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116-547: The title is a translation into German of the Old Norse phrase Ragnarök , which in Norse mythology refers to a prophesied war among various beings and gods that ultimately results in the burning, immersion in water, and renewal of the world. As with the rest of the Ring , however, Wagner's account diverges significantly from these Old Norse sources. The autograph manuscript of the work

232-427: A burial mound and located beside a farm in western Norway is recorded as having had ale poured over its roots during festivals. The tree was felled in 1874. Davidson comments that "the position of the tree in the centre as a source of luck and protection for gods and men is confirmed" by these rituals to Warden Trees. Davidson notes that the gods are described as meeting beneath Yggdrasil to hold their things , and

348-689: A dialect continuum , with no clear geographical boundary between them. Old East Norse traits were found in eastern Norway , although Old Norwegian is classified as Old West Norse, and Old West Norse traits were found in western Sweden . In what is present-day Denmark and Sweden, most speakers spoke Old East Norse. Though Old Gutnish is sometimes included in the Old East Norse dialect due to geographical associations, it developed its own unique features and shared in changes to both other branches. The 12th-century Icelandic Gray Goose Laws state that Swedes , Norwegians , Icelanders , and Danes spoke

464-661: A huge tree standing next to the Temple at Uppsala in Sweden , which remained green throughout summer and winter, and that no one knew what type it was. Davidson comments that while it is uncertain if Adam's informant actually witnessed the tree, the existence of sacred trees in pre-Christian Germanic Europe is further evidenced by records of their destruction by early Christian missionaries, such as Thor's Oak by Saint Boniface . Ken Dowden comments that behind Irminsul, Thor's Oak in Geismar, and

580-557: A shepherd who lives inside a tree, whose descendants repopulate the land after life there has been wiped out by plague (citing a retelling by F. R. Schröder). In addition, Simek points to an Old Norse parallel in the figure of Örvar-Oddr , "who is rejuvenated after living as a tree-man ( Ǫrvar-Odds saga 24–27)". Continuing as late as the 19th century, warden trees were venerated in areas of Germany and Scandinavia, considered to be guardians and bringers of luck, and offerings were sometimes made to them. A massive birch tree standing atop

696-701: A change known as Holtzmann's law . An epenthetic vowel became popular by 1200 in Old Danish, 1250 in Old Swedish and Old Norwegian, and 1300 in Old Icelandic. An unstressed vowel was used which varied by dialect. Old Norwegian exhibited all three: /u/ was used in West Norwegian south of Bergen , as in aftur , aftor (older aptr ); North of Bergen, /i/ appeared in aftir , after ; and East Norwegian used /a/ , after , aftær . Old Norse

812-660: A different woman. However, she notices the ring on Siegfried's hand, and realizes she has been betrayed ( "Betrug! Betrug! Schändlichster Betrug!" ). Declaring publicly that the man who conquered her and took the ring was not Gunther but Siegfried in disguise she exposes Gunther as an impostor who tried to increase his own prestige through the deeds of someone else. Filled with unquenchable desperate rage she also denounces Siegfried and falsely accuses him of having intercourse with her while in Gunther's form, thus breaking his blood-brotherhood with Gunther. Siegfried denies Brünnhilde's charge, but

928-531: A drinking horn ( "Blühenden Lebens labendes Blut" ). Hagen holds the horn but does not join in the oath, and the two new brothers then leave for Brünnhilde's rock. Hagen, left on guard duty, gloats that his so-called masters are unwittingly bringing the ring to him ( "Hier sitz ich zur Wacht" - Hagens Wacht - Hagen's Watch ). Orchestral Interlude Meanwhile, Brünnhilde is visited on her rock by her Valkyrie sister Waltraute, who recounts that Wotan returned from his wanderings with his spear shattered. The spear

1044-417: A female raven or a male crow. All neuter words have identical nominative and accusative forms, and all feminine words have identical nominative and accusative plurals. The gender of some words' plurals does not agree with that of their singulars, such as lim and mund . Some words, such as hungr , have multiple genders, evidenced by their determiners being declined in different genders within

1160-412: A front vowel to be split into a semivowel-vowel sequence before a back vowel in the following syllable. While West Norse only broke /e/ , East Norse also broke /i/ . The change was blocked by a /w/ , /l/ , or /ʀ/ preceding the potentially-broken vowel. Some /ja/ or /jɔ/ and /jaː/ or /jɔː/ result from breaking of /e/ and /eː/ respectively. When a noun, pronoun, adjective, or verb has

1276-409: A given sentence. Nouns, adjectives, and pronouns were declined in four grammatical cases – nominative , accusative , genitive , and dative  – in singular and plural numbers. Adjectives and pronouns were additionally declined in three grammatical genders. Some pronouns (first and second person) could have dual number in addition to singular and plural. The genitive

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1392-435: A hero's song about the adventures of his youth ( "Mime hieß ein mürrischer Zwerg" ), recounting his life with Mime, the forging of Nothung, slaying the dragon Fafner and understanding the language of birds. Hagen gives him another potion, which restores his memory, and Siegfried tells of discovering the sleeping Brünnhilde and awakening her with a kiss. Upon hearing this, now having the apparent evidence of Siegfried's betrayal of

1508-662: A hunting-trip and murder him. They sing a trio in which Brünnhilde and Gunther vow in the name of Wotan, "guardian of oaths", to kill Siegfried, while Hagen repeats his pledge to Alberich: to acquire the ring and rule the world through its power ( Rache-Terzett - Vengeance Trio ). Prelude to Act 3 In the woods by the bank of the Rhine, the Rhinemaidens swim playfully and sing a song to the Sun, mourning their lost Rhine gold ( "Frau Sonne sendet lichte Strahlen" ). Siegfried happens by, separated from

1624-458: A list of things that are what he refers to as the "noblest" of their kind. Within the list, Odin mentions Yggdrasil first, and states that it is the "noblest of trees". Yggdrasil is mentioned in two books in the Prose Edda ; Gylfaginning and Skáldskaparmál . In Gylfaginning , Yggdrasil is introduced in chapter 15. In chapter 15, Gangleri (described as king Gylfi in disguise) asks where

