The Saga of the Volsungs

by Jackson Crawford

  Then King Volsung said: "Everyone will say that I swore, while still in my mother’s womb, that I would never flee in fear from iron nor from fire, and I have kept that oath all of my days until now—and why would I not keep it in my old age? And no women will mock my sons, saying that they feared to die. Everyone will die someday, and no one can escape death when his time has come. I say that we will not flee but will do everything we can in the boldest way. I have fought in a hundred battles, sometimes with the larger army and sometimes with the smaller, and yet I have always had the victory. It will never be said that I fled, nor that I begged for peace."

  Signý wept miserably and asked Volsung not to send her back to King Siggeir. But King Volsung answered, "You will absolutely go home to your husband and stay with him, whatever happens to us."

  {7} Signý went back to her husband, and Volsung and his sons remained there overnight. And in the morning when it dawned, King Volsung ordered all his men to stand up, leave their ships for the land, and prepare themselves for battle. They all went ashore fully armed, and it was not long before King Siggeir arrived with his entire army, and the ensuing battle was extremely hard and the king aggressively urged his men forward. And it is said that on this day, King Volsung and his sons went all the way through the ranks of King Siggeir’s army eight times, cutting with weapons in both hands. And when they were preparing one more such assault, King Volsung fell dead in the middle of his own troops. And there all of his men fell, except for his ten sons, because there was much more opposition from the enemy than they could overcome. All of his sons were captured, tied up, and led away.

  Signý was aware that her father had been killed, and that her brothers were captives destined for death. She called King Siggeir to her for a private conversation, and she said, "I wish to request that you not kill all my brothers immediately, but instead have them held captive in the stocks. I recall that it is said that ‘An eye loves what it lingers on,’ and I will not ask for anything more, as I don’t expect it would be granted to me."

  King Siggeir answered, "You are foolish, and senseless, to request that your brothers be tormented more than if they were simply decapitated. But I will grant your request, because I’ll like it better if I subject them to worse, and make them suffer longer in dying."

  Now Siggeir ordered it to be done as Signý had requested. A huge tree trunk was taken and laid lengthwise over the legs of the ten brothers at a particular place in the forest, and they sat there all day until nightfall. And at midnight there came an old she-wolf, huge and ugly, to the place where they were pinned down by the tree trunk. Each night she would tear one of them to death with her teeth, and then eat him entirely, before she went away.

  The morning after, Signý sent a trusted servant to her brothers, to find out what the news was. And when the messenger came back, he reported that one of her brothers was dead. She was despondent at the thought that they would all die this way, with her unable to help them.

  There is little more to tell. Nine nights in a row, the same wolf came at midnight and killed and ate one of the brothers, until only Sigmund {8} was left alive. But before the tenth night fell, Signý sent her trusted servant to Sigmund. She gave the servant honey, and told him to spread it all over Sigmund’s face and to leave some in his mouth. Then the servant went to Sigmund and did as he was told, and returned home.

  That night, the wolf returned according to her usual habit, intending to kill and eat Sigmund as she had done to his brothers. But when she smelled him, she noticed the honey, and she licked his whole face with her tongue and then stuck her tongue into his mouth. Sigmund’s courage rose up, and he bit down on the wolf’s tongue. She sprang back hard and struggled mightily, and braced her feet against the tree trunk with such strength that it burst apart. Sigmund held on to the wolf’s tongue with his teeth so hard that the tongue was torn out of the wolf’s throat at the root, and the wolf died of this injury.

  Some say that this wolf was the mother of King Siggeir, and that she had taken a wolf’s form by the use of magic and sorcery.

  Chapter 6. How Sigmund Killed the Sons of Siggeir

  Now the stocks where he had been trapped were destroyed, and Sigmund was free, and he remained there in the forest. Signý sent messengers to find out what had happened, and whether Sigmund still lived. When the messengers came to where Sigmund was, he told them everything that had happened with the wolf and his brothers. They went home and reported the situation to Signý.

