Fafnir his foster-son Sigurd to kill the dragon. Regin instructed Sigurd to dig a pit in which he could lie in wait under the trail Fáfnir used to get to a stream and there plunge his sword, Gram, into Fafnir's heart as he crawls over the pit to the water. Regin then ran away in fear, leaving Sigurd to the task. As Sigurd dug, Odin appeared in the form of an old man with a long beard, advising the warrior to dig more trenches for the blood of Fafnir to run into, presumably so that Sigurd does not drown in the
Germanic peoples sake of royal succession. Imperial policy had to be carefully charted between the Roman-Germanic claimants to kingship and the maintenance of Roman imperial administration, as the federated Germanic kings attempted to put their stamp on Roman rule and replace Roman armies with their own warriors. Roman leaders were not oblivious to the clever tactics (intermarriage and offspring) employed by Germanic chieftains and adopted creative treaties to either appease them or temper their ambitions. Prior to the Middle Ages, Germanic peoples followed what is now referred to as Germanic paganism: "a system of interlocking and closely interrelated religious worldviews and practices