewal of fighting. This island battle among
dead and living is peculiar to the Norse version, and coloured by, if not
originating in, the Valhalla idea: Högni and Hedin and their men are the
Einherjar who fight every day and rest and feast at night, Hild is a
war-goddess. Page 42The
conception of her character, contrasting with the gentler part played by the
Continental German heroines (who are rather the causes than the inciters of
strife), can be paralleled from many of the sagas proper.
Högni's
sword Dainsleif, forged by the dwarfs, as were all magic weapons, is like the
sword of Angantyr, in that it claims a victim whenever it is drawn from the sheath:
an idea which may easily have arisen from the prowess of any famous swordsman.
The
Sword of Angantyr.—Like
the two last legends, Angantyr's story is not represented in the Elder Edda; it
is not even told by Snorri. Yet poems belonging to the cycle survive (preserved
by good fortune in the late mythical Hervarar Saga) which among the
heroic poems rank next in artistic beauty to the Helgi Lays. Since the story
possesses besides a striking originality, and is connected with the name of a
Pan-Germanic hero, the Ongendtheow of Old English poetry, I cannot follow the
example of most editors and omit it from the heroic poems.
Like
the Volsung legend it is the story of a curse; and there is a general
similarity of outline, with the exception that the hero is in this case a
woman. The curse-laden treasure is here the sword Tyrfing, which Svafrlami got
by force from Page 43the dwarfs. They laid a curse on it: that it should bring death to
its bearer, no wound it made should be healed, and it should claim a victim
whenever it was unsheathed. In the saga, the story is spread over several
generations: partly, no doubt, in order to include varying versions; partly
also in imitation of the true Icelandic family saga. The chief actors in the
legend, beside the sword, are Angantyr and his daughter Hervör.
The
earlier history of Tyrfing is told in the saga. Svafrlami is killed, with the
magic weapon itself, by the viking Arngrim, who thus gains possession of it;
when he is slain in his turn, it descends to Angantyr, the eldest of his twelve
berserk sons. For a while no one can withstand them, but the doom overtakes
them at last in the battle of Samsey against the Swedes Arrow-Odd and Hjalmar.
In berserk-rage, the twelve brothers attack the Swedish ships, and slay every man
except the two leaders who have landed on the island. The battle over, the
berserks go ashore, and there when their fury is past, they are attacked by the
two Swedish champions. Odd fights eleven of the brothers, but Hjalmar has the
harder task in meeting Angantyr and his sword. All the twelve sons of Arngrim
fall, and Hjalmar is mortally wounded by Tyrfing. The survivor buries his
twelve foemen where they fell, and takes his comrade's body back to Sweden. The
first poem gives the challenge Page 44of the Swedish champions, and Hjalmar's
dying song.
Hervör,
the daughter of Angantyr, is in some respects a female counterpart of Sigurd.
Like him, she is born after her father's death, and brought up in obscurity.
When she learns her father's name, she goes forth without delay to claim her
inheritance from the dead, even with the curse that goes with it. Here the
second poem begins. On reaching the island where her father fell, she asks a
shepherd to guide her to the graves of Arngrim's sons:
“I will ask no hospitality, for I know not the islanders; tell me
quickly, where are the graves called Hjörvard's howes?”
He is
unwilling: “The man is foolish who comes here alone in the dark shade of night:
fire is flickering, howes are opening, field and fen are aflame,” and flees
into the woods, but Hervör is dauntless and goes on alone. She reaches the
howes, and calls on the sons of Arngrim:
“Awake, Angantyr! Hervör calls thee, only daughter to thee and
Tofa. Give me from the howe the keen sword which the dwarfs forged for
Svafrlami, Hervard, Hjörvard, Hrani, Angantyr! I call you all from below the
tree-roots, with helm and corselet, with sharp sword, shield and harness, and
reddened spear.”
