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81-560: The title is a translation into German of the Old Norse phrase Ragnarök , which in Norse mythology refers to a prophesied war among various beings and gods that ultimately results in the burning, immersion in water, and renewal of the world. As with the rest of the Ring , however, Wagner's account diverges significantly from these Old Norse sources. The autograph manuscript of the work

162-696: A dialect continuum , with no clear geographical boundary between them. Old East Norse traits were found in eastern Norway , although Old Norwegian is classified as Old West Norse, and Old West Norse traits were found in western Sweden . In what is present-day Denmark and Sweden, most speakers spoke Old East Norse. Though Old Gutnish is sometimes included in the Old East Norse dialect due to geographical associations, it developed its own unique features and shared in changes to both other branches. The 12th-century Icelandic Gray Goose Laws state that Swedes , Norwegians , Icelanders , and Danes spoke

243-727: A change known as Holtzmann's law . An epenthetic vowel became popular by 1200 in Old Danish, 1250 in Old Swedish and Old Norwegian, and 1300 in Old Icelandic. An unstressed vowel was used which varied by dialect. Old Norwegian exhibited all three: /u/ was used in West Norwegian south of Bergen , as in aftur , aftor (older aptr ); North of Bergen, /i/ appeared in aftir , after ; and East Norwegian used /a/ , after , aftær . Old Norse

324-665: A different woman. However, she notices the ring on Siegfried's hand, and realizes she has been betrayed ( "Betrug! Betrug! Schändlichster Betrug!" ). Declaring publicly that the man who conquered her and took the ring was not Gunther but Siegfried in disguise she exposes Gunther as an impostor who tried to increase his own prestige through the deeds of someone else. Filled with unquenchable desperate rage she also denounces Siegfried and falsely accuses him of having intercourse with her while in Gunther's form, thus breaking his blood-brotherhood with Gunther. Siegfried denies Brünnhilde's charge, but

405-531: A drinking horn ( "Blühenden Lebens labendes Blut" ). Hagen holds the horn but does not join in the oath, and the two new brothers then leave for Brünnhilde's rock. Hagen, left on guard duty, gloats that his so-called masters are unwittingly bringing the ring to him ( "Hier sitz ich zur Wacht" - Hagens Wacht - Hagen's Watch ). Orchestral Interlude Meanwhile, Brünnhilde is visited on her rock by her Valkyrie sister Waltraute, who recounts that Wotan returned from his wanderings with his spear shattered. The spear

486-417: A female raven or a male crow. All neuter words have identical nominative and accusative forms, and all feminine words have identical nominative and accusative plurals. The gender of some words' plurals does not agree with that of their singulars, such as lim and mund . Some words, such as hungr , have multiple genders, evidenced by their determiners being declined in different genders within

567-412: A front vowel to be split into a semivowel-vowel sequence before a back vowel in the following syllable. While West Norse only broke /e/ , East Norse also broke /i/ . The change was blocked by a /w/ , /l/ , or /ʀ/ preceding the potentially-broken vowel. Some /ja/ or /jɔ/ and /jaː/ or /jɔː/ result from breaking of /e/ and /eː/ respectively. When a noun, pronoun, adjective, or verb has

648-409: A given sentence. Nouns, adjectives, and pronouns were declined in four grammatical cases – nominative , accusative , genitive , and dative  – in singular and plural numbers. Adjectives and pronouns were additionally declined in three grammatical genders. Some pronouns (first and second person) could have dual number in addition to singular and plural. The genitive

729-435: A hero's song about the adventures of his youth ( "Mime hieß ein mürrischer Zwerg" ), recounting his life with Mime, the forging of Nothung, slaying the dragon Fafner and understanding the language of birds. Hagen gives him another potion, which restores his memory, and Siegfried tells of discovering the sleeping Brünnhilde and awakening her with a kiss. Upon hearing this, now having the apparent evidence of Siegfried's betrayal of

810-675: A hunting-trip and murder him. They sing a trio in which Brünnhilde and Gunther vow in the name of Wotan, "guardian of oaths", to kill Siegfried, while Hagen repeats his pledge to Alberich: to acquire the ring and rule the world through its power ( Rache-Terzett - Vengeance Trio ). Prelude to Act 3 In the woods by the bank of the Rhine, the Rhinemaidens swim playfully and sing a song to the Sun, mourning their lost Rhine gold ( "Frau Sonne sendet lichte Strahlen" ). Siegfried happens by, separated from

