The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Nibelungenlied, by Unknown

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Title: The Nibelungenlied

Author: Unknown

Posting Date: July 31, 2008 [EBook #1151]
Release Date: December, 1997

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NIBELUNGENLIED ***

Produced by Douglas B. Killings

THE NIBELUNGENLIED

By An Unknown Author

Translated by Daniel B. Shumway

Originally written in Middle High German (M.H.G.), sometime around 1200
A.D., although this dating is by no means certain. Author unknown.

The text of this edition is based on that published as "The
Nibelungenlied", translated by Daniel B. Shumway (Houghton-Mifflin Co.,
New York, 1909).

PREPARER'S NOTE: In order to make this electronic edition easier to use,
the preparer has found it necessary to re-arrange the endnotes of Mr.
Shumway's edition, collating them with the chapters themselves and
substituting page references with footnote references. The preparer
takes full responsibility for these changes.--DBK.

SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY:

OTHER TRANSLATIONS--

Hatto, A.T. (Trans.): "Nibelungenlied" (Penguin Classics, London, 1962).
Prose translation.

Ryder, Frank G. (Trans.): "The Song of the Nibelungs" (Wayne State
University Press, Detroit, 1962). Verse translation.

RECOMMENDED READING--

Anonymous: "Kudrun", Translated by Marion E. Gibbs & Sidney Johnson
(Garland Pub., New York, 1992).

Anonymous: "Volsungasaga", Translated by William Morris and Eirikr
Magnusson (Walter Scott Press, London, 1888; Reissued by the Online
Medieval and Classical Library as E-Text #29, 1997).

Saxo Grammaticus: "The First Nine Books of the Danish History",
Translated by Oliver Elton (London, 1894; Reissued by the Online
Medieval and Classical Library as E-Text OMACL #28, 1997).

PREFACE

This work has been undertaken in the belief that a literal translation
of as famous an epic as the "Nibelungenlied" would be acceptable to the
general reading public whose interest in the story of Siegfried has
been stimulated by Wagner's operas and by the reading of such poems as
William Morris' "Sigurd the Volsung". Prose has been selected as the
me