Angantyr
denies that the sword is in his howe: “Neither father, son, nor other kinsmen
buried me; my slayers had Tyrfing;” but Hervör does Page 45not believe him. “Tell me but truth....
Thou art slow to give thine only child her heritage.” He tries to frighten her
back to the ships by describing the sights she will see, but she only cries
again, “Give me Hjalmar's slayer from the howe, Angantyr!”
A. “Hjalmar's slayer lies under my shoulders; it is all wrapped in
fire; I know no maid on earth who dare take that sword in her hands.”
H. “I will take the sharp sword in my hands, if I can get it: I
fear no burning fire, the flame sinks as I look on it.”
A. “Foolish art thou, Hervör the fearless, to rush into the fire
open-eyed. I will rather give thee the sword from the howe, young maid; I
cannot refuse thee.”
H. “Thou dost well, son of vikings, to give me the sword from the
howe. I think its possession better than to win all Norway.”
Her
father warns her of the curse, and the doom that the sword will bring, and she
leaves the howes followed by his vain wish: “Would that I could give thee the
lives of us twelve, the strength and energy that we sons of Arngrim left behind
us!”
It is
unnecessary here to continue the story as the saga does, working out the doom
over later generations; over Hervör's son Heidrek, who forfeited his head to Odin
in a riddle-contest, and over his children, another Angantyr, Hlod, and a
second Hervör. The verse sources for this latter part are very corrupt. Page 46
A
full discussion of the relation between the Eddic and the Continental versions
of the heroic tales summarised in the foregoing pages would, of course, be far
beyond the scope of this study; the utmost that can be done in that direction
is to suggest a few points. Three of the stories are not concerned in this
section: Helgi and Frodi are purely Scandinavian cycles; while though Angantyr
is a well-known heroic name (in Widsith Ongendtheow is king of the
Swedes), the legend attached to his name in the Norse sources does not survive
elsewhere. The Weland cycle is perhaps common property. None of the versions
localise it, for the names in Völundarkvida, Wolfdale, Myrkwood,
&c., are conventional heroic place-names. It was popular at a very early
date in England, and is probably a Pan-Germanic legend. The Sigurd and Hild
stories, on the contrary, are both, in all versions, localised on the
Continent, the former by the Rhine, the latter in Friesland or Jutland; both,
therefore, in Low German country, whence they must have spread to the other
Germanic lands. To England they were doubtless carried by the Low German
invaders of the sixth century. On the question of their passage to the North
there are wide differences of opinion. Most scholars agree that there was an
earlier and a later passage, the first taking Hild, Ermanric, and the Volsung
story; the second, about the twelfth or thirteenth century, the Page 47Volsungs again, with perhaps Dietrich and
Attila. But there is much disagreement as to the date of the first
transmission. Müllenhoff put it as early as 600; Konrad Maurer, in the ninth
and tenth centuries; while Dr. Golther is of opinion that the Volsung story
passed first to the vikings in France, and then westward over Ireland to
Iceland; therefore also not before the ninth century. Such evidence as is
afforded by the very slight English references makes it probable that the
Scandinavians had the tales later than the English, a view supported by the
more highly developed form of the Norse version, and, in the case of the
Volsung cycle, its greater likeness to the Continental German. The earliest
Norse references which can be approximately dated are in the Skald Bragi (first
half of the ninth century), who knew all three stories: the Hild and Ermanric
tales he gives in outline; his only reference to the Volsungs is a kenning,
“the Volsungs' drink,” for serpent. With the possible exception of the
Anglo-Saxon fragments, the Edda preserves on the whole the purest versions of
those stories which are common to all, though, as might be expected, the
Continental sources sometimes show greater originality in isolated details.