1740-584: A long vowel or diphthong in the accented syllable and its stem ends in a single l , n , or s , the r (or the elder r - or z -variant ʀ ) in an ending is assimilated. When the accented vowel is short, the ending is dropped. The nominative of the strong masculine declension and some i-stem feminine nouns uses one such -r (ʀ). Óðin-r ( Óðin-ʀ ) becomes Óðinn instead of * Óðinr ( * Óðinʀ ). The verb blása ('to blow'), has third person present tense blæss ('[he] blows') rather than * blæsr ( * blæsʀ ). Similarly,

1856-657: A mountaintop surrounded by magic fire ( "Zu neuen Thaten, theurer Helde" ). Brünnhilde sends Siegfried off to new heroic deeds, urging him to keep their love in mind. Siegfried proclaims himself to be simply an executor of her will, and as a pledge of his fidelity he gives her the ring of power that he took from Fafner 's hoard. In a duet, both of them extoll their loving bond, which nothing can untie, even when distance keeps them apart ( "O! heilige Götter!" ). Bearing Brünnhilde's shield and mounting her steed Grane , Siegfried then rides away. Orchestral Interlude - Siegfrieds Rheinfahrt ( Siegfried's Rhine Journey ) The act begins on

1972-474: A noun must mirror the gender of that noun , so that one says, " heill maðr! " but, " heilt barn! ". As in other languages, the grammatical gender of an impersonal noun is generally unrelated to an expected natural gender of that noun. While indeed karl , "man" is masculine, kona , "woman", is feminine, and hús , "house", is neuter, so also are hrafn and kráka , for "raven" and "crow", masculine and feminine respectively, even in reference to

2088-472: A similar development influenced by Middle Low German . Various languages unrelated to Old Norse and others not closely related have been heavily influenced by Norse, particularly the Norman language ; to a lesser extent, Finnish and Estonian . Russian, Ukrainian , Belarusian , Lithuanian and Latvian also have a few Norse loanwords. The words Rus and Russia , according to one theory, may be named after

2204-551: A stanza from Völuspá in support, and adds that dew falls from Yggdrasil to the earth, explaining that "this is what people call honeydew , and from it bees feed". In chapter 41, the stanza from Grímnismál is quoted that mentions that Yggdrasil is the foremost of trees. In chapter 54, as part of the events of Ragnarök , High describes that Odin will ride to the well Mímisbrunnr and consult Mímir on behalf of himself and his people. After this, "the ash Yggdrasil will shake and nothing will be unafraid in heaven or on earth", and then

2320-406: A tree, making this tree Odin's gallows. This tree may have been Yggdrasil. "The horse of the hanged" is a kenning for gallows and therefore Odin's gallows may have developed into the expression "Odin's horse", which then became the name of the tree. Nevertheless, scholarly opinions regarding the precise meaning of the name Yggdrasill vary, particularly on the issue of whether Yggdrasill

2436-601: A voiced velar fricative [ɣ] in all cases, and others have that realisation only in the middle of words and between vowels (with it otherwise being realised [ɡ] ). The Old East Norse /ʀ/ was an apical consonant , with its precise position unknown; it is reconstructed as a palatal sibilant . It descended from Proto-Germanic /z/ and eventually developed into /r/ , as had already occurred in Old West Norse. The consonant digraphs ⟨hl⟩ , ⟨hr⟩ , and ⟨hn⟩ occurred word-initially. It

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2552-460: A vowel or semivowel of a different vowel backness . In the case of i-umlaut and ʀ-umlaut , this entails a fronting of back vowels, with retention of lip rounding. In the case of u-umlaut , this entails labialization of unrounded vowels. Umlaut is phonemic and in many situations grammatically significant as a side effect of losing the Proto-Germanic morphological suffixes whose vowels created

2668-507: A wood or even a forest in which the two keep themselves hidden, but rather as an alternative name for the world-tree Yggdrasill. Thus, the creation of humanity from tree trunks (Askr, Embla) is repeated after the Ragnarǫk as well." Simek says that in Germanic regions , the concept of humanity originating from trees is ancient. Simek additionally points out legendary parallels in a Bavarian legend of

2784-448: A word. Strong verbs ablaut the lemma 's nucleus to derive the past forms of the verb. This parallels English conjugation, where, e.g., the nucleus of sing becomes sang in the past tense and sung in the past participle. Some verbs are derived by ablaut, as the present-in-past verbs do by consequence of being derived from the past tense forms of strong verbs. Umlaut or mutation is an assimilatory process acting on vowels preceding

2900-414: Is Gunther's duty, since the hero has apparently broken the sacred bond of blood-brotherhood during the night on the rock with Brünnhilde, which betrayal condemns him by law to the rightful punishment of death. Brünnhilde, seeking revenge for Siegfried's manifest treachery, joins the plot and tells Hagen that Siegfried would be vulnerable only to a stab in the back. Hagen and Gunther decide to lure Siegfried on

3016-400: Is brought in. Confronted with his sister's pain, Gunther blames Siegfried's death on Hagen, who replies that Siegfried had incurred the penalty of his false oath. Moreover, he claims the ring on Siegfried's finger by right of conquest. When Gunther objects, Hagen appeals to the vassals to support his lawful claim. Gunther draws his sword but Hagen attacks and easily kills him. As he moves to take

3132-517: Is carried away in a solemn funeral procession that forms the interlude as the scene is changed and recapitulates many of the themes associated with Siegfried and the Wälsungs. Orchestral Interlude - Siegfrieds Trauermusik ( Siegfried's Funeral March ) Back in the Gibichung Hall, Gutrune awaits Siegfried's return. Hagen arrives ahead of the funeral party. Gutrune is devastated when Siegfried's corpse

3248-461: Is expected to exist, such as in the male names Ragnarr , Steinarr (supposedly * Ragnarʀ , * Steinarʀ ), the result is apparently always /rː/ rather than */rʀ/ or */ʀː/ . This is observable in the Runic corpus. In Old Norse, i/j adjacent to i , e , their u-umlauts, and æ was not possible, nor u/v adjacent to u , o , their i-umlauts, and ǫ . At

3364-574: Is more common in Old West Norse in both phonemic and allophonic positions, while it only occurs sparsely in post-runic Old East Norse and even in runic Old East Norse. This is still a major difference between Swedish and Faroese and Icelandic today. Plurals of neuters do not have u-umlaut at all in Swedish, but in Faroese and Icelandic they do, for example the Faroese and Icelandic plurals of the word land , lond and lönd respectively, in contrast to

