red the
story later, as Boer would have us believe. After all, it is largely a
matter of belief, for it is impossible to prove positively that mythical
elements did or did not exist in the original.

To the combined Siegfried-Nibelung story various historical elements
were added during the fifth century. At the beginning of this period the
Franks were located on the left bank of the Rhine from Coblenz downward.
Further up the river, that is, to the south, the Burgundians had
established a kingdom in what is now the Rhenish Palatinate, their
capital being Worms and their king "Gundahar", or "Gundicarius", as the
Romans called him. For twenty years the Burgundians lived on good terms
with the surrounding nations. Then, growing bolder, they suddenly
rose against the Romans in the year 436, but the rebellion was quietly
suppressed by the Roman general Aetius. Though defeated, the Burgundians
were not subdued, and the very next year they broke their oaths and
again sought to throw off the Roman yoke. This time the Romans called to
their aid the hordes of Huns, who had been growing rapidly in power and
were already pressing hard upon the German nations from the east. Only
too glad for an excuse, the Huns poured into the land in great numbers
and practically swept the Burgundian people from the face of the earth.
According to the Roman historians, twenty thousand Burgundians were
slain in this great battle of the Catalaunian Fields. Naturally this
catastrophe, in which a whole German nation fell before the hordes of
invading barbarians, produced a profound impression upon the Teutonic
world. The King Gundahar, the Gunther of the "Nibelungenlied", who also
fell in the battle, became the central figure of a new legend, namely,
the story of the fall of the Burgundians.

Attila is not thought to have taken part in the invasion, still, after
his death in 454, his name gradually came to be associated with the
slaughter of the Burgundians, for a legend operates mainly with types,
and as Attila was a Hun and throughout the Middle Ages was looked upon
as the type of a cruel tyrant, greedy for conquest, it was but natural
for him to play the role assigned to him in the legend. Quite plausible
is Boer's explanation of the entrance of Attila into the legend. The
"Thidreksaga" locates him in Seest in Westphalia. Now this province once
bore the haute of "Hunaland", and by a natural confusion, because of
the similarity of the names, "Huna"