These German sources have entangled the different cycles into one involved
mass; but in the Norse the extraneous elements are easily detached. Page 48
The
motives of heroic tales are limited in number and more or less common to
different races. Heroic cycles differ as a rule merely in their choice or
combination of incidents, not in the nature of their material. The origin of
these heroic motives may generally be found in primitive custom or conditions
of life, seized by an imaginative people and woven into legend; sometimes
linked to the name of some dead tribal hero, just as the poets of a later date
wound the same traditions in still-varying combinations round the names of
Gretti Asmundarson and Gold-Thori; though often the hero is, like the Gods,
born of the myth. In the latter case, the story is pure myth; in the former it
is legend, or a mixture of history and legend, as in the Ermanric and Dietrich
tales, which have less interest for the mythologist.
The
curse-bringing treasure, one of the most fruitful Germanic motives, probably
has its origin in the custom of burying a dead man's possessions with him. In
the Waterdale Saga, Ketil Raum, a viking of the eighth and early ninth
centuries, reproaches his son Thorstein as a degenerate, in that he expects to
inherit his father's wealth, instead of winning fortune for himself: “It used
to be the custom with kings and earls, men of our kind, that they won for
themselves fortune and fame; wealth was not counted as a heritage, nor would
sons inherit from their fathers, but rather Page 49lay their possessions in the howe with
them.” It is easy to see that when this custom came into conflict with the
son's natural desire to inherit, the sacrosanctity of the dead man's treasure
and of his burial-mound would be their only protection against violation. The
fear of the consequences of breaking the custom took form in the myth of the
curse, as in the sword of Angantyr and the Nibelungs' hoard; while the dangers
attending the violation of the howe were personified in the dragon-guardian. In
Gold-Thori's Saga, the dead berserks whose howe Thori enters, are found
guarding their treasure in the shape of dragons; while Thori himself is said to
have turned into a dragon after death.
Marriage
with alien wives, which in the case of the Mastermaid story has been postulated
as means of transmission and as the one possible explanation of its nearly
universal diffusion, may perhaps with more simplicity be assumed as the common
basis in custom for independently arising myths of this type. The attempts of
the bride's kindred to prevent the marriage, and of the bridegroom's to undo
it, would be natural incidents in such a story, and the magic powers employed
by and against the bride would be the mythical representatives of the mutually
unfamiliar customs of alien tribes. This theory at least offers a credible
explanation of the hero's temporary oblivion of or unfaithfulness Page 50to his protectress, after their
successful escape together.
In
the Valkyrie-brides, Brynhild and Sigrun, with their double attributes of
fighting and wisdom, there is an evident connexion with the Germanic type of
woman preserved in the allusions of Cæsar and Tacitus, which reaches its
highest development in the heroines of the Edda. Any mythical or ideal
conception of womanhood combines the two primitive instincts, love and
fighting, even though the woman may be only the innocent cause of strife, or
its passive prize. The peculiarity of the Germanic representation is that the
woman is never passive, but is herself the incarnation of both instincts. Even
if she is not a Valkyrie, nor taking part herself in the fight, she is ready,
like the wives of the Cimbri, to drive the men back to the battle from which
they have escaped. Hild and Hervör are at one extreme: war is their spiritual
life. Love is in Hild nothing more than instinct; in Hervör it is not even
that: she would desire nothing from marriage beyond a son to inherit the sword.
At the other extreme is Sigrun, who has the warlike instinct, but is spiritually
a lover as completely and essentially as Isolde or
The
other motives of these stories may be briefly enumerated. The burning of
Brynhild and Signy, and Sigrun's entrance into the howe, are mythical
reminiscences of widow-burial. The “sister's son” is preserved in the Sigmund
and Sinfjötli tale, which also has a trace of animism in the werwolf episode.
The common swanmaid motive occurs in two, the Völund story and the legend of
Helgi and Kara; while the first Helgi tale suggests the Levirate in the
proposed marriage of Svava to her husband's brother. The waverlowe of the
Volsung myth may be traced back to the midsummer fires; the wooing of Brynhild
by Sigurd's crossing the fire would thus, like the similar bridal of Menglad
and Svipdag and the winning of Gerd for Frey, be based on the marriages which
formed a part of agricultural rites.
