Humanities and Pedagogics Academy (branch) of V. I.

 Vernadsky
Crimean Federal University in Yalta

A. A. Maiboroda
K. R. Chemezova

The Anglo-Saxon Period

449-1066

When Angles and Saxons came hither from the east,

Sought Britain over the broad-spreading sea,
Haughty war-smiths overcame the Britons,
Valiant earls got for themselves a home.
from The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle

Yalta
2015
УДК 821.111=021(07)”7”(41)
ББК 83.3Англ(4Вел)
М-12

Рекомендовано к печати
Учёным советом Гуманитарно-педагогической академии (филиал)
ФГАОУ ВО «КФУ им. В. И. Вернадского» в г. Ялте
(протокол заседания №9 от 12.11.2015)

Рецензенты:

Лушникова Г. И. – доктор филологических наук, профессор кафедры иностранной

филологии и методики преподавания Гуманитарно-педагогической академии (филиал) ФГАОУ
ВО «Крымский федеральный университет имени В. И. Вернадского».
Башкатова Ю. А. –кандидат филологических наук, профессор, доцент кафедры
иностранной филологии ФГБОУ ВПО «Кемеровский государственный университет».

Maiboroda A. A., Chemezova K. R.

М-12 The Anglo-Saxon Period. 449-1066 / A. A. Maiboroda, K. R. Chemezova; Humanities
and Pedagogics Academy (branch) of V. I. Vernadsky Crimean Federal University in
Yalta. – Yalta, 2015. – 128 p.

This textbook is designed for students of foreign philology for the disciplines “History of the
English-speaking countries' literature” and “History of the English language”. It consists of
informational texts, translations of Anglo-Saxon texts into English, articles and assignments for the
analysis of the poems and articles. The information of this textbook is accompanied by a explanations
and pictures.

УДК 821.111=021(07)”7”(41)
ББК 83.3Англ(4Вел)

© Maiboroda A. A., 2015

© Chemezova K. R.., 2015

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 Contents
Introduction 4
British Voices 14
Reading Critically: The Literature of 449–1066 15
The Seafarer 16
Beowulf 25
Comparing Translations Beowulf 67
Cross Currents: Beowulf And John Gardner's Grendel
70
The Wanderer 73
Bede 82
Bede. From A History of the English Church and People 84
The Changing English Language 91
Regia Anglorum. The 7 Kingdoms of the Englisc 600 – 800 AD 94
Rulers of England and Great Britain
102
Difference Between Saxons and Vikings 104
The Vikings were no worse than the Anglo-Saxons 106
A Guide to Writing in Norse Runes 113
Should I Write in Runes Phonetically? 116
Viking Words in English
118
Timetable 121

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~4~
 Introduction
The passage on the first page comes from a modern translation of The Anglo-
Saxon Chronicle, an early record of English history. It tells of the attacks staged by
warriors from what are now Denmark and Germany on the rock-bound coast of Britain
during the fifth century. Most of the fierce “war-smiths” identified themselves as
Angles and Saxons, though some belonged to a smaller tribe, the Jutes. At first these
pirates sailed their shallow boats across the “broad-spreading” North Sea to raid
Britain’s low-lying eastern coast. By A.D. 449, however, their raids had turned into a
full-scale invasion.
The arrival of the Anglo-Saxons in Britain signaled the beginning of the English
language. The “war-smiths” soon drove native Britons from the eastern, central, and
southern portions of their island. Those areas became known as “Angles’ land,” or
England. The closely related Germanic languages spoken by the conquering tribes
developed into a new language called “Angle-ish” or English. Although that language
would change a great deal over the centuries, it was the precursor of the English we
speak today. As the language took shape, so did the literature of England, Ireland,
Scotland, and Wales.
To put these early times into historical perspective, we must first examine the
people whom the Angles and Saxons conquered, the settlers of Britain before 449.

Britain Before the Anglo-Saxons

Who were the earliest inhabitants of the British Isles? The answer is not entirely
clear, for some of them arrived in Britain in the dim recesses before recorded time.
Among them were Iberians from present-day Spain and Portugal, who brought late
Stone Age weapons to Britain’s shores. The last, and by far the most important, of the

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early conquerors were the Celts, a people from southern Europe who had gradually
migrated west. Between 800 and 600 b.c., two groups of Celts invaded the British Isles.

Arrival of the Celts

One group, who called themselves Brythons (now spelled “Britons”), settled on
the largest island, Britain. The other, known as Gaels, settled on the second largest
island, known to us as Ireland. Gaels and Britons spoke different but related languages
of the Celtic family. Celtic languages had nothing in common with the Germanic ones
later associated with the Angles and Saxons.
The Celts were farmers and hunters. They organized themselves into tightly knit
clans, each with a fearsome loyalty to its chieftain. When these clans fell into argument
with one another, they often looked to a class of priests known as Druids to settle their
disputes. Druids presided over religious rituals and also memorized and recited long,
heroic poems that preserved the people’s myths about the past. Some of the poems may
have included fables about such leaders as Old King Cole of the nursery rhyme and
King Lear of Shakespeare’s tragic play.

The Roman Conquest

The next conquerors of Britain were the far more sophisticated Romans. In 55
B.C. and again the next year, the Roman general Julius Caesar made hasty invasions.
Although he barely penetrated the island, he quickly declared it conquered and returned
to what is now France to work on his memoirs. The true conquest of Britain occurred
nearly one hundred years later during the reign of the Roman emperor Claudius.
Disciplined Roman legions spread out over the island, establishing camps, which soon
grew into towns.
The Romans transplanted many comforts of their urban, Mediterranean culture to
the distant, rain-drenched north. In perhaps their greatest contribution, they constructed
a system of well- paved roads through the woodland wilderness, highways that
continued to serve the island for centuries.
The Roman rule of Britain lasted for more than 300 years. It ended only when

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northern European tribes invaded Italy and increased pressure on Rome itself. The last
Roman legions departed from Britain to defend Rome in A. D. 407. By that time, some
of their towns were already falling to ruin, and the Britons faced a new set of invaders.

The Anglo-Saxon Conquest

As we have seen, the next invaders were the Anglo-Saxons. Who were these
ancient people? Lacking authentic first-hand accounts from the period, historians simply
have to guess. Some Anglo-Saxons appear to have been deep-sea fishermen, already
accustomed to marauding coasts along the Baltic Sea. Others seem to have been
farmers, perhaps seeking soil richer than the sandy or marshy land at home. Ferocious
as the Angles and Saxons may have been, they did not perform their piracy merely for
plunder – at least not for long. They sought and won territory, apparently by rowing
their shallow boats up river into the British heartland and then building camps and
waging war on the Britons. Gradually, the newcomers gained the upper hand over the
island’s settlers and took over more and more of what today is England.

Early Anglo-Saxon Life

The first Angles, Saxons, and Jutes transferred to England their highly organized
tribal units. Each tribe was ruled by a king, chosen by a witan, or council of elders.
Invading groups set up numerous small kingdoms, and at first the various kingdoms
fought frequently. As time went on, however, many of these tribal differences faded.
Anglo-Saxon kingdoms traded with one another. Men married women from different
tribes. Kingdoms gradually absorbed one another until seven larger ones remained. As
previously mentioned, all this intermingling produced a new language. We call it
Anglo-Saxon or Old English to distinguish it from our modern form.
The Anglo-Saxons brought to Britain their own pagan beliefs. In the world of the
sixth century, the ever-present dangers of death by accident or warfare had led these
people to take a rather grim view of life. In fact, the early Anglo- Saxons believed that
every human life was in the hands of fate. Their attitude was sharply different from the
Christian belief in the freedom of an individual to determine his or her own path.

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 The early Anglo-Saxons worshiped ancient Germanic gods. They included Tiu,
god of war and the sky; Woden, chief of the gods; and Fria, Woden’s wife and goddess
of the home. These gods were abandoned with the coming of Christianity. Even so, their
names survive in our words Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday.
In terror of the Anglo-Saxons, the Britons retreated to the edges of their island –
and beyond. Some went to the southwestern tip (Cornwall), or the hilly western region
(Wales), of Britain. Still others joined the Gaels of Ireland. This group then traveled
back to Britain and settled in the northern part of the island, Scotland. In all these areas,
people spoke Celtic languages – Cornish, Welsh, and Irish and Scottish Gaelic. All but
the Cornish language are still spoken today.

The Coining of Christianity

During the fourth century, the Romans had accepted Christianity and introduced
it to Britain. A century later, when the Celts fled the Anglo- Saxons, they took their
Christian faith with them. After Rome fell to barbarian tribes in A.D. 476,
communications weakened between Celtic and Roman Christians. While the Roman
Church was recovering from political chaos, the Celtic Christian Church continued to
thrive. In 563, a group of Irish monks set sail in tiny skiffs for the west coast of
Scotland. A soldier and abbot named Columba, along with some monks, moved across
northern Britain in the hope of winning souls for the faith. In their travels, they won
acceptance among many Scots and some Saxons and Angles. Their conversions led, in
turn, to the establishment of monasteries in the north.
Meanwhile, the Roman Church had reorganized itself and was beginning to send
missionaries throughout Europe. In 597, the Roman cleric Saint Augustine (not the
early Christian Church father) arrived in southeast England and quickly converted King
Ethelbert of Kent to Christianity. Augustine set up a monastery at Canterbury in Kent
and began preaching his faith to other rulers in southern England. To win over a
kingdom, Augustine and his followers needed only to convert the king, who would then
make Christianity the religion of his realm. By the year 650, they had largely succeeded.
The new religion had a profound effect on Anglo-Saxon civilization. No longer

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could ruling warlords indulge themselves in the belief that they had descended from
pagan gods. No longer could freemen think it permissible to treat their wives or children
or slaves with cruelty. Christian clerics were able to end old feuds by denouncing
revenge and calling upon a higher law. By providing counsel to quarreling rulers, the
Church promoted peace and played a major role in unifying the English people.

Christianity and Literature

The Church also brought to England two elements of civilization that had been
missing since the departure of the Romans: education and written literature. Christian
leaders established schools at Canterbury and York and supervised the preservation of
learning in the island’s monasteries. Within their secluded halls, monks often worked as
scribes, recording and duplicating manuscripts, or books written by hand. At first they
worked only in Latin, the language of Church scholarship. Often several monks labomd
for years to complete a single manuscript. These volumes were elaborately painted and
illuminated in gold and silver.
From such monastic training emerged a Northumbrian monk later considered the
“father of English history.” Today we know him as the Venerable Bede (673 – 735).
Bede was a master of thorough research, tracking down information by studying earlier
documents and interviewing people who had witnessed or taken part in past events. His
most famous volume was A History of the English Church and People, a monumental
work that offers the clearest account we have of early Anglo-Saxon times.
Although Christianity did indeed temper Anglo-Saxon civilization, it did not
destroy the northerners’ spirit. Glimpses of an earlier world lived on in the fragments of
epics such as Beowulf, a long narrative poem that depicted great battles between Anglo-
Saxon warriors and superhuman monsters. The Anglo-Saxons remained a hardy group.
Now they were about to come face to face with a new peril – invasion by the Vikings.

The First Danish Invasion

Between the ninth and twelfth centuries, a great restlessness overtook the region
of northern Europe known as Scandinavia. Beset with a rising population and limited

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farmland, the people of Norway, the Norse, and of Denmark, the Danes, took to the
seas. In some of their most adventurous voyages, the Vikings (warriors) carried their
piracy to the British Isles. The Norse set their sights on Northumbria, Scotland, Wales,
and Ireland, whereas the Danes targeted eastern and southern England.
Viking invaders sacked and plundered monasteries, destroyed manuscripts, and
stole sacred religious objects. They burned entire communities and put villagers to the
sword. Wherever the Vikings went, the sight of their square-sailed ships stirred specters
of terror and destruction. One Anglo-Saxon prayer of the day reflected the fear that the
Danish pirates inspired: “From the fury of the Northmen, О Lord, deliver us.”
Although the English fought back valiantly, the Danesjnade broad inroads. By the
middle of the ninth Century, most of northern, eastern, and central England had fallen to
the invaders. They called their territory the Danelaw. Only the Saxon kingdom of
Wessex managed to fight the Danes to a standstill.

Alfred the Great

In 871, a king ascended to the Wessex throne who would become the only ruler
in England’s history ever to be honored with the epithet “the Great.” His name was
Alfred, and he earned the title partly by resisting further Danish encroachment. Under a
truce concluded in 886, England was formally divided: the Saxons acknowledged
Danish rule in the east and north, but the Danes agreed to respect Saxon rule in the
south. As the king of a much-expanded Wessex, Alfred the Great became a national
hero.
Alfred’s achievements went far beyond the field of battle, however. Not only was
he instrumental in preserving the remnants of pre-Danish civilization in Britain, but he
encouraged a rebirth of learning and education. To make literature and other documents
more accessible, he oversaw translations of Bede’s History and other works from Latin
into Anglo-Saxon, the everyday language of the people. In this way he fostered the
growth of the English language and its literature. He also began to keep records of
English history in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, one of our principal sources of
information on early English life.

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 Gradually the Danes became more peaceful, and old animosities subsided. Even
before their arrival in England, many Danes had been accustomed to the merchant’s
trade, however crudely it may have existed in northern Europe at the time. Now they
built their Danelaw communities not only as military fortresses but as trading centers,
and one result was the growth of English towns.
Like the Anglo-Saxons, the Danes spoke a Germanic language, so they were able
to communicate easily with the English. In fact, many Norse words slowly crept into the
English vocabulary. The word law is Danish, for example. Its use reflected the Danes’
interest in legal procedures.

The Second Danish Invasion and the Norman Conquest

The peace and stability that began with Alfred’s reign lasted more than a century.
Immigration from Scandinavia dwindled, and the descendants of Alfred the Great were
able to regain much conquered territory. Toward the close of the tenth century,
however, a new series of onslaughts began as more Danes from Europe attempted to
recapture and widen the Danelaw. Once they had succeeded, they forced the Saxon
witan to select a succession of Danish kings.
Then, in 1042, the line of succession returned to a descendant of Alfred the Great.
This king, Edward, had gained the title “the Confessor” because he was a deeply
religious Christian. He had spent many of his early years in Normandy, a region once
settled by Scandinavians and now a part of France. Norman on his mother’s side,
Edward had developed a close friendship with his cousin William, Normandy’s ruler.
Once Edward took the English throne, his association with the Normans further
weakened Saxon power. His death in 1066 led directly to a Norman conquest of
England and brought to an end the Anglo- Saxon period of literature, as we shall see in
the next unit.

Anglo-Saxon Literature

Scholars now believe that the literature of the British Isles began with Celtic
Druids. These priests assumed the function of storytellers, reciting poems about Celtic

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leaders and their heroic deeds. In the same way, Anglo-Saxon literature began not with
books, but with spoken verse and incantations. Their purpose was to pass along tribal
history and values to a population that mostly could not read or write.
To be sure, some Anglo-Saxons were familiar with the written word. In the third
century in northern Europe, they had devised an alphabet of letters called runes. When
they came to Britain, they brought this alphabet with them and used it until the Latin
alphabet we have today superseded it. Runes were used chiefly for inscriptions on
important buildings, on statues, and the like.
The reciting of poems often occurred on ceremonial occasions such as the
celebration of a military victory. A warrior’s comrades would gather in his hall or
castle, and the performance would begin. The performers were usually professional
minstrels, known as scops, and their assistants, called gleemen. The scops and gleemen
recited for hours and, in some instances, even for days.
Scholars now suppose that these recitations took place to the accompaniment of a
harp. The poems followed a set formula of composition, which probably made them
easier to memorize. A formal, rigid pattern of word stresses gave the lyrics a terse, sing-
song effect. A mid-line pause, called a caesura, occurred in many lines. Another part of
the pattern was alliteration, the repetition of sounds, especially initial consonant sounds.

Types of Anglo-Saxon Verse

Only about 30,000 lines of Anglo-Saxon verse still exist. Almost all of it is found
in four works dating from about A.D. 975 to 1050. The early verse falls mainly into two
categories. One is heroic poetry, which recounts the achievements of warriors involved
in great battles. The other is elegiac poetry, sorrowful laments that mourn the deaths of
loved ones and the loss of the past.
Copied many years after their composition, the poems have obviously undergone
many changes. Later scops may have adapted them, and so may have monastic scribes.
Nevertheless, pagan elements remain, particularly in the ever-present sense of an
ominous fate, or wyrd. Consider, for example, these lines from one of the elegiac
poems, “The Wanderer”:

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 “He who shall muse on these moldering ruins,
And deeply ponder this darkling life,
Must brood on old legends of battle
and bloodshed,
And heavy the mood that troubles his heart: . . .

The Beowulf Legend

Of the heroic poetry, the most important work is Beowulf, the story of a great
pagan warrior renowned for his courage, strength, and dignity. Beowulf is an epic, a
long heroic poem. Because it is the first such work to be composed in the English
language, it is considered the national epic of England.
Like most Anglo-Saxon poets, the author of Beowulf is unknown. Although
versions of the poem were probably recited as early as the sixth century, the text that we
have today was composed in the eighth century and not written down until the eleventh.
Thus, the poem includes many references to Christian ideas and Latin classics. Clearly
evident in Beowulf, however, are the values of a warrior society, especially such values
as dignity, bravery, and prowess in battle:
And Beowulf was ready, firm with our Lord’s
High favor and his own bold courage and strength.
Emphasis on such values did not disappear in Christian times. It appeared in later
Anglo-Saxon poems such as The Battle of Maldon, which commemorates a great
military defeat by the Danes.
Among the few known poets of the Christian era, two are worthy of mention –
Caedmon and Cynewulf. Caedmon, who apparently lived in the seventh century, is
mentioned in Bede’s History. The poet’s only authenticated verse consists of a few lines
that Bede recorded, called “Caedmon’s Hymn”. Nevertheless, the term Caedmonian
verse is often used to identify other early Christian poetry in English. Scholars believe
that Cynewulf lived around the turn of the ninth century. He is known because he
“signed” his name, spelling it out in runes, on four poems that survive today.

