Ring Legends of Tolkien

by David Day

In secret, Kriemhild has already been to the cells. She meets Hagen and makes to him a false promise of freedom if he will tell her where the Nibelung treasure is hidden. Hagen is a dark and stoic man, and he trusts not a word that Kriemhild speaks. Hagen tells the queen he has sworn an oath never to reveal where the Nibelung treasure is buried while his lord, Gunther, lives.

  Queen Kriemhild orders Hagen to be brought in chains to the throne room. Then, to the horror of all, Kriemhild throws the severed head of King Gunther – her own brother – upon the floor. The emperor Etzel and the hero Dietrich are aghast at the queen’s savagery, but the fierce Hagen of Troneck defiantly laughs aloud.

  There had been no oath of silence. Hagen had provoked the slaying because he feared that Gunther would trade his life for the treasure. But now that Gunther is gone, Hagen alone in all the world knows where that hoard is hidden, and no torture will ever make him tell. For if he cannot return the treasure to his queen, Brunhild, he can now at least deny that reward to her rival. Hagen laughs aloud, boasting that he would gladly suffer death and damnation to keep this last rich victory locked within his heart.

  Hagen’s defiance so enrages Queen Kriemhild that in an instant she takes into her hands Hagen’s sword – the sword Balmung, which had once belonged to Siegfried. Then, before the emperor or his courtiers can recover from the first shock of the unnatural murder of Gunther, Kriemhild strikes off the head of Hagen of Troneck as well.

  All now see the monstrous being that Kriemhild has become. At this last act of treachery, all the royal court recoil in horror. All know that no greater shame can befall a knight than to be slain by the hand of a woman. It is Dietrich’s lieutenant, Hildebrand, who acts out the will of all the assembled nobles when he leaps forward with his drawn sword. In a deed that might almost have been merciful, he ends the tortured life of Queen Kriemhild with a single stroke.

  With the death of Hagen, the last Nibelung lord is slain and the Nibelung treasure is gone forever from the sight of men. The Nixies and water sprites of the Rhine alone know where it lies, and they have no use for gold or gems. The ancient ring that was the cause of all this despair is buried with Queen Kriemhild, who was once the gentlest of women; while her rival, Queen Brunhild, who was once the strongest of her sex, is now broken by the loss of husband, champion and all wealth. She mourns the disaster that has extinguished all her noble men-at-arms and left her alone in a ruined and empty realm.

  War ravages and ruins the lands of the Nibelungs and the Huns

  So ends the tale of the rivalry of the two queens.

  THE ORIGINS OF THE NIBELUNGENLIED

  Although many of the German romances of hero cycles used elements of the Norse Völsunga Saga, the medieval epic the Nibelungenlied is the most direct rendering of that particular tale. Its hero Siegfried is definitely the Norse Sigurd the Dragonslayer. In part, the Nibelungenlied is an attempt by German royal houses to claim mythic ancestors in established heroic tradition; and in part it is authentic history. The heroic age for all the Teutonic (Germanic and Scandinavian) races of Northern Europe was the chaotic 5th and 6th centuries, when the authority of the Roman Empire was collapsing before the migrating Teuton tribes. The historical chieftains of those times became the subjects of oral traditions that elevated them to mythic status.

  The events in the Völsunga Saga and the Nibelungenlied are both based on the historical events surrounding the catastrophic annihilation of the Burgundians in 436 CE by the Huns of Attila, who were acting as mercenary agents for the Roman Emperor. The Nibelungenlied, as we know it, was written by an anonymous poet around 1200 AD for performance in the Austrian court – or rather, he was the last poet to contribute to the Nibelungenlied, for the work was the product of a heroic poetic tradition that began sometime in the 5th century.

  PRINCESSES AND SHIELD MAIDENS

  The characters of Brunhild and Kriemhild – and much of the plot for the Nibelungenlied and the Völsunga Saga – are also partly shaped by another historical character: the notorious Visigoth Queen Brunhilda. Born in about 540 CE, Brunhilda was married to King Sigebert of the Eastern Franks. King Sigebert’s brother Chilperic was the king of the Western Franks and married Queen Brunhilda’s sister. In the ensuing war between brothers, King Sigebert was murdered through intrigue in 575, and Brunhilda was made a captive. Her life was saved and her freedom won, however, by her captor’s son, who took her as his wife. She soon became a powerful force among the Franks, and over the 30 years of her influence she brought about the murders of no fewer than ten royal noblemen. Finally, in 613, a group of Frank noblemen decided to put an end to her intrigues. They tortured Brunhilda for three days, had her torn apart by wild horses, and then burned her on a pyre – an extraordinary and barbaric end to a remarkable historical character.

