Völundarkviða

Völundr and his two brothers see the swan-maidens bathing. Illustration by Jenny Nyström, 1893.

"The three smith boys spy and later marry three valkyrie maidens" (1882) by Friedrich Wilhelm Heine.

Völundarkviða (modern Icelandic spelling) or Vǫlundarkviða (standardised Old Norse spelling) [Völundr's poem] is one of the mythological poems of the Poetic Edda. The title can be anglicized as Völundarkvitha, Völundarkvidha, Völundarkvida, Volundarkvitha, Volundarkvidha or Volundarkvida).

Manuscripts, origins, and analogues

The poem is preserved in its entirety among the mythological poems of the thirteenth-century Icelandic manuscript Codex Regius, and the beginning of the prose prologue is also found in the AM 748 I 4to fragment.

The vocabulary and some of the formulaic phrasing of the poem is clearly influenced by West Germanic, with the strongest case being for influence from Old English (as West Germanic language). It is thought likely, therefore, that the poem was composed in or otherwise influenced by traditions from the Norse diaspora in England. This would suggest origins around the tenth or eleventh century. This fits in turn with the fact that most of the analogues to Vǫlundarkviða are West-Germanic in origin.

In visual sources, the story told in Vǫlundarkviða seems to be portrayed on the front panel of the eighth-century Northumbrian Franks Casket and on the eighth-century Gotlandic Ardre image stone VIII, along with a number of tenth-to-eleventh-century carvings from Northern England, including the Leeds Cross Shaft. In written sources, a largely similar story (Velents þáttr smiðs) is related in the Old Norse Þiðrekssaga af Bern (translated from lost Low German sources. And an evidently similar story is alluded to in the Old English poem The Lament of Deor.

Equivalent character names
Vǫlundarkviða	Dēor	Þiðreks saga
Vǫlundr	Wēlund	Velent
Níðuðr	Nīðhād	Níðungr
Bǫðvildr	Beaduhild	unnamed

Synopsis

The poem relates the story of the artisan Völundr, his capture Níðuðr, implicitly a petty-king of Närke (Sweden), and Vǫlundr's brutal revenge and escape.

Prose introduction

Vǫlundarkviða begins with a prose introduction, setting the scene, giving background about the characters, and partly summarising the poem. It is possible that this passage is much younger than the verse.

Stanzas 1–6

The poem opens by describing the flight of three swan-maidens identified in stanza 1 as meyjar, drósir, alvitr and suðrœnar ('young women, stately women, foreign beings, southerners') to a 'sævar strǫnd' ('lake/sea-shore') where they meet the three brothers Egill, Slagfiðr and Vǫlundr. Each maid takes one of the brothers as her own.

However, nine winters later, the women leave the brothers. The poem does not explain this, simply saying that the women depart 'ørlǫg drýgja' ('to fulfil their fate'). Slagfiðr and Egill go in search of their women, but Vǫlundr remains at home instead, forging baugar (‘(arm-)rings’) for his woman.

Stanzas 7–19

Discovering that Vǫlundr is living alone, a local king, Níðuðr, ‘lord of the Njárar’, has him captured in his sleep (stanzas 7–12).

Níðuðr takes Vǫlundr’s sword and gives one of the rings which Vǫlundr made for his missing bride to his daughter Bǫðvildr, and, at his wife’s instigation, he has Vǫlundr’s hamstrings cut, imprisoning him on an island called Sævarstaðr, where Vǫlundr makes objects for Níðuðr (stanzas 13–19).

Stanzas 20–41

Vǫlundr takes his revenge on Níðuðr first by enticing his two sons to visit with promises of treasure, killing them, and making jewels of their eyes and teeth (stanzas 20–26). He then entices Bǫðvildr by promising to mend the ring which she was given, getting her drunk, and implicitly having sex with her (stanzas 27–29).

The poem culminates in Vǫlundr taking to the air by some means which is not clearly described and telling Níðuðr what he has done, laughing (stanzas 30–39). It focuses finally on the plight of Bǫðvildr, whose lament closes the poem (stanzas 40–41):

Ek vætr hánom
vinna kunnak,
ek vætr hánom
vinna máttak.

I did not know how to
struggle against him at all,
I was not able to
struggle against him at all.

Literary criticism

The poem is appreciated for its evocative images.

In the night went men,

in studded corslets,

their shields glistened

in the waning moon.

Völundarkviða 6, Thorpe's translation

References

• Dronke, Ursula (Ed. & trans.) (1997). The Poetic Edda, vol. II, Mythological Poems. Oxford: Clarendeon. ISBN 0-19-811181-9.
• Thorpe, Benjamin. (Trans.). (1866). Edda Sæmundar Hinns Froða: The Edda Of Sæmund The Learned. (2 vols.) London: Trübner & Co. 1866. Reprinted 1906 as Rasmus B. Anderson & J. W. Buel (Eds.) The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson. London, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Berlin, New York: Norrœna Society. Available online at Google Books. Searchable graphic image version requiring DjVu plugin available at University of Georgia Libraries: Facsimile Books and Periodicals: The Elder Eddas and the Younger Eddas.

External links

English translations

• Völundarkvitha Translation and commentary by Henry Adams Bellows
• Bellows' translation with facing page Old Norse text
• Translation by Benjamin Thorpe
• Völundarkviða Translation by W. H. Auden and P. B. Taylor

Old Norse editions

• Völundarkviða Sophus Bugge's edition of the manuscript text
• Völundarkviða Guðni Jónsson's edition with normalized spelling