Brot Af Sigurtharkvithu: Fragment of a Sigurth Lay

Henry Adams Bellows's notes to his translation (1923; Project Gutenberg #73533).

1. Stanza 1 “(What evil deed | has Sigurth) done, That the hero’s life | thou fain wouldst have?” Gunnar spake:
2. Stanza 1 The fragment begins with the last words of line 1 (probably line 3 of the stanza). A few editors ascribe this speech to Gunnar and the next to Brynhild; one reconstruction of lines 1–2 on this probably false assumption runs: “Why art thou, Brynhild, | daughter of Buthli, / Scheming ill | with evil counsel?” Hogni (German Hagene): brother of Gunnar and Guthrun.
3. Stanza 2 “Sigurth oaths | to me hath sworn, Oaths hath sworn, | and all hath broken; He betrayed me there | where truest all His oaths, methinks, | he ought to have kept.” Hogni spake:
4. Stanza 2 A few editors ascribe this speech to Brynhild. Gunnar, if the stanza is his, has believed Brynhild’s statement regarding Sigurth’s disloyalty to his blood-brother.
5. Stanza 3 “Thy heart hath Brynhild | whetted to hate, Evil to work | and harm to win; She grudges the honor | that Guthrun has, And that joy of herself | thou still dost have.”
6. Stanza 4 They cooked a wolf, | they cut up a snake, They gave to Gotthorm | the greedy one’s flesh, Before the men, | to murder minded, Laid their hands | on the hero bold.
7. Stanza 4 The Volsungasaga quotes a somewhat different version of this stanza, in which the snake is called “wood-fish” and the third line adds “beer and many things.” Eating snakes and the flesh of beasts of prey was commonly supposed to induce ferocity. Gotthorm: Grimhild’s son, half-brother to Gunnar. He it is who, not having sworn brotherhood with Sigurth, does the killing.
8. Stanza 5 Slain was Sigurth | south of the Rhine; From a limb a raven | called full loud: “Your blood shall redden | Atli’s blade, And your oaths shall bind | you both in chains.”
9. Stanza 5 In the manuscript this stanza stands between stanzas 11 and 12; most editions have made the change here indicated. South of the Rhine: the definite localization of the action shows how clearly all this part of the story was recognized in the North as of German origin. Atli (Attila; cf. introductory note to Gripisspo): the Northern version of the story makes him Brynhild’s brother. His marriage with Guthrun, and his slaying of her brothers, are told in the Atli poems. Regarding the manner of Sigurth’s death cf. concluding prose passage and note. Stanza 13 indicates that after stanza 5 a stanza containing the words of an eagle has been lost.
10. Stanza 6 Without stood Guthrun, | Gjuki’s daughter, Hear now the speech | that first she spake: “Where is Sigurth now, | the noble king, That my kinsmen riding | before him come?”
11. Stanza 7 Only this | did Hogni answer: “Sigurth we | with our swords have slain; The gray horse mourns | by his master dead.”
12. Stanza 7 One line of this stanza, but it is not clear which, seems to have been lost. The gray horse: Grani.
13. Stanza 8 Then Brynhild spake, | the daughter of Buthli: “Well shall ye joy | in weapons and lands; Sigurth alone | of all had been lord, If a little longer | his life had been.
14. Stanza 8 Some editions set stanzas 8 and 9 after stanza 11; Sijmons marks them as spurious. Buthli: cf. Gripisspo, 19, note.
15. Stanza 9 “Right were it not | that so he should rule O’er Gjuki’s wealth | and the race of the Goths; Five are the sons | for ruling the folk, And greedy of fight, | that he hath fathered.”
16. Stanza 9 Goths: a generic term for any German race; cf. Gripisspo, 35 and note. Five sons: according to the Volsungasaga Sigurth had only one son, named Sigmund, who was killed at Brynhild’s behest. Sigurtharkvitha en skamma and Guthrunarkvitha II likewise mention only one son. The daughter of Sigurth and Guthrun, Svanhild, marries Jormunrek (Ermanarich).
17. Stanza 10 Then Brynhild laughed— | and the building echoed— Only once, | with all her heart; “Long shall ye joy | in lands and men, Now ye have slain | the hero noble.”
