Mime: (aloud) (#21:) As pledge for my hearth, I accept your head (:#21): (#112 frag:) take care to redeem it with thoughtful reply (:#112 frag)! (#114a:) Three are the questions I freely ask (:#114a).
Wanderer: (#96?; #21/#41) Thrice I must hit the mark.
Mime: (collecting his thoughts: #101) (#113:) You’ve traveled much on the earth’s broad back and wandered far through the world (:#113): - (#41/#17, #101) now tell me cunningly (#101?) (#113?:) what is the race (#? – [is there a motif in play here?]) that trades in the depths of the earth [“Erde”; i.e., Erda] (:#113?; :#? – [what motif is in play?])?
Wotan: The Nibelungs (#41?) trade in the depths of the earth [“Erde”]: (#41) Nibelheim is their land. (#41?) Black elves they are; Black-Alberich once watched over them as their lord. (#17/#41>>:) A magic ring’s compelling power (#?: [quotation from R.3?]) tamed his toiling people (:#17/#41; :#? [quotation from R.3?]) (#5/#46>> [a #46 vari expressing anguish, reminiscent of Mime’s description in R.3 of Alberich turning the Nibelungs’ joy to sorrow when Alberich compelled them to wrest his hoard from the earth?]); #15 hint?/#46:) a glittering hoard of rich-gemmed jewels for him they heaped on high (:#5/#46; :#15 hint?/#46) [there may be a mistake here: I may have accidentally substituted #15 for #5]: (#20b>>: [in a vari associated with Wotan’s and Loge’s forcing Alberich up from Nibelheim to the meadow under Valhalla’s heights in R.3-4, usually heard in association with Loge’s music, perhaps (#@: b)]) it was meant to win him the world (:#20b). (#37?; #20b?; #21/#41) What is your second question, dwarf?
Mime: (sinking into even deeper thought: #41; #101?) Much, (#113 vari:) Wanderer, I see you know of the earth’s umbilical nest [“Erde Nabelnest,” i.e., Erda’s “navel-nest”] (#17/#41, #101)
Wotan introduces a new motif, #114ab, while staking his head in this wager of wits and knowledge, telling Mime that Wotan’s head is Mime’s if Mime fails to ask what he needs to know, and if Wotan doesn’t redeem his head with his lore. [Stewart’s translation of this passage needs to be checked!] In point of fact, Mime will fail to ask what he needs to know, fail to ask about how mankind might achieve redemption, and will lose his head (keep in mind that Mime’s head is Wotan’s head) to Wotan’s proxy Siegfried (Wotan’s heart). Dunning has not found any definitive musical relationship of #114 with any other motif. We can construe it, I think, as the musical embodiment of the fact that while Mime’s mind grasps practical knowledge of the real world, it
