The Edda, Volume 2 / The Heroic Mythology of the North / Popular Studies in Mythology, Romance, and Folklore, No. 13

The study surveys the heroic poetry preserved in Codex Regius and related sources, tracing the principal Germanic cycles and their parallels in Anglo-Saxon and Continental traditions. It treats the smith's tale of Völund and the swan-maidens, the composite Volsung-Sigurd narrative with its dragon-slaying, cursed hoard, and Valkyrie enclosed by a ring of fire, and connections with the Ermanric and Helgi material. Attention is given to motifs of enchantment, betrayal, and vengeance, the gradual absorption of separate traditions into the Volsung complex, and the poems' varying dates, styles, and fragmentary transmission across northern and continental branches.