_Nibelungen Ring_. Geibel eliminated everything supernatural; Wagner
made use chiefly of the Old Norse versions of the story; Hebbel, on the
contrary, dramatized what he regarded as the significant content of the
Middle High German poem, retaining its mythological, Christian,
chivalrous, historical, and legendary elements. The mythological
elements of the epic are indeed indistinct survivals of earlier ages.
Hebbel leaned somewhat upon Norse myths in his reproduction of them,
though it was part of his plan to preserve a certain indistinctness and
mystery in these undramatic presuppositions. Similarly, he made more of
the element of Christianity than is made of it by the _Nibelungenlied_.
In both epic and drama the Burgundians are only formally Christian; the
cardinal principles of heathen ethics, tribal loyalty and vengeance, are
entirely unaffected by the Christian doctrine of forgiveness. In the
play, however, the transition from one system to the other is much more
strongly emphasized than in the poem. The heathen ethics lead to the
mutual destruction of those who profess them, and out of the ruins of
the old civilization a new world rises heralded by Theodoric of Verona,
who accepts the sovereignty relinquished by Attila the Hun, "in His name
who died on the cross."

The downfall of two peoples follows in the train of personal calamity.
Siegfried, foreordained by the ancient gods to become the husband of
Brunhild, neglects in the adventurous days of youth to woo her, and
undertakes for the price of Kriemhild's hand to secure her as a wife for
Gunther. Hidden in his cloak of invisibility, he twice overcomes
Brunhild, thereby committing against her the same kind of outrage as
Herod's against Mariamne, and that of Gyges against Rhodope. Through no
direct fault of Siegfried's the fraud is discovered; it is an offense to
the queen, which insults the State. Gunther the king will not punish it,
for he is under personal obligations to the offender; but he takes no