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On the question of their passage to the North there are wide differences of opinion. Most scholars agree that there was an earlier and a later passage, the first taking Hild, Ermanric, and the Volsung story; the second, about the twelfth or thirteenth century, the Volsungs again, with perhaps Dietrich and Attila. But there is much disagreement as to the date of the first transmission.
Eagerly he asks, "Shall I find in Walhalla my own father Wälse?" and she answers, "The Volsung shall find his father there." With passionate earnestness he asks, "Shall Siegmund there embrace Sieglinde?" The Valkyre replies, "The air of earth she still must breathe. Sieglinde shall not see Siegmund there." Then furiously answers Siegmund, "Then farewell to Walhalla!
Now, if thou art a true Volsung, thou wilt slay the Dragon, and let that land become fair again, and bring the people back to it and so add to King Alv's domain." "I have nought to do with the slaying of Dragons," Sigurd said. "I have to make war on King Lygni, and avenge upon him the slaying of Sigmund, my father."
Sigmund bore it in battle against his brother-in-law, who quarrelled with him about this very sword, when Volsung fell, and Sigmund and his ten brothers were taken and bound. All perished but Sigmund, who was saved by his sister Signy, and hidden in a wood till he could revenge his father and brethren.
Until they wended For Brynhild's wooing, Sigurd a-riding Amidst their rout; The wise young Volsung Who knew of all ways Ah! He had wed her, Had fate so willed it. Southlander Sigurd A naked sword, Bright, well grinded, Laid betwixt them; No kiss he won From the fair woman, Nor in arms of his Did the Hun King hold her, Since he gat the young maid For the son of Giuki.
So Signy went home, and they abode there that night; but in the morning, as soon as it was day, Volsung bade his men arise and go aland and make them ready for battle; so they went aland, all of them all-armed, and had not long to wait before Siggeir fell on them with all his army, and the fiercest fight there was betwixt them; and Siggeir cried on his men to the onset all he might; and so the tale tells that King Volsung and his sons went eight times right through Siggeir's folk that day, smiting and hewing on either hand, but when they would do so even once again, King Volsung fell amidst his folk and all his men withal, saving his ten sons, for mightier was the power against them than they might withstand.
Müllenhoff put it as early as 600; Konrad Maurer, in the ninth and tenth centuries; while Dr. Golther is of opinion that the Volsung story passed first to the vikings in France, and then westward over Ireland to Iceland; therefore also not before the ninth century.
This is the final crushing blow; the Volsung had always deserted him; but he had found the magic sword and thought the promised help would not fail him in his worst need. He ridicules Valhalla and Wotan and the serving-maidens: he wonders who the Valkyrie is, so beautiful and cold and stern.
It says much for the genius of Morris that Sigurd the Volsung, with all these faults, is not to be condemned; that, on the contrary, to read it is rather a great than a tiresome experience; and not only because the faults are relieved, here and there, by exquisite beauties and dignities, indeed by incomparable lines, but because the poem as a whole does, as it goes on, accumulate an immense pressure of significance.
"I am of the race of the sons of Odin, for my father was Sigmund, and his father was Volsung, and his father was Rerir, and his father was Sigi, who was the son of Odin." The stranger, leaning on his staff looked on the youth steadily. Only one of his eyes was to be seen, but that eye, Sigurd thought, might see through a stone.
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