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 Anglo-Saxon Prose

Before the reign of Alfred the Great, all important prose written in the British
Isles was composed in Latin. The monks who transcribed these works regarded the
vernacular, the language of the common people, as a “vulgar tongue.” The greatest of
England’s Latin scholars was the Venerable Bede, as mentioned earlier. His History
gives an account of England from the Roman invasion to his own time.
Bede’s History concerns itself mostly with northern England, but it is not simply
the story of Northumbria or the people who settled there. The monk couples his view of
the Roman Church as a universal force with a distinctly nationalistic view of a unified
English people. Although Bede wrote in Latin, his History may nevertheless be consid-
ered the first truly English prose work. From it we derive much of what we know about
early Anglo- Saxon times.
Bede’s successor as the leading English scholar was Alcuin (735-804), another
monk who, like Bede, won fame throughout Europe. Trained at York, Alcuin traveled
widely in Europe and eventually headed the palace school of the powerful European
emperor Charlemagne. By the time of his death, Alcuin had produced many major
works in philosophy, religion, and Latin grammar.

Alfred the Great and His Successors

Historians usually credit Alfred the Great with having changed the course of
British literature. The spur he gave to the English language was evident in its more
widespread use among scholars after his death. Of these scholars, the foremost were
Aelfric and Wulfstan, who both flourished during the tenth century. Aelfric, a monk of
Wessex, wrote many works in the vernacular, including a series of homilies, or sermons,
based on Bible stories. Though in prose, these sermons employ a great deal of the sort
of alliteration more commonly associated with Anglo-Saxon poetry. Wulfstan, an
archbishop of York, also wrote several sermons in Old English, including a famous
speech on the devastation of the Danish raids.
After the Normans occupied England, they gradually transformed the English that
the Anglo-Saxons spoke. Old English, or Anglo-Saxon, evolved into what we now call

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Middle English, whose literature we will explore in the next unit.

~ 15 ~
 British Voices
Quotations by Prominent Figures of the Period

I sing of myself, a sorrowful woman.

Anonymous, “A Wife’s Lament,” translated by Kemp Malone
This tale is true, and mine. It tells How the sea took me, swept me
back And forth, in sorrow and fear and pain.
Anonymous, 'The Seafarer,” translated by Burton Raffel
It is better never to begin a good work than, having begun it, to stop.
Bede, A History of the English Church and People
Out from the marsh, from the foot of misty
Hills and bogs, bearing God’s hatred,
Grendel came.
Beowulf spoke, in spite of the swollen
Livid wound, knowing he’d unwound
His strings of days on earth. . . .
My days
Have gone by as fate willed, waiting
For its word to be spoken.
Anonymous, Beowulf, translated by Burton Raffel
Light was first Through the Lord’s word Named day:
Beauteous, bright creation!
Caedmon, Creation: The First Day, translated by Benjamin Thorpe
And those people should not be listened to who keep saying the voice of the people
is the voice of God, since the riotousness of the crowd is always very close to
madness.
Alcuin in a letter to
Charlemagne
Alcuin was my name; learning I loved.
Alcuin in his own epitaph
Thought shall be harder, heart the keener, courage the greater, as our might lessens.
Anonymous, The Battle of Maldon, translated by R. K. Gordon

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 Reading Critically
--------------------------The Literature of 449–1066--------------------------
When you read literature, it is important to investigate its historical context.
Doing so will help you to understand the writer’s ideas and techniques.
HISTORICAL CONTEXT
In 449 the island of Britain was invaded by warlike Germanic peoples known as
Angles and Saxons. These invaders brought with them their pagan beliefs and
traditions, which appear in Anglo-Saxon poetry and legends. They also brought with
them a grim, fatalistic view of the world. These Germanic invaders were followed by
Roman missionaries, who converted Britain to Christianity. During this time, different
kinds of literature developed, including the oral poetry of the Anglo-Saxons and written
historical and religious prose. The literature of the time shows both pagan and Christian
influences.
LITERARY MOVEMENTS
Very few people were able to read during this period. Therefore, an oral tradition
flourished. The Anglo- Saxons were fond of poetry, which was developed and passed
on by scops, or poet-singers. Eventually, some of this oral literature was written down
by monks in monasteries, who are largely responsible for having preserved oral
material.
WRITERS' TECHNIQUES
Because most literature was oral, it was composed in such a way that it was easily
memorized. Lines of poetry with regular rhythms were easier to remember than was
prose. Poets used alliteration for the same reason. In addition, Anglo-Saxon poets were
fond of the kenning, a compound metaphorical name for something, such as “whale’s
home” for the sea. The Anglo-Saxon poetry that has been preserved illustrates these

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techniques.

Guide for Interpreting

--------------------------The Seafarer--------------------------

Composed by an unknown poet, “The Seafarer” was discovered in a collection of

manuscripts now called The Exeter Book. Given to Exeter Cathedral by the eleventh-
century Bishop Leofric, The Exeter Book was probably compiled during the reign of
Alfred the Great, between 871 and 899. We do not know why the particular works in
The Exeter Book were gathered together, nor can we say for certain that “The Seafarer”
was meant to be read apart from the rest.

LITERARY FORMS

Anglo-Saxon Lyric Poetry. “The Seafarer” is usually called an elegy, or a

mournful, contemplative poem, but it can also be considered part of the medieval
literary genre called planctus, meaning “complaint.” What distinguishes planctus from
elegy is a fictional speaker and a subject that may be a loss other than death. The emo-
tions expressed by the speakers in both types of poetry are strong. Several other Anglo-
Saxon works in The Exeter Book, including “The Wanderer”, are lyric or elegiac poems.
Some scholars believe “The Seafarer” employs two speakers: one who makes a
personal “complaint” and a second who comments on the condition described by the
first. The second part of the poem, beginning at line 64, is different in tone from the
first, and it emphasizes man’s relationship with the divine rather than one man’s
personal plight. The religious content of “The Seafarer” adds richness and complexity to
its lyric style.

~ 18 ~
 PRIMARY SOURCE

The critic Rosemary Woolf has written about the clever use of imagery in “The
Seafarer”.
The poet seems in fact to have given an individual twist to the
traditional images of man as an exile... and of life as a sea-voyage. According
to his stylized figurative pattern the man who lives a life on land is always in
a state of security and contentment: he is therefore mindless of the Christian
image of man as an exile; . . . The sea, however, is always a place of isolation
and hardship: the man, therefore, who chooses to be literally what in Christian
terms he is figuratively, must forsake the land and live upon the sea.

FOCUS

The Dark Ages were a time of great turmoil and uncertainty. The Anglo-Saxons
wrote about their woes to help make sense of them. How do people today deal with a
sense of loss or alienation? Write about some things that people do to encourage
themselves.

~ 19 ~
 The Seafarer
translated by Burton Raffel
This tale is true, and mine. It tells
How the sea took me, swept me back
And forth in sorrow and fear and pain,
Showed me suffering in a hundred ships,
5 In a thousand ports, and in me. It tells
Of smashing surf when I sweated in the cold
Of an anxious watch, perched in the bow
As it dashed under cliffs. My feet were cast
In icy bands, bound with frost,
10 With frozen chains, and hardship groaned
Around my heart. Hunger tore
At my sea-weary soul. No man sheltered
On the quiet fairness of earth can feel
How wretched I was, drifting through winter
15 On an ice-cold sea, whirled in sorrow.
Alone in a world blown clear of love,
Hung with icicles. The hailstorms flew.
The only sound was the roaring sea,
The freezing waves. The song of the swan
20 Might serve for pleasure, the cry of the sea-fowl,
The death-noise of birds instead of laughter,
The mewing of gulls instead of mead.
Storms beat on the rocky cliffs and were echoed
By icy-feathered terns and the eagle’s screams;

~ 20 ~
25 No kinsman could offer comfort there,
To a soul left drowning in desolation.
And who could believe, knowing but
The passion of cities, swelled proud with wine
And no taste of misfortune, how often, how wearily,
30 I put myself back on the paths of the sea.
Night would blacken; it would snow from the north;
Frost bound the earth and hail would fall.
The coldest seeds. And how my heart
Would begin to beat, knowing once more
35 The salt waves tossing and the towering sea!
The time for journeys would come and my soul
Called me eagerly out, sent me over
The horizon, seeking foreigners’ homes.
But there isn’t a man on earth so proud,
40 So born to greatness, so bold with his youth,
Grown so brave, or so graced by God,
That he feels no fear as the sails unfurl.
Wondering what Fate has willed and will do.
No harps ring in his heart, no rewards,
45 No passion for women, no worldly pleasures,
Nothing, only the ocean’s heave;
But longing wraps itself around him.
Orchards blossom, the towns bloom,
Fields grow lovely as the world springs fresh,
50 And all these admonish that willing mind
Leaping to journeys, always set
In thoughts traveling on a quickening tide.
So summer’s sentinel, the cuckoo, sings
In his murmuring voice, and our hearts mourn

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55 As he urges. Who could understand.
In ignorant ease, what we others suffer
As the paths of exile stretch endlessly on?
And yet my heart wanders away,
My soul roams with the sea, the whales’
60 Home, wandering to the widest corners
Of the world, returning ravenous with desire,
Flying solitary, screaming, exciting me
To the open ocean, breaking oaths
On the curve of a wave.
Thus the joys of God
65 Are fervent with life, where life itself
Fades quickly into the earth. The wealth
Of the world neither reaches to Heaven nor remains.
No man has ever faced the dawn
Certain which of Fate’s three threats
70 Would fall: illness, or age, or an enemy's
Sword, snatching the life from his soul.
The praise the living pour on the dead
Flowers from reputation: plant
An earthly life of profit reaped
75 Even from hatred and rancor, of bravery
Flung in the devil’s face, and death
Can only bring you earthly praise
And a song to celebrate a place
With the angels, life eternally blessed
80 In the hosts of Heaven.
The days are gone
When the kingdoms of earth flourished in glory;
Now there are no rulers, no emperors,

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 No givers of gold, as once there were.
When wonderful things were worked among them
85 And they lived in lordly magnificence.
Those powers have vanished, those pleasures are dead.
The weakest survives and the world continues.
Kept spinning by toil. All glory is tarnished.
The world’s honor ages and shrinks,
90 Bent like the men who mold it. Their faces
Blanch as time advances, their beards
Wither and they mourn the memory of friends.
The sons of princes, sown in the dust.
The soul stripped of its flesh knows nothing
95 Of sweetness or sour, feels no pain,
Bends neither its hand nor its brain. A brother
Opens his palms and pours down gold
On his kinsman’s grave, strewing his coffin
With treasures intended for Heaven, but nothing
100 Golden shakes the wrath of God
For a soul overflowing with sin, and nothing
Hidden on earth rises to Heaven.
We all fear God. He turns the earth.
He set it swinging firmly in space,
105 Gave life to the world and light to the sky.
Death leaps at the fools who forget their God.
He who lives humbly has angels from Heaven
To carry him courage and strength and belief.
A man must conquer pride, not kill it,
110 Be firm with his fellows, chaste for himself.
Treat all the world as the world deserves,
With love or with hate but never with harm,

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 Though an enemy seek to scorch him in hell,
Or set the flames of a funeral pyre
115 Under his lord. Fate is stronger
And God mightier than any man’s mind.
Our thoughts should turn to where our home is,
Consider the ways of coming there,
Then strive for sure permission for us
120 To rise to that eternal joy,
That life born in the love of God
And the hope of Heaven. Praise the Holy
Grace of Him who honored us,
Eternal, unchanging creator of earth. Amen.

---------------------RESPONDING TO THE SELECTION---------------------

Your Response
1. Do you agree that “Fate is stronger . . . than any man’s mind”? Why or why not?
Recalling
2. What are three images the poet uses in the first stanza to convey his sense of
isolation?
3. (a) What happens to “fools who forget their God”? (b) What happens to those who
“live humbly”?
Interpreting
4. How might you explain the mixed feelings about the sea that the poet seems to feel?
5. Pagans in Anglo-Saxon England – that is, non-Christians – felt themselves at the
mercy of forces utterly beyond their control, whereas Christians put their trust in
salvation and heaven. In what way do lines 39 through 43 show the influence of both
beliefs?
6. Explain lines 66 and 67: “The wealth / Of the world neither reaches to Heaven nor
remains”.

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7. “The Seafarer” is a poem of contrasts. What contrast is implied in lines 80 through
102?
8. What does the poet mean by the word home in line 117?
Applying
9. Explain how a person can dislike something as much as the sailor dislikes life at sea
and yet keep going back to it.

---------------------ANALYZING LITERATURE---------------------

Understanding Anglo-Saxon Poetry

A lyric poem is one that expresses intense personal emotions. “The
Seafarer” mixes pagan with Christian beliefs and expresses sorrow for
something lost or past. At times the poet’s feelings seem to border on
despair.
1. What deep personal feelings does the poet express in the first part of “The Seafarer”
that show this to be a lyric poem?
2. “The Seafarer” has two distinct parts, the second of which begins at line 64. What are
some of the strong emotions expressed in the second part of the poem?

---------------------CRITICAL THINKING AND READING---------------------

Comparing and Contrasting Attitudes

To compare two ideas or attitudes is to point out similarities.
To contrast them is to point out differences.
Explain what accounts for the poet’s state of mind at the beginning of the poem and at
the end.

---------------------THINKING AND WRITING---------------------

Writing About Anglo-Saxon Beliefs

“The Seafarer” is not an easy poem to understand. One critic has said that almost any
theory can explain its meaning. What is your theory? What main idea do you think the

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poet intends to convey? In your prewriting, list the various thoughts and feelings the
poet expresses in the poem. Use these notes as the basis for a thesis statement in which
you summarize what you think is the main idea of the poem. In writing a first draft,
support your thesis statement with evidence from the poem. When you revise, be sure
you have made clear the reasons for your conclusion.

---------------------LEARNING OPTION---------------------

Language. Old English is the English language as it existed from about the year 500 to
about 1150. Our language has changed so much since then that Anglo-Saxon poems like
“The Seafarer” must be translated, just as if they were written in a foreign language.
Here are lines 42 and 43 from “The Seafarer” in Old English:
þæt he a his sæfore sorge næbbe.
to hwon hine Dryhten gedon wille.
Some Old English words such as tree, sleep, and winter are still in common use. Others
appear in dictionaries but are seldom used anymore. Find the meanings of the following
words: churl, thane, tor, yare, yclept. Then write a sentence using each word and try to
make the meaning of the word clear in context.

~ 26 ~
 Beowulf 700 [?]
Composed by an unknown poet who lived more than twelve hundred years ago,
Beowulf marks the beginning of English literature. Minstrels called scops recited this
poem to audiences in England for about three hundred years before it was first written
down. Only one original manuscript of the complete 3,128-line poem survives, but
Beowulf is in no danger of becoming extinct. Not only does it have lasting historical
importance as a record of the Angles, Saxons, and Jutes in England, but it also tells a
hair-raising tale that has electrified readers and listeners through the centuries.
Beowulf, a Geat from a region that is today southern Sweden, sets sail from his
homeland to try to free Danish King Hrothgar's great banquet hall, Herat, of a monster
that has been ravaging it for twelve years. This monster, Grendel, is a terrifying
swampland creature of enormous size whose eyes burn “with a gruesome light.” The
struggle between Beowulf, a young adventurer eager for fame, and Grendel, a fierce and
bloodthirsty foe, is the first of three mortal battles in the long poem. The first battle is
the one described in this book. The second struggle pits Beowulf against Grendel’s
“water-hag” mother, and the third, fifty years later, against a dragon.
Although the action takes place in sixth-century Scandinavia, the poem is
unmistakably English. Recited originally in Old English, Beowulf is based on legends
and chronicles of the various Northern Europeans who migrated to England.

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 Guide for Interpreting
--------------------------from Beowulf--------------------------

LITERARY FORMS

Anglo-Saxon Epic Poetry. An epic is a long narrative poem, sometimes

developed orally, that celebrates the deeds of a legendary or heroic figure. A few epics
predate the Anglo-Saxon Beowulf, including the Greek Iliad and Odyssey by Homer and
the Roman Aeneid by Virgil. Typically, an epic features a hero who is larger than life
and concerns eternal human problems such as the struggle between good and evil. An
epic is presented in a serious manner, often through the use of elevated language. The
hero of an epic represents widespread national, cultural, or religious values.
Beowulf is one of the oldest European epics. Its hero, Beowulf, embodies the
highest ideals of his time and place: loyalty, valor, selflessness, and a sense of justice.
He represents good, whereas Grendel represents evil. Throughout Beowulf there is a
prevailing yet somewhat uneasy blend of Christian ethics and pagan morality. Against a
backdrop of gloom that reflects the Anglo-Saxons’ stoic acceptance of fate, the story
applauds the highest virtues of human nature-courage, generosity, faithfulness. Despite
its blood and horror, Beowulf is a deeply idealistic narrative.
Anglo-Saxon epic poetry, of which Beowulf is the greatest example, has certain
distinctive features. One is the two-part line. Each line is separated by a pause, known
as a caesura, and there are generally two strong beats per part. Another feature is the
kenning, a colorful, indirect way of naming something: The sea is a whalepath; a battle
is spear play; the sun is the candle of the skies.