  Then Signý went and met her brother, and they agreed that he ought to build himself a house out of earth in the forest. A long time passed while Signý hid him there, and she brought him whatever he needed.

  For his part, King Siggeir believed that all the Volsungs were dead.

  Siggeir and Signý had two sons, and it is told that the oldest was ten years old when Signý sent him to meet Sigmund. She intended for the boy to help Sigmund if he tried to avenge their father Volsung.

  The boy went into the forest, and late in the evening he came to the turf-house Sigmund lived in. Sigmund greeted him well and appropriately, and asked the boy to make bread for them. "And I will get us firewood," said Sigmund. Sigmund gave him a bag with flour and left to look for firewood.

  {9} But when Sigmund came back, no baking had been done. Sigmund asked if the bread was ready. The boy said, "I didn’t dare touch the flour bag, because there’s something alive in there." So Sigmund thought that this boy might not be brave enough that he’d like to have the boy with him.

  When Sigmund and Signý next met, Sigmund told Signý that he didn’t feel like a man was near him, no matter how near the boy was. Signý said, "Then kill him. He doesn’t need to live any longer." And Sigmund did so.

  A winter passed, and the next winter Signý sent her younger son to meet Sigmund. But there is no reason to dwell on that story for long, because it went the same way, and Sigmund killed the boy at the request of Signý.

  Chapter 7. The Origin of Sinfjotli

  It is now told that Signý was sitting in her room one time when a very powerful witch visited her. Signý said to her: "I would like for the two of us to switch our forms."

  The witch answered, "That’s for you to decide." And so the witch used her magic to cause the two women to exchange shapes. The witch sat in Signý’s room in place of Signý, as Signý requested, and in the evening she went to bed next to King Siggeir. And the king did not discover that it was not Signý next to him.

  Now Signý went to where her brother lived in the turf-house, and she asked for lodging for the night "because I’m lost in the forest, and I don’t know where I am."

  He said that she could stay there, as he wouldn’t deny hospitality to a woman traveling alone, and he didn’t expect her to repay his generosity with betrayal. So she came into the house and they sat down and ate. Sigmund’s eyes were often drawn to the woman, and he thought she was truly beautiful. And when they had finished eating, he told her that he wanted them to share one bed that night. She said nothing against this, and Sigmund laid her down on his bed three nights in a row.

  After this, Signý went home and met the witch again. She asked that they exchange looks once again, and they did so.

  {10} And after some time passed, Signý gave birth to a boy, and he was given the name Sinfjotli. And as Sinfjotli grew up, he proved to be big and strong and good-looking, and very much of the Volsung type. He was not yet ten years old when Signý sent him to Sigmund in his turf-house.

  Before she sent them to Sigmund, Signý had tested her and Siggeir’s sons by sewing the sleeves of their shirts to their arms, through skin and flesh. They had taken it badly and complained about it. Now she did the same to Sinfjotli, and he did not react. Then she ripped the sleeve from his arm, so that the skin came off with it. She admitted that this must put him in a lot of pain.

  "Volsung wouldn’t have thought much of such an injury," he said.

  Now Sinfjotli came to Sigmund, and Sigmund asked him to make bread whi
le he went to get firewood. He handed him the bag of flour, and went into the woods. And when he came back, Sinfjotli was finishing his baking.

  Sigmund asked Sinfjotli if he had found anything in the bag of flour.

  "I am not without suspicion," said Sinfjotli, "that there was something alive in the flour, when I started kneading the dough. But I kneaded it down, whatever it was."

  Then Sigmund laughed and said, "You can’t eat this bread tonight. You’ve ground down a huge poisonous serpent in it."

  Sigmund was so powerful that he could eat poison without being harmed, but Sinfjotli could not eat or drink poison, though he could endure poison that fell on his skin.

