The paper at hand presents a slender body theory for the dynamics of a curved inertial viscous Newtonian ber. Neglecting surface tension and temperature dependence, the ber ow is modeled as a three-dimensional free boundary value problem via instationary incompressible Navier-Stokes equations. From regular asymptotic expansions in powers of the slenderness parameter leading-order balance laws for mass (cross-section) and momentum are derived that combine the unrestricted motion of the ber center-line with the inner viscous transport. The physically reasonable form of the one-dimensional ber model results thereby from the introduction of the intrinsic velocity that characterizes the convective terms.