COMMENTARY

Beowulf belongs to the present as well as to the past. Perhaps the most popular
contemporary works it inspired are a series of epics about the fantasy world of Middle

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Earth. Beginning in 1937 with The Hobbit, Oxford don J.R.R. Tolkien wove
imaginative tales about good and evil. The enthusiastic response to his trilogy The Lord
of the Rings (1954-55) – The Fellowship of the Ring, The Two Towers, and The Return
of the King – prompted him to continue the saga in The Silmarillion (1977), an account
of the origins of Middle Earth. Tolkien, however, was originally far more famous for
completely changing the way we interpret Beowulf. In his 1936 article “Beowulf: The
Monsters and the Critics” he saw Beowulf as poetry rather than history, and modern
Beowulf scholarship began.

FOCUS

At the time Beowulf was composed, the ideals of the Anglo-Saxons included
loyalty, valor, selflessness, and a sense of justice. Those are still highly regarded ideals,
but others exist. List four other ideals that are important to Americans today.

~ 29 ~
 from Beowulf
translated by Burton Raffel

The selection opens during an evening of celebration at Herot, the banquet hall
of the Danish king Hrothgar (hroth' gar). Outside in the darkness, however, lurks the
monster Grendel, a murderous creature who poses a great danger to the people inside
the banquet hall.

The Wrath of Grendel

A powerful monster, living down

In the darkness, growled in pain, impatient
As day after day the music rang
1. hall: Herot.
Loud in that hall,1 the harp’s rejoicing
5 Call and the poet’s clear songs, sung
Of the ancient beginnings of us all, recalling
The Almighty making the earth, shaping
These beautiful plains marked off by oceans,
Then proudly setting the sun and moon
10 To glow across the land and light it;
The corners of the earth were made lovely with trees
And leaves, made quick with life, with each
Of the nations who now move on its face.
And then
As now warriors sang of their pleasure:
15 So Hrothgar’s men lived happy in his hall
Till the monster stirred, that demon, that fiend,
Grendel, who haunted the moors, the wild

~ 30 ~
 Marshes, and made his home in a hell
Not hell but earth. He was spawned in that slime,
20 Conceived by a pair of those monsters born 2. Cain: The oldest son
of Adam and Eve, whom
Of Cain,2 murderous creatures banished murdered his brother
By God, punished forever for the crime Abel.
Of Abel’s death. The Almighty drove
Those demons out, and their exile was bitter,
25 Shut away from men; they split
Into a thousand forms of evil—spirits
And fiends, goblins, monsters, giants,
A brood forever opposing the Lord’s
Will, and again and again defeated.
30 Then, when darkness had dropped, Grendel
Went up to Herot, wondering what the warriors
Would do in that hall when their drinking was done.
He found them sprawled in sleep, suspecting
Nothing, their dreams undisturbed. The monster’s
35 Thoughts were as quick as his greed or his claws:
He slipped through the door and there in the silence
Snatched up thirty men, smashed them
Unknowing in their beds and ran out with their bodies,
The blood dripping behind him, back
40 To his lair, delighted with his night’s slaughter.
At daybreak, with the sun’s first light, they saw
How well he had worked, and in that gray morning
Broke their long feast with tears and laments
For the dead. Hrothgar, their lord, sat joyless
45 In Herot, a mighty prince mourning
The fate of his lost friends and companions,
Knowing by its tracks that some demon had torn

~ 31 ~
 His followers apart. He wept, fearing
The beginning might not be the end. And that night
50 Grendel came again, so set
On murder that no crime could ever be enough,
No savage assault quench his lust
For evil. Then each warrior tried
To escape him, searched for rest in different
55 Beds, as far from Herot as they could find.
Seeing how Grendel hunted when they slept.
Distance was safety; the only survivors
Were those who fled him. Hate had triumphed.
So Grendel ruled, fought with the righteous,
60 One against many, and won; so Herot
Stood empty, and stayed deserted for years,
Twelve winters of grief for Hrothgar, king
Of the Danes, sorrow heaped at his door
By hell-forged hands. His misery leaped
65 The seas, was told and sung in all
Men’s ears: how Grendel’s hatred began,
How the monster relished his savage war
On the Danes, keeping the bloody feud
Alive, seeking no peace, offering
70 No truce, accepting no settlement, no price
In gold or land, and paying the living
For one crime only with another. No one
Waited for reparation from his plundering claws:
That shadow of death hunted in the darkness,
75 Stalked Hrothgar’s warriors, old
And young, lying in waiting, hidden
In mist, invisibly following them from the edge

~ 32 ~
 Of the marsh, always there, unseen.
So mankind’s enemy continued his crimes,
80 Killing as often as he could, coming
Alone, bloodthirsty and horrible. Though he lived
In Herot, when the night hid him, he never
Dared to touch king Hrothgar’s glorious
Throne, protected by God—God,
85 Whose love Grendel could not know.
But Hrothgar’s Heart was bent. The best and most noble
Of his council debated remedies, sat
In secret sessions, talking of terror
And wondering what the bravest of warriors could do.
90 And sometimes they sacrificed to the old stone gods,
Made heathen vows, hoping for Hell’s
Support, the Devil’s guidance in driving
Their affliction off. That was their way,
And the heathen’s only hope. Hell
95 Always in their hearts, knowing neither God
Nor His passing as He walks through our world, the Lord
Of Heaven and earth; their ears could not hear
His praise nor know His glory. Let them
Beware, those who are thrust into danger,
100 Clutched at by trouble, yet can carry no solace
In their hearts, cannot hope to be better! Hail
To those who will rise to God, drop off
Their dead bodies and seek our Father’s peace!
The Coming of Beowulf
So the living sorrow of Healfdane’s son 3. Healfdane’s
(ha’ alf den'nez)
105 Simmered, bitter and fresh, and no wisdom
sons Hrothgar.
Or strength could break it: that agony hung

~ 33 ~
 On king and people alike, harsh
And unending, violent and cruel, and evil.
In his far-off home Beowulf, Higlac’s no 4. Higlac’s (hig' laks):
Follower and the strongest of the Geats—greater Higlac was the king of
the Geats (ga’ ats) and
And stronger than anyone anywhere in this world— Beowulf's feudal lord
Heard how Grendel filled nights with horror and uncle.

And quickly commanded a boat fitted out,

Proclaiming that he’d go to that famous king,
115 Would sail across the sea to Hrothgar,
Now when help was needed. None
Of the wise ones regretted his going, much
As he was loved by the Geats: the omens were good,
And they urged the adventure on. So Beowulf
120 Chose the mightiest men he could find,
The bravest and best of the Geats, fourteen
In all, and led them down to their boat;
He knew the sea, would point the prow
Straight to that distant Danish shore.
125 Then they sailed, set their ship
Out on the waves, under the cliffs.
Ready for what came they wound through the currents,
The seas beating at the sand, and were borne
In the lap of their shining ship, lined
130 With gleaming armor, going safely
In that oak-hard boat to where their hearts took them.
The wind hurried them over the waves.
The ship foamed through the sea like a bird
Until, in the time they had known it would take,
135 Standing in the round-curled prow they could see
Sparkling hills, high and green.

~ 34 ~
 Jutting up over the shore, and rejoicing
In those rock-steep cliffs they quietly ended
Their voyage. Jumping to the ground, the Geats
140 Pushed their boat to the sand and tied it
In place, mail shirts and armor rattling
As they swiftly moored their ship. And then
They gave thanks to God for their easy crossing.
High on a wall a Danish watcher
145 Patrolling along the cliffs saw
The travelers crossing to the shore, their shields
Raised and shining; he came riding down,
Hrothgar’s lieutenant, spurring his horse,
Needing to know why they’d landed, these men
150 In armor. Shaking his heavy spear
In their faces he spoke: “Whose soldiers are you.
You who’ve been carried in your deep-keeled ship
Across the sea-road to this country of mine?
Listen! I’ve stood on these cliffs longer
155 Than you know, keeping our coast free
Of pirates, raiders sneaking ashore
From their ships, seeking our lives and our gold.
None have ever come more openly –
And yet you’ve offered no password, no sign
160 From my prince, no permission from my people for your landing
Here. Nor have I ever seen,
Out of all the men on earth, one greater
Than has come with you; no commoner carries
Such weapons, unless his appearance, and his beauty,
165 Are both lies. You! Tell me your name,
And your father’s; no spies go further onto Danish

~ 35 ~
 Soil than you’ve come already. Strangers,
From wherever it was you sailed, tell it,
And tell it quickly, the quicker the better,
170 I say, for us all. Speak, say
Exactly who you are, and from where, and why.”
Their leader answered him, Beowulf unlocking
Words from deep in his breast:
“We are Geats, Men who follow Higlac. My father
175 Was a famous soldier, known far and wide
As a leader of men. His name was Edgetho.
His life lasted many winters;
Wise men all over the earth surely
Remember him still. And we have come seeking
180 Your prince, Healfdane’s son, protector
Of this people, only in friendship: instruct us,
Watchman, help us with your words! Our errand
Is a great one, our business with the glorious king
Of the Danes no secret; there’s nothing dark
185 Or hidden in our coming. You know (if we’ve heard
The truth, and been told honestly) that your country
Is cursed with some strange, vicious creature
That hunts only at night and that no one Has seen.
It’s said, watchman, that he has slaughtered
190 Your people, brought terror to the darkness.
Perhaps Hrothgar can hunt, here in my heart,
For some way to drive this devil out –
If anything will ever end the evils
Afflicting your wise and famous lord.
195 Here he can cool his burning sorrow.
Or else he may see his suffering go on

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 Forever, for as long as Herat towers
High on your hills.” The mounted officer
Answered him bluntly, the brave watchman:
200 “A soldier should know the difference between words
And deeds, and keep that knowledge clear
In his brain. I believe your words, I trust in
Your friendship. Go forward, weapons and armor
And all, on into Denmark. I’ll guide you
205 Myself—and my men will guard your ship,
Keep it safe here on our shores,
Your fresh-tarred boat, watch it well,
Until that curving prow carries
Across the sea to Geatland a chosen
210 Warrior who bravely does battle with the creature
Haunting our people, who survives that horror
Unhurt, and goes home bearing our love.”
Then they moved on. Their boat lay moored,
Tied tight to its anchor. Glittering at the top
215 Of their golden helmets wild boar heads gleamed,
Shining decorations, swinging as they marched,
Erect like guards, like sentinels, as though ready
To fight. They marched, Beowulf and his men
And their guide, until they could see the gables
220 Of Herot, covered with hammered gold
And glowing in the sun – that most famous of all dwellings,
Towering majestic, its glittering roofs
Visible far across the land.
Their guide reined in his horse, pointing
225 To that hall, built by Hrothgar for the best
And bravest of his men; the path was plain,

~ 37 ~
 They could see their way. Beowulf and his men arrive at
Herot and are about to be escorted in to see King Hrothgar.
Beowulf arose, with his men
230 Around him, ordering a few to remain
With their weapons, leading the others quickly
Along under Herat’s steep roof into Hrothgar’s
Presence. Standing on that prince’s own hearth,
Helmeted, the silvery metal of his mail shirt
235 Gleaming with a smith’s high art, he greeted
The Danes’ great lord: “Hail, Hrothgar!
Higlac is my cousin and my king; the days
Of my youth have been filled with glory. Now Grendel’s
Name has echoed in our land: sailors
240 Have brought us stories of Herot, the best
Of all mead-halls, deserted and useless when the moon
Hangs in skies the sun had lit,
Light and life fleeing together.
My people have said, the wisest, most knowing
245 And best of them, that my duty was to go to the Danes’
Great king. They have seen my strength for themselves,
Have watched me rise from the darkness of war,
Dripping with my enemies’ blood. I drove
Five great giants into chains, chased
250 All of that race from the earth. I swam
In the blackness of night, hunting monsters
Out of the ocean, and killing them one
By one; death was my errand and the fate
They had earned. Now Grendel and I are called
255 Together, and I’ve come. Grant me, then,
Lord and protector of this noble place,

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 A single request! I have come so far,
Oh shelterer of warriors and your people’s loved friend.
That this one favor you should not refuse me –
260 That I, alone and with the help of my men,
May purge all evil from this hall. I have heard,
Too, that the monster’s scorn of men
Is so great that he needs no weapons and fears none.
Nor will I. My lord Higlac
265 Might think less of me if I let my sword
Go where my feet were afraid to, if 1 hid
Behind some broad linden shield: my hands linden: A very sturdy type of
wood.
Alone shall fight for me, struggle for life
Against the monster. God must decide
270 Who will be given to death’s cold grip.
Grendel’s plan, I think, will be
What it has been before, to invade this hall
And gorge his belly with our bodies. If he can.
If he can. And I think, if my time will have come,
275 There’ll be nothing to mourn over, no corpse to prepare
For its grave: Grendel will carry our bloody
Flesh to the moors, crunch on our bones
And smear torn scraps of our skin on the walls
Of his den. No, I expect no Danes
280 Will fret about sewing our shrouds, if he wins.
And if death does take me, send the hammered
Mail of my armor to Higlac, return Wayland: From
Germanic folklore, an
The inheritance I had from Hrethel, and he
invisible blacksmith.
From Wayland. Fate will unwind as it must!”

The Battle with Grendel

~ 39 ~
 That night Beowulf and his men take the places of Hrothgar and the Danes inside
Herot. While his men sleep, Beowulf lies awake, eager to meet with Grendel.
285 Out from the marsh, from the foot of misty
Hills and bogs, bearing God’s hatred,
Grendel came, hoping to kill
Anyone he could trap on this trip to high Herot.
He moved quickly through the cloudy night,
290 Up from his swampland, sliding silently
Toward that gold-shining hall. He had visited Hrothgar’s
Home before, knew the way –
But never, before nor after that night,
Found Herot defended so firmly, his reception
295 So harsh. He journeyed, forever joyless.
Straight to the door, then snapped it open,
Tore its iron fasteners with a touch
And rushed angrily over the threshold.
He strode quickly across the inlaid
300 Floor, snarling and fierce: his eyes
Gleamed in the darkness, burned with a gruesome
Light. Then he stopped, seeing the hall
Crowded with sleeping warriors, stuffed
With rows of young soldiers resting together.
305 And his heart laughed, he relished the sight,
Intended to tear the life from those bodies
By morning; the monster’s mind was hot
With the thought of food and the feasting his belly
Would soon know. But fate, that night, intended
310 Grendel to gnaw the broken bones
Of his last human supper. Human
Eyes were watching his evil steps,

~ 40 ~
 Waiting to see his swift hard claws.
Grendel snatched at the first Geat
315 He came to, ripped him apart, cut
His body to bits with powerful jaws.
Drank the blood from his veins and bolted
Him down, hands and feet; death
And Grendel’s great teeth came together,
320 Snapping life shut. Then he stepped to another
Still body, clutched at Beowulf with his claws,
Grasped at a strong-hearted wakeful sleeper –
And was instantly seized himself, claws
Bent back as Beowulf leaned up on one arm.
325 That shepherd of evil, guardian of crime,
Knew at once that nowhere on earth
Had he met a man whose hands were harder;
His mind was flooded with fear – but nothing
Could take his talons and himself from that tight
330 Hard grip. Grendel’s one thought was to run
From Beowulf, flee back to his marsh and hide there;
This was a different Herot than the hall he had emptied.
But Higlac’s follower remembered his final
Boast and, standing erect, stopped
335 The monster’s flight, fastened those claws
In his fists till they cracked, clutched Grendel
Closer. The infamous killer fought
For his freedom, wanting no flesh but retreat,
Desiring nothing but escape; his claws
340 Had been caught, he was trapped. That trip to Herot
Was a miserable journey for the writhing monster!
The high hall rang, its roof boards swayed,

~ 41 ~
 And Danes shook with terror. Down
The aisles the battle swept, angry
345 And wild. Herot trembled, wonderfully
Built to withstand the blows, the struggling
Great bodies beating at its beautiful walls;
Shaped and fastened with iron, inside
And out, artfully worked, the building
350 Stood firm. Its benches rattled, fell
To the floor, gold-covered boards grating
As Grendel and Beowulf battled across them.
Hrothgar’s wise men had fashioned Herot
To stand forever; only fire,
355 They had planned, could shatter what such skill had put
Together, swallow in hot flames such splendor
Of ivory and iron and wood. Suddenly
The sounds changed, the Danes started
In new terror, cowering in their beds as the terrible
360 Screams of the Almighty’s enemy sang
In the darkness, the horrible shrieks of pain
And defeat, the tears torn out of Grendel's
Taut throat, hell’s captive caught in the arms
Of him who of all the men on earth
365 Was the strongest. That mighty protector of men
Meant to hold the monster till its life
Leaped out, knowing the fiend was no use
To anyone in Denmark. All of Beowulf’s
Band had jumped from their beds, ancestral
370 Swords raised and ready, determined
To protect their prince if they could. Their courage
Was great but all wasted: they could hack at Grendel

~ 42 ~
 From every side, trying to open
A path for his evil soul, but their points
375 Could not hurt him, the sharpest and hardest iron
Could not scratch at his skin, for that sin-stained demon
Had bewitched all men’s weapons, laid spells
That blunted every mortal man’s blade.
And yet his time had come, his days
380 Were over, his death near; down
To hell he would go, swept groaning and helpless
To the waiting hands of still worse fiends.
Now he discovered – once the afflictor
Of men, tormentor of their days – what it meant
385 To feud with Almighty God: Grendel
Saw that his strength was deserting him, his claws
Bound fast, Higlac’s brave follower tearing at
His hands. The monster’s hatred rose higher,.
But his power had gone. He twisted in pain,
390 And the bleeding sinews deep in his shoulder
Snapped, muscle and bone split And broke.
The battle was over, Beowulf
Had been granted new glory: Grendel escaped,
But wounded as he was could flee to his den,
395 His miserable hole at the bottom of the marsh.
Only to die, to wait for the end
Of all his days. And after that bloody
Combat the Danes laughed with delight.
He who had come to them from across the sea,
400 Bold and strong-minded, had driven affliction
Off, purged Herot clean. He was happy,
Now, with that night’s fierce work; the Danes

~ 43 ~
 Had been served as he’d boasted he’d serve them; Beowulf,
A prince of the Geats, had killed Grendel,
405 Ended the grief, the sorrow, the suffering
Forced on Hrothgar’s helpless people
By a bloodthirsty fiend. No Dane doubted
The victory, for the proof, hanging high
From the rafters where Beowulf had hung it, was the monster’s
410 Arm, claw and shoulder and all.