3480-554: Is possible that Hoddmimir is another name for Mimir, and that the two survivors hide in Yggdrasill." Rudolf Simek theorizes that the survival of Líf and Lífþrasir through Ragnarök by hiding in Hoddmímis holt is "a case of reduplication of the anthropogeny, understandable from the cyclic nature of the Eddic eschatology". Simek says that Hoddmímis holt "should not be understood literally as

3596-572: Is preserved in the Richard Wagner Foundation . Prelude to the Prologue The three Norns , daughters of Erda , the goddess of Nature, gather beside Brünnhilde 's rock, weaving the Rope of Destiny . From it they read of the past, the present, and of the future when Valhalla will be set on fire and the end of the gods will come ( "Welch' Licht leuchtet dort?" ). As their narration approaches

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3712-459: Is that the name Yggdrasill refers to the word yggr ("terror"), yet not in reference to the Odinic name, and so Yggdrasill would then mean "tree of terror, gallows". F. R. Schröder has proposed a fourth etymology according to which yggdrasill means "yew pillar", deriving yggia from *igwja (meaning " yew-tree "), and drasill from *dher- (meaning "support"). In

3828-456: Is that the nonphonemic difference between the voiced and the voiceless dental fricative is marked. The oldest texts and runic inscriptions use þ exclusively. Long vowels are denoted with acutes . Most other letters are written with the same glyph as the IPA phoneme, except as shown in the table below. Ablaut patterns are groups of vowels which are swapped, or ablauted, in the nucleus of

3944-443: Is the chief or holiest place of the gods. High replies "It is the ash Yggdrasil. There the gods must hold their courts each day". Gangleri asks what there is to tell about Yggdrasil. Just-As-High says that Yggdrasil is the biggest and best of all trees, that its branches extend out over all of the world and reach out over the sky. Three of the roots of the tree support it, and these three roots also extend extremely far: one "is among

4060-443: Is the name of the tree itself or if only the full term askr Yggdrasil (where Old Norse askr means "ash tree") refers specifically to the tree. According to this interpretation, askr Yggdrasils would mean the world tree upon which "the horse [Odin's horse] of the highest god [Odin] is bound". Both of these etymologies rely on a presumed but unattested *Yggsdrasill . A third interpretation, presented by F. Detter,

4176-486: Is the same figure as Mímir (associated with the spring named after him, Mímisbrunnr), then the Mímir's holt—Yggdrasil—and Mímir's spring may be within the same proximity. Carolyne Larrington notes that it is nowhere expressly stated what will happen to Yggdrasil during the events of Ragnarök . Larrington points to a connection between the primordial figure of Mímir and Yggdrasil in the poem Völuspá , and theorizes that "it

4292-557: Is unclear whether they were sequences of two consonants (with the first element realised as /h/ or perhaps /x/ ) or as single voiceless sonorants /l̥/ , /r̥/ and /n̥/ respectively. In Old Norwegian, Old Danish and later Old Swedish, the groups ⟨hl⟩ , ⟨hr⟩ , and ⟨hn⟩ were reduced to plain ⟨l⟩ , ⟨r⟩ , ⟨n⟩ , which suggests that they had most likely already been pronounced as voiceless sonorants by Old Norse times. The pronunciation of ⟨hv⟩

4408-603: Is unclear, but it may have been /xʷ/ (the Proto-Germanic pronunciation), /hʷ/ or the similar phoneme /ʍ/ . Unlike the three other digraphs, it was retained much longer in all dialects. Without ever developing into a voiceless sonorant in Icelandic, it instead underwent fortition to a plosive /kv/ , which suggests that instead of being a voiceless sonorant, it retained a stronger frication. Primary stress in Old Norse falls on

4524-525: The Latin alphabet , there was no standardized orthography in use in the Middle Ages. A modified version of the letter wynn called vend was used briefly for the sounds /u/ , /v/ , and /w/ . Long vowels were sometimes marked with acutes but also sometimes left unmarked or geminated. The standardized Old Norse spelling was created in the 19th century and is, for the most part, phonemic. The most notable deviation

4640-551: The Nine Worlds . Yggdrasil is attested in the Poetic Edda compiled in the 13th century from earlier traditional sources, and in the Prose Edda compiled in the 13th century by Snorri Sturluson . In both sources, Yggdrasil is an immense ash tree that is central to the cosmos and considered very holy. The gods go to Yggdrasil daily to assemble at their traditional governing assemblies . The branches of Yggdrasil extend far into

4756-630: The Oslo City Hall by Dagfin Werenskiold ; and the bronze relief on the doors of the Swedish Museum of National Antiquities (around 1950) by B. Marklund in Stockholm , Sweden. Poems mentioning Yggdrasil include Vårdträdet by Viktor Rydberg and Yggdrasill by J. Linke. In Overlord , a Japanese light novel series written by Kugane Maruyama, Yggdrasil is the name of a popular DMMORPG , where

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4872-523: The Poetic Edda , the tree is mentioned in the three poems Völuspá , Hávamál and Grímnismál . In the second stanza of the Poetic Edda poem Völuspá , the völva (a shamanic seeress) reciting the poem to the god Odin says that she remembers far back to "early times", being raised by jötnar , recalls nine worlds and nine ídiðiur (rendered in a variety of ways by translators—Dronke, for example, provides "nine wood-ogresses"), and when Yggdrasil

4988-657: The Rus' people , a Norse tribe, probably from present-day east-central Sweden. The current Finnish and Estonian words for Sweden are Ruotsi and Rootsi , respectively. A number of loanwords have been introduced into Irish , many associated with fishing and sailing. A similar influence is found in Scottish Gaelic , with over one hundred loanwords estimated to be in the language, many of which are related to fishing and sailing. Old Norse vowel phonemes mostly come in pairs of long and short. The standardized orthography marks

5104-429: The skald Hallvarðr Háreksblesi : "There is not under the pole of the earth [Yggdrasil] an illustrious one closer to the lord of monks [God] than you." Hilda Ellis Davidson comments that the existence of nine worlds around Yggdrasil is mentioned more than once in Old Norse sources, but the identity of the worlds is never stated outright, though it can be deduced from various sources. Davidson comments that "no doubt