  Sigurd the VÖlsung discovers Brynhild the sleeping shield maiden

  In The Lord of the Rings, the basic central plot of the Nibelungenlied can be found in an understated subplot involving the four-way romance of Aragorn–Arwen–Éowyn–Faramir. The shield maiden Éowyn of Rohan falls in love with Aragorn in the same hopeless way, it is implied, that the Amazonian warrior Queen Brunhild of Iceland falls for Siegfried. Siegfried is betrothed to the beautiful Kriemhild, in the same way that Aragorn is betrothed to beautiful Arwen of Rivendell. Tolkien’s resolution of the love triangle in The Lord of the Rings is far happier and more gentlemanly, with none of the low trickery or bloody retribution of the Nibelungenlied.

  CHANGING PERSPECTIVES

  The Nibelungenlied displays many perspectives that sound strange to a modern reader. The Nibelungenlied epic is not primarily a vehicle for the hero Siegfried, as, say, the Iliad is for Achilles. It also appears that our sympathies with the valiant Siegfried in the first half are supposed to shift in the second half to the heroic deeds of his murderers, Hagen and Gunther. The epic is not even a history of a single dynasty or race. The Nibelungs are first one people, then another, then a third, depending on who controls the Nibelung treasure, which has become separated from the ring.

  There are also other curiosities about the epic. In the Völsunga Saga, the historical Attila the Hun is Atli, a savage and treacherous tyrant. However, in the Nibelungenlied, the Hun king known as Etzel is portrayed as a humane and sympathetic character. This is certainly because of the politics of the Austrian court for whom the Nibelungenlied was composed.

  Christian morality and chivalric traditions also resulted in changes. The extreme courtly behaviour of the knights and the coyness concerning the defloration of Brunhild is at odds with the straightforward Norse version. Also, there is undoubtedly a war-of-the-sexes aspect to the epic. Siegfried makes this clear in his battle with the Amazon. “If I now lose my life to this girl, the whole sex will become uppish and never obey their husbands forever after,” he says. It does not seem to matter that Siegfried and Gunther cheat and lie to this obviously superior woman in the arena and in the bedroom. It all serves the higher moral purpose of keeping women subservient.

  The warrior-maiden is also humbled and transformed – but more gently and without humiliation – in The Lord of the Rings. The shield maiden Éowyn who has slain the Witch-king is transformed by marriage into the gentle and subservient wife of Faramir, just as the unconquerable Amazon queen Brunhild is transformed by marriage into the gentle and subservient wife of Gunnar.

  The double standard is also vividly demonstrated in the remarkable last scene of the Nibelungenlied. Here the narrator suggests that the proper and chivalric attitude of Queen Kriemhild toward Hagen – the knight who murdered her husband, stole her treasure and decapitated her only child – should have been mercy. When she demurs by cutting Hagen’s head off with Siegfried’s sword, her behaviour is seen as monstrous. In the chivalric tradition of the time, vengeance is a male prerogative, and the slaying of even the vilest of knights by a woman is unforgivable. Immediately, a knight acts out the collective will of the court. He draws his own sword and executes her.

  In the Nibe
lungenlied, the ring is obviously separated from the treasure before the tale properly begins. It is not with the treasure, but on the hand of the Amazon queen. However, one aspect of the ring is taken on in the treasure trove by the Tarnkappe, the cloak of invisibility that Siegfried wins by wrestling with the dwarf Alberich. (In the same way, the god Loki wins the ring by wrestling with the dwarf Andvari, and Frodo twice wrestles with Gollum for possession of the One Ring.) The trick of invisibility that the One Ring possesses is not present in Norse tales. In the Nibelungenlied Siegfried uses the Tarnkappe for invisibility against the Amazon, while both Bilbo and Frodo use the One Ring’s invisibility against various enemies, dragons and wraiths.