  Chapter 8. The Vengeance of the Volsungs

  Now the saga tells that Sigmund thought Sinfjotli was too young to avenge Volsung with him, and he wanted to get Sinfjotli accustomed to some hardship first. They went out during the summers, traveling widely through the forests and killing men for their money. Sigmund thought Sinfjotli was much like a man of the Volsung kin, though he believed that Sinfjotli was King Siggeir’s son, and thought that he had his father’s evil disposition even if he had the vigor of a Volsung. He also thought Sinfjotli had a certain contempt for his family, because he {11} often reminded Sigmund about the wrongs he had suffered and often encouraged him to kill King Siggeir.

  One time, the two of them went into the forest to go robbing, and they found a house where two men were sleeping who wore thick golden rings. These men were princes who had suffered an evil fate, because wolfskins hung over them in the house and they could only come out of these wolfskins every tenth day. Sigmund and Sinfjotli put the wolfskins on and could not remove them. Like the princes before them, their voices were also changed into wolves’ howls, although they both understood each other.

  Now they took to the forests, each one on his own path. They made an arrangement that one of them would risk his life to attack up to seven men on his own, but not more than seven, and to howl for the other if he were in danger. "Let’s not break this arrangement," said Sigmund, "because you’re young and full of daring, and men will think it’s good to hunt you."

  Now each of them went his own way. And one time when they were apart, Sigmund came across seven men and let out a howl. When Sinfjotli heard it, he ran to Sigmund immediately and killed all the men, and they separated once again.

  And when Sinfjotli had not wandered a long way into the forest, he encountered eleven men and fought them, and he killed them all. But he was badly injured himself, and he went under an oak tree and rested there. He did not have long to wait for Sigmund, and they talked together for a while. Sinfjotli said to Sigmund, "You had help killing seven men, but I’m a child in age next to you, and I didn’t ask for help killing eleven."

  Sigmund leapt at him so hard that Sinfjotli lost his footing and fell, and Sigmund bit into his throat. That day they were unable to come out of their wolfskins. Sigmund took Sinfjotli up on his back and carried him home to the turf-house. There he sat over Sinfjotli and cursed the wolfskins, saying the trolls could take them.

  One day Sigmund watched two weasels fighting, and one of them bit the throat of the other. Then the weasel ran into the forest and got a leaf that he put on the other one’s wound, and the wounded weasel stood up unharmed. Sigmund then saw a raven flying with a leaf, and the raven gave it to him. He put the leaf on Sinfjotli’s wound, and Sinfjotli sprang up unharmed as if he had never been injured.

  {12} After this they went into Sigmund’s turf-house and stayed there until it was the tenth day and they could take off the wolfskins. Then they took the skins and burned them and cursed them, saying they would never cause anyone harm again.

  During this time of bad fate, they did many brave things in King Siggeir’s land. And now Sinfjotli was a grown man, and Sigmund thought that he had tested him plenty.

  Now a short time passed before Sigmund wanted to see to avenging his father, if it could be done. And he and Sinfjotli left their turf-house one day and came to King Siggeir’s house and went into the entryway in front of the hall, where there were beer barrels, and they hid themselves there. Queen Signý knew where they were and wanted to see them. And when they met, they all agreed to a plan, that Sigmund and Sinfjotli would take their vengeance when night fell.

  Signý and Siggeir had two young children who were playing on the floor with gold pieces. They rolled the gold pieces around the hall and ran after them. And when one golden ring rolled out of the house to the place where Sigmund and Sinfjotli were, one of the boys ran after it, and he saw where two large and grim-looking men were sitting wearing tall helmets and shining coats of armor. The boy ran back into the hall to his father and told him what he had seen, and the king suspected that there might be some treachery at hand.

  Signý heard what was said. She stood up, took both the children and went out into the entryway to Sigmund and Sinfjotli and told them that they ought to know that the children had betrayed them. "And I advise you to kill them," she said.

  Sigmund said, "I will not kill your children, even if they’ve betrayed me." But Sinfjotli did not hesitate; he drew his sword and killed both the children, and threw them into the hall at the feet of King Siggeir.

  The king stood up and called to his soldiers to seize these men who had been hiding in his home that evening. Some men ran out and seized them, but Sigmund and Sinfjotli defended themselves manfully and well, and the man who had it worst was whoever stood closest to them. But finally they were overwhelmed and captured and tied up and put into chains, and then they sat there the whole night.

