Guthrunarkvitha II en Forna — The Second, or Old, Lay of Guthrun

From the Poetic Edda, translated by Henry Adams Bellows

The Guðrúnarkviða II en forna (Old Norse: "The Second, or Old, Lay of Guthrun") is the earliest surviving poem of the Sigurth cycle, probably composed in the first half of the tenth century — a full hundred years before the First Lay of Guthrun and the other heroic poems of the Codex Regius. The poem is a lament in which Guthrun, sitting with Thjothrek at the court of Atli, reviews the full arc of her sorrows: the death of Sigurth, the riderless horse returning with bloodied saddle, her long stay weaving tapestries with Thora in Denmark, the draught of forgetfulness that Grimhild brewed to make her consent to marry Atli, and finally Atli's own dreams foretelling the death of his sons. It is the only poem of the Sigurth cycle antedating the year 1000 that survives in anything approaching complete form.

The poem has been preserved in rather bad shape, with several omissions and some interpolations, but in just this form it lay before the compilers of the Volsunga saga, who paraphrased it faithfully and quoted five of its stanzas. The narrative follows the German tradition rather than the Norse — Sigurth is slain in the forest, not in his bed, and the urging of Guthrun by her mother and brothers to become Atli's wife belongs directly to the continental sources. The absence of most characteristic Norse additions to the story reinforces the poem's antiquity and its likely origin in a German lament that reached the North in verse form.

This is Henry Adams Bellows' translation from The Poetic Edda (New York: The American-Scandinavian Foundation, 1923). The translation was verified against the sacred-texts.com digitised edition, transcribed from the original 1923 printed text. One digitisation error corrected ("am" to "art" in stanza 40).

Introductory Note

It has already been pointed out (introductory note to Guthrunarkvitha I) that the tradition of Guthrun's lament was known wherever the Sigurth story existed, and that this lament was probably one of the earliest parts of the legend to assume verse form. Whether it reached the North as verse cannot, of course, be determined, but it is at least possible that this was the case, and in any event it is clear that by the tenth and eleventh centuries there were a number of Norse poems with Guthrun's lament as the central theme. Two of these are included in the Eddic collection, the second one being unquestionably much the older. It is evidently the poem referred to by the annotator in the prose note following the Brot as "the old Guthrun lay," and its character and state of preservation have combined to lead most commentators to date it as early as the first half of the tenth century, whereas Guthrunarkvitha I belongs a hundred years later.

The poem has evidently been preserved in rather bad shape, with a number of serious omissions and some interpolations, but in just this form it lay before the compilers of the Volsungasaga, who paraphrased it faithfully, and quoted five of its stanzas. The interpolations are on the whole unimportant; the omissions, while they obscure the sense of certain passages, do not destroy the essential continuity of the poem, in which Guthrun reviews her sorrows from the death of Sigurth through the slaying of her brothers to Atli's dreams foretelling the death of their sons. It is, indeed, the only Norse poem of the Sigurth cycle antedating the year 1000 which has come down to us in anything approaching complete form; the Reginsmol, Fafnismol, and Sigrdrifumol are all collections of fragments, only a short bit of the "long" Sigurth lay remains, and the others — Gripisspo, Guthrunarkvitha I and III, Sigurtharkvitha en skamma, Helreith Brynhildar, Oddrunargratr, Guthrunarhvot, Hamthesmol, and the two Atli lays — are all generally dated from the eleventh and even the twelfth centuries.

An added reason for believing that Guthrunarkvitha II traces its origin back to a lament which reached the North from Germany in verse form is the absence of most characteristic Norse additions to the narrative, except in minor details. Sigurth is slain in the forest, as "German men say" (cf. Brot, concluding prose); the urging of Guthrun by her mother and brothers to become Atli's wife, the slaying of the Gjukungs (here only intimated, for at that point something seems to have been lost), and Guthrun's prospective revenge on Atli, all belong directly to the German tradition (cf. introductory note to Gripisspo). In the Codex Regius the poem is entitled simply Guthrunarkvitha; the numeral has been added in nearly all editions to distinguish this poem from the other two Guthrun lays, and the phrase "the old" is borrowed from the annotator's comment in the prose note at the end of the Brot.