18. Stanza 11 Then Guthrun spake, | the daughter of Gjuki: “Much thou speakest | in evil speech; Accursed be Gunnar, | Sigurth’s killer, Vengeance shall come | for his cruel heart.”
19. Stanza 12 Early came evening, | and ale was drunk, And among them long | and loud they talked; They slumbered all | when their beds they sought, But Gunnar alone | was long awake.
20. Stanza 12 The manuscript marks line 4 as the beginning of a new stanza, and a few editions combine it with stanza 13.
21. Stanza 13 His feet were tossing, | he talked to himself, And the slayer of hosts | began to heed What the twain from the tree | had told him then, The raven and eagle, | as home they rode.
22. Stanza 13 Slayer of hosts: warrior (Gunnar). Raven and eagle: cf. note on stanza 5.
23. Stanza 14 Brynhild awoke, | the daughter of Buthli, The warrior’s daughter, | ere dawn of day: “Love me or hate me, | the harm is done, And my grief cries out, | or else I die.”
24. Stanza 15 Silent were all | who heard her speak, And nought of the heart | of the queen they knew, Who wept such tears | the thing to tell That laughing once | of the men she had won. Brynhild spake:
25. Stanza 16 “Gunnar, I dreamed | a dream full grim: In the hall were corpses; | cold was my bed; And, ruler, thou | didst joyless ride, With fetters bound | in the foemen’s throng.
26. Stanza 16 Mogk regards stanzas 16 and 17 as interpolated, but on not very satisfactory grounds. On the death of Gunnar cf. Drap Niflunga.
27. Stanza 17 “. . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . | . . . . . . . . Utterly now | your Niflung race All shall die; | your oaths ye have broken.
28. Stanza 17 No gap is indicated in the manuscript, and some editions attach these two lines to stanza 16. Niflungs: this name (German Nibelungen), meaning “sons of the mist,” seems to have belonged originally to the race of supernatural beings to which the treasure belonged in the German version. It was subsequently extended to include the Gjukungs and their Burgundians. This question, of minor importance in the Norse poems, has evoked an enormous amount of learned discussion in connection with the Nibelungenlied.
29. Stanza 18 “Thou hast, Gunnar, | the deed forgot, When blood in your footprints | both ye mingled; All to him | hast repaid with ill Who fain had made thee | the foremost of kings.
30. Stanza 18 Footprints: the actual mingling of blood in one another’s footprints was a part of the ceremony of swearing blood-brotherhood, the oath which Gunnar and Sigurth had taken. The fourth line refers to the fact that Sigurth had won many battles for Gunnar.
31. Stanza 19 “Well did he prove, | when proud he rode To win me then | thy wife to be, How true the host-slayer | ever had held The oaths he had made | with the monarch young.
32. Stanza 20 “The wound-staff then, | all wound with gold, The hero let | between us lie; With fire the edge | was forged full keen, And with drops of venom | the blade was damp.” Here it is told in this poem about the death of Sigurth, and the story goes here that they slew him out of doors, but some say that they slew him in the house, on his bed while he was sleeping. But German men say that they killed him out of doors in the forest; and so it is told in the old Guthrun lay, that Sigurth and Gjuki’s sons had ridden to the council-place, and that he was slain there. But in this they are all agreed, that they deceived him in his trust of them, and fell upon him when he was lying down and unprepared. NOTES
33. Stanza 20 Regarding the sword episode cf. Gripisspo, 41 and note. Wound-staff: sword. Prose. This prose passage has in the manuscript, written in red, the phrase “Of Sigurth’s Death” as a heading; there is no break between it and the prose introducing Guthrunarkvitha I, the heading for that poem coming just before stanza 1. This note is of special interest as an effort at real criticism. The annotator, troubled by the two versions of the story of Sigurth’s death, feels it incumbent on him not only to point the fact out, but to cite the authority of “German men” for the form which appears in this poem. The alternative version, wherein Sigurth is slain in bed, appears in Sigurtharkvitha en skamma, Guthrunarhvot, and Hamthesmol, and also in the Volsungasaga, which tells how Gotthorm tried twice to kill Sigurth but was terrified by the brightness of his eyes, and succeeded only after the hero had fallen asleep. That the annotator was correct in citing German authority for the slaying of Sigurth in the forest is shown by the Nibelungenlied and the Thithrekssaga. The “old” Guthrun lay is unquestionably Guthrunarkvitha II.