The Story of Siegfried

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica.

Learn More in these related Britannica articles: One man, Siegfried , is able to fulfill her conditions, but he woos and wins her not for himself but for another. When Brunhild discovers this deception, she exacts vengeance, which results in the death of Siegfried. Odin gave the gold but….

Navigation menu

Fafnir, in Nordic mythology, name of the great dragon slain by Sigurd, the Norse version of the German hero Siegfried. Articles from Britannica Encyclopedias for elementary and high school students. Help us improve this article! Contact our editors with your feedback. You may find it helpful to search within the site to see how similar or related subjects are covered. Any text you add should be original, not copied from other sources. At the bottom of the article, feel free to list any sources that support your changes, so that we can fully understand their context.

To ask other readers questions about The Story of Siegfried , please sign up. Be the first to ask a question about The Story of Siegfried.

The Story of Siegfried

Lists with This Book. This book is not yet featured on Listopia. Sep 24, Rudyard Lynch rated it really liked it Shelves: You will like this book if you like-Tolkien, Norse Mythology, Iliad, Beowulf, Hercules This is a great story told in an innovative prose. The story of Siegfried is one of my favorites the Niebelunglied is my favorite medieval epic , and this book gives the story credit. This book will not change your life or make you think about the greater universe in a new way. It is the equivalent to reading a well written book about the life of Hercules.

May 11, Julie rated it really liked it Shelves: A lovely read for any Tolkien fan. It is a wonderful resource to see what inspired such a legendary author. This was an unexpectedly fun read, and a nice change of pace from the usual. I read it for a challenge in tandem with another book, and have left with a greater understanding and admiration for the Norse legends as Baldwin presents them; certainly there are a certain number of tropes that would absolutely not work in a contemporary novel such as the stupidity of telling your sworn enemy your only weakness and all the characters were somewhat selfish, but the story was well-constructed and it al This was an unexpectedly fun read, and a nice change of pace from the usual.

I read it for a challenge in tandem with another book, and have left with a greater understanding and admiration for the Norse legends as Baldwin presents them; certainly there are a certain number of tropes that would absolutely not work in a contemporary novel such as the stupidity of telling your sworn enemy your only weakness and all the characters were somewhat selfish, but the story was well-constructed and it all just worked in the grand scheme of things.

I do have to say, I enjoyed this. I would have given it 3. I enjoyed Baldwin's interpretation of Siegfried's life. It's certainly more continuous than other stories I've read, where the tales tend to conflict and things. While I enjoyed the footnote explanations, I would have preferred not having to flip to the back every time there was one to be rea I do have to say, I enjoyed this. While I enjoyed the footnote explanations, I would have preferred not having to flip to the back every time there was one to be read. It's a foot note. Put your note in the foot note!

I really did enjoy the comparisons to other types of mythology. Some were obvious, like winter battling spring. Others I simply had never thought about. The story of Brunhild being the source of Sleeping Beauty was really interesting to me. It had never occurred to me that it had originated as a Norse myth as opposed to a Grimm Fairy Tale.

I thought that was very interesting. You learn something new every day, right? Older scholarship sometimes connected him with Arminius , victor of the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest. He may also have a purely mythological origin. Sigurd's story is first attested on a series of carvings, including runestones from Sweden and stone crosses from the British Isles , dating from the eleventh century. His slaying of a dragon and possession of the hoard of the Nibelungen is also common to both traditions. In other respects, however, the two traditions appear to diverge.

He also appears in numerous other works from both Germany and Scandinavia, including a series of medieval and early modern Scandinavian ballads. Wagner relied heavily on the Norse tradition in creating his version of Siegfried. His depiction of the hero has influenced many subsequent depictions.

In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Siegfried became heavily associated with German nationalism. The Thidrekssaga finishes its tale of Sigurd by saying. The names Sigurd and Siegfried do not share the same etymology. The second elements of the two names are different, however: This form of the name had been common even outside of heroic poetry since the ninth century, though the form Sigevrit is also attested, along with the Middle Dutch Zegevrijt.