891-584: A long vowel or diphthong in the accented syllable and its stem ends in a single l , n , or s , the r (or the elder r - or z -variant ʀ ) in an ending is assimilated. When the accented vowel is short, the ending is dropped. The nominative of the strong masculine declension and some i-stem feminine nouns uses one such -r (ʀ). Óðin-r ( Óðin-ʀ ) becomes Óðinn instead of * Óðinr ( * Óðinʀ ). The verb blása ('to blow'), has third person present tense blæss ('[he] blows') rather than * blæsr ( * blæsʀ ). Similarly,

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972-657: A mountaintop surrounded by magic fire ( "Zu neuen Thaten, theurer Helde" ). Brünnhilde sends Siegfried off to new heroic deeds, urging him to keep their love in mind. Siegfried proclaims himself to be simply an executor of her will, and as a pledge of his fidelity he gives her the ring of power that he took from Fafner 's hoard. In a duet, both of them extoll their loving bond, which nothing can untie, even when distance keeps them apart ( "O! heilige Götter!" ). Bearing Brünnhilde's shield and mounting her steed Grane , Siegfried then rides away. Orchestral Interlude - Siegfrieds Rheinfahrt ( Siegfried's Rhine Journey ) The act begins on

1053-474: A noun must mirror the gender of that noun , so that one says, " heill maðr! " but, " heilt barn! ". As in other languages, the grammatical gender of an impersonal noun is generally unrelated to an expected natural gender of that noun. While indeed karl , "man" is masculine, kona , "woman", is feminine, and hús , "house", is neuter, so also are hrafn and kráka , for "raven" and "crow", masculine and feminine respectively, even in reference to

1134-476: A similar development influenced by Middle Low German . Various languages unrelated to Old Norse and others not closely related have been heavily influenced by Norse, particularly the Norman language ; to a lesser extent, Finnish and Estonian . Russian, Ukrainian , Belarusian , Lithuanian and Latvian also have a few Norse loanwords. The words Rus and Russia , according to one theory, may be named after

1215-608: A voiced velar fricative [ɣ] in all cases, and others have that realisation only in the middle of words and between vowels (with it otherwise being realised [ɡ] ). The Old East Norse /ʀ/ was an apical consonant , with its precise position unknown; it is reconstructed as a palatal sibilant . It descended from Proto-Germanic /z/ and eventually developed into /r/ , as had already occurred in Old West Norse. The consonant digraphs ⟨hl⟩ , ⟨hr⟩ , and ⟨hn⟩ occurred word-initially. It

1296-467: A vowel or semivowel of a different vowel backness . In the case of i-umlaut and ʀ-umlaut , this entails a fronting of back vowels, with retention of lip rounding. In the case of u-umlaut , this entails labialization of unrounded vowels. Umlaut is phonemic and in many situations grammatically significant as a side effect of losing the Proto-Germanic morphological suffixes whose vowels created

1377-448: A word. Strong verbs ablaut the lemma 's nucleus to derive the past forms of the verb. This parallels English conjugation, where, e.g., the nucleus of sing becomes sang in the past tense and sung in the past participle. Some verbs are derived by ablaut, as the present-in-past verbs do by consequence of being derived from the past tense forms of strong verbs. Umlaut or mutation is an assimilatory process acting on vowels preceding

1458-414: Is Gunther's duty, since the hero has apparently broken the sacred bond of blood-brotherhood during the night on the rock with Brünnhilde, which betrayal condemns him by law to the rightful punishment of death. Brünnhilde, seeking revenge for Siegfried's manifest treachery, joins the plot and tells Hagen that Siegfried would be vulnerable only to a stab in the back. Hagen and Gunther decide to lure Siegfried on

1539-400: Is brought in. Confronted with his sister's pain, Gunther blames Siegfried's death on Hagen, who replies that Siegfried had incurred the penalty of his false oath. Moreover, he claims the ring on Siegfried's finger by right of conquest. When Gunther objects, Hagen appeals to the vassals to support his lawful claim. Gunther draws his sword but Hagen attacks and easily kills him. As he moves to take

1620-529: Is carried away in a solemn funeral procession that forms the interlude as the scene is changed and recapitulates many of the themes associated with Siegfried and the Wälsungs. Orchestral Interlude - Siegfrieds Trauermusik ( Siegfried's Funeral March ) Back in the Gibichung Hall, Gutrune awaits Siegfried's return. Hagen arrives ahead of the funeral party. Gutrune is devastated when Siegfried's corpse

