Brunhilde

Brunhilde was a mighty female warrior, one of the Valkyries. She was also a heroine from the German epics, especially in the Nibelungen saga, in which she is an Icelandic princess.

She defied Odin and in punishment he imprisoned her within a ring of fire on earth. She had to stay there until someone rescued her. Siegfied (Sigurd) braved the fire, woke her, and fell in love with her.

He gave her the ring Andvarinaut, unaware of its curse. Eventually she killed herself when she learned that Sigurd had betrayed her with another woman (Gudrun), not knowing he had been bewitched into doing so by Grimhild.

Brunhilde Media

"Brunnhild" (1897) by Gaston Bussière
Sigrdrífa giving Sigurd a drinking horn; illustration on the 11th-century Drävle Runestone
French operatic soprano Rose Caron as Brunhild at Théâtre de La Monnaie, Brussels, 1884
Illustration of Helreið Brynhildar, 1893
Brunhild proposes the creation of a wall of fire around her hall to her father Budli in order to challenge Sigurd; Faroese postal stamp from 1998
Brunhild arrives in Worms. Hundeshagener Kodex
The quarrel between Brunhild and Kriemhild; Hundeshagener Kodex
Amalie Materna, the first singer to play Brünnhilde in Wagner's Ring des Nibelungen

Sources

http://www.pantheon.org/articles/b/brunhilde.html Archived 2014-10-26 at the Wayback Machine

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