There are competing theories as to which name is original. Names equivalent to Siegfried are first attested in Anglo-Saxon Kent in the seventh century and become frequent in Anglo-Saxon England in the ninth century. Hermann Reichert, on the other hand, notes that Scandinavian figures who are attested in pre-twelfth-century German, English, and Irish sources as having names equivalent to Siegfried are systematically changed to forms equivalent to Sigurd in later Scandinavian sources.

Unlike many figures of Germanic heroic tradition, Sigurd cannot be easily identified with a historical figure. The most popular theory is that Sigurd has his origins in one or several figures of the Merovingian dynasty of the Franks: In particular, the murder of Sigebert I , who was married to Brunhilda of Austrasia , is often cited as a likely inspiration for the figure, [14] [15] a theory that was first proposed in If this theory is correct, then in the legend, Fredegunda and Brunhilda appear to have switched roles, [17] while Chilperic has been replaced with Gunther.

Another theory argues that Sigurd and his slaying of the dragon represented a mythological version of Arminius 's defeat of Publius Quinctilius Varus at the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in 9 AD. A connection between Siegfried and Arminius was first proposed by Franz-Joseph Mone in , who believed Sigurd to be an amalgamation of several historical figures. In , Adolf Griesebrecht proposed that Sigurd is a mythologized version of Arminius, while the Romans represent the dragon.

It has also been suggested that Sigurd may be a purely mythological figure without a historical origin. Continental Germanic traditions about Siegfried enter writing with the Nibelungelied around The German tradition strongly associates Siegfried with a kingdom called "Niederland" Middle High German Niderlant , which, despite its name, is not the same as the modern Netherlands , but describes Siegfried's kingdom around the city of Xanten.

The Nibelungenlied gives two contradictory descriptions of Siegfried's youth. On the level of the main story, Siegfried is given a courtly upbringing in Xanten by his father king Siegmund and mother Sieglind. When he is seen coming to Worms , capital of the Burgundian kingdom to woo the princess Kriemhild, however, the Burgundian vassal Hagen von Tronje narrates a different story of Siegfried's youth: He also tells an unrelated tale about how Siegfried killed a dragon, bathed in its blood, and thereby received a skin as hard as horn that makes him invulnerable.

Of the features of young Siegfried's adventures, only those that are directly relevant to the rest of the story are mentioned. In order to win the hand of Kriemhild, Siegfried becomes a friend of the Burgundian kings Gunther , Gernot, and Giselher. Siegfried, using his cloak of invisibility, aids Gunther in each task. Siegfried and Kriemhild have a son, whom they name Gunther. Finally, in front of the door of the cathedral in Worms, the two queens argue who should enter first.

Hagen tricks Kriemhild into telling him where Siegfried's skin is vulnerable, and Gunther invites Siegfried to take part in a hunt in the Waskenwald the Vosges. Siegfried is mortally wounded, but still attacks Hagen, before cursing the Burgundians and dying. Hagen arranges to have Siegfried's corpse thrown outside the door to Kriemhild's bedroom. Kriemhild mourns Siegfried greatly and he is buried in Worms. The redaction of the text known as the Nibelungenlied C makes several small changes to localizations in the text: It is also mentioned that he was buried in a marble sarcophagus—this may be connected to actual marble sarcophagi that were displayed in the abbey, having been dug up following a fire in In the Rosengarten zu Worms c.

Kriemhild decides that she would like to test Siegfried's mettle against the hero Dietrich von Bern , and so she invites him and twelve of his warriors to fight her twelve champions. When the fight is finally meant to begin, Dietrich initially refuses to fight Siegfried on the grounds that the dragon's blood has made Siegfried's skin invulnerable. Dietrich is convinced to fight Siegfried by the false news that his mentor Hildebrand is dead and becomes so enraged that he begins to breathe fire, melting Siegfried's protective layer of horn on his skin.

The Story of Siegfried by James Baldwin

He is thus able to penetrate Siegfried's skin with his sword, and Siegfried becomes so afraid that he flees to Kriemhild's lap. Only the reappearance of Hildebrand prevents Dietrich from killing Siegfried. Some of the details agree with the Thidrekssaga. When Sigmund returns from a campaign one day, he discovers his wife is pregnant, and believing her to be unfaithful to him, he exiles her to the "Swabian Forest" the Black Forest?