The Second, or Old, Lay of Guthrun

King Thjothrek was with Atli, and had lost most of his men. Thjothrek and Guthrun lamented their griefs together. She spoke to him, saying:

A maid of maids | my mother bore me,
Bright in my bower, | my brothers I loved,
Till Gjuki dowered | me with gold,
Dowered with gold, | and to Sigurth gave me.

So Sigurth rose | o'er Gjuki's sons
As the leek grows green | above the grass,
Or the stag o'er all | the beasts doth stand,
Or as glow-red gold | above silver gray.

Till my brothers let me | no longer have
The best of heroes | my husband to be;
Sleep they could not, | or quarrels settle,
Till Sigurth they | at last had slain.

From the Thing ran Grani | with thundering feet,
But thence did Sigurth | himself come never;
Covered with sweat | was the saddle-bearer,
Wont the warrior's | weight to bear.

Weeping I sought | with Grani to speak,
With tear-wet cheeks | for the tale I asked;
The head of Grani | was bowed to the grass,
The steed knew well | his master was slain.

Long I waited | and pondered well
Ere ever the king | for tidings I asked.
. . . . . . . . . .

His head bowed Gunnar, | but Hogni told
The news full sore | of Sigurth slain:
"Hewed to death | at our hands he lies,
Gotthorm's slayer, | given to wolves.

"On the southern road | thou shalt Sigurth see,
Where hear thou canst | the ravens cry;
The eagles cry | as food they crave,
And about thy husband | wolves are howling."

"Why dost thou, Hogni, | such a horror
Let me hear, | all joyless left?
Ravens yet | thy heart shall rend
In a land that never | thou hast known."

Few the words | of Hogni were,
Bitter his heart | from heavy sorrow:
"Greater, Guthrun, | thy grief shall be
If the ravens so | my heart shall rend."

Never so black | had seemed the night
As when in sorrow | by Sigurth I sat;
The wolves . . . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . .
Best of all | methought 'twould be
If I my life | could only lose,
Or like to birch-wood | burned might be.

From the mountain forth | five days I fared,
Till Hoalf's hall | so high I saw;
Seven half-years | with Thora I stayed,
Hokon's daughter, | in Denmark then.

Sigmund's ship | by the land was sailing,
Golden the figure-head, | gay the beaks;
On board we wove | the warriors faring,
Sigar and Siggeir, | south to Fjon.

Then Grimhild asked, | the Gothic queen,
Whether willingly would I . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . .

Her needlework cast she | aside, and called
Her sons to ask, | with stern resolve,
Who amends to their sister | would make for her son,
Or the wife requite | for her husband killed.

Each to give me | gifts was fain,
Gifts to give, | and goodly speech,
Comfort so | for my sorrows great
To bring they tried, | but I trusted them not.

A draught did Grimhild | give me to drink,
Bitter and cold; | I forgot my cares;
For mingled therein was magic earth,
Ice-cold sea, and the blood of swine.

In the cup were runes | of every kind,
Written and reddened, | I could not read them;
A heather-fish | from the Haddings' land,
An ear uncut, | and the entrails of beasts.

Much evil was brewed | within the beer,
Blossoms of trees, | and acorns burned,
Dew of the hearth, | and holy entrails,
The liver of swine,-- | all grief to allay.

Then I forgot, | when the draught they gave me,
There in the hall, | my husband's slaying;
On their knees the kings | all three did kneel,
Ere she herself | to speak began:

"Guthrun, gold | to thee I give,
The wealth that once | thy father's was,
Rings to have, | and Hlothver's halls,
And the hangings all | that the monarch had.