  It is important also to point out that, even though the treasure and the cape of invisibility take over aspects of the ring’s power, the ring remains the key to the epic’s tragic plot. It is the ring taken by Siegfried from Brunhild and given to Kriemhild that ultimately seals the fate of all in the Nibelungenlied, just as surely as the movement of the One Ring seals the fate of all in The Lord of the Rings.

  PART

  TEN

  GREEK AND ROMAN MYTHS

  There is one ancient Greek myth that tells of the forging of the first ring. The tale begins at the dawn of time, long before humans or even gods existed. In fact, the story of the first ring is bound up with the tale of the coming of the gods and the creation of man.

  The Titans were the first race to rule the primeval world. They were the giant sons and daughters of Gaea, who is Mother Earth. Titans were as tall as the hills and both wise and strong. They also possessed magic powers with which they brought forth unlimited wealth and bounty.

  The Titans gave birth to many children: sons and daughters who became the spirits of rivers and forests. All nature was animated by their offspring: the nymphs of the sea, the mermaids, the naiads, the satyrs and the sylphs.

  THE WAR OF THE TITANS AND OLYMPIAN GODS

  One of the wisest of the Titans was gifted with the art of prophecy, and for this reason was named Prometheus, which means “foresight”. By this gift Prometheus had foreknowledge of the end of this age. He saw that by craft and cunning the Titans would be overthrown by the lesser race of the gods. Furthermore, he knew that his own fate was to be different from that of his soon-to-be-vanquished race; that it was to be bound up with that of these youthful gods.

  When the war between the Titans and the gods was fought, it all but consumed the world. For ten long years the terror of that war racked the earth. From the height of Olympus, Zeus, the storm god, hurled down his thunderbolts; while his brother Poseidon, the sea god, with his trident commanded the earth to quake. Yet with their strength and magicians’ powers, the Titans stood and fought the gods with glittering armour and shining spears. But valiant though they were, the Titans were overwhelmed by the gods. They were blasted by thunderbolts and the earth was rent from under them, causing them to fall into the deep pits of Tartarus, over which cruel Hades, the god of the underworld, ruled, and from which none could escape.

  Yavanna and Aulë look over their creations

  The light of the first sunrise brings about the miracle of the Awakening of Men upon Middle-earth

  PROMETHEUS AND THE CREATION OF MEN

  The Titan Prometheus was not condemned to such a fate as his brother, Atlas, who eternally held the weight of the heavens on his shoulders. Prometheus had taken no part in the war against the gods, and though he grieved for his kin, he long had known their fate. Instead, he went among the new gods and gave these harsh new rulers gifts of wisdom and knowledge. Prometheus turned his hand more and more to the arts of shaping metals and the substances of the earth he loved.

  He chose as a companion the lame son of Zeus named Hephaestus, the least haughty and overbearing of the gods. To Hephaestus he brought the fire and the forge, and with that god shared his deep knowledge of the earth. In the volcanic hearts of mountains, Prometheus taught Hephaestus the skills of the forging of metals. There they forged jewelled crowns, sceptres and golden thrones for the gods of Olympus. They made bright weapons and armour blessed with magical powers. Hephaestus the Smith soon became so valued by Zeus that he gave the lame god the hand of Aphrodite, the beautiful goddess of love, in marriage.

  Yet far-seeing Prometheus had also employed other crafts in his delving and forging. For the skills of the magician as well as the smith were endowed to those of the Titan race, so that in time the secret of life itself came to him. And, as is well known, Prometheus was the deity who shaped men from clay and breathed into them the breath of life. Furthermore, it was Prometheus who brought to men the gift of fire, for in their beginning they lived in darkness. With this gift of fire came also the light of wisdom and the heat of unquenchable desire, and all the things that make men greater than beasts and cause them to strive to achieve immortal fame.

  THE PUNISHMENT OF PROMETHEUS

  The Olympian gods were greatly displeased, for they wished no rivals in the world, and claimed that Prometheus had given to the mortals what the gods alone should possess. Yet the act could not be undone and the fire could not be quenched. In wrath, Zeus commanded Hephaestus to forge a great chain of unbreakable adamantine, the iron of the gods. Then he commanded that Prometheus be taken into the Asian wilderness among the White Mountains, between Scythia and Cimmeria, and upon the mountain called the Caucasus be chained. To that rock, Zeus swore Prometheus would forever be bound. To Prometheus Zeus sent a great eagle and a vulture of immense size. By these cruel birds, Prometheus’s side was pierced and his liver torn out. Each night his liver grew again, only to be torn from him the next day. To him also came the fiery sun and the freezing rain and hail. Thus, like his brethren beneath the earth, Prometheus was filled with eternal pain.