---------------------MULTICULTURAL CONNECTION---------------------

Monsters Around the World

Most of us are familiar with Dracula, Frankenstein’s monster, and King Kong,
but monsters go back a lot further in history. Almost all cultures tell stories of fantastic
creatures that both frighten and fascinate us.
Monsters in early civilizations
Where did these stories come from? Some may have been inspired by unfamiliar
animals. Sea mammals like the manatee, for instance, may have given rise to stories of
mermaids and mermen. Other creatures may have been invented to explain the creation
of the world, natural phenomena, or the struggle between good and evil.
Among the world’s earliest monsters were the winged bull of Babylon, the
dragon, and the griffin – a creature with the body and hind legs of a lion and the head,
wings, and claws of an eagle. In ancient Greek mythology, many monsters were half
human and half beast: the harpy, a bird with a woman’s head; the sphinx, a winged lion
with a woman’s head; the centaur, half man, half horse: and the Minotaur, half man,
half bull.
Monsters in Native American folklore.
Native American folklore is filled with monsters who lived long ago. Examples
include Fire-Moccasins, who sets fire everywhere he steps, and Burr-Woman, who
clings to a person’s back and won’t let go. In many tales, a hero must kill the creatures
to save his people. For instance, the Jicarilla Apache folk hero Killer-of-Enemies slays a

~ 44 ~
giant elk, a rock monster, and a monster eagle!
Monsters today
Even in today’s scientific world, some people believe in monsters. They report
sightings of the Loch Ness monster, the hairy giant called Bigfoot or Sasquatch, and
Yeti, a mysterious creature thought to live high in the Himalayas.
Exploring on Your Own
Research more about monsters in the folklore section of your library or read
about the world’s most famous man-made monster in Mary Shelley’s novel
Frankenstein.

---------------------RESPONDING TO THE SELECTION---------------------

Your Response
1. How do you think Grendel compares to the fictional monsters in today’s books and
movies? Explain.
Recalling
2. (a) When does Grendel first go to Herot? (b) Explain what the warriors are doing
when he arrives, (c) What does he do to them?
3. (a) What is Beowulf’s plan for fighting Grendel? (b) Why does he choose this plan?
4. How does Grendel die?
Interpreting
5. At the beginning of the poem, Hrothgar’s warriors are happy, whereas Grendel is
consumed by hatred. What causes these differences in attitude?
6. How does Beowulf’s remark, “Fate will unwind as it must” reflect the Anglo-Saxons’
attitude toward fate?
 7. What traits of Beowulf and Grendel raise the fight between them to an epic struggle
between two great opposing forces in the world?
Applying
8. Beowulf is thought to be a perfect hero for his time, (a) What qualities should a
modern hero have? (b) In what situations might a modern hero demonstrate these heroic
qualities? (c) Give examples of modern heroes or of heroic behavior.

~ 45 ~
 ---------------------ANALYZING LITERATURE---------------------

Understanding the Anglo-Saxon Epic

An epic is a long narrative poem, – presented in an elevated style, that celebrates
episodes in a people’s heroic tradition.
The Anglo-Saxon epic Beowulf has two distinctive features. One feature is the
two-part line in which the two parts are separated by a caesura. Each part has two strong
beats.
Till the monster stirred / that demon, that fiend
The kenning is another feature in Beowulf. A kenning is a colorful, roundabout
way of naming something.
That shepherd of evil, guardian of crime
1. What are the two parts and the four strong beats in each of the following lines?
As day after day the music rang
Loud in that hall, the harp’s rejoicing
2. In addition to the example given, find another kenning in Beowulf.
3. Explain why you do or do not find the use of kenning effective.

---------------------CRITICAL THINKING AND READING---------------------

Making Inferences About Ideals

An inference is a conclusion you reach based on various details in a work of
literature. The hero in an epic embodies the highest ideals of the times. The Anglo-
Saxon epic Beowulf reflects the values of the plundering Anglo-Saxon warriors.
Beowulf himself is a fighting man, eager to take on challenging personal encounters for
a good cause.
From Beowulf’s description of his previous heroic feats (lines 247–254), you can
infer that his listeners respected and admired the qualities that enabled Beowulf to
accomplish such deeds. In addition, you can infer that they believed that such qualities
enabled Beowulf to take on the evil Grendel.
1. In what specific way does Beowulf demonstrate loyalty to his lord and king?
2. In what specific ways does he demonstrate his valor?

~ 46 ~
3. In lines 378–380, Grendel realizes that he has been beaten:
Now he discovered – once the afflictor
Of men, tormentor of their days – what it meant
To feud with Almighty God.
What inference about Anglo-Saxon beliefs can you make from these lines?

---------------------THINKING AND WRITING---------------------

Writing About Character Traits

Write a composition for your classmates in which you tell the incidents in
Beowulf from Grendel’s point of view. Begin by jotting down notes about Grendel’s
thoughts and feelings during his final, fatal visit to Hrothgar’s hall. Then, arrange these
notes in a logical order to create a working outline. Next, write a draft, keeping in mind
that you are giving Grendel’s version of events, not your own or Beowulf’s. Finally,
revise your draft, improving your content and organization and correcting any errors
you find in grammar or mechanics.

---------------------LEARNING OPTIONS---------------------

1. Art. Create a brief comic book that features the adventures of Beowulf. Use a comic-
book character such as Superman as the model for your hero. Illustrate episodes from
the poem or make up new adventures. Make sure, however, that your hero has character
traits that are consistent with Beowulf’s.
2. Performance. Present a dramatic reading of “The Battle with Grendel”. Divide this
section of the poem among several classmates, giving each approximately a dozen lines
to read aloud. Select logical places for making the transitions from speaker to speaker
(sometimes within a printed line). Practice your dramatic reading, paying close attention
to the action and emotions being expressed. During the reading, be guided by
punctuation rather than by line breaks. For your performance you may wish to use
costumes and props that reflect the historical context of the poem.

~ 47 ~
 Guide for Interpreting
--------------------------from Beowulf--------------------------
WRITERS’ TECHNIQUES

Pagan and Christian Elements. The eighth-century poet who composed

Beowulf lived in a civilization that had become Christian only a hundred or so years
earlier. It is not surprising, therefore, that for the characters and events of his story, he
drew upon pagan legends and folk tales. The magnificent monsters of Beowulf, for
example are derived from the trolls of Scandinavian mythology, who were shadowy
creatures that lurked around waterfalls or caves.
However, the Christian beliefs of the poets of England also pervade the poem.
For example, the poet disguises the true lineage of Grendel and his mother, giving them
instead a biblical origin:

He [Grendel] was spawned in that slime,

Conceived by a pair of those monsters born
Of Cain, murderous creatures banished
By God punished forever for the crime
Of Abel's death…

In battling Grendel, Beowulf is not only a brave pagan warrior but also a
Christian hero challenging the forces of evil, the first such hero in a line that includes
Sir Galahad of the Round Table and the legendary Saint George, dragon slayer and
patron saint of England.
The combat with Grendel s mother, described on the following pages, also reflects the
weaving together of pagan and Christian elements. The creature's underwater lair and

~ 48 ~
the magic sword found by the hero are familiar elements in pagan folk tales. However,
in Beowulf God plays a role in the battle: “and Holy / God, who sent him victory, gave
judgment / For truth and right”.

COMMENTARY

The Christian influence on the poem is not limited to specific references to the
Bible and God. As Charles W. Kennedy points out, the spirit of the newly victorious
religion is evident throughout the epic: “… Beowulf is a tale of the pagan past in which
the endurance, the loyalty, the courage, and the strength of the heroic age are tempered
by union with Christian virtues…”. Alert readers will find this “welding of pagan
heroism with Christian virtue” in the depiction of Beowulf as a young warrior and an
aging king.

FOCUS

In his battle with Grendel’s mother and later with a dragon. Beowulf faces the
possibility of failure. Briefly describe a time when you had to confront the possibility of
failure. Tell how you struggled with this feeling and overcame it.

~ 49 ~
 from Beowulf
translated by Burton Raffel

Hrothgar and his host celebrate Beowulf's victory over the monster Grendel.
That night, however. Grendel's mother kidnaps and kills Hrothgar's closest friend and
carries off the clam that Beowulf tore from her child. The next dag the horrified king
tells Beowulf about the two monsters and their underwater lair.

The Monsters' Lair

“I’ve heard that my people, peasants working

In the fields, have seen a pair of such rends
Wandering in the moors and marshes, giant
Monsters living in those desert lands.
415 And they've said to my wise men that, as well as they could see.
One of the devils was a female creature.
The other, they say, walked through lire wilderness
Like a man – but mightier than any man.
They were frightened, and they fled, hoping to find help
420 In Herot. They named the huge one Grendel:
If he had a father no one knew him,
Or whether there'd been others before these two,
Hidden evil before hidden evil.
They live in secret places, windy
425 Cliffs, wolf-dens where water pours
From the rocks, then runs underground, where mist
Steams like black clouds, and the graves of trees

~ 50 ~
 Growing out over their lake arc all covered
With frozen spray, and wind down snakelike
430 Knots that reacli as far as the water
2. Unferth: A Danish
And help keep it dark. At night that lake warrior who had
Burns like a torch. No one knows its bottom. questioned Beowulf's
bravery before the battle
Ко wisdom reaches such depths. A deer, with Grendel
Hunted through the woods by packs of hounds.
435 A stag with greal horns, though driven through
the forest
From faraway places, prefers to die
On those shores, refuses to save its life
In that water. It isn't far, nor is it
A pleasant spot! When the wind stirs
440 And storms, waves splash toward the sky.
As dark as the air. as black as the rain
That the heavens weep. Our only help.
Again, lies with you. Grendel’s mother
Is hidden in her terrible home, in a place
445 You've not seen. Seek it, if you dare! Save us.
Once more, and again twisted gold.
Heaped-up ancient treasure, will reward you
For the battle you win!”

The Battle with Grendel’s Mother

Beowulf resolves to kill the “lady monster”. Arriving at the lake under which she
lives. Beowulf and his companions see serpents in the water and sea beasts brave
1. Edgetho's on theson:
rocks.
The young hero kills one of the beasts with an arrow and thenBeowulf. Elsewhere
prepares to fight he is
with
identified by such phrases
Grenders mother. as the Geats' proud prince"
and the Geats' brave
prince." These different
Then Edgetho’s brave son spoke: designations add variety
and interest to the poem.
~ 51 ~
 “Remember,
450 Hrothgar, Ob knowing king, now
When my danger is near, the warm words we uttered,
And if your enemy should end my life
Then be, oh generous prince, forever
The father and protector of all whom I leave
455 Behind me, here in your hands, my beloved
Comrades left with no leader, their leader Dead.
And the precious gifts you gave me,
My friend, send them to Higlac. May he see
In their golden brightness, the Geats' great lord
460 Gazing at your treasure, that here in Denmark
2. Unferth: A Danish
I found a noble protector, a giver warrior who had
Of rings whose rewards 1 won and briefly questioned Beowulf's
bravery before the
Relished. And you, Unferth, let battle with Grendel
My famous old sword stay in your hands:
465 I shall shape glory with Hrunting, or death
Will hurry me from this earth?”
As his words ended
He leaped into the lake, would not wait for anyone's
Answer: the heaving water covered him
Over. For hours he sank through the waves:
470 At last he saw the mud of the bottom.
And all at once the greedy she-wolf
Who'd ruled those waters for half a hundred
Years discovered him, saw that a creature
From above had come to explore the bottom
475 Of her wet world. She welcomed him in her claws,
Clutched at him savagely but could not harm him.
Tried to work her fingers through the tight

~ 52 ~
 Ring-woven mail on his breast, but tore
And scratched in vain. Then she carried him armor
480 And sword and all. to her home: he struggled
To free his weapon, and failed. The fight
Brought other monsters swimming to see
Her catch, a host of sea beasts who beat at
His mail shirt, stabbing with tusks and teeth
485 As they followed along. Then he realized, suddenly,
That she'd brought him into someone's battle-hall.
And there the water's heat could not hurt him.
Nor anything in the lake attack him through
The building's high-arching roof. A brilliant
490 Light burned all around him. the lake
Itself like a fiery flame.
Then he saw
The mighty water witch and swung his sword.
His ring-marked blade, straight at her head:
The iron sang its fierce song.
495 Sang Beowulf's strength. But her guest
Discovered that no sword could slice her evil
Skin, that Hrunting could not hurt her. was useless
Now when he needed it. They wrestled, she ripped
And tore and clawed at him. bit holes in his helmet.
500 And that too failed him: for the first time in years
Of being worn to war it would earn no glory:
It was the last time anyone would wear it. But Beowulf
Longed only for fame, leaped back
Into battle. He tossed his sword aside,
505 Angry: the steel-edged blade lay where
He’d dropped it. If weapons were useless he'd use

~ 53 ~
 His hands, the strength in his fingers. So fame
Comes to the men who mean to win it
And care about nothing else! He raised
510 His arms and seized her by the shoulder: anger
Doubled his strength, he threw her to the floor.
She fell, Grendel’s fierce mother, and the Geats’
Proud prince was ready to leap on her. But she rose
At once and repaid him with her clutching claws,
515 Wildly tearing at him. He was weary, that best
And strongest of soldiers: his feet stumbled
And in an instant she had him down, held helpless.
Squatting with her weight on his stomach, she drew
A dagger, brown with dried blood, and prepared
520 To avenge her only son. But he was stretched
On his back, and her stabbing blade was blunted
By the woven mail shirt he wore on his chest.
The hammered links held; the point
Could not touch him. He’d have traveled to the bottom of the earth,
525 Edgetho’s son, and died there, if that shining
Woven metal had not helped – and Holy
God, who sent him victory, gave judgment
For truth and right, Ruler of the Heavens,
Once Beowulf was back on his feet and fighting.
530 Then he saw, hanging on the wall, a heavy
Sword, hammered by giants, strong
And blessed with their magic, the best of all weapons
But so massive that no ordinary man could lift
Its carved and decorated length. He drew it
535 From its scabbard, broke the chain on its hilt,
And then, savage, now, angry

~ 54 ~
 And desperate, lifted it high over his head
And struck with all the strength he had left,
Caught her in the neck and cut it through,
540 Broke bones and all. Her body fell
To the floor, lifeless, the sword was wet
With her blood, and Beowulf rejoiced at the sight.
The brilliant light shone, suddenly.
As though burning in that hall, and as bright as Heaven’s
545 Own candle, lit in the sky. He looked
At her home, then following along the wall
Went walking, his hands tight on the sword.
His heart still angry. He was hunting another
Dead monster, and took his weapon with him
550 For final revenge against Grendel’s vicious
Attacks, his nighttime raids, over
And over, coming to Herot when Hrothgar’s
Men slept, killing them in their beds,
Eating some on the spot, fifteen
555 Or more, and running to his loathsome moor
With another such sickening meal waiting
In his pouch. But Beowulf repaid him for those visits,
Found him lying dead in his corner.
Armless, exactly as that fierce fighter
560 Had sent him out from Herot, then struck off
His head with a single swift blow. The body
Jerked for the last time, then lay still.
The wise old warriors who surrounded Hrothgar,
Like him staring into the monsters’ lake,
565 Saw the waves surging and blood
Spurting through. They spoke about Beowulf,

~ 55 ~
 All the graybeards, whispered together
And said that hope was gone, that the hero
Had lost fame and his life at once, and would never
570 Return to the living, come back as triumphant
As he had left; almost all agreed that Grendel’s
Mighty mother, the she-wolf, had killed him.
The sun slid over past noon, went further
Down. The Danes gave up, left
575 The lake and went home, Hrothgar with them.
The Geats stayed, sat sadly, watching,
Imagining they saw their lord but not believing
They would ever see him again.
– Then the sword
Melted, blood-soaked, dripping down
580 Like water, disappearing like ice when the world’s
Eternal Lord loosens invisible
Fetters and unwinds icicles and frost
As only He can. He who rules Time and seasons, He who is truly
585 God. The monsters’ hall was full of
Rich treasures, but all that Beowulf took
Was Grendel’s head and the hilt of the giants’
Jeweled sword; the rest of that ring-marked
Blade had dissolved in Grendel’s steaming
590 Blood, boiling even after his death.
And then the battle’s only survivor
Swam up and away from those silent corpses;
The water was calm and clean, the whole
Huge lake peaceful once the demons who’d lived in it
595 Were dead.
Then that noble protector of all seamen

~ 56 ~
 Swam to land, rejoicing in the heavy
Burdens he was bringing with him. He
And all his glorious band of Geats
Thanked God that their leader had come back unharmed;
600 They left the lake together. The Geats
Carried Beowulf’s helmet, and his mail shirt.
Behind them the water slowly thickened
As the monsters’ blood came seeping up.
They walked quickly, happily, across
605 Roads all of them remembered, left
The lake and the cliffs alongside it, brave men
Staggering under the weight of Grendel’s skull,
Too heavy for fewer than four of them to handle –
Two on each side of the spear jammed through it –
610 Yet proud of their ugly load and determined
That the Danes, seated in Herot, should see it.
Soon, fourteen Geats arrived
At the hall, bold and warlike, and with Beowulf,
Their lord and leader, they walked on the mead-hall
615 Green. Then the Geats' brave prince entered
Herat, covered with glory for the daring
Battles he had fought; he sought Hrothgar
To salute him and show Grandel’s head.
He carried that terrible trophy by the hair.
620 Brought it straight to where the Danes sat.
Drinking, the queen among them, it was a weird
And wonderful sight, and the warriors stared.

