[Pitchwife]

Actually, Aiwendil, I think the saga character that is most clearly a model for Túrin has to be Sigurd the Volsung - dragonslayers both, and if I get the meaning of Sig-urd right (sig=victory and Urd=one of the Norns, goddesses of fate), doesn't that remind us of Túrins pseudonym Turambar? (Not my thought, but I can't at the moment remember where I read it; and I guess Sigurd could probably be construed as meaning something like "fated to be victorious" or some such - any Old Norse scholars around here?)

I, too, had Njals saga in mind when I wrote that bit about Aerin, but I also see echoes of Gudrun Gjuki's daughter and her 'Easterling' husband Atli in her and Brodda - not a happy marriage either, and in the Norse versions of the story she actually kills him (to avenge her brothers). It all doesn't add up to a 1:1 correspondence (which would be boring anyway), but I think we have here some of the ingredients that went into Tolkien's very own stew.