  Yet Prometheus endured and did not repent his deeds. By night came many nymphs, sylphs and spirits who grieved for him and sang soothing songs. Even some few of the race of men dared come to that terrible wilderness and seek his counsel. Yet none had the strength to break his bonds, and he seemed forever doomed to this torture.

  As the long ages passed, it is said that the gods became less cruel, and though their treatment of men was not always fair or good, they came to favour many among that mortal race and even love them. Between gods and men there grew a bond and a union, and from that union came many offspring. Mightiest of all of these was Heracles, the son of Zeus.

  Zeus had come at last to regret his punishment of Prometheus. However, he was restrained by his own unbreakable oath of eternal bondage. However, when Heracles went into the Asian wilderness, Zeus did not drive him away from the White Mountains, and allowed him to seek out Prometheus. Zeus knew that only Heracles possessed the strength to break the chains of adamantine, and the courage to slay the eagle and the vulture.

  PROMETHEUS AND ANNATAR – LORDS OF GIFTS

  When Prometheus was at last freed, Zeus spoke to him in a voice of thunder. Zeus swore that he would keep his oath of bondage, yet allow Prometheus to keep his freedom. So Zeus took from the chain of adamantine a broken link, and from Mount Caucasus he took a fragment of rock. With his immortal hand, Zeus welded the stone to the link. He then took the hand of Prometheus, and about his finger he closed the link of adamantine. By this device Zeus kept his oath to chain the Titan to the rock of Caucasus for ever, and yet he fulfilled his promise to let Prometheus walk free.

  Great Eagles – the emissaries of Zeus, King of the Greek gods

  This was how the first ring was made.

  Afterward, it is said, men came to wear rings to honour Prometheus, the bringer of fire and the father of man. It is claimed that the ring is a sign of both the smith who is master of fire and the magician who is master of life. And those who are kings of men wear the ring as a sign of their descent from Prometheus and the Titans who once ruled the earth.

  In Prometheus, the good Titan who brought life and fire to the human race, we have a mirror opposite to Tolkien’s Sauron, the evil sorcerer who brought death and darknes
s. However, when Sauron appeared in the Second Age in disguise among the Elven-smiths of Eregion as the mysterious stranger Annatar the Lord of Gifts, he must have seemed everything to the Elves that Prometheus was to humans. For Annatar the Lord of Gifts was also a magician-smith who, like Prometheus, defied the gods by giving away forbidden gifts of knowledge and skill. With Annatar’s guidance, Celebrimbor and the Elven-smiths of Ostin-Edhil in Eregion learned secrets of the smith and the magician matched only by the Valar themselves. Only after Annatar tricked the Elves into forging the Rings of Power did they learn the terrible price of Annatar’s gifts. The price demanded of Prometheus’s gifts was that the Titan himself be eternally bound and enslaved. The price demanded of Sauron’s gifts was that the Elves be eternally bound and enslaved.

  The Greek legend of the first ring links the ring to many primal images of power, which later emerge in the ring quest tradition and are linked with alchemy and metallurgy. In this tale, the first ring is solidly connected with the powers of the magician and the smith. Curiously, Prometheus, the father of man, the giver of fire and the master of smiths, has a ring forged of iron in the Caucasian Mountains: the very place where the secret of iron-smelting was discovered.

  PART

  ELEVEN

  JUDEO-CHRISTIAN LEGENDS

  The contribution of Judeo–Christian tradition to Tolkien’s imaginative writing is both paradoxical and – in one particular legend – profound. In many respects, the early Judeo–Christian world is very unlike Tolkien’s world. Tolkien purposely created a world that is without formal religion. Although Tolkien’s characters do not quite worship the Valar, their beliefs are very much closer to the pantheism of the pagan Teutons, Celts and Greeks than they are to the fierce monotheism of the Old Testament Hebrews.