"Hunnish women, | skilled in weaving,
Who gold make fair | to give thee joy,
And the wealth of Buthli | thine shall be,
Gold-decked one, | as Atli's wife."

Guthrun spake:

"A husband now | I will not have,
Nor wife of Brynhild's | brother be;
It beseems me not | with Buthli's son
Happy to be, | and heirs to bear."

Grimhild spake:

"Seek not on men | to avenge thy sorrows,
Though the blame at first | with us hath been;
Happy shalt be | as if both still lived,
Sigurth and Sigmund, | if sons thou bearest."

Guthrun spake:

"Grimhild, I may not | gladness find,
Nor hold forth hopes | to heroes now,
Since once the raven | and ravening wolf
Sigurth's heart's-blood | hungrily lapped."

Grimhild spake:

"Noblest of birth | is the ruler now
I have found for thee, | and foremost of all;
Him shalt thou have | while life thou hast,
Or husbandless be | if him thou wilt choose not."

Guthrun spake:

"Seek not so eagerly | me to send
To be a bride | of yon baneful race;
On Gunnar first | his wrath shall fall,
And the heart will he tear | from Hogni's breast."

So must I do | as the kings besought,
And against my will | for my kinsmen wed,
Ne'er with my husband | joy I had,
And my sons by my brothers' | fate were saved not.

. . . . . . . . . .
I could not rest | till of life I had robbed
The warrior bold, | the maker of battles.

The warders now | on the lofty walls
Opened the gates, | and in we rode.

Atli woke me, | for ever I seemed
Of bitterness full | for my brothers' death.

Atli spake:

"Now from sleep | the Norns have waked me
With visions of terror,-- | to thee will I tell them;
Methought thou, Guthrun, | Gjuki's daughter,
With poisoned blade | didst pierce my body."

Guthrun spake:

"Fire a dream | of steel shall follow
And willful pride | one of woman's wrath;
A baneful sore | I shall burn from thee,
And tend and heal thee, | though hated thou art."

Atli spake:

"Of plants I dreamed, | in the garden drooping,
That fain would I have | full high to grow;
Plucked by the roots, | and red with blood,
They brought them hither, | and bade me eat.

"I dreamed my hawks | from my hand had flown,
Eager for food, | to an evil house;
I dreamed their hearts | with honey I ate,
Soaked in blood, | and heavy my sorrow.

"Hounds I dreamed | from my hand I loosed,
Loud in hunger | and pain they howled;
Their flesh methought | was eagles' food,
And their bodies now | I needs must eat."

Guthrun spake:

"Men shall soon | of sacrifice speak,
And off the heads | of beasts shall hew;
Die they shall | ere day has dawned,
A few nights hence, | and the folk shall have them."

Atli spake:

"On my bed I sank, | nor slumber sought,
Weary with woe,-- | full well I remember.
. . . . . . . . . .

Colophon

The Guðrúnarkviða II en forna ("The Second, or Old, Lay of Guthrun") is the oldest surviving poem of the Sigurth cycle — probably composed in the first half of the tenth century, a hundred years before the other heroic lays that fill the Codex Regius. In forty-five stanzas, Guthrun moves from the memory of Sigurth's death and the riderless horse Grani returning with empty saddle, through the years of weaving tapestries in Denmark, to the draught of forgetfulness that made her consent to marry the man whose sons she would one day kill. The poem ends abruptly with Atli's ominous dreams — plants torn up by the roots, red with blood; hawks that flew to an evil house; hounds howling in hunger — and Guthrun's cryptic interpretations that veil her coming vengeance. The conclusion has been lost. What remains is the voice of a woman who forgot once, and has now remembered everything.

Translated by Henry Adams Bellows, The Poetic Edda (New York: The American-Scandinavian Foundation, 1923). Digitised text from sacred-texts.com. One digitisation error corrected ("am" to "art" in stanza 40).

Compiled and formatted for the Good Work Library by the New Tianmu Anglican Church, 2026.

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