Who Was the Original Dragon-slayer of the Nibelung Cycle?

This article attempts to provide a fresh perspective on the thorny issue of what exactly preceded the category of texts labeled “Germanic heroic poetry.” The argument follows the character of the dragonslayer (Sigurd/Sigmund) through its manifold avatars in the Nibelung cycle of texts, from the earliest skaldic poets and the “Sigemund episode” in Beowulf to Völsunga saga and the Nibelungenlied. It argues that there are three separate narrative cores which collided into the grand narrative of the Nibelung cycle: a dragon-slayer Indo-European-type legend and two narrative traditions of two separate historical events (the fifth-century fall of the Burgundian kingdom and the seventh-century events at the Frankish court surrounding the death of the Merovingian king Sigibert, his wife Brunichildis, and her rival, Fredegunde). This argument is accompanied by a revaluation of past scholarship - both “Old” and “New Philological.” The article aims to go beyond source-criticism to a deeper understanding of how the Germanic heroic tradition works. Ultimately, it advocates a third way - a rhizomatic understanding of Germanic heroic narrative ecologies as processes of narrative and cultural exchange and transformation, rather than clear-cut categorizations and genealogies of textual artifacts.