Nothing is clearer than that strife is
her only object. It is her mediation which brings about the battle,
when apparently both heroes would be quite willing to make peace; and
her arts which cause the daily renewal of fighting. This island battle
among dead and living is peculiar to the Norse version, and coloured
by, if not originating in, the Valhalla idea: Hoegni and Hedin and
their men are the Einherjar who fight every day and rest and feast
at night, Hild is a war-goddess. The conception of her character,
contrasting with the gentler part played by the Continental German
heroines (who are rather the causes than the inciters of strife),
can be paralleled from many of the sagas proper.
Hoegni's sword Dainsleif, forged by the dwarfs, as were all magic
weapons, is like the sword of Angantyr, in that it claims a victim
whenever it is drawn from the sheath: an idea which may easily have
arisen from the prowess of any famous swordsman.
_The Sword of Angantyr_.--Like the two last legends, Angantyr's
story is not represented in the Elder Edda; it is not even told by
Snorri. Yet poems belonging to the cycle survive (preserved by good
fortune in the late mythical _Hervarar Saga_) which among the heroic
poems rank next in artistic beauty to the Helgi Lays. Since the story
possesses besides a striking originality, and is connected with the
name of a Pan-Germanic hero, the Ongendtheow of Old English poetry,
I cannot follow the example of most editors and omit it from the
heroic poems.
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