Page 52
To
avoid confusion, and in view of the customary loose usage of the word “saga,”
it may be as well to state that it is here used only in its technical sense of
a prose history.
Dr.
Rydberg formulates a theory identifying Völund with Thiazi, the giant who
carried off Idunn. It is based chiefly on arguments from names and other
philological considerations, and gives perhaps undue weight to the authority of
Saxo. It is difficult to see any fundamental likenesses in the stories.
The
Old English references to Weland are in the Waldere fragment and the Lament
of Deor. For the Franks Casket, see Professor Napier's discussion, with
photographs, in the English Miscellany (Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1901). The
Thidreks Saga (sometimes called Vilkina Saga), was edited by
Unger (Christiania, 1853), and by Hylten-Cavallius (1880). There are two German
translations: by Rassmann (Heldensage, (1863), and by Von der Hagen (Nordische
Heldenromane, 1873).
The
Volsungs. (Pages 8 to
27.)
As
divided in most editions the poems connected with the Volsung cycle, including
the two on Ermanric, are fifteen in number: Page 53
Gripisspa.
Reginsmal,
Fafnismal, Sigrdrifumal,
a continued narrative compiled from different sources.
Sigurd
Fragment, on the death
of Sigurd.
First
Gudrun Lay, on Gudrun's
mourning, late.
Short
Sigurd Lay (called Long
Brynhild Lay in the Corpus Poeticum; sometimes called Third
Sigurd Lay). style late.
Brynhild's
Hellride, a continuation
of the preceding.
Second, or Old, Gudrun Lay, is also
late. It contains more kennings than are usual in Eddic poetry, and the picture
of Gudrun's sojourn in Denmark and the tapestry she wrought with Thora
Halfdan's daughter, together with the descriptions of her suitors, belong to a
period which had a taste for colour and elaboration of detail.
Third
Gudrun Lay, or the Ordeal
of Gudrun (after her marriage to Atli), is romantic in character. The
Gothic hero Thjodrek (Dietrich) is introduced.
Oddrun's
Lament, in which
Gunnar's death is caused by an intrigue with Atli's sister Oddrun, marks the
disintegration of the Volsung legend.
The
two Atli Lays (Atlakvida and Atlamal, the latter of Greenland
origin), deal with the death of Gunnar and Högni, and Gudrun's vengeance on
Atli.
Gudrun's
Lament and Hamthismal
belong to the Ermanric cycle.
Volsung
Paraphrases. (Page 11.)
Skaldskaparmal,
Völsunga Saga and Norna-Gests
Thattr (containing another short paraphrase) are all included in Dr.
Wilken's Die Prosaische Edda (Paderborn, 1878). There is an English
version of Völsunga by Magnusson and Morris (London, 1870) and a German
version of Völsunga and Norna-Gest by Edzardi. Page 54
Nibelungenlied. (Page 11.)
Editions
by Bartsch (Leipzig, 1895) and Zarncke (Halle, 1899); translation into modern
German by Simrock.
Signy
and Siggeir. (Page 13.)
Saxo
Grammaticus (Book vii.) tells the story of a Signy, daughter of Sigar, whose
lover Hagbard, after slaying her brothers, wins her favour. Sigar in vengeance
had him strangled on a hill in view of Signy's windows, and she set fire to her
house that she might die simultaneously with her lover. The antiquity of part
at least of this story is proved by the kenning “Hagbard's collar” for halter,
in a poem probably of the tenth century. On the other hand, a reference in Völsunga
Saga, that “Haki and Hagbard were great and famous men, yet Sigar carried
off their sister, ... and they were slow to vengeance,” shows that there is
confusion somewhere. It seems possible that Hagbard's story has been
contaminated with a distorted account of the Volsung Signy, civilised as usual
by Saxo, with an effect of vulgarity absent from the primitive story.