5220-654: The word stem , so that hyrjar would be pronounced /ˈhyr.jar/ . In compound words, secondary stress falls on the second stem (e.g. lærisveinn , /ˈlɛːɾ.iˌswɛinː/ ). Unlike Proto-Norse, which was written with the Elder Futhark , runic Old Norse was originally written with the Younger Futhark , which had only 16 letters. Because of the limited number of runes, several runes were used for different sounds, and long and short vowels were not distinguished in writing. Medieval runes came into use some time later. As for

5336-436: The Æsir , the second among the frost jötnar, and the third over Niflheim . The root over Niflheim is gnawed at by the wyrm Níðhöggr , and beneath this root is the spring Hvergelmir . Beneath the root that reaches the frost jötnar is the well Mímisbrunnr , "which has wisdom and intelligence contained in it, and the master of the well is called Mimir ". Just-As-High provides details regarding Mímisbrunnr and then describes that

5452-551: The 11th century in most of Old East Norse. However, the distinction still holds in Dalecarlian dialects . The dots in the following vowel table separate the oral from nasal phonemes. Note: The open or open-mid vowels may be transcribed differently: Sometime around the 13th century, /ɔ/ (spelled ⟨ǫ⟩ ) merged with /ø/ or /o/ in most dialects except Old Danish , and Icelandic where /ɔ/ ( ǫ ) merged with /ø/ . This can be determined by their distinction within

5568-957: The 12th-century First Grammatical Treatise but not within the early 13th-century Prose Edda . The nasal vowels, also noted in the First Grammatical Treatise, are assumed to have been lost in most dialects by this time (but notably they are retained in Elfdalian and other dialects of Ovansiljan ). See Old Icelandic for the mergers of /øː/ (spelled ⟨œ⟩ ) with /ɛː/ (spelled ⟨æ⟩ ) and /ɛ/ (spelled ⟨ę⟩ ) with /e/ (spelled ⟨e⟩ ). Old Norse had three diphthong phonemes: /ɛi/ , /ɔu/ , /øy ~ ɛy/ (spelled ⟨ei⟩ , ⟨au⟩ , ⟨ey⟩ respectively). In East Norse these would monophthongize and merge with /eː/ and /øː/ , whereas in West Norse and its descendants

5684-642: The 13th century there. The age of the Swedish-speaking population of Finland is strongly contested, but Swedish settlement had spread the language into the region by the time of the Second Swedish Crusade in the 13th century at the latest. The modern descendants of the Old West Norse dialect are the West Scandinavian languages of Icelandic , Faroese , Norwegian , and the extinct Norn language of Orkney and Shetland , although Norwegian

5800-487: The 8th century, and Old Norse began to develop into the modern North Germanic languages in the mid- to late 14th century, ending the language phase known as Old Norse. These dates, however, are not absolute, since written Old Norse is found well into the 15th century. Old Norse was divided into three dialects : Old West Norse (Old West Nordic, often referred to as Old Norse ), Old East Norse (Old East Nordic), and Old Gutnish . Old West Norse and Old East Norse formed

5916-560: The Faroe Islands, Faroese has also been influenced by Danish. Both Middle English (especially northern English dialects within the area of the Danelaw ) and Early Scots (including Lowland Scots ) were strongly influenced by Norse and contained many Old Norse loanwords . Consequently, Modern English (including Scottish English ), inherited a significant proportion of its vocabulary directly from Norse. The development of Norman French

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6032-619: The Norse" inspired the editor of The Ruskin Reading Guild Journal to add Igdrasil to its name in 1890. Modern works of art depicting Yggdrasil include Die Nornen (painting, 1888) by K. Ehrenberg; Yggdrasil ( fresco , 1933) by Axel Revold , located in the University of Oslo library auditorium in Oslo , Norway ; Hjortene beiter i løvet på Yggdrasil asken (wood relief carving , 1938) on

6148-399: The Rhine's shore in front of Siegfried, Gutrune, Hagen, and the assembled Gibichung men and women and leads in a downcast Brünnhilde as his trophy. With false pomp he then triumphantly announces a double wedding: Brünnhilde to himself, and Gutrune to Siegfried ( "Brünnhild', die hehrste Frau" ). Brünnhilde almost faints in despair as she now sees her beloved, who doesn't even recognize her, with

6264-468: The Swedish plural land and numerous other examples. That also applies to almost all feminine nouns, for example the largest feminine noun group, the o-stem nouns (except the Swedish noun jord mentioned above), and even i-stem nouns and root nouns , such as Old West Norse mǫrk ( mörk in Icelandic) in comparison with Modern and Old Swedish mark . Vowel breaking, or fracture, caused

6380-405: The ash, as it stands. The old tree groans, and the giant slips free. In stanza 138 of the poem Hávamál , Odin describes how he once sacrificed himself to himself by hanging on a tree. The stanza reads: I know that I hung on a windy tree nine long nights, wounded with a spear, dedicated to Odin, myself to myself, on that tree of which no man knows from where its roots run. In

6496-411: The ash?" High says there is quite a lot to tell about. High continues that an eagle sits on the branches of Yggdrasil and that it has much knowledge. Between the eyes of the eagle sits a hawk called Veðrfölnir . A squirrel called Ratatoskr scurries up and down the ash Yggdrasil carrying "malicious messages" between the eagle and Níðhöggr. Four stags named Dáinn, Dvalinn, Duneyrr, and Duraþrór run between

6612-541: The beginning of words, this manifested as a dropping of the initial /j/ (which was general, independent of the following vowel) or /v/ . Compare ON orð , úlfr , ár with English word, wolf, year . In inflections, this manifested as the dropping of the inflectional vowels. Thus, klæði + dat -i remains klæði , and sjáum in Icelandic progressed to sjǫ́um > sjǫ́m > sjám . The * jj and * ww of Proto-Germanic became ggj and ggv respectively in Old Norse,

6728-425: The blood-brotherhood in front of Gunther and his men, Hagen stabs Siegfried in the back with his spear, declares that he had avenged perjury and calmly walks away. In his final agony Siegfried recollects the awakening of Brünnhilde and his love for her and with the memory of blessed fear the feeling for Brünnhilde had taught him, seeing her giving him greetings in a vision, dies ( "Brünnhilde! Heilige Braut!" ). His body