1701-465: Is expected to exist, such as in the male names Ragnarr , Steinarr (supposedly * Ragnarʀ , * Steinarʀ ), the result is apparently always /rː/ rather than */rʀ/ or */ʀː/ . This is observable in the Runic corpus. In Old Norse, i/j adjacent to i , e , their u-umlauts, and æ was not possible, nor u/v adjacent to u , o , their i-umlauts, and ǫ . At

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1782-576: Is known for always hitting the target of the attacker regardless of the attacker's skill. In the Poetic Edda poem Völuspá , the Æsir-Vanir War is described as officially starting when Odin throws a spear over the heads of an assembly of Vanir gods. Whether or not this was specifically Gungnir is, however, unstated. In Sigrdrífumál , the valkyrie Sigrdrífa advises Sigurd on the magical application of runes . She gives Sigurd advice and shares with him lore, including that runes were carved on

1863-584: Is more common in Old West Norse in both phonemic and allophonic positions, while it only occurs sparsely in post-runic Old East Norse and even in runic Old East Norse. This is still a major difference between Swedish and Faroese and Icelandic today. Plurals of neuters do not have u-umlaut at all in Swedish, but in Faroese and Icelandic they do, for example the Faroese and Icelandic plurals of the word land , lond and lönd respectively, in contrast to

1944-593: Is preserved in the Richard Wagner Foundation . Prelude to the Prologue The three Norns , daughters of Erda , the goddess of Nature, gather beside Brünnhilde 's rock, weaving the Rope of Destiny . From it they read of the past, the present, and of the future when Valhalla will be set on fire and the end of the gods will come ( "Welch' Licht leuchtet dort?" ). As their narration approaches

2025-459: Is that the nonphonemic difference between the voiced and the voiceless dental fricative is marked. The oldest texts and runic inscriptions use þ exclusively. Long vowels are denoted with acutes . Most other letters are written with the same glyph as the IPA phoneme, except as shown in the table below. Ablaut patterns are groups of vowels which are swapped, or ablauted, in the nucleus of

2106-557: Is unclear whether they were sequences of two consonants (with the first element realised as /h/ or perhaps /x/ ) or as single voiceless sonorants /l̥/ , /r̥/ and /n̥/ respectively. In Old Norwegian, Old Danish and later Old Swedish, the groups ⟨hl⟩ , ⟨hr⟩ , and ⟨hn⟩ were reduced to plain ⟨l⟩ , ⟨r⟩ , ⟨n⟩ , which suggests that they had most likely already been pronounced as voiceless sonorants by Old Norse times. The pronunciation of ⟨hv⟩

2187-620: Is unclear, but it may have been /xʷ/ (the Proto-Germanic pronunciation), /hʷ/ or the similar phoneme /ʍ/ . Unlike the three other digraphs, it was retained much longer in all dialects. Without ever developing into a voiceless sonorant in Icelandic, it instead underwent fortition to a plosive /kv/ , which suggests that instead of being a voiceless sonorant, it retained a stronger frication. Primary stress in Old Norse falls on

2268-535: The Latin alphabet , there was no standardized orthography in use in the Middle Ages. A modified version of the letter wynn called vend was used briefly for the sounds /u/ , /v/ , and /w/ . Long vowels were sometimes marked with acutes but also sometimes left unmarked or geminated. The standardized Old Norse spelling was created in the 19th century and is, for the most part, phonemic. The most notable deviation

2349-667: The Rus' people , a Norse tribe, probably from present-day east-central Sweden. The current Finnish and Estonian words for Sweden are Ruotsi and Rootsi , respectively. A number of loanwords have been introduced into Irish , many associated with fishing and sailing. A similar influence is found in Scottish Gaelic , with over one hundred loanwords estimated to be in the language, many of which are related to fishing and sailing. Old Norse vowel phonemes mostly come in pairs of long and short. The standardized orthography marks

2430-461: The dwarves known as the Sons of Ivaldi under the mastery of the blacksmith dwarf Dvalin . The spear was obtained from the dwarfs by Loki , the result of a scheme he concocted as a partial reparation for his cutting of the goddess Sif 's hair. The spear is described as being so well balanced that it could strike any target, no matter the skill or strength of the wielder. If the rider on horseback on

2511-668: The word stem , so that hyrjar would be pronounced /ˈhyr.jar/ . In compound words, secondary stress falls on the second stem (e.g. lærisveinn , /ˈlɛːɾ.iˌswɛinː/ ). Unlike Proto-Norse, which was written with the Elder Futhark , runic Old Norse was originally written with the Younger Futhark , which had only 16 letters. Because of the limited number of runes, several runes were used for different sounds, and long and short vowels were not distinguished in writing. Medieval runes came into use some time later. As for

