The Song of the Nibelungs, written around 1200 in Middle High German, is famous for the appearance of Siegfried the dragon slayer and that of Hagen von Tronje, who sinks the treasure of the Nibelungen in the Rhine near Worms. The heroic epic is a literary reappraisal of the downfall of the kingdom of Burgundy, which -- triggered by the escalating dispute between Brunhild and Kriemhild -- ends in a mighty battle.
Paperback, 368 pages. Issued as Nos. 642-645 of the Universalbibliothek ("Universal Library") series which has since become recognizable by its distinctive yellow covers. Published at Leipzig, Germany in 1942, by Verlag: Philipp Reclam jun[ior], now known simply as Reclam. No dust jacket. Dimensions are 3.8125 x 6.0625 (~pocket book), sized to be sold via vending machine (by 1970, Reclam had deployed more than 2,000 such machines in Germany). Some speckling on front cover; small tear on rear cover.
Printed in blackletter font; pages clean, no handwriting or underlining. Translation by Hermann August Junghans; foreword by the prominent medievalist and philologist Wolfgang Golther. Scarce in paperback in this year -- an Allied bombing raid on Leipzig in December 1943 destroyed hundreds of tons of books.