6844-475: The branches of Yggdrasil and consume its foliage. In the spring Hvergelmir are so many snakes along with Níðhöggr "that no tongue can enumerate them". Two stanzas from Grímnismál are then cited in support. High continues that the norns that live by the holy well Urðarbrunnr each day take water from the well and mud from around it and pour it over Yggdrasil so that the branches of the ash do not rot away or decay. High provides more information about Urðarbrunnr, cites

6960-452: The bystanders exuberantly off to the wedding feast, as if nothing too significant has happened. Orchestral Interlude Brünnhilde, Hagen, and Gunther do not join the celebration and stay alone by the shore. Deeply shamed by Brünnhilde's outburst in front of his subjects and thus threatened in his authority, Gunther agrees to Hagen's suggestion that Siegfried must be killed in order for Gunther to regain his standing. Indeed, to see Siegfried die

7076-411: The cluster */Crʀ/ cannot be realized as /Crː/ , nor as */Crʀ/ , nor as */Cʀː/ . The same shortening as in vetr also occurs in lax = laks ('salmon') (as opposed to * lakss , * laksʀ ), botn ('bottom') (as opposed to * botnn , * botnʀ ), and jarl (as opposed to * jarll , * jarlʀ ). Furthermore, wherever the cluster */rʀ/

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7192-560: The deceit. Hagen summons the Gibichung vassals to welcome Gunther and his bride ( Hagens Ruf - Hagen's Call ). He does this by sounding the war-alarm. The vassals are surprised to learn that the occasion is not battle, but their master's wedding and party. Hagen announces that Gunther has won himself a wife and orders them to slay sacrificial animals so that gods may grant a happy marriage. The vassals are then told to defend their new queen's honour if someone were to wrong her. Gunther lands on

7308-449: The diphthongs remained. Old Norse has six plosive phonemes, /p/ being rare word-initially and /d/ and /b/ pronounced as voiced fricative allophones between vowels except in compound words (e.g. veðrabati ), already in the Proto-Germanic language (e.g. * b *[β] > [v] between vowels). The /ɡ/ phoneme was pronounced as [ɡ] after an /n/ or another /ɡ/ and as [k] before /s/ and /t/ . Some accounts have it

7424-431: The dragon-slayer, the greatest of heroes, as the best husband for Gutrune. Neither Gunther nor Gutrune knows how to win themselves such partners, but Hagen reminds Gutrune that he has given her a potion she can use to make Siegfried forget any woman he has ever seen and fall in love with her; enamoured of Gutrune, Siegfried will then also be surely willing to bring Brünnhilde, who sleeps on a mountaintop encircled by fire only

7540-488: The dramaturgy of the ending of Götterdämmerung in the context of the entire Ring cycle. William Kinderman has evaluated a large-scale instance of musical recapitulation in Act III. Warren J. Darcy has expostulated on the potential influence of Wagner's readings of the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer on the music of the Ring cycle, particularly on the ending of Götterdämmerung . The historian John Roberts suggested that

7656-438: The fearless can pass, to Gunther in order to gain from him the permission for marriage with Gutrune. Gunther and Gutrune, not knowing that Siegfried and Brünnhilde are actually in love with each other, agree enthusiastically with this plan. Siegfried lands near the Gibichung Hall with his boat, seeking to meet Gunther, of whose fame he has heard during his journey ( "Heil, Siegfried, theurer Held!" ). Gunther extends hospitality to

7772-461: The flames, and the Rhinemaidens swim in to claim the ring. Hagen in a frenzy tries at the last moment to stop them and seize the ring for himself, but they drag him into the depths and drown him ( "Zurück vom Ring!" ), the theme of the curse of the ring being then heard for the last time. As they celebrate the return of the Rhinegold to their river and the breaking of its curse, a red glow spreads through

7888-506: The god of fire that still burns on her rock, to fly to Valhalla and set it on fire ( "Fliegt heim, ihr Raben!" ). After a final eulogy to the dead hero, Brünnhilde, willing to be reunited with her love, mounts her horse Grane and as a valkyrie rides into the flames, joining Siegfried in death. A sequence of leitmotifs portray the fire flaring up, and the hall of the Gibichungs catching fire and collapsing. The Rhine overflows its banks, quenching

8004-507: The heavens, and the tree is supported by three roots that extend far away into other locations; one to the well Urðarbrunnr in the heavens, one to the spring Hvergelmir , and another to the well Mímisbrunnr . Creatures live within Yggdrasil, including the dragon Níðhöggr , an unnamed eagle , and the stags Dáinn, Dvalinn, Duneyrr and Duraþrór . Scholars generally consider Hoddmímis holt , Mímameiðr , and Læraðr to be other names for

8120-406: The hero, and Gutrune offers him the potion. Unaware of deception, Siegfried toasts Brünnhilde and their mutual love and drinks. In a while he loses his memory of her and is struck by desire for Gutrune. Drugged, Siegfried then offers to win a wife for Gunther, who tells him about Brünnhilde and the magic fire, which only a fearless person can cross. They swear blood-brotherhood , mixing their blood in

8236-456: The hunting party while searching for prey. The Rhinemaidens urge him to return the ring to the Rhine and thus avoid its curse, but he laughs at them in heroic pride and says he prefers to die rather than bargain for his life. They swim away, predicting that Siegfried will die this very day and that his heir, a lady, will treat them more fairly. Siegfried rejoins the hunters, who include Gunther and Hagen. While resting, he sings them in high spirits

8352-418: The identity of the nine varied from time to time as the emphasis changed or new imagery arrived". Davidson says that it is unclear where the nine worlds are located in relation to the tree; they could either exist one above the other or perhaps be grouped around the tree, but there are references to worlds existing beneath the tree, while the gods are pictured as in the sky, a rainbow bridge ( Bifröst ) connecting

8468-495: The killing of Siegfried by Hagen with a stab in the back gave inspiration for the myth that the German Army did not lose World War I , but was instead defeated by a treasonous " stab in the back " from civilians, in particular Jews and Socialists. The German bass Kurt Moll pointed out that the part of the principal villain, Hagen, is unique in the bass repertoire: it requires a shouting, blaring vocal technique that risks damaging