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2592-557: The 11th century in most of Old East Norse. However, the distinction still holds in Dalecarlian dialects . The dots in the following vowel table separate the oral from nasal phonemes. Note: The open or open-mid vowels may be transcribed differently: Sometime around the 13th century, /ɔ/ (spelled ⟨ǫ⟩ ) merged with /ø/ or /o/ in most dialects except Old Danish , and Icelandic where /ɔ/ ( ǫ ) merged with /ø/ . This can be determined by their distinction within

2673-979: The 12th-century First Grammatical Treatise but not within the early 13th-century Prose Edda . The nasal vowels, also noted in the First Grammatical Treatise, are assumed to have been lost in most dialects by this time (but notably they are retained in Elfdalian and other dialects of Ovansiljan ). See Old Icelandic for the mergers of /øː/ (spelled ⟨œ⟩ ) with /ɛː/ (spelled ⟨æ⟩ ) and /ɛ/ (spelled ⟨ę⟩ ) with /e/ (spelled ⟨e⟩ ). Old Norse had three diphthong phonemes: /ɛi/ , /ɔu/ , /øy ~ ɛy/ (spelled ⟨ei⟩ , ⟨au⟩ , ⟨ey⟩ respectively). In East Norse these would monophthongize and merge with /eː/ and /øː/ , whereas in West Norse and its descendants

2754-668: The 13th century there. The age of the Swedish-speaking population of Finland is strongly contested, but Swedish settlement had spread the language into the region by the time of the Second Swedish Crusade in the 13th century at the latest. The modern descendants of the Old West Norse dialect are the West Scandinavian languages of Icelandic , Faroese , Norwegian , and the extinct Norn language of Orkney and Shetland , although Norwegian

2835-487: The 8th century, and Old Norse began to develop into the modern North Germanic languages in the mid- to late 14th century, ending the language phase known as Old Norse. These dates, however, are not absolute, since written Old Norse is found well into the 15th century. Old Norse was divided into three dialects : Old West Norse (Old West Nordic, often referred to as Old Norse ), Old East Norse (Old East Nordic), and Old Gutnish . Old West Norse and Old East Norse formed

2916-572: The Faroe Islands, Faroese has also been influenced by Danish. Both Middle English (especially northern English dialects within the area of the Danelaw ) and Early Scots (including Lowland Scots ) were strongly influenced by Norse and contained many Old Norse loanwords . Consequently, Modern English (including Scottish English ), inherited a significant proportion of its vocabulary directly from Norse. The development of Norman French

2997-399: The Rhine's shore in front of Siegfried, Gutrune, Hagen, and the assembled Gibichung men and women and leads in a downcast Brünnhilde as his trophy. With false pomp he then triumphantly announces a double wedding: Brünnhilde to himself, and Gutrune to Siegfried ( "Brünnhild', die hehrste Frau" ). Brünnhilde almost faints in despair as she now sees her beloved, who doesn't even recognize her, with

3078-473: The Swedish plural land and numerous other examples. That also applies to almost all feminine nouns, for example the largest feminine noun group, the o-stem nouns (except the Swedish noun jord mentioned above), and even i-stem nouns and root nouns , such as Old West Norse mǫrk ( mörk in Icelandic) in comparison with Modern and Old Swedish mark . Vowel breaking, or fracture, caused

3159-541: The beginning of words, this manifested as a dropping of the initial /j/ (which was general, independent of the following vowel) or /v/ . Compare ON orð , úlfr , ár with English word, wolf, year . In inflections, this manifested as the dropping of the inflectional vowels. Thus, klæði + dat -i remains klæði , and sjáum in Icelandic progressed to sjǫ́um > sjǫ́m > sjám . The * jj and * ww of Proto-Germanic became ggj and ggv respectively in Old Norse,

3240-425: The blood-brotherhood in front of Gunther and his men, Hagen stabs Siegfried in the back with his spear, declares that he had avenged perjury and calmly walks away. In his final agony Siegfried recollects the awakening of Brünnhilde and his love for her and with the memory of blessed fear the feeling for Brünnhilde had taught him, seeing her giving him greetings in a vision, dies ( "Brünnhilde! Heilige Braut!" ). His body