In a
recently published pamphlet by Mr. W.W. Lawrence and Dr. W.H. Schofield (The
First Riddle of Cynewulf and Signy's Lament. Baltimore: The Modern
Language Association of America. 1902) it is suggested that the so-called First
Riddle in the Exeter Book is in reality an Anglo-Saxon translation of a Norse
“Complaint” spoken by the Volsung Signy. Evidence from metre and form is all in
favour of this view, and the poem bears the interpretation without any
straining of the meaning. Dr. Schofield's second contention, that the poem thus
interpreted is evidence for the theory of a British origin for the Eddie poems,
is not equally convincing. The existence in Anglo-Saxon of a translation from
the Norse is no proof that any of the Eddie poems, or even the Page 55original Norse “Signy's Lament”
postulated by Dr. Schofield, were composed in the West.
It
seems unnecessary to suppose, with Dr. Schofield, an influence of British
legend on the Volsung story. The points in which the story of Sigmund resembles
that of Arthur and differs from that of Theseus prove nothing in the face of
equally strong points of correspondence between Arthur and Theseus which are
absent from the Volsung story.
Sinfjötli's
Death. (Page 14.)
Munch
(Nordmændenes Gudelære, Christiania, 1847) ingeniously identified the
old man with Odin, come in person to conduct Sinfjötli to Valhalla, since he
would otherwise have gone to Hel, not having fallen in battle; a stratagem
quite in harmony with Odin's traditional character.
Sigmund
and Sinfjötli. (Page 15.)
It
seems probable, on the evidence of Beowulf, that Sigmund and Sinfjötli
represent the Pan-Germanic stage of the national-hero, and Sigurd or Siegfried
the Continental stage. Possibly Helgi may then be the Norse race-hero. Sigurd
was certainly foreign to Scandinavia; hence the epithet Hunnish, constantly
applied to him, and the localising of the legend by the Rhine. The possibility
suggests itself that the Brynhild part of the story, on the other hand, is of
Scandinavian origin, and thence passed to Germany. It is at least curious that
the Nibelungen Lied places Prunhilt in Iceland.
Wagner
and the Volsung Cycle.
(Page 26.)
Wagner's
Ring des Nibelungen is remarkable not only for the way in which it
reproduces the spirit of both the Sinfjötli and the Sigurd traditions, but also
for the wonderful instinct which chooses the best and most Page 56primitive features of both Norse and
Continental versions. Thus he keeps the dragon of the Norse, the Nibelungs of
the German; preserves the wildness of the old Sigmund tale, and substitutes the
German Hagen for his paler Norse namesake; restores the original balance
between the parts of Brynhild and Gudrun; gives the latter character, and an
active instead of a passive function in the story, by assigning to her her
mother's share in the action; and by substituting for the slaying of the otter
the bargain with the Giants for the building of Valhalla, makes the cause
worthy of the catastrophe.
Ermanric. (Page 27.)
For
examples of legend becoming attached to historical names, see Tylor's Primitive
Culture.
The
Helgi Lays. (Page 29.)
The
Helgi Lays stand before the Volsung set in the MS.; I treat them later for the
sake of greater clearness.
Helgi
and Kara. (Page 30.)
Hromundar
Saga Gripssonar, in
which this story is given, is worthless as literature, and has not been
recently edited. P.E. Müller's Sagabibliothek, in which it was
published, is out of print. Latin and Swedish translations may be found in
Björner's Nordiske Kåmpa Dater (Stockholm, 1737), also out of print.
Rebirth. (Page 31.)
Dr.
Storm has an interesting article on the Norse belief in Re-birth in the Arkiv
for Nordisk Filologi, ix. He collects instances, and among other arguments
points out the Norse custom of naming a posthumous child after its dead father
as a probable relic of the belief. The inheritance of luck may perhaps be
another survival; a notable Page 57instance occurs in Viga-Glums Saga, where the warrior
Vigfus bequeaths his luck to his favourite grandson, Glum. In the Waterdale
Saga there are two instances in which it is stated that the luck of the
dead grandfather will pass to the grandson who receives his name. Scholars do
not, however, agree as to the place of the rebirth idea in the Helgi poems,
some holding the view that it is an essential part of the story.
