Wotan: (#5 or #15?:; #13 hint?:) What nonsense is that? What was hard for me to capture I’ll fearlessly keep for myself (:#5 or #15?; :#13 hint?). (#12)
Loge: Then things look black for the promise I gave to the grieving sisters.
Wotan: Your promise isn’t binding on me: the ring remains mine as booty.
Fafner: (#26a:; #19:) But as ransom you have to leave it here (:#26a; :#19).
Wotan: (#19?:) Brazenly ask for whatever you want, everything will I grant you; but not for the world (:#19?) shall I give up the ring!
Fasolt: (angrily pulling Freia out from behind the hoard) Then it’s all off! We’re back where we started; Freia will follow us now for ever.
Freia: (#5?:) Help me! Help me (:#5?)!
Fricka: Hard-hearted god, give in to them!
Froh: Don’t stint the gold!
Donner: Let them have the ring!
Wotan: Leave me in peace: the ring I’ll not give up.
The vulgarity with which the Giants transform Freia into a commodity to be weighed in value against a treasure in gold plunges Wotan into an apoplexy of shame and consternation, for which Fricka blames him, since it was he who placed Freia in pawn in the first place. This scene dramatizes how entirely dependent man’s ideal is upon the real, how dependent the sublime is upon its foundation in the mundane. When the Nibelung Hoard is used up Freia’s hair can still be seen through a crack, and so, accompanied by #29 (Freia’s golden apples of immortality), Fafner insists that Wotan fill the gap with the Tarnhelm. At last, when Freia seems to be entirely hidden from view, Fasolt comes eye to eye with her through a chink in the gold. Fafner now claims the Ring (Alberich’s Ring) Wotan is wearing in order to block Fasolt’s view and completely sever love from