  Now King Siggeir pondered what kind of death he could give them that would be slowest. And when morning came, the king had a big {13} burial mound made of stone and turf, and when this mound was ready, he had a large flat stone set in the middle in such a way that one end of the stone stood up, and the other down. This stone was so large that it could barely be circled by the arms of two men standing on either end. Now he had Sigmund and Sinfjotli set into the mound on either side of this stone, because he thought it would be worse for them to be separated even though they could hear one another.

  And when the workers began to fill the mound back in, Signý came with a bundle of straw in her hands and threw it into the mound with Sinfjotli, and she ordered the slaves not to tell King Siggeir about this. They obeyed her, and finished closing the mound.

  And when night fell, Sinfjotli said to Sigmund, "I don’t expect we’ll lack food for a while. Queen Signý has thrown a side of bacon into the mound for us, and wrapped it up in straw." And then he felt the meat more closely and found that Sigmund’s sword was sheathed inside it, and he found the hilt, and told Sigmund. Both of them celebrated. Now Sinfjotli stabbed up through the earth above the stone and cut hard. The sword bit into the stone. Then Sigmund took the point of the blade in hand and the two of them together sawed through the stone until it was split in half, as the poem tells:

  They cut that great stone

  with their strength.

  Sigmund wielded the sword,

  and Sinfjotli did as well.

  And now they were both free to move around in the burial mound, and they cut through stone and iron and escaped.

  Now they walked to King Siggeir’s hall, where everyone was asleep. They stacked up wood by the hall and set fire to it, and the people inside woke up to the smoke inside and the hall burning over them. King Siggeir asked who had set the fire.

  "Here I am with Sinfjotli, my nephew," said Sigmund, "and now we think that you ought to know that not all the Volsungs are dead."

  Sigmund asked Signý to come outside and receive praise and great honor. He said that he wanted to compensate her this way for her miseries.

  {14} But she answered: "Now you will see whether I have remembered the murder of King Volsung by King Siggeir. I had our children killed, when I thought they were too slow to avenge our father, and Sigmund, I went to you in the forest disguised as a sorceress, and Sinfjotli is your and my son. H
e is exceedingly manly, because he is the son of both a son and a daughter of Volsung.

  "Everything I have done has been to bring about the death of King Siggeir my husband, and now I have done so much to accomplish my vengeance that I cannot choose to live. I ought to die now with King Siggeir by choice, as I lived with him by force." Then she kissed her brother Sigmund and Sinfjotli and she went back into the fire and wished them farewell. There she died with King Siggeir and all Siggeir’s followers.

  Sigmund and Sinfjotli got an army and ships, and Sigmund set a course for his ancestral home and drove out the king who had set himself up there after King Volsung. Sigmund now became a great and powerful king, both wise and well-advised, and he married a woman named Borghild. They had two sons, named Helgi and Hámund.

  And when Helgi was born, the Norns came to him to determine his fate, and they said that he would become the most famous of all kings. Sigmund had come back from a battle, and he gave his son a clove of garlic and the name Helgi, and as his naming-gift he added the lands of Hringstaðir and Sólfjoll and a sword, and he urged him to do great things and to be a Volsung.

  Helgi became great and popular, and better than most other men at every kind of skill, and it is said that he rode to battle while still only fifteen years old. Helgi was made king over the army, and Sinfjotli came with him and they both commanded the troops.

  Chapter 9. Concerning Helgi, Killer of Hunding

  [compare Helgakviða Hundingsbana (Helgakvitha Hundingsbana) I & II in the Poetic Edda]

  It is said that Helgi met a king in battle who was named Hunding. He was a powerful king with a large army, and he ruled many lands. A {15} battle erupted between them, and Helgi pushed forward hard, and the battle ended with Helgi taking the victory. King Hunding fell, together with a large part of his army. Now Helgi was thought to have become a greater man, since he had killed such a powerful king.