S5E20: Volsung Poems: Two Poems of Atli (Part 6 of 7)

S5E20 Volsung Poems: Two Poems of Atli (Part 5)

David continues his series of not so short solo episodes, deep diving into the Poems of the Poetic Edda which inspired the Saga of the Volsungs.
In this episode:
The Lay of Atli
The Greenlandic Lay of Atli

These poems connect the legends of Atli the Hun, to his wife Gudrun and the poems of Sigurd and his decent from the Norse Gods. 

Atli kills Gudrun's brothers. Some would say to avenge Sigurd and Brunhilde. Others would say to obtain Fafnir's Hoard of Gold. Either way, it is the curse of Andvari's gold, leading to the deaths of generations of fathers and sons.

We see in these poems the author favors the Giukung family, Gudrun, Hogni and Gunnar. Where previous poems placed them as the betrayers of Sigurd, Sigurd has been mostly forgotten here. Gudrun does grieve the loss of her great love, but she also hangs on to the love of her brothers and the bonds of kinship.

The Giukung family are Goths, a Germanic Tribe. Sigurd joined their clan. But he betrayed the love of Brunhilde, of the family of Atli and the Huns. Gunnar is too smart to allow the hoard of Fafnir to fall into the hands of the Huns. It is returned to the bottom of the Rhine River. But the curse lives through Gudrun and she sees to the death of her two sons by Atli. In the next and final short, she will be remarried to a third king, and see to the deaths of two more sons.

The Greenlandic Lay of Atli seems to be a fan fiction. Another take on the same story. The Greenlanders wished to see Gunnar and Hogni as Greenlanders, falling into the same trap of Atli. Blindly trusting fate and the bonds of kindship.



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