~ 57 ~
 The Last Battle
After being honored by Hrothgar. Beowulf and his fellow Geats return home. He
is welcomed by the king, his uncle Higtac. and later becomes king himself when Higlac
and his son have died. Beowulf rules Geatland for fifty years. Then a dragon menaces
his kingdom. Although he is an old man. Beowulf determines to slay the beast. Before
going into battle, he tells the men who have accompanied him about the history of the
royal house and his exploits in its service.

And Beowulf uttered his final boast:

“I’ve never known fear, as a youth I fought
625 In endless battles. I am old, now,
But 1 will fight again, seek fame still,
If the dragon hiding in his tower dares
To face me”.
Then he said farewell to his followers.
Each in his turn, for the last time:
630 “I'd use no sword, no weapon, if this beast
Could be killed without it. crushed to death
Like Grendel, gripped in my hands and torn
Limb from limb. But his breath will be burning
Hot, poison will pour from his tongue.
635 I feel no shame, with shield and sword
And armor, against this monster: when he comes to me
I mean to stand, not run from his shooting
Flames, stand till fate decides Which of us wins. My heart is firm.
640 My hands calm: I need no hot
Words. Wait for me close by. my friends.
We shall see, soon, who will survive
This bloody battle, stand when the fighting
Is done. No one else could do

~ 58 ~
645 What I mean to, here, no man but me
Could hope to defeat this monster. No one
Could try. And this dragon's treasure, his gold
And everything hidden in that tower, will be mine
Or war will sweep me to a bitter death!"
650 Then Beowulf rose, still brave, still strong.
And with his shield at his side, and a mail shirt on his breast.
Strode calmly, confidently, toward the tower, under
The rocky cliffs: no coward could have walked there!
And then he who'd endured dozens of desperate
655 Battles, who'd stood boldly while swords and shields
Clashed, the best of kings, saw
Huge stone arches and felt the heat
Of the dragon's breath, flooding down
Through the hidden entrance, too hot for anyone
660 To stand, a streaming current of fire
And smoke that blocked all passage. And the Geats’
Lord and leader, angry, lowered
His sword and roared out a battle cry,
A call so loud and clear that it reached through
665 The hoary rock, hung in the dragon's
Ear. The beast rose, angry,
Knowing a man had come – and then nothing
But war could have followed. Its breath came first.
A steaming cloud pouring from the stone,
670 Then the earth itself shook. Beowulf
Swung his shield into place, held it
In front of him, facing the entrance. The dragon
Coiled and uncoiled, its heart urging it
Into battle. Beowulf's ancient sword

~ 59 ~
675 Was waiting, unsheathed, his sharp and gleaming
Blade. The beast came closer; both of them
Were ready, each set on slaughter. The Geats'
Great prince stood firm, unmoving, prepared
Behind his high shield, waiting in his shining
680 Armor. The monster came quickly toward him.
Pouring out fire and smoke, hurrying
To its fate. Flames beat at the iron
Shield, and for a time it held, protected
Beowulf as he'd planned: then it began to melt,
685 And for the first time in his life that famous prince
Fought with fate against him. with glory
Denied him. He knew it. but be raised his sword
And struck at the dragon's scaly hide.
The ancient blade broke, bit into
690 The monster's skin, drew blood, but cracked
And failed him before it went deep enough, helped him
Less than he needed. The dragon leaped
With pain, thrashed and beat at him. spouting
Murderous flames, spreading them everywhere.
695 And the Gears' ring-giver did not boast of glorious
Victories in other wars: his weapon
Had failed him. deserted him. now when be needed it
Most, chat excellent sword. Edgetho's
Famous son stared at death,
700 Unwilling to leave this world, to exchange it
For a dwelling in some distant place – a journey
Into darkness that all men must make, as death
Ends their few brief hours on earth.
Quickly, the dragon came at him, encouraged

~ 60 ~
705 As Beowulf fell back: its breath flared.
And he suffered, wrapped around in swirling
Flames – a king, before, but now
A beaten warrior. None of his comrades
Came to him. helped him, his brave and noble
710 Followers; they ran for their lives, fled
Deep in a wood. And only one of them
Remained, stood there, miserable, remembering.
As a good man must, what kinship should mean.
His name was Wiglaf. he was Wexstan's son
715 And a good soldier: his family had been Swedish,
Once. Watching Beowulf, he could see
How his king was suffering, burning. Remembering
Everything his lord and cousin had given him.
Armor and gold and the great estates
720 Wexstan's family enjoyed, Wiglaf s
Mind was made up: he raised his yellow 3. Onela's / Nephew . . .
found death: When
Shield and drew his sword – an ancient Onela seized the throne
Weapon that had once belonged to Onela’s of Sweden, his two
nephews sought shelter
Nephew, and that Wexstan had won, kilting with (he king of
725 The prince when he fled from Sweden, sought safety Ccatland. Herdred.
Wiglaf's father.
With Herdred. and found death. And Wiglaf's father Wexstan. killed the older
Had carried the dead man's armor, and his sword. nephew for Onela.

To Onela. and the king had said nothing, only

Given him armor and sword and all.
730 Everything his rebel nephew had owned
And lost when he left this life. And Wexstan
Had kept those shining gifts, held them
For years, waiting for his son to use them.
Wear them as honorably and well as once

~ 61 ~
735 His father had done: then Wexstan died
And Wiglaf was his heir, inherited treasures
And weapons and land. He'd never worn
That armor, fought with that sword, until Beowulf
Called him to his side, led him into war.
740 But his soul did not melt, his sword was strong:
The dragon discovered his courage, and his weapon.
When the rush of battle brought them together.
And Wiglaf. his heart heavy, uttered
The kind of words ins comrades deserved:
745 “I remember how we sat in the mead-hall, drinking
And boasting of how brave we'd be when Beowulf
Needed us. he who gave us these swords
And armor: all of us swore to repay him.
When the time came, kindness for kindness
750 – With our lives, if he needed them. He allowed us to join him.
Chose us from all his great army, thinking
Our boasting words had some weight, believing
Our promises, trusting our swords. He took us
For soldiers, for men. He meant to kilt
755 This monster himself, our mighty king,
Fight this battle alone and unaided.
As in the days w-'hen his strength and daring dazzled
Men's eyes. But those days are over and gone
And now our lord must lean on younger
760 Arms. And we must go to him. while angry
Flames burn at his flesh, help
Our glorious king! By almighty God.
I’d rather burn myself than see
Flames swirling around my lord.

~ 62 ~
 765 And who are we to carry home
Our shields before we've slain his enemy
And ours, to run back to our homes with Beowulf
So hard-pressed here? I swear that nothing
He ever did deserved an end
770 Like this, dying miserably and alone.
Butchered by this savage beast: we swore
That these swords and armor were each for us all!”
Then he ran to his king, crying encouragement
As he dove through the dragon's deadly fumes.

The Spoils

Together, Wiglaf and Beowulf kill the dragon, but the old king is mortally
wounded. As a fast request, Beowulf asks Wiglaf to bring him the treasure that the
dragon was guarding.

775 Then Wexstan's son went in, as quickly

As he could, did as the dying Beowulf
Asked, entered the inner darkness
Of the tower, went with his mail shirt and his sword.
Flushed with victory he groped his way,
780 A brave young warrior, and suddenly saw
Piles of gleam ing gold, precious Gems, scattered on the floor, cups
And bracelets, rusty old helmets, beautifully
Made but rotting with no hands to rub
785 And polish them. They lay where the dragon left them:
It had flown in the darkness, once, before fighting
Its final battle. (So gold can easily Triumph, defeat the strongest of men.
No matter how deep it is hidden!) And he saw.
790 Hanging high above, a golden

~ 63 ~
 Banner, woven by the best of weavers
And beautiful. And over everything he saw
A strange light, shining everywhere.
On walls and floor and treasure. Nothing
795 Moved, no other monsters appeared:
He took what he wranted. all the treasures
That pleased his eye. heavy plates
And golden cups and the glorious banner.
Loaded his arms with all they could hold.
800 Beowulf's dagger, his iron blade.
Had finished the fire-spitting terror
That once protected tower and treasures
Alike; the gray-bearded lord of the Geats
Had ended those flying, burning raids
805 Forever.
Then Wiglaf went back, anxious
To return while Beowulf was alive, to bring him
Treasure they'd won together. He ran,
Hoping his wounded king, weak
And dying, had not left the world too soon.
810 Then he brought their treasure to Beowulf, and found
His famous king bloody, gasping
For breath. But Wiglaf sprinkled water
Over his lord, until the words
Deep in his breast broke through and were heard.
815 Beholding the treasure he spoke, haltingly:
“For this, this gold, these jewels, I thank
Our Father in Heaven. Ruler of the Earth –
For all of this, that His grace has given me.
Allowed me to bring to my people while breath

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 820 Still came to my lips. 1 sold my life
For this treasure, and I sold it well. Take
What I leave, Wiglaf. lead my people,
Help them: my time is gone. Have
The brave Geats build me a tomb.
825 When the funeral flames have burned me, and build it
Here, at the water’s edge, high
On this spit of land, so sailors can see
This tower, and remember my name, and call it
Beowulf's tower, and boats in the darkness
830 And mist, crossing the sea. will know it”.
Then that brave king gave the golden
Necklace from around his throat to Wiglai.
Gave him his gold-covered helmet, and his rings.
And his mail shirt, and ordered him to use them well:
835 “You're the last of all our far-flung family.
Fate has swept our race away.
Taken warriors in their strength and led them
To the death that was waiting. And now I follow them”.
The old man's mouth was silent, spoke
840 No more, had said as much as it could:
He would sleep in the fire. soon. His soul
Left his flesh, flew to glory.

The Farewell

Wiglaf denounces the soldiers who deserted Beowulf in his combat with the
dragon. The Geats burn their king's body on a great funeral pyre and bitterly lament his
death.

Then the Geats built the tower, as Beowulf

Had asked, strong and tall, so sailors

~ 65 ~
845 Could find it from far and wide: working
For ten long days they made his monument.
Sealed his ashes in walls as straight
And high as wise and willing hands
Could raise them. And the riches he and Wigiaf
850 Had won from the dragon, rings, necklaces.
Ancient, hammered armor – all
The treasures they'd taken were left there, too.
Silver and jewels buried in the sandy
Ground, back in the earth, again
855 And forever hidden and useless to men.
And then twelve of the bravest Geats
Rode their horses around the tower.
Telling their sorrow, telling stories
Of their dead king and his greatness, his glory.
860 Praising him for heroic deeds, for a lite
As noble as his name. So should all men
Raise up words for their lords, warm
With love, when their shield and protector leaves
His body behind, sends his soul
865 On high. And so Beowulf's followers
Rode, mourning their beloved leader,
Crying that no better king had ever
Lived, no prince so mild, no man
So open to his people, so deserving of praise.

~ 66 ~
 ---------------------RESPONDING TO THE SELECTION---------------------
Your Response
1. Do you think that Beowulf grows in stature as a hero? Explain.
Recalling
2. Briefly summarize the battle between Beowulf and Grendel’s mother.
3. Describe what happens when Beowulf attempts to fight the dragon alone.
Interpreting
4. Critics have praised the Beowulf poet's skill at describing various settings, (a) Find a
passage in which the poet displays this skill, (b) Explain what makes the description so
effective.
5. (a) Compare and contrast the three battles described in these excerpts, (b) In what
ways are all three battles different versions of the poem s main conflict?
6. (a) Identify the figure of speech that the poet uses in lines 578 – 583. (b) Explain how
the figure of speech adds to the meaning of the poem.
Applying
7. Many critics claim that Beowulf contains themes that are relevant to modern life. Do
you agree or disagree? Why?

---------------------ANALYZING LITERATURE---------------------

Tracing Pagan and Christian Elements

In Beowulf we can see evidence of the Anglo-Saxon warrior culture, with its
stress on heroism, and Christianity's emphasis on brotherly love and God’s compassion.
For example, in the combat with the dragon, Beowulf seeks “fame” like any self-
respecting warrior. As he is dying however, he thanks “Our Father in Heaven” for the
opportunity to give his people the treasure.
1. Reread the tribute to Beowulf in the last eight lines of the poem. Identify pagan and
Christian influences in the qualities for which the king is praised. Give reasons for your
conclusions.
2. A prominent Germanic pagan belief is that fame is the only thing that will survive a
human's death, (a) What evidence do you find in this poem of the importance placed on
public esteem or reputation? (b) What value do you feel contemporary society places on

~ 67 ~
fame?
3. The poem contains many references to the blind and mysterious power of Wyrd, or
Fate, as in line 836. Do such references suggest pagan or Christian influence? Explain.

---------------------THINKING AND WRITING---------------------

Responding to Criticism
Burton Raffel, who wrote this translation, remarked that, “of all the many-sided
excellences of Beowulf,” one of the most satisfying “is the poet s insight into people”.
Respond to this observation, expressing your agreement or disagreement. First, gather
evidence. Identify instances in which the poet does or does not show insight into human
nature. Then, write a thesis statement setting forth your point of view. Support this
statement with references to specific passages in the poem. As you revise your essay,
see whether you can find other passages that support your thesis. Remember that
descriptions of action can reveal character as effectively as direct statements.

---------------------LEARNING OPTIONS---------------------

Art. Sculpt a model of Grendel’s mother or the dragon. First, review the details the poet
uses to describe the monster Then, choose materials (such as clay, papier-mache, or
plaster) that you think would be appropriate. Create some sketches of how your monster
will look. Finally, construct your monster Ask your classmates to compare your model
with their mental images of the monster. How similar are they? In what ways do they
differ?

~ 68 ~
 Comparing Translations
BEOWULF

Manuscript page from BEOWULF

The British Museum

~ 69 ~
TRANSLATION: “A THANKLESS AND DESOLATE UNDERTAKING”
The twentieth-century poet Ezra Pound once remarked that “all translation is a
thankless, or at least most apt to be a thankless and desolate undertaking”. Although
translating Beowulf has proven to be an especially challenging task, an impressive
number of scholars have tried their hands at it. Currently, well over half a dozen transla-
tions of Beowulf are in print, and a score of others are available in libraries. But judging
from the problems these scholars encountered – and the criticism they received – Pound
may well have had a point about the translator’s task!
THE DISASTROUS FATE OF THE BEOWULF MANUSCRIPT
Most translators of Beowulf start with the Beowulf manuscript. This
manuscript, however, is far from perfect. It represents the work of two tenth-
century scribes copying from an older manuscript. However, the text is in prose,
not verse. It contains spotty punctuation and vowel markings, apparently resulting
from the uncertainty of the unlearned scribes. In addition, the manuscript is
damaged – a disastrous fire in 1731 scorched the manuscript, hastening its
disintegration. It was sheer good fortune that Danish scholar Thorkelin made the
first translation in 1787 before the manuscript crumbled further. Subsequent work
showed that letters visible when Thorkelin worked have become illegible or even
disappeared completely. Although steps were taken to preserve the manuscript
from further harm, precious passages had already been lost forever.
THE PECULIAR PROBLEMS OF TRANSLATING BEOWULF
Aside from the dilemma of working with a damaged text, Beowulf presents
special problems for the translator. Most notable is the metrical puzzle, for the form of
Old English verse is very different from that of modern poetry. Most poetry composed
after the Norman Conquest in 1066 depends on the regular pattern of stressed and
unstressed syllables. Old English poetry, in contrast, is held together by four stresses
and alliteration. If this dilemma is not enough to give pause to even the most determined
translator, consider Beowulf’s content. How can a translator make the remote,
unfamiliar past of a long-gone civilization come alive for today’s readers?

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THE KENNEDY VERSUS RAFFEL TRANSLATIONS
Of all the translations now available, scholars generally agree that Charles
Kennedy and Burton Raffel have produced the most useful works. That’s about all they
agree on, however, for each translator has his staunch defenders – and detractors.
Kennedy called his 1940 poetic translation an example of “authentic modern
verse”. However, he has been criticized for using such artificial expressions as “Lo! I
ween” and “smote him sore”. But critics have condemned the modern idiom Raffel used
in his 1963 version as “too physical”, and panned the entire work for creating “a new art
rather than making available the old”.
THE CASE OF THE FIRST THREE LINES
Openings set the stage for what’s to follow. Which of the following two openings
do you think best captures the excitement and grandeur of Beowulf?
Kennedy's translation
Lo! we have listened to many a lay
Of the Spear-Danes’ fame, their splendor of old,
Their mighty princes, and martial deeds!
Raffel's translation
HEAR ME! We’ve heard of Danish heroes,
Ancient kings and the glory they cut
For themselves, swinging mighty swords!
What difference in tone do you detect between Kennedy’s literal translation of
the Old English “la” into “lo” and Raffel’s use of the more modern phrase “Hear me”?
Is Kennedy’s translation more dignified? Is Raffel’s more assertive? Why might
Kennedy have used the alliterative l (lo, listened, and lay) but Raffel the h (hear, heard,
heroes) in the same first line? Why do you think Kennedy translated the original as
“splendor of old” but Raffel used “glory they cut”? Notice how Raffel used
enjambment, running the second line into the third, to set a swing to the passage, while
Kennedy used a list to create a feeling of nobility and stateliness.
That two scholars can produce such different versions of only three lines shows
the challenges and excitement of translation!