3321-452: The bystanders exuberantly off to the wedding feast, as if nothing too significant has happened. Orchestral Interlude Brünnhilde, Hagen, and Gunther do not join the celebration and stay alone by the shore. Deeply shamed by Brünnhilde's outburst in front of his subjects and thus threatened in his authority, Gunther agrees to Hagen's suggestion that Siegfried must be killed in order for Gunther to regain his standing. Indeed, to see Siegfried die

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3402-411: The cluster */Crʀ/ cannot be realized as /Crː/ , nor as */Crʀ/ , nor as */Cʀː/ . The same shortening as in vetr also occurs in lax = laks ('salmon') (as opposed to * lakss , * laksʀ ), botn ('bottom') (as opposed to * botnn , * botnʀ ), and jarl (as opposed to * jarll , * jarlʀ ). Furthermore, wherever the cluster */rʀ/

3483-565: The deceit. Hagen summons the Gibichung vassals to welcome Gunther and his bride ( Hagens Ruf - Hagen's Call ). He does this by sounding the war-alarm. The vassals are surprised to learn that the occasion is not battle, but their master's wedding and party. Hagen announces that Gunther has won himself a wife and orders them to slay sacrificial animals so that gods may grant a happy marriage. The vassals are then told to defend their new queen's honour if someone were to wrong her. Gunther lands on

3564-449: The diphthongs remained. Old Norse has six plosive phonemes, /p/ being rare word-initially and /d/ and /b/ pronounced as voiced fricative allophones between vowels except in compound words (e.g. veðrabati ), already in the Proto-Germanic language (e.g. * b *[β] > [v] between vowels). The /ɡ/ phoneme was pronounced as [ɡ] after an /n/ or another /ɡ/ and as [k] before /s/ and /t/ . Some accounts have it

3645-431: The dragon-slayer, the greatest of heroes, as the best husband for Gutrune. Neither Gunther nor Gutrune knows how to win themselves such partners, but Hagen reminds Gutrune that he has given her a potion she can use to make Siegfried forget any woman he has ever seen and fall in love with her; enamoured of Gutrune, Siegfried will then also be surely willing to bring Brünnhilde, who sleeps on a mountaintop encircled by fire only

3726-493: The dramaturgy of the ending of Götterdämmerung in the context of the entire Ring cycle. William Kinderman has evaluated a large-scale instance of musical recapitulation in Act III. Warren J. Darcy has expostulated on the potential influence of Wagner's readings of the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer on the music of the Ring cycle, particularly on the ending of Götterdämmerung . The historian John Roberts suggested that

3807-438: The fearless can pass, to Gunther in order to gain from him the permission for marriage with Gutrune. Gunther and Gutrune, not knowing that Siegfried and Brünnhilde are actually in love with each other, agree enthusiastically with this plan. Siegfried lands near the Gibichung Hall with his boat, seeking to meet Gunther, of whose fame he has heard during his journey ( "Heil, Siegfried, theurer Held!" ). Gunther extends hospitality to

3888-466: The flames, and the Rhinemaidens swim in to claim the ring. Hagen in a frenzy tries at the last moment to stop them and seize the ring for himself, but they drag him into the depths and drown him ( "Zurück vom Ring!" ), the theme of the curse of the ring being then heard for the last time. As they celebrate the return of the Rhinegold to their river and the breaking of its curse, a red glow spreads through

3969-512: The god of fire that still burns on her rock, to fly to Valhalla and set it on fire ( "Fliegt heim, ihr Raben!" ). After a final eulogy to the dead hero, Brünnhilde, willing to be reunited with her love, mounts her horse Grane and as a valkyrie rides into the flames, joining Siegfried in death. A sequence of leitmotifs portray the fire flaring up, and the hall of the Gibichungs catching fire and collapsing. The Rhine overflows its banks, quenching

4050-406: The hero, and Gutrune offers him the potion. Unaware of deception, Siegfried toasts Brünnhilde and their mutual love and drinks. In a while he loses his memory of her and is struck by desire for Gutrune. Drugged, Siegfried then offers to win a wife for Gunther, who tells him about Brünnhilde and the magic fire, which only a fearless person can cross. They swear blood-brotherhood , mixing their blood in

4131-456: The hunting party while searching for prey. The Rhinemaidens urge him to return the ring to the Rhine and thus avoid its curse, but he laughs at them in heroic pride and says he prefers to die rather than bargain for his life. They swim away, predicting that Siegfried will die this very day and that his heir, a lady, will treat them more fairly. Siegfried rejoins the hunters, who include Gunther and Hagen. While resting, he sings them in high spirits

