Perhaps the most famous of all Norse sagas, the Völsung Saga presents the tales of the son and grandson of King Völsung, Sigmund and Sigurd, respectively. The stories are presented in the Eddas, then collected and recounted in the thirteenth-century Völsung Saga.
These tales have become iconic, in part because they inspired the medieval poem Nibelungenlied, Wagner’s Der Ring des Nibelungen, and part of Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings. The cursed ring, Andvaranaut, brings about the downfall of all who possess it or strive for it, in a manner not dissimilar to the One Ring.
The cycle as a whole recounts the rise and fall of the Völsung dynasty as well as the fall of the great family, the Niflungar. The Niflungar were said to be a royal clan among the Burgundians and were also sometimes known as Gjúkingar (after King Gjúki) or the Nibelungs. Odin, king of the gods, appears at several points in disguise, manipulating the destinies of the Völsung lines for reasons he does not deign to reveal.
* * *
Sigi, said to be the son of Odin, was once hunting with the thrall Bredi, who belonged to a man named Skadi. When it turned out that Bredi’s kill was the larger, Sigi’s shame to be outdone by a thrall grew to wrath, and so he murdered Bredi and buried the body in a snowdrift. He then told Skadi that the thrall had ridden away on his own. Skadi little believed such a thing of Bredi, who had long been loyal, and thus sent men to search for the thrall. His people found the body beneath the snow.
For the crime of murder, Sigi was outlawed—declared varg—and forced to leave home. But Odin took pity on his son and thus guided him through a series of adventures that ended with Sigi able to claim a kingdom for himself: Hunaland. Sigi married and had a son he named Rerir.
As Sigi grew older, his wife’s brothers grew jealous of all he had and conspired against him. Together they slew him and his men whilst Rerir was away from home. When the young man returned and saw what had been done to his father, terrible fury took him, and, raising an army of his own, he slaughtered his uncles and reclaimed his father’s lands.
After this, Rerir married, and for a time he and his wife ruled in peace. Yet they remained unable to conceive a child, which much grieved them and threatened the stability of Hunaland. They made sacrifices to Frigg to implore her aid, and she besought her husband Odin to use his power to give them a child. So Odin called forth a valkyrja, Hljod, to solve the issue. The woman took a magic apple and, in the shape of a crow, dropped the apple in the lap of the king. Once he ate of the fruit, he lay with the queen, and she conceived.
Her pregnancy proved unnaturally long, and during this time, Rerir was forced to ride to war. Illness took him on campaign, and he perished, leaving the queen alone. For six long years she was with child, and she knew she could not survive in such a state. Thus, she had the child cut from her, though it would cost her life. The boy was already half grown when born, and soon he became the king and was named Völsung.
When Völsung was grown, he married Hljod, and they had ten sons and a daughter. The eldest were twins, Sigmund and Sieglinde1. During his reign, Völsung built an enormous hall around the mighty tree Barnstokkr, whose branches reached into the rafters and through the roof.
* * *
At this time, a man named Siggeir was king of Gautland. When Sieglinde was of age, Siggeir came to call upon Völsung and ask for his daughter’s hand in marriage. Though Sieglinde misliked the foreign king, she would not gainsay her father, who thought the match fitting. So a great feast was thrown to celebrate the marriage, and the men of both kingdoms fell into mighty revels.
During the feast, an elderly one-eyed man came into the hall, bearing a strange sword. This hooded figure drove the sword into Barnstokkr. It sank over a foot into the bark, quivering in place when he released it. “He who draws this sword from the trunk shall have it as a gift and never carry a finer blade than this one.”
Some suspected the old man was Odin, who had once been a patron to Völsung’s line, but none could say for certain. The sword was Gramr, a legendary weapon, and the men soon fell into dispute over who was most worthy to draw the sword. Though many men, great and noble, sought to free the blade, none could move it an inch.
Even Siggeir tried to claim the sword, for he much desired such a thing and thought it a great honour, but he too failed. “It is true then,” he said. “None may claim this blade.” And there he was, huffing, chest heaving, and glaring at the ancient sword as if it had personally offended him.
“Won’t you try, Brother?” Sieglinde asked her Sigmund.
And so Sigmund grasped the sword’s hilt, expecting to do no better. Yet with a single heave, the blade was loosed.
“‘Twas well done, indeed,” Siggeir said. “Very worthy … And what price would you ask for such a weapon?”
“Price?” Sigmund glanced at the blade in his hand. The blade that was like a part of him, in truth. For it was his. It had always been his, waiting for him, slumbering ere now. This he knew, in the pith of his soul, from the moment he held it.
“I will gift you three times its weight in gold for this blade, and a more generous offer you will never hear.”
