“The race of Giants, boastful, violent, ur-begotten, is troubled in its savage ease: their monstrous strength, their simple mother-wit, no longer are a match for Alberich’s crafty plans of conquest: alarmed they see the Nibelungen forging wondrous weapons, that one day in the hands of human heroes shall cause the Giants’ downfall.” [375W-{6-8/48} The Nibelungen Myth: PW Vol. VII, p. 301]
In other words, it was Alberich’s forging of the Ring which made it not only possible, but indeed, inevitable, that Wotan would commit his sin against Mother Nature’s truth, that sin which Alberich’s curse on his Ring (i.e., on those who try to co-opt his power in order to invent and sustain the self-deceptions of religion) punishes.
[S.2.2: G]
Siegfried now, seemingly inadvertently, has a startling revelation by virtue of accidentally tasting the dead Fafner’s blood: he is now able to grasp the meaning of the Woodbird’s song, which presumably is the secret source of inspiration behind music itself:
Siegfried: The dead can serve as no source of knowledge. (#103?:) So let my living sword now lead me (:#103?)!
(Fafner, in dying, has rolled over on one side. #109. Siegfried now draws his sword from his breast; as he does so, his hand comes into contact with the dragon’s blood: he snatches his hand away.)
Siegfried: Its blood is burning like fire.
(Involuntarily, he raises his fingers to his mouth in order to suck the blood from them. As he gazes thoughtfully in front of him, his attention is caught increasingly by the song of the forest birds. #11 >>; #128, #129)
Siegfried: It’s almost as though (#128:) the woodbirds were speaking to me. Was this brought about by the taste of blood? (#128 segment?:; #108?:) That strange little bird here (:#108?). – Listen! What is it singing to me (:#128 segment?)?
The Woodbird: (from the branches of a lime-tree above Siegfried: #129/#11 >>>> :) Hey! Siegfried now owns the Nibelung hoard: o might he now find the hoard in the cave! If he wanted to win the
