   gunther (gundahar, gundahari, latin gundaharius, gundicharius, or guntharius, old english gÅ«Ã°here, old norse gunnarr, anglicised as gunnar) is the german name of a semi-legendary king of burgundy of the early 5th century. legendary tales about him appear in latin, medieval middle high german, old norse, and old english texts, especially concerning his relations with siegfried (sigurd in old norse) and his death by treachery in the hall of attila the hun. ==history== in 406 the alans, vandals, the suevi, and possibly the burgundians crossed the rhine and invaded gaul. in 411 ad, the burgundian king gundahar or gundicar set up a puppet emperor, jovinus, in cooperation with goar, king of the alans. with the authority of the gallic emperor that he controlled, gundahar settled on the left or western (i.e., roman) bank of the rhine, between the river lauter and the nahe, seizing worms, speyer, and strasbourg. apparently as part of a truce, the emperor honorius later officially "granted" them the land. olympiodorus of thebes also mentions a guntiarios who was called "commander of the burgundians" in the context of the 411 usurping of germania secunda by jovinus. (prosper, a. 386) despite their new status as foederati, burgundian raids into roman upper gallia belgica became intolerable and were ruthlessly brought to an end in 436, when the roman general flavius aetius called in hun mercenaries who overwhelmed the rhineland kingdom (with its capital at the old celtic roman settlement of borbetomagus, now called worms) in 437. gundahar was killed in the fighting, reportedly along with the majority of the burgundian tribe.prosper; chronica gallica 452; hydatius; and sidonius apollinaris. ==in legend== the destruction of worms and the burgundian kingdom by the huns became the subject of heroic legends that were afterwards incorporated into many works of medieval literature such as the middle high german epic poem, the nibelungenlied, where king gunther and queen brÃ¼nhild hold their court at worms, and siegfried comes to woo gunther's sister kriemhild. in old norse sources, the names are gunnar, brynhild, sigurd, and gudrun as normally rendered in english. in the waltharius, gibicho and his son guntharius are kings of the [
5th-century_monarchs_in_Europe Burgundian_kings Fictional_German_people German_heroic_legends German_masculine_given_names Kings_of_Burgundy Medieval_literature Nibelung_tradition People_in_Norse_mythology_and_legends Surnames VAPlsung_cycle