~ 71 ~
 Cross Currents
BEOWULF AND JOHN GARDNER'S GRENDEL
Let’s face it – against heroic Beowulf, evil Grendel just didn’t stand a chance.
And if Beowulf didn’t kill the monster, the bad press surely would have! This situation
changed recently, however, when contemporary novelist John Gardner decided to tell
the monster’s side of the story in his novel Grendel. And what a story it is! Newsweek
called Gardner’s Grendel “a marvelous novel, absolutely marvelous: witty, intelligent,
delightful”.
BEOWULF BECOMES GRENDEL?
How much of the Anglo-Saxon tale of Beowulf did Gardner use in his novel? Is
Grendel simply the Beowulf legend retold from the monster’s point of view? Let’s start
with the form of each. Beowulf can be divided into four parts: the episode with Grendel,
the battle with Grendel’s mother, the return voyage, and the dragon fight. Each part
ends before the next begins, and Beowulf rules successfully for fifty years between the
dragon fight and his victory over Grendel and his mother. The order of events in
Grendel is very different, however. The novel begins with the monster attacking
Hrothgar’s meadhall and men, and ends right after the fight with Beowulf, as Grendel is
about to die. This particular section is only about a quarter of the Anglo-Saxon poem.
There is also a difference in characters. Although both Grendel’s mother and the dragon
appear in Grendel, Gardner gives each new roles.
A MONSTER WITH A NAPKIN TUCKED UNDER HIS CHIN
The main difference between the Anglo-Saxon poem and the modern “retelling”,
however, lies in the development of Grendel as a character. In Beowulf, the monster is
static, his actions predictable. In Grendel, the monster is dynamic, his awareness
growing as the action unfolds. Compare Grendel’s attack in this excerpt from Gardner’s
novel to lines 285-324 of the poem.

~ 72 ~
 “I am swollen with excitement, bloodlust and joy and a strange fear that mingle
in my chest like the twisting rage of a bone-fire,”
Grendel begins. “I step onto the brightly shining floor and angrily advance onto
them. They’re all asleep, the whole company! I can hardly believe my luck and
my wild heart laughs, but I let out no sound. Swiftly, softly, I will move from bed
to bed and destroy them all, swallow every man. I am blazing, half-crazy with
joy. For pure, mad prank, I snatch a cloth from the nearest table and tie it around
my neck to make a napkin.
I delay no longer. I seize up a sleeping man, tear at him hungrily, bite through his
bone-locks and suck hot, slippery blood. He goes down in huge morsels, head,
chest, hips, legs, even the hands and feet.
My face and arms are wet, matted.
The napkin is sopping. The dark floor steams. I move on at once and I reach for
another one . . . and I seize a wrist. A shock goes through me. Mistake!”
A monster tying a napkin around his neck? This is not the Grendel we’ve
encountered in Beowulf! Gardner’s use of the first-person point of view helps him
remake Grendel from the Anglo-Saxon incarnation of blind evil, unthinking and
senseless, into a conscious, rational force.
BEOWULF TAUNTS GRENDEL

Gardner plays equally sly tricks with Beowulf. In place of the noble hero of
Anglo- Saxon lore we get a man who is strangely mechanical, even mad. Beowulf
taunts Grendel as he kills him, demanding songs that amount to the playground
surrender of “enough”. See how Grendel describes it in this passage:
And now something worse. He’s whispering – spilling words like showers of
sleet, his mouth three inches from my ear. 1 will not listen. I continue whispering.
As long as I whisper to myself I need not hear. His syllables lick at me, chilly
fire ... I do not listen. I sick at heart. I have been betrayed by talk like that.
“Mama!” I bawl . . . And still he whispers.
Grendel, Grendel! You make the world by whispers, second by second. Are you
blind to that?

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 Whether you make it a grave or a garden of roses is not the point.
Feel the wall: is it not hard? He smashes me against it, breaks open my forehead.
Hard, yes! . . . Now sing of walls! Sing!
I howl.
Sing!
“I’m singing!”
Sing words! Sing raving hymns!
“You’re crazy! Ow!”
Sing!
“I sing of walls,” I howl. “Hooray for the hardness of walls!”
AN EXTRAORDINARY ACHIEVEMENT
What The New York Times called John Gardner’s “extraordinary achievement” is
far more than Beowulf retold from Grendel’s view. It’s a funny, intriguing, and
ultimately touching examination of the way we look at monsters, heroes, and the world
we create with both.

GRENDEL (Frontispiece from BEOWULF)

Patten Wilson, The British Library

~ 74 ~
 Guide for Interpreting
--------------------------The Wanderer--------------------------
LITERARY ELEMENTS

The Theme of Exile. Exile means “separation or banishment from one’s

native country, region, or home.” The theme of exile recurs throughout world
literature – the medieval Italian poet Dante wrote Divine Comedy after being
banished from his beloved city of Florence – but this theme is expressed with
memorable sadness and pain in Anglo-Saxon poetry.
We cannot understand what exile meant to an Anglo-Saxon warrior until we
understand what he meant by “home”. While we identify ourselves as citizens of a
certain country, an Anglo-Saxon warrior viewed himself as the follower of a
particular lord or king. The notion of loyalty toward one’s country, called
patriotism today, did not exist. It was the lord himself who commanded allegiance,
and of course there were many lords in what is now called England. The Anglo-
Saxon word for “lord”, hlaford, came from the word hlafweard, which means
“guardian of the loaf”. The lord was the dispenser of bread and the source of
sustenance. He was also the dispenser of the booty won in raids and skirmishes, or
a “gold-lord”. Perhaps even more important, he guaranteed the security of his
followers in a dangerous and uncertain world. In return, he expected loyalty in
war. His followers would form his great shield-wall in the thick of battle.
The most important symbol of home was the mead-hall (mead was an
alcoholic beverage made of fermented honey and water), where the lord and his
followers shared the warmth of fire, the comfort of food and drink, and the
pleasures of hearing poetry recited. The pleasures of poetry were especially

~ 75 ~
welcome when the scop praised the heroism of the listening warriors. Because we
tend to identify home with individual families living in a house or an apartment, it
is useful to keep in mind the image of the mead-hall while reading “The
Wanderer”. Enlivened with a feeling of fellowship, the mead-hall was smoky,
noisy, smelly, and crowded. It was home.
Imagine what it meant for a warrior to lose his lord and his place in the
mead-hall. The Anglo-Saxon exile was indeed a wraecca, a word meaning “wretch,
stranger, unhappy man, and wanderer”.

FOCUS

Suppose that you were forced to leave your home for an indefinite period of
time. List some of the things that you would miss the most. What effect would the
loss of these things eventually have on you?

~ 76 ~
 The Wanderer
translated by Charles W. Kennedy

Oft to the wanderer, weary of exile,

Cometh God's pity, compassionate love,
Though woefully toiling on wintry seas
With churning oar in the icy wave,
5 Homeless and helpless he fled from fate.
Thus saith the wanderer mindful of misery,
Grievous disasters, and death of kin:
“Oft when the day broke, oft at the dawning,
Lonely and wretched I wailed my woe.
10 No man is living, no comrade left,
To whom I dare fully unlock my heart.
I have learned truly the mark of a man
Is keeping his counsel and locking his lips.
Let him think what he will! For, woe of heart
15 Withstandeth not fate; a failing spirit
Earneth no help. Men eager for honor
Bury their sorrow deep in the breast.
“So have I also, often in wretchedness
Fettered1 my feelings, far from my kin,
20 Homeless and hapless,2 since days of old,
When the dark earth covered my dear lord’s face.
And I sailed away with sorrowful heart,

1 Fettered (Fetʹ ərd): Chained, restrained.

2 hapless (hap' lis): Unlucky.

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 Over wintry seas, seeking a gold-lord,
If far or near lived one to befriend me
25 With gift in the mead-hall and comfort for grief.
“Who bears it, knows what a bitter companion.
Shoulder to shoulder, sorrow can be,
When friends are no more. His fortune is exile.
Not gifts of fine gold; a heart that is frozen,
30 Earth’s winsomeness3 dead. And he dreams of the hall-men,
The dealing of treasure, the days of his youth,
When his lord bade welcome to wassail4 and feast.
But gone is that gladness, and never again
Shall come the loved counsel of comrade and king.
35 “Even in slumber his sorrow assaileth,
And, dreaming he claspeth his dear lord again,
Head on knee, hand on knee, loyally laying,
Pledging his liege5 as in days long past.
Then from his slumber he starts lonely-hearted,
40 Beholding gray stretches of tossing sea,
Sea-birds bathing, with wings outspread,
While hailstorms darken, and driving snow.
Bitterer then is the bane of his wretchedness,
The longing for loved one: his grief is renewed.
45 The forms of his kinsmen take shape in the silence;
In rapture he greets them; in gladness he scans
Old comrades remembered. But they melt into air
With no word of greeting to gladden his heart.
Then again surges his sorrow upon him;

3 winsomeness (win' səm nəs): Pleasantness, delightfulness.

4 wassail (wäs' əl): A toast in drinking a person’s health, or a celebration at which

such toasts are made.

5 liege (lēj): Loyalty.

~ 78 ~
 50 And grimly he spurs his weary soul
Once more to the toil of the tossing sea.
“No wonder therefore, in all the world,
If a shadow darkens upon my spirit
When I reflect on the fates of men –
55 How one by one proud warriors vanish
From the halls that knew them, and day by day
All this earth ages and droops unto death.
No man may know wisdom till many a winter
Has been his portion. A wise man is patient,
60 Not swift to anger, nor hasty of speech,
Neither too weak, nor too reckless, in war,
Neither fearful nor fain,6 nor too wishful of wealth,
Nor too eager in vow – ere he know the event.
A brave man must bide7 when he speaketh his boast
65 Until he know surely the goal of his spirit.
“A wise man will ponder how dread is that doom
When all this world’s wealth shall be scattered and waste
As now, over all, through the regions of earth,
Walls stand rime-covered8 and swept by the winds.
70 The battlements crumble, the wine-halls decay;
Joyless and silent the heroes are sleeping
Where the proud host fell by the wall they defended.
Some battle launched on their long, last journey;
One a bird bore o’er the billowing sea;
75 One the gray wolf slew; one a grieving earl
Sadly gave to the grave’s embrace.

6 fain (fān): An archaic word meaning “eager”; in this context it means “too
eager."
7 bide (bīd): Wait.
8 rime (rīm) -covered: Covered with frost.

~ 79 ~
 The Warden of men hath wasted this world
Till the sound of music and revel is stilled,
And these giant-built structures stand empty of life.
80 “He who shall muse on these moldering ruins,
And deeply ponder this darkling life,
Must brood on old legends of battle and bloodshed,
And heavy the mood that troubles his heart:
“Where now is the warrior? Where is the war horse?
85 Bestowal of treasure, and sharing of feast?
Alas! the bright ale-cup, the byrny-clad9 warrior,
The prince in his splendor – those days are long sped
In the night of the past, as if they never had been!”
And now remains only, for warriors’ memorial,
90 A wall wondrous high with serpent shapes carved.
Storms of ash-spears have smitten the earls.
Carnage of weapon, and conquering fate.
“Storms now batter these ramparts of stone;
Blowing snow and the blast of winter
95 Enfold the earth; night-shadows fall
Darkly lowering, from the north driving
Raging hail in wrath upon men.
Wretchedness fills the realm of earth.
And fate’s decrees transform the world.
100 Here wealth is fleeting, friends are fleeting,
Man is fleeting, maid is fleeting;
All the foundation of earth shall fail!”
Thus spake the sage in solitude pondering.
Good man is he who guardeth his faith.
105 He must never too quickly unburden his breast

9 byrny (bər' nē) -clad: Dressed in a coat of chain-mail armor.

~ 80 ~
 Of its sorrow, but eagerly strive for redress;
And happy the man who seeketh for mercy
From his heavenly Father, our fortress and strength.

---------------------RESPONDING TO THE SELECTION---------------------

Your Response
1. Can you identify with the feelings expressed in “The Wanderer”? Why or why not?
Recalling
2. (a) What event causes the wanderer to go into exile? (b) What is the goal of his
search?
3. Identify a brief passage in which he expresses his outlook on life.
Interpreting
4. “The Wanderer” has been called an elegy, meaning a poem of mourning and lament,
(a) Identify three vivid details that you feel evoke a mood of mourning and lament, (b)
Explain why these details are effective.
5. How does the poet’s use of repetition contribute to the mood?
6. Explain the wanderer’s attitude toward wisdom. Find details to support your answer.
7. Tone refers to a writer’s attitude toward the subject or theme. (a) Choose two
adjectives to describe the tone of this poem, (b) Give reasons for your choices.
Applying
8. What does this poem suggest about the role of women in the Anglo-Saxon world?
9. What would a modern wanderer be like? Briefly describe the causes of such a
person’s exile and the goal of his or her search.

---------------------ANALYZING LITERATURE---------------------

Understanding Exile
As a poem about exile and the loss of one’s home, “The Wanderer” works

~ 81 ~
primarily through contrast. For instance, the vivid dream image in which the wanderer
once again clasps his king, “Head on knee, hand on knee,” contrasts with the waking
image of the monotonous “gray stretches” of sea and the “Seabirds... with wings
outspread.” The first image conveys closeness and enfolded intimacy, while the second
communicates the far- flung emptiness of exile and desolation.
1. Identify two other pairs of contrasting images in the poem and explain how they
contribute to the theme of exile.
2. In addition to using contrasting images, the poet juxtaposes his personal experience
with broad generalities about human life. Would the poem be more effective or less
effective if the poet’s generalizations (lines 100 – 103) preceded his account of his
exile? Why?

---------------------CRITICAL THINKING AND READING---------------------

Appreciating a Poem’s Structure

Critics often seek to understand a poem by analyzing its structure, or the major
units of meaning into which it is divided. “The Wanderer,” for example, is framed
by opening (lines 1 – 5) and closing (lines 104 – 108) passages that refer to God’s
“pity” and “mercy”. These religious invocations are clearly different from the
soliloquy in the rest of the poem. The body of the poem itself, however, can also be
divided into distinct parts.
1. Identify the units of meaning into which you think the poem should be divided.
Indicate the lines where each begins and ends.
2. Explain why you divided the poem as you did. Consider such factors as a change
in pronouns or a shift from an individual’s experience to generalities.

---------------------THINKING AND WRITING---------------------

Responding to Criticism
The scholar Michael Alexander argues that the mournful mood of “The

~ 82 ~
Wanderer” is not diminished by the more comforting religious passages that
appear at the beginning and end of the poem. Write an essay in which you agree or
disagree with this assertion. Begin by identifying the passages and phrases that
contribute most to the poem’s mood. Then write a thesis statement expressing your
opinion of Alexander’s critical comment. In revising your work, test your thesis by
rereading the poem several times and being receptive to the mood it evokes in you.

~ 83 ~
 Bede
--------------------------673 – 735--------------------------

Much of what the world knows about England before A.D. 700 is based on a
history written in Latin by a Benedictine monk, Bede, who is often called the father of
English history. Bede was the most learned scholar of his day not only in England but in
all of Western Europe. Although he wrote forty books on a variety of subjects, his
reputation would be secure on the basis of a single book – his Historia Ecclesiastica
Gentis Anglorum, or, in English, A History of the English Church and People.
Bede was born in Wearmouth (now the city of Sunderland) on the northeast coast
of England. As a child of seven, he entered the nearby monastic school of Jarrow on the
river Tyne. A diligent student, he took full advantage of the library at Jarrow, in time
becoming a priest, teacher, and scholar at the monastery. He remained at Jarrow for the
rest of his life.
A contemporary of the unknown author of Beowulf, Bede was fascinated by a
broad range of ideas. His writings summarize much of the thought and learning of his
time. As the earliest important English prose writer, he concentrated on the Bible but
did not neglect science and history. One of his innovations was the dating of events
from the birth of Christ, a system that other scholars began to follow. It was through
Bede’s work that the Christian chronology in use today became common throughout
Europe.
Bede had a deep love for his native island and its people, which led him to write
his History of the English Church and People. In working on his history, Bede gathered
information from many kinds of documents, interviewed knowledgeable monks, and, in
general, proceeded very much like a modern historian, although he accepted as fact

~ 84 ~
some miracles that a modern historian would not.
In the History, Bede describes the conquests of the Anglo- Saxon tribes and the
fortunes of the various small fiefdoms that spread across the land. His primary concern,
however, was the expansion of Christianity and the growth of the Church in England.
He wrote in Latin, the language of scholarship in his age. There are several surviving
manuscripts, however, that have the Old English text in addition to Bede’s Latin
version. He became famous throughout the land as one of the most learned scholars of
his age, despite the fact that he never ventured beyond Northumbria.
In the century after his death, King Alfred translated Bede's history from Latin
into English. In the same century, the word Venerable was first applied to his name to
honor his wisdom and achievements. The honor was well deserved. The Venerable
Bede was largely responsible for what is sometimes called the Christian renaissance in
eighth-century England.

~ 85 ~
 Guide for Interpreting
--------from A History of the English Church and People---------

WRITERS’ TECHNIQUES

Historical Writing. A history is a factual narrative or record of past events.

Unless a historian has actually observed the events being described, he or she must rely
on outside sources. These sources include testimony from living witnesses, accounts in
letters or memoirs, and records from courts, businesses, churches, armies, or other
groups. Today’s historian has libraries of books, newspapers, and films to consult, as
well as unwritten records, such as buildings, artwork, and various physical remains of
bygone days. An enormous amount of historical material exists.
That was not the case in Bede’s time. English monastic libraries had modest
collections of documents that Bede read, cross-checked, and evaluated. He made
excellent use of the limited resources of his time. Bede was an innovator among
historical writers, and if he sometimes accepted unlikely tales as truth, he did so far less
often than did most scholars of his era.