  1. Nibelungenlied - Wikipedia.
  2. Sigurd - Wikipedia.
  3. Adventurous Women?

She dies after some time, and Sigurd is suckled by a hind before being found by the smith Mimir. Mimir tries to raise the boy, but Sigurd is so unruly that Mimir sends him to his brother Regin, who has transformed into a dragon, in the hopes that he will kill the boy. Sigurd, however, slays the dragon and tastes its flesh, whereby he learns the language of the birds and of Mimir's treachery.

He smears himself with dragon's blood, making his skin invulnerable, and returns to Mimir. Mimir gives him weapons to placate him, but Sigurd kills him anyway.


  • Introduction to Book History.
  • ?
  • The Homeric Hymn to Demeter: Translation, Commentary, and Interpretive Essays (Mythos: The Princeton/Bollingen Series in World Mythology)!
  • ?
  • Thidrek is unable to wound Sigurd because of his invulnerable skin, but on the third day Thidrek receives the sword Mimung, which can cut through Sigurd's skin, and defeats him. Sigurd recommends to Gunnar that he marry Brynhild, and the two ride to woo for her. Brynhild now claims that Sigurd had earlier said he would marry her unmentioned before in the text , but eventually she agrees to marry Gunnar. She will not, however, allow Gunnar to consummate the marriage, and so with Gunnar's agreement, Sigurd takes Gunnar's shape and deflowers Brynhild, taking away her strength.

    Some time later, Grimhild and Brynhild fight over who has a higher rank.

    The Story of Sigurd — Andrew LANG

    Brynhild claims that Sigurd is not of noble birth, after which Grimhild announces that Sigurd and not Gunnar deflowered Brynhild. The brothers then place his corpse in Grimhild's bed, and she mourns. The author of the saga has made a number of changes to create a more or less coherent story out of the many oral and possibly written sources that he used to create the saga.

    The Thidrekssaga makes no mention of how Sigurd won the hoard of the Nibelungen. The second half of the heroic poem Biterolf und Dietleib between and [55] features a war between the Burgundian heroes of the Nibelungenlied and the heroes of the cycle around Dietrich von Bern, something likely inspired by the Rosengarten zu Worms. In this context, it also features a fight between Siegfried and Dietrich in which Dietrich defeats Siegfried after initially appearing cowardly. The text also features a fight between Siegfried and the hero Heime , in which Siegfried knocks Heime's famous sword Nagelring out of his hand, after which both armies fight for control over the sword.

    The text also relates that Dietrich once brought Siegfried to Etzel's court as a hostage, something which is also alluded to in the Nibelungenlied. The so-called "Heldenbuch-Prosa" , first found in the Heldenbuch of Diebolt von Hanowe and afterwards contained in printings until , is considered one of the most important attestations of a continued oral tradition outside of the Nibelungenlied , with many details agreeing with the Thidrekssaga. The Heldenbuch-Prosa has very little to say about Siegfried: Unattested in any other source, however, is that Kriemhild orchestrated the disaster at Etzel's court in order to avenge Siegfried being killed by Dietrich von Bern.

    According to the Heldenbuch-Prosa, Dietrich killed Siegfried fighting in the rose garden at Worms see the Rosengarten zu Worms section above.

    Product Review

    This may have been another version of Siegfried's death that was in oral circulation. It agrees in many details with the Thidrekssaga and other Old Norse accounts over the Nibelungenlied , suggesting that these details existed in an oral tradition about Siegfried in Germany. He was so unruly, however, that the smith arranged for him to be killed by a dragon. Siegfried was able to kill the dragon, however, and eventually kills many more by trapping them under logs and setting them on fire.

    The dragon's skin, described as hard as horn, melts, and Siegfried sticks his finger into it, discovering that his finger is now hard as horn as well. He smears himself with the melted dragon skin everywhere except for one spot. Later, he stumbles upon the trail of another dragon that has kidnapped princess Kriemhild of Worms.

    With the help of the dwarf Eugel, Siegfried fights the giant Kuperan, who has the key to the mountain Kriemhild has been taken to. He rescues the princess and slays the dragon, finding the treasure of the Nibelungen inside the mountain. Eugel prophesies, however, the Siegfried only has eight years to live. Realizing he will not be able to use the treasure, Siegfried dumps the treasure into the Rhine on his way to Worms.