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Updated: June 29, 2025
The two men go off together, and the scene changes again to the Valkyries' rock. Brünnhilda sits alone looking at the Ring; Waltraute, one of the Valkyries, rushes in and demands that Ring. She relates how for want of it Wotan, dreading that it may fall into the hands of Alberich, sits gloomy and silent in Valhalla.
Wotan does not yield until he is reached by the voice of the fruitful earth that before he or the dwarfs or the giants or the Law or the Lie or any of these things were, had the seed of them all in her bosom, and the seed perhaps of something higher even than himself, that shall one day supersede him and cut the tangles and alliances and compromises that already have cost him one of his eyes.
The confiding dwarf, in order to display the quality of the Tarnhelm, first changes himself into a snake and then into a toad. While he is in the shape of the latter, Wotan sets his foot upon him, Loge snatches the Tarnhelm from his head, and together they bind him and carry him off to the upper air.
But Loki is unaffected: he has no moral passion: indignation is as absurd to him as enthusiasm. He finds it exquisitely amusing having a touch of the comic spirit in him that the dwarf, in stirring up the moral fervor of Wotan, has removed his last moral scruple about becoming a thief.
Two dramas, the huge encircling tragedy of Wotan in conflict with his wife Fricka, the goddess of laws and covenants, especially the covenant of marriage, and the subsidiary tragedy of Siegmund and Sieglinda, are combined in perfect proportions in the Valkyrie.
Wotan asks him, for the first question, and the pain of the memories oppressing him is translated to us by the motif of parting, the motif of "last times," while the god's tones are infinitely tender "What race is it to which Wotan shows himself stern, and which yet he loves the best of all living?" Glibly Mime answers, showing a full acquaintance with the circumstances, "The Wälsungen."
Fricka is absolutely right when she declares that the ending of the gods began when he brought this wolf-hero into the world; and now, to save their very existence, she pitilessly demands his destruction. Wotan has no power to refuse: it is Fricka's mechanical force, and not his thought, that really rules the world.
"Surely, some great hero must come who will be brave enough to slay the dragon and give the ring back to its rightful owners." Said Wotan to himself, "I shall make a mighty sword, and when the hero comes, his sword will be ready for him." Then the great Wotan wrought a matchless sword. When it was finished, he took it and went into the forest.
In the next act Wotan tells Brunnhilda she must protect Siegmund in the coming fight; but Fricka seeks him out in this rocky place amongst the hills, and compels him to promise on oath that Siegmund shall die to atone for his violation of the sacred rite of marriage. Brunnhilda reenters, and then occurs a scene which has caused much debate.
There Nothung, the sword, shall protect you, when Siegmund lies overthrown, in the power of love!" "If your are Siegmund," cries the woman, "I am Sieglinde, who have so longed for you! Your own sister you have won at the same time as the sword!" Siegmund is given no pause by this revelation. At the realisation of this double dearness, the joy flares all the higher of the lawless pupil of Wotan.
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