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4212-617: The image on the Böksta Runestone has been identified as Odin, then Odin is shown carrying Gungnir while hunting an elk. In Richard Wagner 's opera cycle, Der Ring des Nibelungen , Wotan's (Odin's) spear is made from the wood of the world tree , the ash tree Yggdrasil , and engraved with the contracts from which Wotan's power derives. He uses the spear to break the sword of Siegmund , leading to Siegmund's death. When he later tries to bar Siegmund's son Siegfried from awakening Brünnhilde from her magic sleep, Siegfried breaks

4293-501: The killing of Siegfried by Hagen with a stab in the back gave inspiration for the myth that the German Army did not lose World War I , but was instead defeated by a treasonous " stab in the back " from civilians, in particular Jews and Socialists. The German bass Kurt Moll pointed out that the part of the principal villain, Hagen, is unique in the bass repertoire: it requires a shouting, blaring vocal technique that risks damaging

4374-399: The long vowels with an acute accent. In medieval manuscripts, it is often unmarked but sometimes marked with an accent or through gemination . Old Norse had nasalized versions of all ten vowel places. These occurred as allophones of the vowels before nasal consonants and in places where a nasal had followed it in an older form of the word, before it was absorbed into a neighboring sound. If

4455-454: The might of grieving love the power of the ring, she bequeaths it to the Rhinemaidens, who are to claim it from her own ashes after fire has cleansed it of its curse, and declares that Wotan can finally truly rest in peace ( "Mein Erbe nun nehm' ich zu eigen" ). Brünnhilde then lights the funeral pyre with a firebrand and with "anxiously longed-for tidings" sends Wotan's ravens home to command Loge,

4536-679: The most conservative language, such that in present-day Iceland, schoolchildren are able to read the 12th-century Icelandic sagas in the original language (in editions with normalised spelling). Old Icelandic was very close to Old Norwegian , and together they formed Old West Norse , which was also spoken in Norse settlements in Greenland , the Faroes , Ireland , Scotland , the Isle of Man , northwest England, and in Normandy . Old East Norse

4617-514: The nasal was absorbed by a stressed vowel, it would also lengthen the vowel. This nasalization also occurred in the other Germanic languages, but were not retained long. They were noted in the First Grammatical Treatise , and otherwise might have remained unknown. The First Grammarian marked these with a dot above the letter. This notation did not catch on, and would soon be obsolete. Nasal and oral vowels probably merged around

4698-641: The other North Germanic languages. Faroese retains many similarities but is influenced by Danish, Norwegian, and Gaelic ( Scottish and/or Irish ). Although Swedish, Danish and Norwegian have diverged the most, they still retain considerable mutual intelligibility . Speakers of modern Swedish, Norwegian and Danish can mostly understand each other without studying their neighboring languages, particularly if speaking slowly. The languages are also sufficiently similar in writing that they can mostly be understood across borders. This could be because these languages have been mutually affected by each other, as well as having

4779-534: The point when they want to sing about the fate of Alberich's ring and its curse and as the themes of Siegfried and the Curse of the ring are heard, the rope breaks. Lamenting the loss of their wisdom, the Norns disappear, returning to their mother Erda beneath the earth ( "Zu End' ewiges Wissen!" ). Orchestral Interlude - Tagesgrauen ( Dawn ) As day breaks, Siegfried and Brünnhilde emerge from their dwelling high on

4860-440: The queen of the Gibichungs she then issues orders for a huge funeral pyre for the dead hero to be assembled by the river ( "Starke Scheite schichtet mir dort" ) and takes the ring from Siegfried's hand. With her eyes turned upwards to the sky, Brünnhilde in an apostrophe addresses Wotan, the ruler of oaths and laws, and proclaims that the death of the free hero Siegfried has atoned for the god's guilt; renouncing and overcoming through

4941-577: The ring ( "Schläfst du, Hagen, mein Sohn?" ). Hagen, barely conscious, swears to do so and Alberich vanishes with pleas for Hagen to remain loyal to him. Orchestral Interlude - Morgenröthe ( The Blush of Dawn ) Siegfried arrives at dawn via Tarnhelm-magic back to the settlement of the Gibichungs, having resumed his natural form and left Brünnhilde on a boat on the Rhine with Gunther. He explains to Gutrune how he managed to change his form back from Gunther's just in time for Brünnhilde to not be able to recognize

