The Nibelungenlied: The Lay of the Nibelungs (Oxford World's Classics) (5 page)

Helmut Brackert (ed. and trans.),
Das Nibelungenlied
, 2 vols. (Hamburg: Fischer Bücherei, 1970).

Helmut de Boor,
Das Nibelungenlied
, Deutsche Klassiker des Mittelalters, based upon the edn. of Karl Bartsch, 22nd edn., rev. Roswitha Wisniewski (Wiesbaden: F. A. Brockhaus, 1988).

Heinz Engels,
Das Nibelungenlied
. A complete transcription in Modern German type of the text of Manuscript C from the Fürstenberg Court Library Donaueschingen (New York: Frederick A. Praeger, 1969).

Karl Lachmann,
Der Nibelunge Noth und Die Klage
, 5th edn. (1878; repr. Hamburg: Robert Mölich, 1948).

Cyril Edwards (ed. and trans.),
Hartmann von Aue: Iwein or The Knight with the Lion
, Arthurian Archives, German Romance, 3 (Cambridge: D. S. Brewer, 2007).

Anthony Faulkes (ed.), Snorri Sturluson,
Edda: Prologue and Gylfaginning
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1982).

R. G. Finch,
The Saga of the Volsungs
(London: Thomas Nelson, 1965).

Dennis M. Kratz (ed. and trans.),
Waltharius
and
Ruodlieb
, Garland Library of Medieval Literature (New York: Garland, 1984).

Karl Langosch (ed. and trans.),
Waltharius; Ruodlieb; Märchenepen. Lateinische Epik des Mittelalters mit deutschen Versen
, 3rd edn. (Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft, 1967).

Bruce Mitchell and Fred C. Robinson,
A Guide to Old English
, 6th edn. (Oxford: Blackwell, 2001).

A. T. Hatto,
The Nibelungenlied
, Penguin Classics (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1965).

D. G. Mowatt,
The Nibelungenlied
, Everyman’s Library (London: Dent, 1962).

Burton Raffel,
Das Nibelungenlied—Song of the Nibelungs
(New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 2006).

Jesse L. Byock,
The Saga of the Volsungs: The Norse Epic of Sigurd the Dragon Slayer
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990).

Kevin Crossley-Holland,
Beowulf
(London: Macmillan, 1968).

Cyril Edwards,
Wolfram von Eschenbach: Parzival and Titurel
, Oxford World’s Classics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006).

Andrew Faulkes (trans.),
Snorri Sturluson: Edda
, Everyman Classics (London: Dent, 1987).

Edward R. Haymes,
The Saga of Thidrek of Bern
, Garland Library of Medieval Literature (New York and London: Garland, 1988).

Carolyne Larrington,
The Poetic Edda
, Oxford World’s Classics (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996).

Margaret Schlauch,
The Saga of the Volsungs; The Saga of Ragnar Lodbrok together with the Lay of Kraka
, Scandinavian Classics, 35 (New York, 1930; repr. New York: AMS Press).

Lewis Thorpe,
Gregory of Tours: The History of the Franks
(Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1974).

J. M. Wallace-Hadrill,
The Fourth Book of the Chronicle of Fredegar with its Continuations
(Edinburgh: Thomas Nelson, 1960).

C. M. Bowra,
Heroic Poetry
(London: Macmillan, 1952).

George T. Gillespie,
A Catalogue of Persons Named in German Heroic Literature
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1973).

Edward R. Haymes and Susann Samples,
Heroic Legends of the North
(New York: Garland, 1996).

Albert B. Lord,
The Singer of Tales
, Harvard Studies in Comparative Literature, 25 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1960).

Theodore M. Andersson,
The Legend of Brynhild
, Islandica, 43 (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1980).

——
A Preface to the Nibelungenlied
(Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1987).

Eldo Frederick Bunge, ‘Siegfried in German Literature’,
Philological Quarterly
, 19 (1940), 29–65.

Cyril Edwards, ‘Censoring Siegfried’s Love-Life: the
Nibelungenlied
in the Third Reich’, in
Mythos-Sage-Erzählung, Gedenkschrift für Alfred Ebenbauer
, ed. Johannes Keller and Florian Kragl (Vienna UP, 2009), 87–103.

Francis G. Gentry,
Tnuwe and Vriunt in the ‘Nibelungenlied
’ (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 1975).

—— Winder McConnell, Ulrich Müller, and Werner Wunderlich (eds.),
The Nibelungenlied Tradition: An Encyclopedia
(New York: Routledge, 2002).

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The ‘Nibelungenlied’: History and Interpretation
, Illinois Medieval Monographs, 2 (Urbana and Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1986).

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The Nibelungenlied
, Twayne’s World Authors Series (Boston: Twayne, 1984).

—— (ed.),
A Companion to the ‘Nibelungenlied
’ (Columbia, SC: Camden House, 1998).

D. G. Mowatt and Hugh Sacker,
The ‘Nibelungenlied’: An Interpretative Commentary
(Aylesbury: University of Toronto Press, 1967).

