Gjúki and Grímhild ruled the Burgundian court and raised four children — Gunnar, Högni, Gudrún, and Guttormr — whose entanglement with Sigurd and the cursed hoard of Fáfnir brought ruin upon the entire dynasty.
Gudrún was married to Atli after her mother Grímhild gave her a potion of forgetfulness. The loveless marriage ended when Gudrún killed their sons Erpr Atlason and Eitill, served their flesh to Atli, and burned his hall.
Gudrún married Jónakr after her vengeance on Atli, and bore him two sons, Hamðir and Sörli, whom she later goaded into their doomed ride to avenge Svanhild's death at the hands of Jörmunrekr.
Sigurd married Gudrún after Grímhild's memory potion erased his love for Brynhild. Their children included Svanhild, famed for her beauty but tragically trampled on Jörmunrekr's orders, and Sigmund Sigurdsson.
Gudrún and Atli were locked in bitter enmity from the moment he lured her brothers Gunnar and Högni to his hall and had them killed for Fáfnir's gold. Gudrún's vengeance was absolute — she slew their sons, served their flesh to Atli, and burned his hall with him inside.
Gudrún and Brynhild clashed bitterly when they quarreled at the river over whose husband was greater. Gudrún revealed the deception of Sigurd's wooing, and Brynhild's fury drove her to orchestrate Sigurd's murder and then take her own life on his pyre.
Gudrún slew her own sons Erpr and Eitill as the first act of her vengeance against Atli. She cut their throats, roasted their hearts, and served the flesh to their father at the feast, telling him what he had eaten only after he had swallowed.
Gudrún killed Atli in his own hall to avenge her brothers Gunnar and Högni, whom he had slain for Fáfnir's gold. She set fire to the hall and burned it with all of Atli's men inside.
⚠ Atlakviða describes Gudrún burning the hall; Völsunga saga adds that she first stabbed Atli in bed before setting the fire.
Gudrún Gjúkadóttir and Kriemhild descend from the same legendary Burgundian figure — in the Norse tradition she avenges her brothers against Atli, while in the German Nibelungenlied she avenges her husband Siegfried against her own kin.
Gudrún showed the ring Andvaranaut to Brynhild as proof that Sigurd had crossed the flames in Gunnarr's shape. The cursed ring's reappearance exposed the deception and triggered the Völsung catastrophe.
Grímhild brewed potions of forgetfulness that twice reshaped Gudrún's fate — the first erased Gudrún's knowledge of Sigurd's betrothal to Brynhild, binding her to a doomed marriage, and the second dulled her grief after Sigurd's death, compelling her into marriage with Atli.
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