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

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© Cyril Edwards 2010

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Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data
Nibelungenlied. English.
The Nibelungenlied: the Lay of the Nibelungs/
translated with an introduction and notes by Cyril Edwards.
p. cm.—(Oxford World’s Classics)
Written down by an anonymous poet c.1200.
Includes bibliographical references.
ISBN 978–0–19–923854–5 (pbk.: acid-free paper)
1.  Epic poetry, German—Translations into English.
2.  Nibelungen—Poetry. I.  Edwards, Cyril W. II.  Title. III.  Title: Lay of the Nibelungs.
PT1579.A3E38 2010
83l′.21—dc22
2009024520

Typeset by Glyph International, Bangalore, India
Printed in Great Britain
on acid-free paper by
Clays Ltd, St Ives plc

ISBN 978–0–19–923854–5

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OXFORD WORLD’S CLASSICS

The Lay of the Nibelungs

Translated with an Introduction and Notes by

CYRIL EDWARDS

OXFORD WORLD’S CLASSICS

W
RITTEN
down by an anonymous poet
c
.1200, the
Nibelungenlied
(
Lay of the Nibelungs
) is the greatest medieval German heroic poem, a revenge saga on an epic scale, which has justly been compared with Homer and with the Old Icelandic
Saga of Burnt Njal
. Its origins reach back into the fifth century; it underwent a long genesis in the form of oral poetry before taking on written form. It proved hugely popular in the Middle Ages, with some forty manuscripts and fragments surviving. In the sixteenth century it disappeared from sight for 200 years. The poem grew to become central to the nationalist thinking of the Romantics, and in the twentieth century was appropriated by Nazi propagandists. The
Nibelungenlied
was a central inspiration for Richard Wagner’s
Ring
cycle and Fritz Lang’s two-part silent film,
Siegfried’s Death
and
Kriemhild’s Revenge
.

C
YRIL
E
DWARDS
is a Senior Research Fellow of Oxford University’s Faculty of Medieval and Modern Languages, and an Honorary Research Fellow of University College London. He is the author of
The Beginnings of German Literature
(Rochester, NY, 2002) and numerous articles on medieval love-lyrics, Old High German, and the supernatural. His translations include Wolfram von Eschenbach’s
Parzival and Titurel
(Oxford World’s Classics, 2006) and Hartmann von Aue’s
Iwein or The Knight with the Lion
(Cambridge, 2007).

Introduction

Note on the Text and Translation

Select Bibliography

Chronology

THE NIBELUNGENLIED

Appendix I: History and Legend

Appendix II: The Nordic Sources and the Problem of Genesis

Appendix III: The Metre of the Nibelungenlied

Explanatory Notes

Glossary of People and Places

A map of the Nibelungenlied

For Kate, most indefatigable of readers,
and in memory of George T. Gillespie and David R. McLintock

F
IRST
and foremost, I would like to thank my editor at Oxford World’s Classics, Judith Luna, for permitting me to take on this task, which has, on the whole, been enormous fun. As an undergraduate, I was weaned on the 1965 Penguin Classics translation of the
Nibelungenlied
by Arthur Hatto, and I am grateful for the assistance his version, and that of D. G. Mowatt (Everyman’s Library, 1962), have provided.

Undertaking such tasks, I have always felt the need to consult both colleagues and lay readers, to ensure both reliability and readability. I am most grateful to those I list below, but particularly to Kate Douglas. This is the third translation with which she has helped me, and there is no limit to her acuity. Other readers who helped were Katy Beebe, Jeff Ashcroft, Jennifer Hall, and Christine Ward. Heather Birt gave valuable advice on fiddling. Hauke Fill helped with Danubian place-names. Peter Drexler made available to me several film versions of the
Nibelungenlied
. Stewart Spencer wrote the section on Richard Wagner. Carolyne Larrington helped me through the Eddic morass. Paul Fouracre and Helena Carr guided me through the equally morassic Merovingian material. Kurt Gärtner assisted with Middle High German lexis. Karen Pratt made available to me Schlauch’s translation of
The Saga of Ragnar Lodbrok
—a rare book indeed. Frank Lamport helped me through his knowledge of Hebbel, and my colleague Kevin Hilliard with the eighteenth-century reception of the lay. Christine Glassner kept me abreast of recently found fragments of the
Nibelungenlied
and showed me the beautiful Melk fragments. Peter Christian and Rupert Wilson almost overcame my incompetence with computers, as I made my way up and through these thirty-nine steps.

Two reference books in particular have been of great assistance: David Dalby’s
Dictionary of the Mediœval German Hunt
(Berlin, 1965) and George Gillespie’s
Catalogue of Persons Named in German Heroic Literature
(Oxford, 1973).

Finally I would like to thank my tutors who introduced me to the text, both now deceased, Ruth Harvey and Peter Ganz.

All errors are, as the cliché would have it, mine alone.

All Mankinde is of one Author, and is in one volume; when one Man dies, one Chapter is not torne out of the booke, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated; God emploies several translators; some peeces are translated by age, some by sicknesse, some by warre, some by justice; but Gods hand is in every translation; and his hand shall binde up all our scattered leaves againe, for that Librarie where every booke shall lie open to one another.

(John Donne,
Devotions
VII)

Being true to the author is all.
                  (Naveed Chaudhri)

W
RITTEN
down by an anonymous poet
c
.1200, the
Nibelungenlied
, to give it its commonly used Modern German title, is the greatest medieval German heroic poem or lay, a revenge saga on an epic scale, which has justly been compared with Homer and with the Old Icelandic
Saga of Burnt Njal
. It tells of the heroic dragon-slayer Sivrit’s wooing of the beautiful Kriemhilt and King Gunther’s wooing of the Amazon-like Queen Prünhilt. The brutal murder of Sivrit by the fierce anti-hero Hagen, and the vengeance wreaked by Kriemhilt are recounted in bloody detail. Its origins reach back into the fifth century; it underwent a long genesis in the form of oral poetry before taking on written form. The poem proved hugely popular in the Middle Ages, with some forty manuscripts and fragments surviving. The latest of these is the
Ambraser Heldenbuch
, a huge two-volume compilation of romances and epics, now in the Austrian National Library, which was compiled between 1504 and 1516 for the emperor Maximilian I. After this last late medieval recording of the text the lay disappeared from sight almost entirely for 200 years. Rediscovered in 1755, the
Nibelungenlied
then became central to the nationalist thinking of the Romantics, coming to be regarded, anachronistically, as the ‘national epic’ of the Germans. This nationalistic abuse of the text culminated in its popularity in the Third Reich. The
Lay of the Nibelungs
was a central inspiration behind Richard Wagner’s monumental
Ring
cycle. Its greatest cinematic treatment is Fritz Lang’s two-part silent film,
Siegfried’s Death
and
Kriemhild’s Revenge
(1922–4), one of the high points of Weimar cinema.