Mary Thorp,
The Study of the ‘Nibelungenlied’: Being the History of the Study of the Epic and Legend from 1755 to 1937
(Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1941).

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‘Was sider da geschach’: American-German Studies on the ‘Nibelungenlied’, Text and Reception, with Bibliography, 1980–1990/91
(Göppingen: Kümmerle, 1992).

[NL = the
Nibelungenlied
]

THE NIBELUNGENLIED

1st Adventure.      Of Kriemhilt

2nd Adventure.     Of Sivrit

3rd Adventure.     How Sivrit came to Worms

4th Adventure.      How Sivrit fought against the Saxons

5th Adventure.      How Sivrit beheld Kriemhilt for the very first time

6th Adventure.      How Gunther went to Iceland to woo Prünhilt

7th Adventure.      How Gunther won Prünhilt

8th Adventure.      How Sivrit fetched his men

9th Adventure.      How Sivrit was sent to Worms

10th Adventure.    How Prünhilt was welcomed in Worms

11th Adventure.    How Sivrit returned to his homeland with his wife

12th Adventure.    How Gunther invited Sivrit to the festivity

13th Adventure.    How Sivrit went with his wife to the festivity

14th Adventure.    How the queens scolded one another

15th Adventure.    How Sivrit was betrayed

16th Adventure.    How Sivrit was slain

17th Adventure.    How Sivrit was mourned over and buried

18th Adventure.    How Sigmunt returned to his homeland

19th Adventure.    How the hoard of the Nibelungs was brought to Worms

20th Adventure.    How King Etzel sent to Burgundy for Kriemhilt

21st Adventure.    How Kriemhilt travelled to the Huns

22nd Adventure.   How Kriemhilt was welcomed by Etzel

23rd Adventure.    How Kriemhilt saw to it that her brothers came to the festivity

24th Adventure.    How Wärbel and Swemmel carried out their lord’s embassy

25th Adventure.    How the Nibelungs travelled to the Huns

26th Adventure.    How Gelpfrat was slain by Dancwart

27th Adventure.    How they arrived in Pöchlarn

28th Adventure.    How the Burgundians arrived among the Huns

29th Adventure.    How Kriemhilt rebuked Hagen and how he did not stand up to greet her

30th Adventure.    How Hagen and Volker kept watch

31st Adventure.    How they went to church

32nd Adventure.   How Dancwart slew Blœdelin

33rd Adventure.    How the Burgundians fought against the Huns

34th Adventure.    How they threw the dead out of the hall

35th Adventure.    How Irinc was slain

36th Adventure.    How the queen ordered that the hall be burned down

37th Adventure.    How Rüedeger was slain

38th Adventure.    How Lord Dietrich’s warriors were all slain

39th Adventure.    How Sir Dietrich fought with Gunther and with Hagen

I
N
ancient tales many marvels are told us: of renowned heroes, of great hardship, of joys, festivities, of weeping and lamenting, of bold

warriors’ battles—now
you
may hear such marvels told!
*

1

There grew up in Burgundy a most noble maiden.
*
No one in all the lands
*
could be fairer. She was called Kriemhilt—she grew to be a beautiful woman. For her sake many knights were to lose their lives.

2

Wooing became that lovely maiden well. Bold warriors sought her love—no one wished her ill. Her noble form was beautiful beyond measure. The damsel’s virtues were an ornament to all other women.

3

Three kings, noble and powerful, were her guardians: Gunther and Gernot, those renowned warriors, and young Giselher, an outstanding knight. The lady was their sister—the princes had her in their care.

4

Those lords were munificent, of high-born lineage, outstanding warriors possessing armies of boldness beyond measure. Burgundy was the name of their land. In time to come they wrought great marvels in Etzel’s land. They resided with their armies in Worms by the

5

Rhine. Many proud knights from their lands served them with honour and renown until their end came. They afterwards died wretchedly because of two noble ladies’ enmity.

6

Their mother, a powerful queen, was called Lady Uote. Their father was called Dancrat, a man rich in courage, who bequeathed them their inheritance on his death—in his youth he had also won great repute.

7

The three kings were, as I have said, of very great courage. Subject to them were also the best warriors of whom tale has ever been told, strong and valiant, undaunted in fierce battles. These were Hagen of

8

Tronege, and also his brother, valiant Dancwart; Ortwin of Metz; the two margraves
*
Gere and Ekkewart; Volker of Alzey, never lacking in courage; Rumolt, the master of the kitchen, an outstanding knight;

9

Sindolt and Hunolt, those lords who had charge of the court and its repute—they were vassals of the three kings. They had many other warriors whose names I cannot tell.

10

Dancwart was marshal, and his kinsman, Ortwin of Metz, was the king’s steward. Sindolt, an outstanding knight, was cup-bearer.
Hunolt was chamberlain.
*
They knew how to act with high honour.

11

No one, indeed, could ever give you a full and true account of that court’s might and far-reaching power, of its most high dignity and of its chivalry, joyfully practised by those lords all their lives.