The disappearance of the elements derived from the märchen-myth, however, must in part be attributed to another factor. This factor, which is closely bound up with the entire culture of the heroic age, consists in the increasing influence of _historical recollections_. Particularly illuminative, as regards this point, are the Greek and Germanic sagas. The sagas of Hercules and the Argonauts, which, from this point of view, belong to a relatively early stage, are purely mythical creations. So far as one can see, no actual events are referred to by them. The Trojan saga, on the other hand, clearly exhibits the traces of historical recollections; its historical setting, moreover, seems to cause the events that transpire within it to approximate more nearly to the character of real life. Even here, indeed, ancient magical motives still cast their fantastic shadows over the narrative. Occasionally, however, the miracle appears in a rationalized form. The magician of the märchen gives place to the seer who predicts the future. What the miracle effected is now accomplished by the overpowering might and the baffling cunning of the strong and wily hero. In this change, the external accessories may sometimes remain the same, so that it is only the inner motives that become different. Thus, it is not impossible that the wooden horse which was said to have been invented by Odysseus and to have brought into Troy the secreted warriors of the besieging hosts, was at one time, in märchen or in saga, an actual magical horse, or a help-bringing deity who had assumed this form. In this case, the poet may possibly be presenting a rationalistic reinterpretation of an older magical motive, with the aim of exalting the craftiness of his hero. In the account of Achilles' youth, on the other hand, and in the story of Helen which the poet takes as his starting-point, the märchen-idea of the saga obviously affects the action itself, though it is significant to note that these purely mythical features do not belong to the plot so much as to its antecedent history. In so far as the heroes directly affect the course of action, they are portrayed as purely human. The same is true of the German _Niebelungen_ saga. Just as Achilles, a mythical hero not at all unlike the märchen-hero, was taken over into the historical saga, so also was Siegfried. But here again the märchen motives, such as the fight with the dragon, Siegfried's invulnerability through bathing in its blood, the helmet of invisibility, and others, belong to the past history of the hero, and are mentioned only incidentally in the narrative itself. By referring these specifically märchen miracles to the past, the saga seems to say, as it were, that its heroes were at one time märchen-heroes.