Brunhild

In the Norse tradition, Brunhild is a shieldmaiden or valkyrie, who appears as a main character in the Völsunga saga and some Eddic poems treating the same events.

In both traditions, she is instrumental in bringing about the death of the hero Sigurd or Siegfried after he deceives her into marrying the Burgundian king Gunther or Gunnar.

Richard Wagner made Brunhild (as Brünnhilde) an important character in his opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen.

[16] After Sigurd kills the dragon Fafnir, he rides up to a house on a mountain, inside of which he finds a woman sleeping wearing armor.

Gudrun replies with Sigurd's deeds of killing the dragon, but Brunhild says that only Gunnar had dared to ride through the wall of flame.

[33] Brot af Sigurðarkviðu is only preserved fragmentarily: the surviving part of the poem tells the story of Sigurd's murder.

[43] The Völsunga saga tells the fullest version of Brunhild's life in the Scandinavian tradition, explaining many unclear references found in the Poetic Edda.

[48] The author appears to have been working in Norway and to have known the Thidrekssaga (c. 1250), a translation of continental Germanic traditions into Old Norse (see § Þiðrekssaga).

When she is twelve years old, King Agnar steals Brunhild's magical swan shirt, and she is forced to swear an oath of loyalty to him.

Sigurd feels love when he sees her and, despite her insistence she wants only to fight as a warrior, convinces her to renew her vow to marry him.

Brunhild can only be wed by a man who will ride through the flames around her tower; Gunnar is unable to do this, so Sigurd takes his shape and performs the deed for him.

[54] In the Danish ballad Sivard og Brynild (DgF 3, TSB E 101), Sigurd wins Brunhild on the "glass mountain" and then gives her to his friend Hagen.

Some manuscripts spell the name of her kingdom Îsenlant (iron-land), and it is possible that this is the original form, with the association with Iceland being secondary.

[61] Her kingdom is twelve days journey by boat from the Burgundian capital of Worms, marking her as living outside the bounds of courtly society.

[60] Brunhild is introduced to the story when word of her immense beauty reaches Worms one day, and King Gunther decides he wishes to marry her.

[70] Her disappearance in the second half of the epic may reflect the sources of the Nibelungenlied, but it also suggests a lack of interest in the character when she is no longer directly relevant to the story.

[72][73] In the Rosengarten zu Worms version D (after 1250), Brunhild is mentioned as among the spectators watching the tournament in Kriemhild's rose garden.

[83] In Biterolf und Dietleib (c. 1250), a parody of sorts of the heroic world,[84] Brunhild is shown to be concerned with avoiding loss of life in the war between the Burgundians and the heroes of the Dietrich von Bern cycle.

In the conciliatory festivities that follow, Brunhild explains that she gave Rüdiger the lance so that all the warriors would be encouraged to show the best of their abilities, not so that any would be killed.

[85] Brunhild's role in Biterolf is usually taken to parodic, and includes the detail that she says that she is afraid of Gunther's strength, whereupon Rüdiger reminds her of her own violent past.

[86] That Brunhild has given Etzel's most important hero, Rüdiger, a lance to fight against the Burgundians, without however, any of them dying, likely had a strong parodic effect on the poem's audience.

Theodore Andersson has argued that Brunhild was originally the more important figure of the two, as she is the main character in the surviving Eddic poems.

[92] The existence of a mountain called lectulus Brunihildae (Brunhild's bed) in the Taunus may attest to the awakening story in Germany,[8] but it is more likely that this name refers to the historical queen Brunhilda of Austrasia.

Although the ride through the flames is only attested in Scandinavia, a somewhat similar scene occurs in Das Lied vom Hürnen Seyfrid when Siegfried rescues Kriemhild.

[97] Common to all versions of the wooing is that Sigurd takes Gunther's place in the marriage bed in one way or another using deception and strength, which later provides part of Brunhild's motivation to have him killed.

[100][101] Theodore Andersson writes that "the family [that appears in Norse tradition] looks like a late speculative attempt to domesticate [Brunhild] in the style of other heroic stories.

"[102] Though it is only attested in the Norse tradition, it seems likely that the German Siegfried also had prior involvement with Brunhild before he wooed her for Gunther—the Nibelungenlied strongly hints that the two already know each other.

Her motivation as a scorned lover, which is introduced in the Sigurðarkviða hin skamma and reaches its apex in the Völsunga saga, is likely a later development of the Norse tradition and is possibly inspired by the story of Tristan and Iseult.

[104][105] Theodore M. Andersson and Hans Kuhn have both argued that Brunhild's suicide is a later development in the tradition, possibly modeled after the presumed original death of Gudrun/Kriemhild in the burning of Atli/Etzel's hall.

[110] In Friedrich Hebbel's three-part tragedy Die Nibelungen, Brunhild comes to symbolize a heathen past that must be overcome by Christianity, represented by Dietrich von Bern.