The Nibelungenlied by Unknown

First transcribed: c. 1200 (English translation, 1848)

Type of work: Poetry

Type of plot: Epic

Time of plot: c. 437

Locale: North-central Europe

Principal characters

• Siegfried, the son of Siegmund and Sieglind
• Kriemhild, a Burgundian princess and Siegfried’s wife
• Gunther, ,
• Gernot, and
• Giselher, the brothers of Kriemhild
• Hagen, their retainer
• Brunhild, the wife of Gunther
• Etzel (Attila), Kriemhild’s second husband
• Dankwart, Hagen’s brother

The Poem:

In Burgundy there lives a noble family that numbers three brothers and a sister. The sons are Gunther, who wears the crown, Gernot, and Giselher. The daughter is Kriemhild. About them is a splendid court of powerful and righteous knights, including Hagen of Trony, his brother Dankwart, and mighty Hunold. Kriemhild dreams one night that she rears a falcon that then is slain by two eagles. When she tells her dream to Queen Uta, her mother’s interpretation is that Kriemhild should have a noble husband but that unless God’s protection follows him he might soon die. Siegfried is born in Niderland, the son of King Siegmund and Queen Sieglind. In his young manhood he hears of the beautiful Kriemhild, and, although he has never seen her, he determines to have her for his wife. Undeterred by reports of her fierce and warlike kinsmen, he makes his armor ready for his venture. Friends come from all parts of the country to bid him farewell, and many of them accompany him as retainers into King Gunther’s land. When he arrives at Gunther’s court, Hagen, who knows his fame, tells the brothers the story of Siegfried’s first success, relating how Siegfried killed great heroes and won the hoard of the Nibelung, a treasure of so much gold and jewels that five score wagons cannot carry all of it. He also tells how Siegfried won the cloak of invisibility from the dwarf Albric and how Siegfried became invulnerable from having bathed in the blood of a dragon he slew. Gunther and his brothers admit Siegfried to their hall after they hear of his exploits, and the hero stays with them a year. In all that time, however, he does not once see Kriemhild.

The Saxons, led by King Ludger, threaten to overcome the kingdom of the Burgundians. Siegfried pledges to use his forces in overcoming the Saxons, and in the battle he leads his knights and Gunther’s troops to a great victory. In the following days there are great celebrations at which Queen Uta and her daughter Kriemhild appear in public. On one of these occasions Siegfried and Kriemhild meet and become betrothed. King Gunther, wanting to marry Brunhild, Wotan’s daughter, tells Siegfried that if he will help him win Brunhild, then he might wed Kriemhild. Gunther sets out at the head of a great expedition, all of his knights decked in costly garments in order to impress Brunhild. Her preference for a husband, however, is not a well-dressed prince but a hero. She declares that the man who will win her must surpass her in feats of skill and strength. With Siegfried’s aid Gunther overcomes Brunhild, and she agrees to go with Gunther as his wife.

Siegfried is sent on ahead to announce a great celebration in honor of the coming marriage of Gunther to Brunhild. A double ceremony takes place, with Kriemhild becoming the bride of Siegfried at the same time. At the wedding feast Brunhild bursts into tears at the sight of Kriemhild and Siegfried together. Gunther tries to explain away her unhappiness, but once more, Gunther needs Siegfried’s aid, for Brunhild determines never to let Gunther share her bed. Siegfried goes to her chamber and there overpowers her. Thinking she is overcome by Gunther, she is thus subdued. Brunhild gives birth to a son who is named for Siegfried. As time passes she wishes once more to see Siegfried, who returned with Kriemhild to his own country. Therefore, she instructs Gunther to plan a great hunting party to which Siegfried and Kriemhild should be invited.

At the meeting of the two royal families, there is great rivalry between Brunhild and Kriemhild. They vie with each other by overdressing their attendants and then argue as to the place each should have in the royal procession. Finally, Kriemhild takes revenge when she tells Brunhild the true story of Brunhild’s wedding night. Accusing Brunhild of acting the part of a harlot, she says that Brunhild slept first with Siegfried, then with her husband, Gunther. For proof, she displays Brunhild’s ring and girdle, both of which Siegfried won from Brunhild the night he overcame her. Brunhild, furious and desirous of revenge, seeks out her husband and confronts him with the story of her humiliation and betrayal. Gunther and Siegfried soon settle to their own satisfaction the quarrel between the two women, but Hagen, the crafty one, stirs up trouble among Gunther’s brothers with his claim that Siegfried stained the honor of their house. They plot to trap Siegfried and to destroy him. When it is reported that the Saxons are to attack Gunther’s knights, Kriemhild unwittingly reveals Siegfried’s one vulnerable spot. While bathing in the dragon’s blood, he failed to protect a portion of his body the size of a linden leaf because a leaf fell down between his shoulders. The villainous Hagen asks her to sew a token on the spot so that he can protect Siegfried during the fighting. Hagen sends men to say that the Saxons gave up the attack. Then, the fear of battle over, Gunther rides out to hunt with all of his knights. There, deep in the forest, as Siegfried is bending over a spring to drink, he is struck in the fatal spot by an arrow from Hagen’s bow. Before he dies, Siegfried curses the Burgundians and their tribe forever. Indifferent to the dying man’s curse, Hagen carries home the body of the dead hero.

He places Siegfried’s body in the path where Kriemhild will see it on her way to church, but a chamberlain discovers the body before she passes. Kriemhild knows instinctively whose hand did the deed. A thousand knights headed by Siegmund, his father, mourn the dead hero, and everyone claims vengeance. The widow gives vast sums of money to the poor in honor of Siegfried. When Siegmund prepares to leave for Niderland, he asks Kriemhild to go with him. She refuses but allows him to take Siegfried’s son with him. She is determined to stay with the Burgundians. Queen Brunhild, however, offers no compassion. The Nibelungen hoard is given to Kriemhild because it is her wedding gift. By order of Hagen, who plans to get possession of the treasure, all of it is dropped to the bottom of the Rhine. In the years that follow Kriemhild remains in mourning for Siegfried.

