[14] In Saxo Gervandillus (_Geirvandill_) is the father of Horvandillus (_Örvandill_). Orvandel has been proved to be identical with Egil. And as Egil is the son of Ivalde, Geirvandel is identical with Ivalde.
THE NIFLUNG HOARD IS THE TREASURE LEFT BY VOLUND AND HIS BROTHERS.
When Volund and Egil, angry at the gods, abandoned Frey to the power of the giants and set out for the Wolfdales, they were unable to take with them their immense treasures inherited from their father and augmented by themselves. Nor did they need them for their purposes. Volund carried with him a golden fountain in his wealth-bringing arm-ring (see Nos. 87, 98, 101) from which the seven hundred rings, that Nidhad to his astonishment discovered in his smithy, must have come. But the riches left by these brothers ought not to fall into the hands of the gods, who were their enemies. Consequently they were concealed. Saxo (_Hist._, 193) says of the father of Svipdag-Ericus, that is to say, of Orvandel-Egil, that he long had had great treasures concealed in earth caves (_gazæ, quas diu clausæ telluris antra condiderant_). The same is true of Gjuke-Slagfin, who went with his brothers to the Wolfdales. Vilkinasaga (see below) has rescued an account of a treasure which was preserved in the interior of a mountain, and which he owned. The same is still more and particularly applicable to Volund, as he was the most famous smith of the mythology and of the heroic saga. The popular fancy conceived these treasures left and concealed by Volund as being kept in earth caves, or in mountain halls, guarded and brooded over by dragons. Or it conceived them as lying on the bottom of the sea, or in the bottom of deep rivers, guarded by some dwarf inhabiting a rocky island near by. Many of the songs and sagas of heathendom and of the older days of Christianity were connected with the refinding and acquisition of the Niblung hoard by some hero or other as the Volsung Sigmund, the Borgar descendant Hadding-Dieterich, and Siegfried-Sigurd-Fafnersbane. The Niflung treasure, _hodd Niflunga_ (Atlakvida, 26), _Nibelunge Hort_, is in its more limited sense these Volund treasures, and in its most general signification the golden wealth left by the three brothers. This wealth the saga represents as gathered again largely in the hands of the Gjukungs, after Sigurd, upon the victory over Fafner, has reunited the most important one of Volund's concealed treasures with that of the Gjukung's, and has married the Gjukung sister Gudrun. The German tradition, preserved in middle-age poems, shows that the continental Teutons long remembered that the _Nibelunge Hort_ originally was owned by Volund, Egil, and Slagfin-Gjuke. In _Lied von Siegfried_ the treasure is owned by three brothers who are "Niblungs." Only one of them is named, and he is called King Euglin, a name which, with its variation Eugel, manifestly is a variation of Eigel, as he is called in the Orentel saga and in Vilkinasaga, and of Egil as he is called in the Norse records. King Euglin is, according to _Lied von Siegfried_, an interpreter of stars. Siegfried bids him _Lasz mich deyner kunst geniessen, Astronomey genannt_. This peculiar statement is explained by the myth according to which Orvandel-Egil is a star-hero. Egil becomes, like Atlas of the antique mythology, a king versed in astronomy in the historical interpretation of mythology. In _Nibelunge Noth_ the treasure is owned by "the valiant" Niblungs, Schilbunc and Niblunc. Schilbunc is the Norse _Skilfingr_, and I have already shown above that Ivalde-Svigder is the progenitor of the Skilfings. The poem Biterolf knows that the treasure originally belonged to _Nibelót, der machet himele guldîn; selber wolt er got sîn_. These remarkable words have their only explanation in the myths concerning the Niflung Volund, who first ornamented Asgard with golden works of art, and subsequently wished to destroy the inhabitants of Asgard in order to be god himself. The Norse heroic saga makes the treasures brooded over by Fafner to have been previously guarded by the dwarf Andvare, and makes the latter (Sigurdarkvida Fafn., ii. 3) refer to the first owner. The saga characterises the treasure guarded by him as _that gull, er Gustr átti_.