8584-399: The long vowels with an acute accent. In medieval manuscripts, it is often unmarked but sometimes marked with an accent or through gemination . Old Norse had nasalized versions of all ten vowel places. These occurred as allophones of the vowels before nasal consonants and in places where a nasal had followed it in an older form of the word, before it was absorbed into a neighboring sound. If

8700-450: The might of grieving love the power of the ring, she bequeaths it to the Rhinemaidens, who are to claim it from her own ashes after fire has cleansed it of its curse, and declares that Wotan can finally truly rest in peace ( "Mein Erbe nun nehm' ich zu eigen" ). Brünnhilde then lights the funeral pyre with a firebrand and with "anxiously longed-for tidings" sends Wotan's ravens home to command Loge,

8816-661: The most conservative language, such that in present-day Iceland, schoolchildren are able to read the 12th-century Icelandic sagas in the original language (in editions with normalised spelling). Old Icelandic was very close to Old Norwegian , and together they formed Old West Norse , which was also spoken in Norse settlements in Greenland , the Faroes , Ireland , Scotland , the Isle of Man , northwest England, and in Normandy . Old East Norse

8932-503: The nasal was absorbed by a stressed vowel, it would also lengthen the vowel. This nasalization also occurred in the other Germanic languages, but were not retained long. They were noted in the First Grammatical Treatise , and otherwise might have remained unknown. The First Grammarian marked these with a dot above the letter. This notation did not catch on, and would soon be obsolete. Nasal and oral vowels probably merged around

9048-641: The other North Germanic languages. Faroese retains many similarities but is influenced by Danish, Norwegian, and Gaelic ( Scottish and/or Irish ). Although Swedish, Danish and Norwegian have diverged the most, they still retain considerable mutual intelligibility . Speakers of modern Swedish, Norwegian and Danish can mostly understand each other without studying their neighboring languages, particularly if speaking slowly. The languages are also sufficiently similar in writing that they can mostly be understood across borders. This could be because these languages have been mutually affected by each other, as well as having

9164-463: The plain" or possibly amended as "the one ruling in the ditch" ), Ófnir (Old Norse "the winding one, the twisting one" ), and Sváfnir (Old Norse, possibly "the one who puts to sleep = death" ), who Odin adds that he thinks will forever gnaw on the tree's branches. In stanza 35, Odin says that Yggdrasil "suffers agony more than men know", as a hart bites it from above, it decays on its sides, and Níðhöggr bites it from beneath. In stanza 44, Odin provides

9280-526: The point when they want to sing about the fate of Alberich's ring and its curse and as the themes of Siegfried and the Curse of the ring are heard, the rope breaks. Lamenting the loss of their wisdom, the Norns disappear, returning to their mother Erda beneath the earth ( "Zu End' ewiges Wissen!" ). Orchestral Interlude - Tagesgrauen ( Dawn ) As day breaks, Siegfried and Brünnhilde emerge from their dwelling high on

9396-440: The queen of the Gibichungs she then issues orders for a huge funeral pyre for the dead hero to be assembled by the river ( "Starke Scheite schichtet mir dort" ) and takes the ring from Siegfried's hand. With her eyes turned upwards to the sky, Brünnhilde in an apostrophe addresses Wotan, the ruler of oaths and laws, and proclaims that the death of the free hero Siegfried has atoned for the god's guilt; renouncing and overcoming through

9512-467: The related Irminsul , which may have been a pillar, was also symbolic of the center of the world. Davidson details that it would be difficult to ascertain whether a tree or pillar came first, and that this is likely to depend on whether the holy location was in a thickly wooded area or not. Davidson notes that there is no mention of a sacred tree at Þingvellir in Iceland , but that Adam of Bremen describes

9628-573: The ring ( "Schläfst du, Hagen, mein Sohn?" ). Hagen, barely conscious, swears to do so and Alberich vanishes with pleas for Hagen to remain loyal to him. Orchestral Interlude - Morgenröthe ( The Blush of Dawn ) Siegfried arrives at dawn via Tarnhelm-magic back to the settlement of the Gibichungs, having resumed his natural form and left Brünnhilde on a boat on the Rhine with Gunther. He explains to Gutrune how he managed to change his form back from Gunther's just in time for Brünnhilde to not be able to recognize

9744-659: The ring to the Rhinemaidens , but Brünnhilde refuses to relinquish the pledge of Siegfried's love, and Waltraute rides away in despair. Crossing the ring of fire, Siegfried arrives disguised as Gunther by using the Tarnhelm and claims Brünnhilde for his wife ( "Brünnhild', ein Freier kam" ). Though Brünnhilde, terrified by the appearance of an unknown man, tries to resist him, without the divine powers she has earlier renounced for love's sake she has now nothing with which to defend herself but

9860-608: The ring, however, Siegfried's hand rises miraculously in a threatening gesture. Hagen as well as all present recoil in utmost fear. Brünnhilde, with her features as if transfigured, suddenly makes her entrance ( "Schweigt eures Jammers jauchzenden Schwall!" ), having in the meantime met on the river's shores the daughters of the Rhine, who talked to her about the ring and its curse. She proclaims Siegfried innocent, as she now recognizes that he betrayed her only due to an intrigue, and declares that Siegfried's betrayal and death were necessary for her to become all-knowing and completely free. As

9976-532: The ring, which Siegfried manages to snatch cruelly from her hand during a fight, being immune to its coercive power thanks to his fearlessness. Putting the ring on his own hand instead, Siegfried then spends the night with Brünnhilde on her rock, placing the magic sword Nothung between them as a witness to his loyalty to Gunther and his keeping the promise to bring Brünnhilde untouched ( "Nun Nothung, zeuge du" ). Prelude to Act 2 As Hagen sits sleeping on night watch, his father Alberich appears and urges him to obtain

10092-417: The rivers Körmt and Örmt and two rivers named Kerlaugar to go "sit as judge at the ash of Yggdrasill". In the stanza that follows, a list of names of horses are given that the Æsir ride to "sit as judges" at Yggdrasil. In stanza 31, Odin says that the ash Yggdrasil has three roots that grow in three directions. He details that beneath the first lives Hel , under the second live frost jötnar, and beneath