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5022-674: The ring to the Rhinemaidens , but Brünnhilde refuses to relinquish the pledge of Siegfried's love, and Waltraute rides away in despair. Crossing the ring of fire, Siegfried arrives disguised as Gunther by using the Tarnhelm and claims Brünnhilde for his wife ( "Brünnhild', ein Freier kam" ). Though Brünnhilde, terrified by the appearance of an unknown man, tries to resist him, without the divine powers she has earlier renounced for love's sake she has now nothing with which to defend herself but

5103-608: The ring, however, Siegfried's hand rises miraculously in a threatening gesture. Hagen as well as all present recoil in utmost fear. Brünnhilde, with her features as if transfigured, suddenly makes her entrance ( "Schweigt eures Jammers jauchzenden Schwall!" ), having in the meantime met on the river's shores the daughters of the Rhine, who talked to her about the ring and its curse. She proclaims Siegfried innocent, as she now recognizes that he betrayed her only due to an intrigue, and declares that Siegfried's betrayal and death were necessary for her to become all-knowing and completely free. As

5184-532: The ring, which Siegfried manages to snatch cruelly from her hand during a fight, being immune to its coercive power thanks to his fearlessness. Putting the ring on his own hand instead, Siegfried then spends the night with Brünnhilde on her rock, placing the magic sword Nothung between them as a witness to his loyalty to Gunther and his keeping the promise to bring Brünnhilde untouched ( "Nun Nothung, zeuge du" ). Prelude to Act 2 As Hagen sits sleeping on night watch, his father Alberich appears and urges him to obtain

5265-536: The root vowel, ǫ , is short. The clusters */Clʀ, Csʀ, Cnʀ, Crʀ/ cannot yield */Clː, Csː, Cnː, Crː/ respectively, instead /Cl, Cs, Cn, Cr/ . The effect of this shortening can result in the lack of distinction between some forms of the noun. In the case of vetr ('winter'), the nominative and accusative singular and plural forms are identical. The nominative singular and nominative and accusative plural would otherwise have been OWN * vetrr , OEN * wintrʀ . These forms are impossible because

5346-441: The same language, dǫnsk tunga ("Danish tongue"; speakers of Old East Norse would have said dansk tunga ). Another term was norrœnt mál ("northern speech"). Today Old Norse has developed into the modern North Germanic languages Icelandic , Faroese , Norwegian , Danish , Swedish , and other North Germanic varieties of which Norwegian, Danish and Swedish retain considerable mutual intelligibility . Icelandic remains

5427-622: The shores of the Rhine in the Hall of the Gibichungs , a people named after the deceased king Gibich . Gunther , his son and heir, sits enthroned. Gunther's half-brother and chief minister Hagen advises him to find a wife for himself and a husband for Gutrune , the sister of them both, to enlarge the glory and might of their dynasty and secure it for the future. He suggests Brünnhilde, the noblest of women, as appropriate for Gunther, and Siegfried,

5508-506: The singer's voice; only very large-voiced, powerful singers can sing it. Moll himself avoided the role. Friedrich Nietzsche 's 1888–1889 book, Götzendämmerung —Twilight of the Idols—is a pun on the title of Götterdämmerung , with Götze being the German word for "idol" or "false god". Notes Old Norse Old Norse , also referred to as Old Nordic , or Old Scandinavian ,

5589-672: The sky. The surviving Gibichungs now see the interior of Valhalla with gods and heroes visible as described by Waltraute in Act I, Scene 3. A new fire flares up around the Hall of the Gods, hiding it from sight; the gods are consumed in flames and the curtain falls. At the very end of the work there emerges the sound of the Liebeserlösung motive - the redemption-through-love leitmotif . Robert A. Hall Jr. has analysed Götterdämmerung in terms of cultural symbolism. Hermann Danuser has discussed

5670-525: The tip of Gungnir. According to chapter 51 of the Prose Edda book, Gylfaginning , Odin will ride in front of the Einherjar while advancing on to the battle field at Ragnarök wearing a gold helmet, an impressive cloak of mail and carrying Gungnir. He will then attack the wolf Fenrir with it. In Skáldskaparmál , more information regarding the spear is presented. The spear was fashioned by

5751-497: The umlaut allophones . Some /y/ , /yː/ , /ø/ , /øː/ , /ɛ/ , /ɛː/ , /øy/ , and all /ɛi/ were obtained by i-umlaut from /u/ , /uː/ , /o/ , /oː/ , /a/ , /aː/ , /au/ , and /ai/ respectively. Others were formed via ʀ-umlaut from /u/ , /uː/ , /a/ , /aː/ , and /au/ . Some /y/ , /yː/ , /ø/ , /øː/ , and all /ɔ/ , /ɔː/ were obtained by u-umlaut from /i/ , /iː/ , /e/ , /eː/ , and /a/ , /aː/ respectively. See Old Icelandic for information on /ɔː/ . /œ/