Hunding. (Page 32.)
It is
possible that the werwolf story is a totem survival. If so, the Hunding feud
might easily belong to it: dogs are the natural enemies of wolves. It is
curious that the Irish werwolf Cormac has a feud with MacCon (i.e., Son
of a Dog), which means the same as Hunding. This story, which has not been
printed, will be found in the Bodleian MS. Laud, 610.
Thorgerd
Holgabrud. (Page 33.)
Told
in Saxo, Book ii. Snorri has a bare allusion to it.
Holger
Danske, or Ogier Le Danois. (Page 33.)
See Corpus
Poeticum Boreale, vol. i. p. cxxx., and No. 10 of this series. The Norse
version of the story (Helgi Thorisson) is told in the Saga of Olaf Tryggvason,
and is summarised by Dr. Rydberg in the Teutonic Mythology, and by Mr.
Nutt in the Voyage of Bran.
Ballads. (Page 36.)
Professor
Child is perhaps hasty in regarding the two parts of Clerk Saunders as
independent. The first part, though unlike the Helgi story in circumstance,
seems to preserve the tradition of the hero's hostility to his bride's kindred,
and his death at their hands.
The
Helgi story, in all its variants, is as familiar in Page 58Danish as in Border ballads. The
distribution of the material in Iceland, Denmark, England and Scotland is
strongly in favour of the presumption that Scandinavian legend influenced
England and Scotland, and against the presumption that the poems in question
passed from the British Isles to Iceland. The evidence of the Danish ballads
should be conclusive on this point. There is an English translation of the
latter by R.C.A. Prior (Ancient Danish Ballads, London, 1860).
The
Everlasting Battle.
(Page 39.)
The
Skald Bragi (before 850 A.D.) has a poem on this subject, given with a
translation in the Corpus, vol. ii. Saxo's version is in the fifth book
of his History. According to Bragi, Hild has a necklace, which has caused
comparison of this story with that of the Greek Eriphyle. Irish legendary
history describes a similar battle in which the slain revive each night and
renew the fight daily, as occurring in the wanderings of the Tuatha De Danann
before they reached Ireland. According to Keating, they learnt the art of
necromancy in the East, and taught it to the Danes.
The
latest edition of the Gudrun is by Ernst Martin (second edition, Halle,
1902). There is a modern German translation by Simrock.
Angantyr. (Page 42.)
The
poems of this cycle are four in number—(1) Hjalmar's Death-song: (2) Angantyr
and Hervör; (3) Heidrek's Riddle-Poem: (4) Angantyr the Younger
and Hlod. All are given in the first volume of the Corpus, with
translations.
Herrarar
Saga was published by
Rafn (Copenhagen, 1829–30) in Fornaldar Sögur, vol. i., now out of
print. It has been more recently edited by Dr. Bugge, together with Völsunga
and others. Petersen (Copenhagen, 1847) edited Page 59it with a Danish translation. Munch's Nordmuendenes
Gudelære (out of print) contains a short abstract.
Death
of Angantyr. (Page 43.)
Angantyr's
death is related by Saxo, Book v., with entire exclusion of all mythical
interest.
Transmission
of Legends. (Page 47.)
Müllenhoff's
views are given in the Zeitschrift für deutsches Altertum, vol. x.;
Maurer's in the Zeitschrift für deutsche Philologie, vol. ii. For
Golther's views on the Volsung cycle see Germania, 33.
The
Dragon Myth. (Page 49.)
See
also Hartland, Science of Fairy-Tales.
The eating of the dragon's heart (see p. 19) may possibly be a survival of the custom of eating a slain enemy's he