10208-536: The root vowel, ǫ , is short. The clusters */Clʀ, Csʀ, Cnʀ, Crʀ/ cannot yield */Clː, Csː, Cnː, Crː/ respectively, instead /Cl, Cs, Cn, Cr/ . The effect of this shortening can result in the lack of distinction between some forms of the noun. In the case of vetr ('winter'), the nominative and accusative singular and plural forms are identical. The nominative singular and nominative and accusative plural would otherwise have been OWN * vetrr , OEN * wintrʀ . These forms are impossible because

10324-419: The roots of the tree has parallels in other cosmologies from Asia . She goes on to say that Norse cosmology may have been influenced by these Asiatic cosmologies from a northern location. Davidson adds, on the other hand, that it is attested that the Germanic peoples worshiped their deities in open forest clearings and that a sky god was particularly connected with the oak tree, and therefore "a central tree

10440-579: The sacred tree at Uppsala "looms a mythic prototype, an Yggdrasil, the world-ash of the Norsemen ". Thomas Carlyle adopted "Igdrasil" as a favorite symbol; it features in both On Heroes, Hero-Worship, & the Heroic in History (1841) and Past and Present (1843). John Ruskin referenced it in the conclusion to The Laws of Fésole (1877–1878). An unpublished manuscript of Carlyle's entitled "Igdrasil. From

10556-441: The same language, dǫnsk tunga ("Danish tongue"; speakers of Old East Norse would have said dansk tunga ). Another term was norrœnt mál ("northern speech"). Today Old Norse has developed into the modern North Germanic languages Icelandic , Faroese , Norwegian , Danish , Swedish , and other North Germanic varieties of which Norwegian, Danish and Swedish retain considerable mutual intelligibility . Icelandic remains

10672-530: The shamanic lore shared by many peoples of this region. This seems to be a very ancient conception, perhaps based on the Pole Star , the centre of the heavens, and the image of the central tree in Scandinavia may have been influenced by it.... Among Siberian shamans, a central tree may be used as a ladder to ascend the heavens. Davidson says that the notion of an eagle atop a tree and the world serpent coiled around

10788-608: The shores of the Rhine in the Hall of the Gibichungs , a people named after the deceased king Gibich . Gunther , his son and heir, sits enthroned. Gunther's half-brother and chief minister Hagen advises him to find a wife for himself and a husband for Gutrune , the sister of them both, to enlarge the glory and might of their dynasty and secure it for the future. He suggests Brünnhilde, the noblest of women, as appropriate for Gunther, and Siegfried,

10904-502: The singer's voice; only very large-voiced, powerful singers can sing it. Moll himself avoided the role. Friedrich Nietzsche 's 1888–1889 book, Götzendämmerung —Twilight of the Idols—is a pun on the title of Götterdämmerung , with Götze being the German word for "idol" or "false god". Notes Old Norse Old Norse , also referred to as Old Nordic , or Old Scandinavian ,

11020-658: The sky. The surviving Gibichungs now see the interior of Valhalla with gods and heroes visible as described by Waltraute in Act I, Scene 3. A new fire flares up around the Hall of the Gods, hiding it from sight; the gods are consumed in flames and the curtain falls. At the very end of the work there emerges the sound of the Liebeserlösung motive - the redemption-through-love leitmotif . Robert A. Hall Jr. has analysed Götterdämmerung in terms of cultural symbolism. Hermann Danuser has discussed

11136-481: The slip of wood", "laid down laws" and "chose lives" for the children of humanity and the destinies ( ørlǫg ) of men. In stanza 27, the völva details that she is aware that " Heimdallr 's hearing is couched beneath the bright-nurtured holy tree." In stanza 45, Yggdrasil receives a final mention in the poem. The völva describes, as a part of the onset of Ragnarök, that Heimdallr blows Gjallarhorn , that Odin speaks with Mímir 's head, and then: Yggdrasill shivers,

11252-422: The stanza that follows, Odin describes how he had no food nor drink there, that he peered downward, and that "I took up the runes , screaming I took them, then I fell back from there." Odin later used "the knowledge of the sacred runes" as a magical tool to give to humanity to increase humans' skill in magic and poetry. While Yggdrasil is not mentioned by name in the poem and other trees exist in Norse mythology,

11368-628: The third lives humanity. Stanza 32 details that a squirrel named Ratatoskr must run across Yggdrasil and bring "the eagle's word" from above to Níðhöggr below. Stanza 33 describes that four harts named Dáinn, Dvalinn, Duneyrr and Duraþrór consume "the highest boughs" of Yggdrasil. In stanza 34, Odin says that more serpents lie beneath Yggdrasil "than any fool can imagine" and lists them as Góinn and Móinn (possibly meaning Old Norse "land animal" ), which he describes as sons of Grafvitnir (Old Norse, possibly "ditch wolf" ), Grábakr (Old Norse "Greyback" ), Grafvölluðr (Old Norse, possibly "the one digging under

11484-414: The third root of the well "extends to heaven" and that beneath the root is the "very holy" well Urðarbrunnr . At Urðarbrunnr the gods hold their court, and every day the Æsir ride to Urðarbrunnr up over the bridge Bifröst . Later in the chapter, a stanza from Grímnismál mentioning Yggdrasil is quoted in support. In chapter 16, Gangleri asks "what other particularly notable things are there to tell about

11600-440: The tree is near universally accepted as Yggdrasil by scholars, and if the tree is Yggdrasil, then the name Yggdrasil directly relates to this story. In the poem Grímnismál , Odin (disguised as Grímnir ) provides the young Agnar with cosmological lore. Yggdrasil is first mentioned in the poem in stanza 29, where Odin says that, because the " bridge of the Æsir burns" and the " sacred waters boil," Thor must wade through

11716-454: The tree with other worlds. Davidson opines that "those who have tried to produce a convincing diagram of the Scandinavian cosmos from what we are told in the sources have only added to the confusion". Davidson notes parallels between Yggdrasil and shamanic lore in northern Eurasia: The conception of the tree rising through a number of worlds is found in northern Eurasia and forms part of