FOCUS

If you were writing a history of your community, you would have to find and use
a number of different sources. List at least five specific sources that might be helpful.

PRIMARY SOURCE

~ 86 ~
 Joseph Addison wrote, “The end of a man’s life is often compared to the winding
up of a well-written play, where the principal persons still act in character, whatever the
fate is which they undergo.” Bede’s death was certainly in character, and it became the
subject of historical writing in the hands of Cuthbert, a former student: “At the ninth
hour, Bede said to me, ‘I have a few valuables in my cask–pepper, vestments, and
incense. Run quickly and bring the priests of our monastery, so that I may share among
them little gifts, such as God has granted me.’ And I did so with trembling. When they
were all present, he addressed each and every one, urging them, imploring them they
should say prayers and masses for him – which they freely promised. But they all kept
weeping and sorrowing, especially because he said they must not think to see his face
much longer in this world. But they rejoiced because he said, ‘It is time for me, if my
Maker sees fit, to be freed from the flesh and go to Him who made me out of nothing, at
the time when I was nothing. I have lived a long time, and my merciful Judge has
ordered my life well . . . This and much else he said for our instruction, and passed his
last day happily until evening . . . upon the floor of his little cell, chanting . . . his spirit
passed from the body”.

~ 87 ~
 from A History of the English
Church and People
Bede translated by Leo Sherley-Price

The Situation of Britain and Ireland: Their Earliest Inhabitants

Britain, formerly known as Albion, is an island in the ocean, facing between
north and west, and lying at a considerable distance from the coasts of Germany, Gaul,
and Spain, which together form the greater part of Europe. It extends 800 miles
northwards, and is 200 in breadth, except where a number of promontories stretch
farther, the coastline round which extends to 3,675 miles. To the south lies Belgic Gaul,
from the nearest shore of which travelers can see the city known as Rutubi Portus,
which the English have corrupted to Reptacestir. The distance from there across the sea
to Gessoriacum,10 the nearest coast of the Morini, is 50 miles or, as some write it, 450
furlongs. On the opposite side of Britain, which lies open to the boundless ocean, lie the
isles of the Orcades.11 Britain is rich in grain and timber; it has good pasturage for cattle
and draft animals,12 and vines are cultivated in various localities. There are many land
and sea birds of various species, and it is well known for its plentiful springs and rivers
abounding in fish. There are salmon and eel fisheries, while seals, dolphins, and
sometimes whales are caught. There are also many varieties of shellfish, such as
mussels, in which are often found excellent pearls of several colors: red, purple, violet,
and green, but mainly white. Cockles are abundant, and a beautiful scarlet dye is
extracted from them which remains unfaded by sunshine or rain; indeed, the older the
cloth, the more beautiful its color. The country has both salt and hot springs, and the
waters flowing from them provide hot baths, in which the people bathe separately
10 Gessoriacum: Boulogne, France.
11 Orcades: The Orkney Isles.
12 draft animals: Animals used for pulling loads.

~ 88 ~
according to age and sex. As Saint Basil says: “Water receives its heat when it flows
across certain metals, and becomes hot, and even scalding”. The land has rich veins of
many metals, including copper, iron, lead, and silver. There is also much black jet6 of
fine quality, which sparkles in firelight. When burned, it drives away snakes, and, like
amber, when it is warmed by friction, it clings to whatever is applied to it. In old times,
the country had twenty-eight noble cities, and innumerable castles, all of which were
guarded by walls, towers, and barred gates.
Since Britain lies far north toward the pole, the nights are short in summer, and at
midnight it is hard to tell whether the evening twilight still lingers or whether dawn is
approaching; for in these northern latitudes the sun does not remain long below the
horizon at night. Consequently both summer days and winter nights are long, and when
the sun withdraws southwards, the winter nights last eighteen hours. In Armenia, 13
Macedonia,14 and Italy, and other countries of that latitude, the longest day lasts only
fifteen hours and the shortest nine.
At the present time there are in Britain, in harmony with the five books of the
divine law, five languages and four nations – English, British, Scots, and Piets. Each of
these have their own language, but all are united in their study of God’s truth by the
fifth, Latin, which has become a common medium through the study of the scriptures.
The original inhabitants of the island were the Britons, from whom it takes its name,
and who, according to tradition, crossed into Britain from Armorica, 15 and occupied the
southern parts. When they had spread northwards and possessed the greater part of the
islands, it is said that some Piets from Scythial put to sea in a few long ships and were
driven by storms around the coasts of Britain, arriving at length on the north coast of
Ireland. Here they found the nation of the Scots, from whom they asked permission to
settle, but their request was refused. Ireland is the largest island after Britain, and lies to
the west. It is shorter than Britain to the north, but extends far beyond it to the south
towards the northern coasts of Spain, although a wide sea separates them. These Pictish
seafarers, as I have said, asked for a grant of land to make a settlement. The Scots

13 Armenia: Now part of the Soviet Union.

14 Macedonia: Now a region divided among

15Greece, Yugoslavia, and Bulgaria.

~ 89 ~
replied that there was not room for them both, but said: “We can give you good advice.
There is another island not far to the east, which we often see in the distance on clear
days. Go and settle there if you wish; should you meet resistance, we will come to your
help”. So the Piets crossed into Britain, and began to settle in the north of the island,
since the Britons were in possession of the south. Having no women with them, these
Piets asked wives of the Scots, who consented on condition that, when any dispute
arose, they should choose a king from the female royal line rather than the male. This
custom continues among the Piets to this day. As time went on, Britain received a third
nation, that of the Scots, who migrated from Ireland under their chieftain Reuda, and by
a combination of force and treaty, obtained from the Piets the settlements that they still
hold. From the name of this chieftain, they are still known as Dalreudians, for in their
tongue dal means a division.
Ireland is broader than Britain, and its mild and healthy climate is superior. Snow
rarely lies longer than three days, so that there is no need to store hay in summer for
winter use or to build stables for beasts. There are no reptiles, and no snake can exist
there, for although often brought over from Britain, as soon as the ship nears land, they
breathe its scented air and die. In fact, almost everything in this isle enjoys immunity to
poison, and I have heard that folk suffering from snakebite have drunk water in which
scrapings from the leaves of books from Ireland had been steeped, and that this remedy
checked the spreading poison and reduced the swelling. The island abounds in milk and
honey, and there is no lack of vines, fish, and birds, while deer and goats are widely
hunted. It is the original home of the Scots, who, as already mentioned, later migrated
and joined the Britons and Piets in Britain. There is a very extensive arm of the sea,
which originally formed the boundary between the Britons and the Piets. This runs
inland from the west for a great distance as far as the strongly fortified British city of
Alcuith.16 It was to the northern shores of this firth that the Scots came and established
their new homeland.

16 Alcuith: Dumbarton, Scotland.

~ 90 ~
 ---------------------RESPONDING TO THE SELECTION---------------------
Your Response
1. Do you find Bede’s history of England more appealing than a standard history
textbook? Why or why not?
Recalling
2. What countries formed the greater part of Europe at the time of Bede’s history?
3. (a) In Bede’s time, what were the four nations in Britain? (b) What united them?
Interpreting
4. What does the explanation about scarlet dye imply about the lifestyle of the people?
5. Bede states that Britain once “had twenty-eight noble cities . . . guarded by walls,
towers, and barred gates”. What does this statement suggest about the political situation
at the time?
6. What is one unlikely tale that Bede includes in his history?
Applying
7.  If you wanted to read a reliable history of early England, why would you probably
choose something other than Bede’s work? What kind of source might you choose?

---------------------ANALYZING LITERATURE---------------------

Understanding Historical Writing

A history provides factual information about the past. This information comes
from a variety of sources, including books and other printed materials, public records,
and personal letters, memoirs, and interviews. A good historian does more than just list
facts, however. Bede presents his facts as part of an understandable whole.
1. Accuracy is very important in historical writing. Read the quotation from the Scots.
(a) Do you think the statement is an exact quotation? (b) If not, does it cast doubt on the
accuracy of Bede’s history? Explain.
2. Bede sometimes relies on people’s oral statements for his information. He makes a
specific reference to such a source. What is it?

~ 91 ~
 ---------------------CRITICAL THINKING AND READING---------------------

Making Inferences About Attitudes

Bede’s history reflects his own attitudes and those of the people he is writing
about. Since these attitudes tend to be revealed indirectly, you must make inferences, or
draw conclusions about them. For example, Bede states that the people of England are
“united in their study of God’s truth”. From this statement you can infer that religion
played an important role in the life of the people.
1. From Bede’s comments, what do you think was the general attitude in Britain toward
snakes?
2. Do you think the Piets and Scots got along well with each other? Cite the evidence on
which you base your inference.

---------------------THINKING AND WRITING---------------------

Writing a Critical Review

Give your opinion of this excerpt from Bede’s history. First, jot down your
answers to the following questions: Does the history seem accurate? Is it clearly
written? What do you find to be its most striking fact? Next, write a topic sentence that
states your opinion clearly. Then, write a draft, using examples to support your opinion.
Finally, revise your draft, making sure that its sentences are in logical order.

---------------------LEARNING OPTION---------------------

Cross-curricular Connection
Investigate the history of illuminated manuscripts – the colorful, ornate,
handmade illustrated books created before the printing press was invented. Where were
they first made? Who made them? What media were used to create them? What
purposes did the elaborate calligraphic designs and illustrations serve? Find several
examples of illuminated manuscripts from various time periods and bring them to class.
Give a brief explanation about the background of each.

~ 92 ~
The Changing English Language
--------------------------Old English 449 – 1066--------------------------
“ENGLISC”
The story of English is the story of roamings and settling, invasions and war.
What we call Anglo-Saxon or Old English developed through the contributions of
many different peoples, including the Jutes (from Danish Jutland), the Saxons
(from the region of Germany still called Lower Saxony), and scatterings of other
groups. Old English began with the Angles, a people who originated in a section of
Denmark still called Angeln, a word that means "an angle in the coast.” The Celts
called their German conquerors Saxons but by degrees the terms Anglii and An-
glia entered their speech. Soon, people were referring to their language as Englisc
and themselves as Angelcgnn; literally, the relatives (cynn as “kin”) of the Angles.
By A.D. 1000 they called their country Englaland.

THE HUNDRED MOST COMMON WORDS

The Anglo-Saxons were farmers – when they were not at war – and they
soon settled down and took over all the good farming country, chasing the Celts to
the hilltops or to Wales and Ireland. Although more than half the vocabulary of
modern English is borrowed from other languages, and more than half the words
of Old English (some say as much as 85 percent) have vanished, the language of
these Anglo-Saxon farmers became the basis of modern English. Of the hundred
most common words in our speech today, every one derives from Old English; of
the next hundred, eighty-three are native. Some Old English words hardly need
translation – mann and hus for example – although of course we spell them
differently today (man and house). It is nearly impossible to write a modern
English sentence without using a wealth of Old English vocabulary. All the words

~ 93 ~
in Roosevelt’s famous comforting phrase – “The only thing we have to fear is fear
itself” – come from Old English. Francis Scott Key used words derived from Old
English in 1814 when he saw the flag waving over Fort McHenry: “Oh say, can
you see, by the dawn’s early light, what so proudly we hailed at the twilight’s last
gleaming?” “Proudly” is the only non-native word, and it was borrowed nearly a
thousand years ago!

RIDDLES
The Anglo-Saxons delighted in word play, riddles, and ambiguity in
language. Few people could read or write, and so they had to rely on their
memories. As a result, the Anglo-Saxons developed their oral tradition very fully.
They liked stating their ideas in subtle, original ways and especially admired
poems that went in circles. This love of word play, which characterizes English to
the present, can be seen especially in The Exeter Book of Riddles, a collection of Old
English verse. Can you solve this one-line riddle? “On the way a miracle: water be-
comes bone”. Ice!

THE INFLUENCE OF CHRISTIANITY

Although the English people already knew about heofon (heaven), synne
(sin) and hel (hell), the language received a huge boost in A.D. 597, when
Christianity arrived with its enormous Latin vocabulary, more than 400 words of
which survive to this day. For example, the Latin evangelium (good news) became
the English god-spell, which has become the modern word gospel. Even more
important, words from Latin gave English speakers the ability to express abstract
thoughts, including such concepts as angel and discipline. Further, Old English
rejuvenated itself by giving new meaning to old words. God, heaven, and hell all
assumed deeper meanings upon the arrival of Christianity.

THE VIKINGS SIMPLIFY ENGLISH

Superior numbers and literacy assured the victory of English over Danish,
but the Danes left a lasting influence on English nonetheless. First, they
contributed at least 900 words, such as husbondi (housemaster or husband) and

~ 94 ~
syster (sister). Second, the Danes added pronouns to English, filling a real linguistic
need. Most important, before the arrival of the Danes, Old English conveyed
meaning through word endings rather than word order. The Danes simplified lan-
guage by eliminating this practice, called inflection, although the process would not
be completed until Middle English developed.

THE SPELLING DILEMMA

Written English presented a problem that still confounds us today: spelling.

~ 95 ~
Almost all writing is based on symbols that stand for the sounds of the language
they record. The early scribes used the Roman alphabet to record Old English.
The Roman alphabet did a fine job of representing the sounds of Latin, for which
it had been created. But Old English included a number of decidedly un-Roman
sounds, such as the sound we now write as TH. The scribes solved the problem by
borrowing two symbols from the runic alphabet, ð and þ. Unfortunately, they used
the two symbols interchangeably. This continued with other sounds, and spelling
problems abounded.
So begun, English would continue to develop over the next four hundred
years, becoming ever richer and more flexible.

THE ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE

The British Library

~ 96 ~
~ 97 ~
 Regia Anglorum
The 7 Kingdoms
of the Englisc 600 – 800 AD
A red sunset; and a long night; a pale, misty dawn! But as the light grows it
becomes apparent to remote posterity that everything has changed. Night had
fallen on Britannia. But dawn had risen on a New England, humble, poor,
barbarous, degraded and divided, but alive. A new story had begun a story of a
New England, but the story and history of the English People is an old one, but
would continue in a New Land.
After the initial impetus of settlement, the Englisc went through a period of
consolidation during which many small kingdoms sprang up. In time, the more
powerful of these swallowed their neighbours, and by the end of the seventh
century there were seven main kingdoms whose rulers were vying for position as
overlord of the Englisc. 
Before the Viking attacks in the last quarter of the ninth century, the new
homeland of the Englisc was divided into several kingdoms, governed mainly by
rulers who traced their ancestry back to the god Woden. There were seven main
kingdoms:
1) Northumbria, (Angles living North of the River Humber.) This eventually
stretched to Edinburgh – created by Edwin a Saxon war lord (Edwins Town.)
2) Mercia (Middle Angles.) 
3) East Anglia (East Angles.)
4) Essex (East Saxons.)
5) Wessex (West Saxons.) This eventually took in Cornwall, which became

~ 98 ~
fully English. 
6) Sussex (South Saxons.) 
7) Kent (Formed from the original Jutes who landed with Hengist in 449 AD
and who formed the ‘Men of Kent’)
Hence late in the sixteenth century the term “Heptarchy” was coined to
describe this period of our history. Sometimes competing or warring with each
other, sometimes helping each other. England was not be properly unified until
937 AD. But read on and discover the regions of England and their origins. 
Though there was a tradition, which was given wide circulation by Bede’s
Ecclesiastical History of the English Nation, that the English consisted of three
tribes - Angles, Saxons, and Jutes – they were conscious of kinship, as coming from
“three very powerful nations of the Germans”; this sense of unity was reinforced
by their feeling of difference from the Brythonic peoples of Britain, and, after the
conversion to Christianity, by the establishment of an English Church which rose
above political boundaries. 
But there was a further unifying feature: for much of the period all the
kingdoms south of the Humber were controlled by a single overlord. Bede called
the area over which an overlord exercised authority an empire, or dominion,
Ethelbald of Mercia, who held it in the eighth century, in using Latin title Rex
Britanniae, was doubtless translating the vernacular term Bretwalda, “Ruler of
Britain”, first recorded in annal 827 of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. 
Little is known of the powers of the earliest overlords, Ælle of Sussex and
Ceawlin of Wessex, but from the time of Ethelbert of Kent (whose over-lordship at
the time of St Augustine’s arrival in 597 AD is the reason why Canterbury holds
the primacy over English sees) it was certainly no empty title. The overlord’s safe
conduct was valid over the whole area; vassal-kings led their forces to serve under
his banner; they dared not harbour his fugitives; they required his consent when
making grants of lands; he could dispose of estates in their territories, and no
doubt he also demanded tribute. In return, the sub-kingdoms received his
protection.