At last the mighty Etzel, king of the Huns, seeks to marry Kriemhild. After a long courtship he wins Kriemhild and takes her to his land to be his wife. Etzel is rich and strong, and after her long years of mourning, Kriemhild again occupies a position of power and honor. Now she begins to consider how she might avenge herself for the death of Siegfried. Hoping to get Hagen in her power, she sends a messenger to her brothers, saying that she longs to see all of them again. When they receive her message, the brothers and Hagen set out. Old Queen Uta tells them that in a dream she saw a vision of dire foreboding, but the Burgundians refuse to heed her warning. Hagen receives a token from some mermaids, who say none of the knights will return from Hunland. He disregards the prediction. Then a quarrel breaks out among the Burgundians, and Dankwart slays Gelfrat. Three evil omens now attend the coming journey, but still the brothers refuse to turn back. At last the Burgundians come to Etzel’s castle. Gunther and his brothers are put into separate apartments. Dankwart and Hagen are sent to other quarters. Warned by Sir Dietrich that Kriemhild still plots vengeance for Siegfried’s death, Hagen urges them all to take precautions. When Kriemhild asks them to give her their weapons, Hagen replies that it could not be. The Burgundians decide to post a guard to prevent a surprise attack while they sleep. The court goes to mass. At the services the Huns are displeased to see that Gunther and his party jostle Queen Kriemhild.

In honor of the Burgundians, a great tournament is held for all the knights. The feeling between the Burgundians and the Huns is so bad that King Etzel is forced to intervene in order to keep the peace. To appease the brothers, Etzel gives them Kriemhild’s small son, Ortlieb, as a hostage. Sir Bloedel, however, presses into Dankwart’s quarters demanding justice for Kriemhild. In a few minutes he arouses the anger of Dankwart, who rises from his table and kills Bloedel. For this deed the angered Huns killed Dankwart’s retainers. Dankwart, at bay, runs to Hagen for help. Hagen, knowing that he will not live to seek his vengeance on Kriemhild later, slaughters the little prince, Ortlieb. Then a mighty battle follows in which Hagen and Gunther manage to kill most of their adversaries.

Kriemhild now urges her heroes to kill Hagen. The first to take up the challenge is Iring. After he wounds Hagen, he rushes back to Kriemhild for praise. Hagen recovers quickly and seeks Iring to kill him. The battle continues, and many knights from both sides fall in the bloody combat. Outnumbered, the Burgundians fall one by one. Kriemhild herself slays Hagen, the last of the Burgundians to survive. He dies without revealing the location of the treasure.

King Etzel grieves to see so many brave knights killed. At a sign from him, Hildebrand, one of his retainers, lifts his sword and ends the life of Kriemhild as well. In this way dies the secret of the new hiding place of the Nibelungen treasure.

Bibliography

Bekker, Hugo. “The Nibelungenlied”: A Literary Analysis. Toronto, Ont.: University of Toronto Press, 1971. Deals at length with the four main characters and with numerous parallelisms in the epic. Bekker’s main point is that Brunhild is offended not because Siegfried overpowers her in bed but because he breaches the rules of kingship by not consummating the sexual act.

Gibbs, Marion E., and Sidney M. Johnson. “Nibelungenlied, the Klage (and Kudrun).” In Medieval German Literature: A Companion. New York: Routledge, 2001. This chapter provides an overview of the epic, including a discussion of its origins, dating, author, form, and the poem itself. It also describes the epic’s impact after the Middle Ages.

Haymes, Edward R. “The Nibelungenlied”: History and Interpretation. Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 1986. Discusses how the epic would have been received around the year 1200, when it was written. Haymes interprets the work as an argument for the stability of the old feudal structure and against new elements from chivalric literature.

McConnell, Winder. The Nibelungenlied. Boston: Twayne, 1984. An excellent discussion of the epic, with strong historical and cultural background and an interesting overview of the reception of the work in Germany. McConnell provides well-organized interpretations of the major characters, and she emphasizes the anonymous author’s style of presenting the events without passing judgment.

Mowatt, D. G., and Hugh Sacker. “The Nibelungenlied”: An Interpretative Commentary. Toronto, Ont.: University of Toronto Press, 1967. A good general introduction followed by more than one hundred pages of commentary that closely follow the original text. Most useful in conjunction with an English translation that retains the stanza numbers. Includes maps and a genealogical diagram.

Müller, Jan-Dirk. Rules for the Endgame: The World of “The Nibelungenlied.” Translated by William T. Whobrey. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2007. Müller argues that modern methods of interpretation, with their expectations of coherence, are not useful to understanding the epic, and he offers another means of analyzing the work’s themes and structure.

The Nibelungenlied. Translated by A. T. Hatto. New York: Penguin Books, 1969. In addition to the translation, Hatto provides more than one hundred pages of information on the epic. He points out many discrepancies in the work. Includes a useful glossary of the characters’ names.

Poor, Sara S., and Jana K. Schulman, eds. Women and Medieval Epic: Gender, Genre, and the Limits of Epic Masculinity. New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007. This collection of essays about the representation of gender in medieval epics includes two discussions of The Nibelungenlied: “Monstrous Mates: The Leading Ladies of The Nibelungenlied and Völsunga Saga” by Kaaren Grimstad and Ray M. Wakefield and “The Politics of Emotion in The Nibelungenlied” by Kathryn Starkey.