11832-552: The tree. The tree is an example of sacred trees and groves in Germanic paganism and mythology , and scholars in the field of Germanic philology have long discussed its implications. The generally accepted meaning of Old Norse Yggdrasill is "Odin's horse", meaning " gallows ". This interpretation comes about because drasill means "horse" and Ygg(r) is one of Odin's many names . The Poetic Edda poem Hávamál describes how Odin sacrificed himself by hanging from

11948-497: The umlaut allophones . Some /y/ , /yː/ , /ø/ , /øː/ , /ɛ/ , /ɛː/ , /øy/ , and all /ɛi/ were obtained by i-umlaut from /u/ , /uː/ , /o/ , /oː/ , /a/ , /aː/ , /au/ , and /ai/ respectively. Others were formed via ʀ-umlaut from /u/ , /uː/ , /a/ , /aː/ , and /au/ . Some /y/ , /yː/ , /ø/ , /øː/ , and all /ɔ/ , /ɔː/ were obtained by u-umlaut from /i/ , /iː/ , /e/ , /eː/ , and /a/ , /aː/ respectively. See Old Icelandic for information on /ɔː/ . /œ/

12064-607: The vassals urge him to prove his innocence by taking an oath. Hagen offers his spear as the weapon by which Siegfried can do so. Siegfried agrees and swears upon Hagen's spear-point that he may be killed with it if he has ever loved Brünnhilde ( "Helle Wehr, heilige Waffe!" ). She also seizes the spear and swears that Siegfried may be killed with it for swearing the false oath. Once again Hagen supervises silently as others take oaths to his advantage. The naively light-hearted Siegfried, wishing for his wedding day to be joyful, then leads Gutrune and

12180-482: The verb skína ('to shine') had present tense third person skínn (rather than * skínr , * skínʀ ); while kala ('to cool down') had present tense third person kell (rather than * kelr , * kelʀ ). The rule is not absolute, with certain counter-examples such as vinr ('friend'), which has the synonym vin , yet retains the unabsorbed version, and jǫtunn (' giant '), where assimilation takes place even though

12296-527: The Æsir and Einherjar will don their war gear and advance to the field of Vígríðr . Further into the chapter, the stanza in Völuspá that details this sequence is cited. In the Prose Edda book Skáldskaparmál , Yggdrasil receives a single mention, though not by name. In chapter 64, names for kings and dukes are given. "Illustrious one" is provided as an example, appearing in a Christianity-influenced work by

12412-404: Was a moderately inflected language with high levels of nominal and verbal inflection. Most of the fused morphemes are retained in modern Icelandic, especially in regard to noun case declensions, whereas modern Norwegian in comparison has moved towards more analytical word structures. Old Norse had three grammatical genders – masculine, feminine, and neuter. Adjectives or pronouns referring to

12528-455: Was a natural symbol for them also". Connections have been proposed between the wood Hoddmímis holt ( Old Norse "Hoard- Mímir 's" holt ) and the tree Mímameiðr ("Mímir's tree"), generally thought to refer to the world tree Yggdrasil, and the spring Mímisbrunnr . John Lindow concurs that Mímameiðr may be another name for Yggdrasil and that if the Hoard-Mímir of the name Hoddmímis holt

12644-465: Was a seed ("glorious tree of good measure, under the ground"). In stanza 19, the völva says: An ash I know there stands, Yggdrasill is its name, a tall tree, showered with shining loam . From there come the dews that drop in the valleys. It stands forever green over Urðr's well . In stanza 20, the völva says that from the lake under the tree come three "maidens deep in knowledge" named Urðr , Verðandi , and Skuld . The maidens "incised

12760-552: Was a stage of development of North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and their overseas settlements and chronologically coincides with the Viking Age , the Christianization of Scandinavia , and the consolidation of Scandinavian kingdoms from about the 8th to the 15th centuries. The Proto-Norse language developed into Old Norse by

12876-400: Was also influenced by Norse. Through Norman, to a smaller extent, so was modern French. Written modern Icelandic derives from the Old Norse phonemic writing system. Contemporary Icelandic-speakers can read Old Norse, which varies slightly in spelling as well as semantics and word order. However, pronunciation, particularly of the vowel phonemes, has changed at least as much in Icelandic as in

12992-571: Was heavily influenced by the East dialect, and is today more similar to East Scandinavian (Danish and Swedish) than to Icelandic and Faroese. The descendants of the Old East Norse dialect are the East Scandinavian languages of Danish and Swedish . Among these, the grammar of Icelandic and Faroese have changed the least from Old Norse in the last thousand years, though their pronunciations both have changed considerably from Old Norse. With Danish rule of

13108-535: Was obtained through a simultaneous u- and i-umlaut of /a/ . It appears in words like gøra ( gjǫra , geyra ), from Proto-Germanic *garwijaną , and commonly in verbs with a velar consonant before the suffix like søkkva < *sankwijaną . OEN often preserves the original value of the vowel directly preceding runic ʀ while OWN receives ʀ-umlaut. Compare runic OEN glaʀ, haʀi, hrauʀ with OWN gler, heri (later héri ), hrøyrr/hreyrr ("glass", "hare", "pile of rocks"). U-umlaut

13224-734: Was spoken in Denmark, Sweden, Kievan Rus' , eastern England, and Danish settlements in Normandy. The Old Gutnish dialect was spoken in Gotland and in various settlements in the East. In the 11th century, Old Norse was the most widely spoken European language , ranging from Vinland in the West to the Volga River in the East. In Kievan Rus' , it survived the longest in Veliky Novgorod , probably lasting into

13340-482: Was the symbol of the god's authority and the source and instrument of his power, carved with all the treaties through which he ruled. Unable to influence events any more, he has ordered branches of the World tree to be piled around Valhalla by its heroes and waits in resignation for his ravens to bring him news about the ring ( "Höre mit Sinn, was ich dir sage!" - Waltraute's Monologue ). Waltraute begs Brünnhilde to return

13456-444: Was used partitively and in compounds and kennings (e.g., Urðarbrunnr , the well of Urðr; Lokasenna , the gibing of Loki). There were several classes of nouns within each gender. The following is an example of the "strong" inflectional paradigms : Yggdrasil Yggdrasil (from Old Norse Yggdrasill ) is an immense and central sacred tree in Norse cosmology . Around it exists all else, including

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