Talk:Völsunga saga

Comments

Where is the oldest manuscript of this subject ? Whithouth source is not Falsifiable Nasz 10:12, 14 February 2007 (UTC) The links on page had not very sholarly nature.

I've been reading about this all my life and the saga is always referred to in English as Volsunga Saga. NO umlaut. Why do we suddenly need one here in the English-language wiki? It seems superfluous and un-English. Evangeline (talk) 22:11, 13 April 2010 (UTC)

I agree, it would probably better to move it to Völsunga Saga. However it's not critical as long as there are redirects. Cilibinarii (talk) 15:26, 31 January 2011 (UTC)

"Odin appears a number of times to assist characters with his magic and powers. At the start of the saga, he guides his son Sigi out of the underworld." Not so, the saga says nothing of the underworld. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.167.125.95 (talk) 15:16, 5 December 2011 (UTC)

The subtitle of the book

"The Norse Epic of Sigurd the Dragon Slayer" is only the subtitle of Jesse L Byock's translation. In Old Icelandic it is Völsunga saga (complete with umlaut). This does not imply that Sigurd is the central character of the entire narrative. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.132.246.244 (talk) 13:56, 10 February 2013 (UTC)

Merger proposal

I see that a merger of Völsung Cycle to this article was proposed in 2010. I have just reverted someone making that article into a redirect here, so I had better state my disagreement with the proposal. The Völsung stories are also told in the "heroic" poems of the Poetic Edda and in the Nibelungenlied, so there should be a separate article on the cycle itself, although it is badly in need of expansion. Yngvadottir (talk) 22:34, 20 February 2013 (UTC)

Context

An IP editor has drafted a possible extension to the Context section. This may well contain useful ideas, but without cited references, both to the Völsunga saga and to reliable sources (presumably, academic critics of the VS), it reads as WP:OR. Suitably cited, more explanation of the context would be welcome. Chiswick Chap (talk) 08:22, 4 December 2014 (UTC)

Atli and Attila

@TylerBurden: can you explain the source of your definitive statement that Atli is not related to Attila the Hun? Our article Atlakviða says "One of the main characters is Atli who originates from Attila the Hun." Looking at external sources, I find quite a few that equate Atli and Attila. Looking at the higher quality sources, Professor D. L. Ashliman here says "his son was Atli (Attila the Hun)". In this introduction to the Volsunga Saga, H. Halliday Sparling says "In these poems the only historical name is that of Attila, the great Hun leader". This site says "From contemporary historical sources, we know that Attila the Hun (Atli) was betrothed to a Germanic princess...".

Perhaps this is a widespread misconception that has been debunked elsewhere, in which case a source would be appreciated. CodeTalker (talk) 23:25, 19 May 2022 (UTC)

Based on your sources there certainly seem to be connections, but in this particular saga Atli is the brother of Brunhild, so linking to the actual historical figure of Attila seems a bit much given that this is at best an entirely fictionalized version of him with seemingly the only similarity being the name. TylerBurden (talk) 23:39, 19 May 2022 (UTC)

Yes, I agree that it seems weird for a real historical figure to be pulled out of his historical and geographic context and written into a role entirely unrelated to his real history. But as Halliday says, he "filled so large a part of the imagination of the people whose power he had broken. There is no doubt that, in the days when the kingdoms of the Scando-Goths reached from the North Cape to the Caspian, that some earlier great king performed his part; but, after the striking career of Attila, he became the recognised type of a powerful foreign potentate." In other words, his career became a kind of stereotype and his name and history were merged into the Atli character. I am by no means an expert on this topic, but I've seen this sort of analysis of Atli/Attila in several places besides the ones I cited above. Probably the article needs a bit more nuance about this topic than simply placing "Attila the Hun" in parentheses after Atli's name with no further explanation. CodeTalker (talk) 00:25, 20 May 2022 (UTC)

I agree with you, I am not sure this would be the article for it though. Probably a more general article about Norse sagas or perhaps even the Attila article itself, if it is not mentioned in those already. TylerBurden (talk) 01:09, 20 May 2022 (UTC)