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Poetic Edda

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.^[1]

↑ 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.

[410]

[Brot_af_Sigurtharkvithu_20-a-b-1] 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.

[1]