5832-611: The vassals urge him to prove his innocence by taking an oath. Hagen offers his spear as the weapon by which Siegfried can do so. Siegfried agrees and swears upon Hagen's spear-point that he may be killed with it if he has ever loved Brünnhilde ( "Helle Wehr, heilige Waffe!" ). She also seizes the spear and swears that Siegfried may be killed with it for swearing the false oath. Once again Hagen supervises silently as others take oaths to his advantage. The naively light-hearted Siegfried, wishing for his wedding day to be joyful, then leads Gutrune and

5913-482: The verb skína ('to shine') had present tense third person skínn (rather than * skínr , * skínʀ ); while kala ('to cool down') had present tense third person kell (rather than * kelr , * kelʀ ). The rule is not absolute, with certain counter-examples such as vinr ('friend'), which has the synonym vin , yet retains the unabsorbed version, and jǫtunn (' giant '), where assimilation takes place even though

5994-404: Was a moderately inflected language with high levels of nominal and verbal inflection. Most of the fused morphemes are retained in modern Icelandic, especially in regard to noun case declensions, whereas modern Norwegian in comparison has moved towards more analytical word structures. Old Norse had three grammatical genders – masculine, feminine, and neuter. Adjectives or pronouns referring to

6075-566: Was a stage of development of North Germanic dialects before their final divergence into separate Nordic languages. Old Norse was spoken by inhabitants of Scandinavia and their overseas settlements and chronologically coincides with the Viking Age , the Christianization of Scandinavia , and the consolidation of Scandinavian kingdoms from about the 8th to the 15th centuries. The Proto-Norse language developed into Old Norse by

6156-400: Was also influenced by Norse. Through Norman, to a smaller extent, so was modern French. Written modern Icelandic derives from the Old Norse phonemic writing system. Contemporary Icelandic-speakers can read Old Norse, which varies slightly in spelling as well as semantics and word order. However, pronunciation, particularly of the vowel phonemes, has changed at least as much in Icelandic as in

6237-583: Was heavily influenced by the East dialect, and is today more similar to East Scandinavian (Danish and Swedish) than to Icelandic and Faroese. The descendants of the Old East Norse dialect are the East Scandinavian languages of Danish and Swedish . Among these, the grammar of Icelandic and Faroese have changed the least from Old Norse in the last thousand years, though their pronunciations both have changed considerably from Old Norse. With Danish rule of

6318-535: Was obtained through a simultaneous u- and i-umlaut of /a/ . It appears in words like gøra ( gjǫra , geyra ), from Proto-Germanic *garwijaną , and commonly in verbs with a velar consonant before the suffix like søkkva < *sankwijaną . OEN often preserves the original value of the vowel directly preceding runic ʀ while OWN receives ʀ-umlaut. Compare runic OEN glaʀ, haʀi, hrauʀ with OWN gler, heri (later héri ), hrøyrr/hreyrr ("glass", "hare", "pile of rocks"). U-umlaut

6399-766: Was spoken in Denmark, Sweden, Kievan Rus' , eastern England, and Danish settlements in Normandy. The Old Gutnish dialect was spoken in Gotland and in various settlements in the East. In the 11th century, Old Norse was the most widely spoken European language , ranging from Vinland in the West to the Volga River in the East. In Kievan Rus' , it survived the longest in Veliky Novgorod , probably lasting into

6480-486: Was the symbol of the god's authority and the source and instrument of his power, carved with all the treaties through which he ruled. Unable to influence events any more, he has ordered branches of the World tree to be piled around Valhalla by its heroes and waits in resignation for his ravens to bring him news about the ring ( "Höre mit Sinn, was ich dir sage!" - Waltraute's Monologue ). Waltraute begs Brünnhilde to return

6561-405: Was used partitively and in compounds and kennings (e.g., Urðarbrunnr , the well of Urðr; Lokasenna , the gibing of Loki). There were several classes of nouns within each gender. The following is an example of the "strong" inflectional paradigms : Gungnir In Norse mythology , Gungnir ( / ˈ ɡ ʌ ŋ . n ɪər / , "the rocking") is the spear of the god Odin . It

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