~ 99 ~
 In the seventh century, when the over-lordship was held by three successive
Northumbrian kings, Edwin, Oswald, and Oswy, the whole of Anglo-Saxon
England was under a single overlord; but after 657 AD Northumbria declined and
never recovered its political supremacy. Its glory was to lie in a different direction,
in the amazing flourishing of learning, literature and art which made, in the age of
Bede, this outpost of civilisation the leader of European culture. In the late eighth
century Northumbria supplied Charlemagne with a scholar, Alcuin, to direct his
educational reforms.
Penda - The First Great Mercian
Meanwhile political power had passed to the Mercians, originally a small
people dwelling in the basins of the Upper Trent and its tributaries, and receiving
their name, which means “border folk”, from their proximity to lands under
Brythonic control. Even in the days of the great Northumbrian kings, they
expanded their power far beyond this area. Their Prince Penda defeated the West
Saxons in 628 AD and annexed the West Saxon settlement in the valley of the lower
Severn; in 653 AD he put his son Peada over the Middle Angles, whose territories
stretched right across the Midlands to the borders of East Anglia and Essex; he
caused the death in battle of both Edwin and Oswald of Northumbria, though this
did not lead to any lasting influence in Northumbria, whereas East Anglia came
under his direct rule, after the killing of three of their kings. According to Bede he
had thirty “royal leaders” in his army at the battle of Winwaed, which brought an
end to his triumphant career in 654 AD.
The exploits of such a leader would have been celebrated in song, and it is
probably from poetic source that the Anglo-Saxon chronicler got his figures of
thirty years for Penda’s reign and fifty for his age at his accession, these being the
favourite round numbers in Anglo-Saxon verse. The picture of this grand old
champion of the pagan faith, meeting his death in battle at the age of eighty, has
passed into history; and yet it must be fiction, for he left two sons who were
minors, and his sister married later than 642 AD.
Penda’s death was only a temporary eclipse in Mercian power, for three

~ 100 ~
years later the Mercians rebelled against Northumbrian control, setting up
Penda’s son Wulfhere, and he not only recovered what Penda had held but also
became overlord of the East Saxons, thus gaining control of London. Moreover, he
obtained the West Saxon territories on both sides of the Upper Thames and also
became overlord of Surrey (or The South Region people.) The King of Sussex was
his godson, and he gave to him the Isle of White when he captured it in 661 AD,
probably with the aim of creating a barrier against West Saxon expansion
eastwards. Though in his last year he was defeated by Ecgfrith of Northumbria,
and lost the province of Lindsey, this was recovered by his brother and successor
Ethelred (674-704), who retained control of all the area between the Humber and
the Thames and who made raids into Kent. But with the rise of the strong West-
Saxon Kings Ceadwalla (685-688), and Ine (688-726), the land south of the Thames
passed out of Mercian domination. Nothing more seems to have been lost even in
the reigns of two weak kings of Mercia. The second of these two kings, Ceolred,
was followed in 717 AD by a formidable character, Ethelbald. 
As a member of a rival branch of the royal house, Ethelbald spent his early
life in exile, where he became a friend of the hermit St Guthlac, who prophesied his
future success (but not, apparently, his tragic end). Bede tells us that by 731 all
provinces south of the Humber were subject to him, and this is confirmed in other
sources. He was in unquestioned control of London and Essex and had influence in
Kent; he granted away lands in Somerset, Wiltshire, and Berkshire, and Cynewulf
of Wessex acknowledged his overlordship. Ethelbald held his throne for forty
years, and his internal government is praised in a letter written from Germany by
St Boniface and seven other Anglo-Saxon missionary bishops. The purpose of the
letter was to complain of his personal immorality and disregard of certain
ecclesiastical privileges, but it speaks of good order and firm peace he maintained
in his kingdom, of his defence of widows and the poor, and of his generosity in
almsgiving. 
He was generous in grants to churches, and, in fact, throughout the reigns of
the Mercian Kings after Wulfhere (657-674), one can glimpse a steady advance in

~ 101 ~
the foundation of monasteries and the consolidation of Christianity. Nor should it
be forgotten that this is the period when the Anglo-Saxon church carried out its
great missionary activities to the continental Germans. Though the Frisian mission
received its main support from Northumbria, and though St Boniface and several
of his followers were West Saxons, all the kingdoms showed an eager interest in the
work, supplying books and other gifts, and probably personnel. Chroniclers tend
to confine themselves to recording warfare, but it would be far from the truth to
regard the period as barbaric or chaotic. It was not ‘the Dark Ages’, as we know
much of what happened.

The Anglo-Saxon "King of Britan" - The Great Offa and the building of Offa's
Dyke
It is sad to learn that Ethelbald, who had been loyally accompanied in his
early exile by faithful companions, was murdered in 757 AD by members of his
own household, bribed, one may suspect, by a rival. The throne was seized by a
certain Beorhred, who, however, was soon driven out by Offa, the greatest of the
Mercian Kings, but it was some years before he could re-establish the Mercian
dominion. Cynewulf of Wessex recovered the disputed lands on the banks of the
upper Thames, and kept them until his defeat at Bensington in 779 AD brought
him under subservience to Offa. 
In Kent, Offa was in power by 764 AD, but as there is no sign of his influence
there for nine years after the battle of Otford in 776 AD, and Kentish Kings issued
Charters without his permission during this period, it is likely that the Men of
Kent recovered their independence at Otford. However, from 785 AD until his
death in 796 AD Offa was again supreme. He was overlord of West Sussex by 770
AD at the latest, and conquered the people of Hastings (east Sussex) in 771 AD.
Coins show him using an East Anglian mint, and his execution of Ethelbert of East
Anglia in 794 AD was probably prompted by an attempted revolt. He refrained
from interference in Northumbria, which he allied to himself by giving a daughter

~ 102 ~
in marriage to its king, Ethelred, in 792 AD, but south of the Humber he was
supreme as no other King had been. 
He became a figure of importance in the eyes of the Pope and if
Charlemagne (the Ruler of the Franks on the continent and a powerful influence,)
who regarded Offa as competent to speak for the whole country, an in the course
of a personal quarrel with him, closed the ports of his Kingdom to all from the
Island of Britain and the English race. When the quarrel was ended, Charlemagne
was at great pains to deny that he had out of hostility given asylum to fugitives
from “his dearest brother” – though he undoubtedly had one of his letters, which
includes a grant of immunity to bona fide pilgrims passing through the Frankish
Kingdom, is of great interest in showing that trade between England and the
Franks was important enough to engage the interest of their respective rulers. 
King Ethelbald had announced the dignity of his position by high sounding
titles in his charters: “King not only of the Mercians but also of all the provinces
which are called by the general name of South English”, or “King of Britain”. Offa
used other means. Partly in imitation of Frankish practice, he inaugurated a
remarkable new coinage, replacing the mainly anonymous sceattas with coins for
which numismatists reserve the name “penny”. These were struck on broader
flans, which left more room for legend and design. He put his name and sometimes
his portrait on his coins, and they have been much admired for their artistic merit
and the variety of their designs. They were sometimes copied on the Continent. He
also issued coins with the name of his Queen, Cynethryth, being the only Anglo-
Saxon King to do so, and in this he was probably inspired by Roman coins with
portraits of empresses. In addition to his silver pennies, there survive from his
reign two gold coins, one imitation of an Arabic dinar. They may represent issues
of “mancuses” struck for presentation to churches, for Offa was a generous donor:
he promised on behalf of himself and his successors to send annually to St Peter’s
at Rome “as many mancuses as the year had days”, for support of the poor and the
provision of lights. The new coinage was introduced in the interests of trade, but it
carried Offa’s name, not only over his own Kingdom, but on the Continent as

~ 103 ~
well. 
The great dyke, whom he built along the whole of the Welsh frontier from
the estuary of the Dee to that of the Severn has kept Offa’s name alive throughout
the centuries. The dyke’s purpose was more than to defend vulnerable areas; it
defined a frontier, and probably dates from late in the reign after periods of war
with Wales. It is a work that shows great engineering skill, and in spite of
differences in method of construction in various sectors, it bears the mark of a
single conception. To carry through so great an undertaking required enormous
resources, and only a strong ruler could induce his subjects to supply the labour
involved. It is a worthy memorial to a mighty King, whether or not he intended it
to be. 
Offa’s awareness of his own dignity is seen in his dealings with
Charlemagne, and also in his ecclesiastical policy. It was his insistence on his
equality with Charlemagne that caused their quarrel, for he refused to give a
daughter in marriage to Charlemagne’s son unless he would reciprocate by letting
one of his daughters marry Offa’s son Ecgfrith. Offa’s ambitions for this son was
one of the reasons for his persuading Pope Hadrian to send papal legates in 786
AD – the first to visit this New England since its conversion. They came “to renew
the friendship with us and the catholic faith which Pope Gregory taught us”, but
Offa used them for two purposes of his own. 
He caused the legates to consecrate his son Ecgfrith King, making him the
first English King to receive ecclesiastical consecration. In this, Offa was imitating
Pippin, King of the Franks, who had had his sons Charles and Carlo man
consecrated by Pope Stephen when visited by him in 754 AD. Offa took more
sinister action for his son’s sake, to judge by the words of Alcuin (an English
scholar at Charlemagne’s court) to a Mercian ealdorman soon after Ecgfrith had
died, only one hundred and forty-one days after his father: “You know very well
how much blood his father shed to secure the Kingdom on his son”. 
Offa’s second purpose was connected with his scheme to detach Mercia from
the primacy of Canterbury by making it a separate ecclesiastical province with an

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archiepiscopal see at Lichfield. He was on bad terms with the Archbishop of
Canterbury, but this was perhaps not the only reason for this action; it would seem
fitting to him that the leading should receive the dignity of an archbishop of its
own. He succeeded against strong opposition, but the new arrangement did not
long outlast his lifetime; the Archbishopric of Lichfield was suppressed in 802 AD.
A scheme of his successor Coenwulf to transfer the Primacy from Canterbury to
London met with Papal opposition and was dropped. As Offa had secured the
election of a Mercian abbot to the see of Canterbury in 792 AD, one reason for
removing the Mercian church from domination of Canterbury had been
eliminated. 
Alcuin addresses Offa as “glory of Britain, trumpet of proclamation, sword
against foes, shield against enemies”, and soon after his death he is referred to as
“King and glory of Britain” and as “of blessed memory”. But, alas, we have no
contemporary biography. The picture of his achievement must be built from
scattered sources, and much remains obscure. King Alfred made use of his laws,
but they have not survived to inform us of his internal government. We learn
incidentally that he had a special devotion to St Peter and founded several
monasteries in his honour; that he interested himself in the spread of education
“that the light of wisdom might shine in his Kingdom”; and that he possessed a
manuscript of Bede’s Ecclesiastical History. There is little reason to suspect a
decline of scholarship in his reign. The most probable date for some of the
surviving vernacular poetry, including Beowulf is in the period. We do not know if
he was himself the subject of poems; but we do know that a sword which he owned,
was handed down in the West Saxon royal house until 1015.
Mercian power did not crumble at once after his death, being upheld by
Coenwulf till his death in 821AD. Nevertheless, after 802AD when Egbert of
Wessex came to the throne, there was never again a single lord of all England
south of the Humber, except for one year, 829-830AD, when Egbert temporarily
conquered Mercia and was proudly added by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicler to
Bede’s list of Kings who had been Bretwaldas. Yet, the almost unbroken period of

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Mercian control in the reigns of Ethelbald and Offa must have accustomed men to
the idea of a unified rule. When Northumbria, East Anglia, Essex and half of
Mercia had been ceded to the Viking Danes, Alfred was accepted as King by “all
the English People not under subjection to the Danes”. His son, daughter and
grandsons re-conquered the Dane-law, and King Athelstan (924-939) sometimes
put on his coins the title Rex Tot(ius) Brit(anniae) – “King of all Britain”.

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 Rulers of England and Great Britain
(including dates of reign)

Kingdom of Kent
Ethelbert, 560 – 616

Kingdom of Northumbria
Ethelfrith, 593 – 617
Edwin, 617 – 633
Oswald, 635 – 642
Oswy, 642 – 670
Ecgfrith, 670 – 685

Kingdom of Mercia
Penda, 626 – 655
Ethelbald, 716 – 757
Offa II, 757 – 796
Cenulf, 796 – 821

Kingdom of Wessex
Ine, 688 – 726

Saxons and Danes

Egbert, 802 – 839
Æthelwulf, 839 – 858
Æthelbald, 858 – 860

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Æthelbert, 860 – 865
Æthelred, 865 – 871
Alfred, 871 – 899
Edward, 899 – 924
Athelstan, 924 – 939
Edmund, 946 –955
Edred, 946 – 955
Edway, 955 – 959
Edgar, 959 – 978
Edward (the Martyr), 978 – 1016
Æthelred (the Unready), 978 – 1016
Edmund (Ironside), son of Æthelred 1016
Canute, by conquest, 1016 – 1035
Harold I (Harefoot), 1037 – 1040
Harthacunute, 1040 – 1042
Edward (the Confessor), 1042 – 1066
Harold II, 1066

House of Normandy
William I The Conquerer, 1066 – 87
William II, 1087 – 1100
Henry I, 1100-1135

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 Difference Between Saxons and Vikings
Saxons and Vikings were two different tribes of people who are believed to
have been dominant in what was to become the United Kingdom later. Both
groups of people were Germanic, and there were many similarities between Saxons
who were later known as Anglo Saxons and the Vikings though the two belonged
to different eras. However, there were also differences between Saxons and the
Vikings that will be discussed in this article.
Saxons
Before the start of the 5th century, England was under the Roman control.
Romans decided to leave England by around 410 AD and by this time, there were
successions of raids by invaders from all sides of the English isles. These invaders
mainly belonged to the tribes called the Saxons, the Jutes, the Angles, and the
Frisians. Angles and the Saxons arrived in England from Denmark and adjoining
areas and took over the vast expanse of land called UK from the left over Romans
and the Celts. England was not a unified nation at this time, and the geographic
areas controlled by the Saxons were named differently by these Saxons (such as
Sussex, Essex, Wessex etc.)
The term Anglo Saxons refers to the intermingling of the two tribes of
Angles and the Saxons. The era of Anglo Saxons lasted in England for about 600
years, and the biggest legacy of this dominance is the English language.
The name Saxons may have been derived from the knife called Seax that was
used prominently by the tribe.
Vikings
Viking was a Germanic tribe arriving in England from Denmark in the
closing years of the 8th century. Their first raid took place in East Anglia on a
monastery where they killed the monks and also made many slaves work for them.
While many Vikings behaved as pirates and continued to raid, many of them

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settled and became Christians and started to live a civilized life. Alfred the great, a
Saxon King, was the lone warrior against these raids, and he successfully repulsed
the Vikings in a war, in 917 AD. However, Vikings continued to raid and also
establish Danish rule in many territories in England. By the time 11th century
arrived, a Danish even became the king of England. However, Vikings could not
rule England for long, and the Saxons regained the country within 20 years of
Viking rule. But, in 1066AD, the Saxon era came to an end as England was
conquered by the Normans. Interestingly, Normans were of Viking descent.
Saxons vs Vikings
• Saxons were a Germanic tribe to arrive in England from Denmark, and
they invaded and settled in East Anglia, in the year 410 AD as the Romans left the
area.
• Vikings were also Germanic tribe that invaded England in the 9th century,
in the year 840 AD, in East Anglia.
• Vikings were pirates and warriors who invaded England and ruled many
parts of England during 9th and 11the centuries.
• Saxons led by Alfred the Great successfully repulsed the raids of Vikings.
• Saxons were more civilized and peace loving than the Vikings.
• Saxons were Christians while Vikings were Pagans.
• Vikings were seafaring people while the Saxons were farmers.
• Vikings had tribal chiefs while Saxons had lords.

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 The Vikings were no worse
than the Anglo-Saxons

The article from The Telegraph by Dr Dominic Selwood

For the last few centuries, the Vikings have been enjoying a European
revival.
The composer Richard Wagner was in the vanguard, burying his
unfathomably brilliant head deep into the Norse Eddas, mining the stories for
material to build the Ring Cycle.
Around him, at the same time, fledgling neo-pagan groups surfaced in smoky
upper-rooms, dusting the centuries of abandon off Thor’s great hammer, Mjöllnir.
Following directly in this tradition, in Scandinavia today, armies of forked-
bearded fans of Viking heavy metal can be found chanting along to thundering
music hyping the axe-wielding heroes of Norse myths and sagas.
And along the way, we have seen almost everything in between – from the
elite Wiking Fifth Panzers of the Waffen SS to modern light relief like Hägar the
Horrible and How to Train Your Dragon.
In March this year, the British Museum is hosting its first major Viking
exhibition for 30 years: Vikings. Life and Legend, spotlighting many exhibits never
before seen in the UK, and drawing on the vast amount of more recent Viking
scholarship.
Although the Vikings are at times increasingly presented as slightly comical
figures, no one was laughing in late 700s England.

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 Take Alcuin. He was a Yorkshireman. Perhaps he is not so well known now.
But he was, once.
At a time when there was not a great deal of learning about, his brilliance
shone out, winning him an invitation to set up a school for Charlemagne, king of
the Franks.
Once at Charlemagne’s court in Aachen, he ripped up the dreary text books
and started his royal pupils studying English humanism.
In AD 793 he wrote a letter to his friend, Bishop Higbald, in Northumbria:
The pagans have contaminated the sanctuaries of God, and have poured out
the blood of the saints round about the altar.  They have laid waste the house
of our hope, and have trampled upon the bodies of the saints in the temple of
God like dung in the street.
Surprisingly, he was not sending Higbald news of some distant calamity,
although the language is almost identical to that used on the eve of the First
Crusade three centuries later.
No. Alcuin was describing something that had happened in his native
England — in Bishop Higbald’s own diocese.
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle also described the event, but preceded it with
some quality harbingers of doom:
This year dire forwarnings came over the land of the Northumbrians, and
miserably terrified the people; these were excessive whirlwinds, and lightnings;
and fiery dragons were seen flying in the air. A great famine soon followed
these tokens; and a little after that, in the same year … the ravaging of heathen
men lamentably destroyed God's church … through rapine and slaughter.
It was the 8th of June AD 793. And the Vikings had arrived.
Longboats from Scandinavia beached on the small two-mile-square
Northumbrian island of Lindisfarne and sacked the world-famous priory that had
painstakingly produced the exquisite Lindisfarne Gospels less than a century
earlier.
There had been Viking raids to England before, of course. But nothing on

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this scale.
And from that moment on, it was only going to get worse. For the next 300
years, the history of Britain and of the marauding Scandinavian seafarers would
be inseparably intertwined.

Nowadays, everyone calls them Vikings. But it is not, in fact, a racial

description. The Scandinavians of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden were farmers.
Viking invasions (map: BBC)
But when the men — and it was only ever men — went off looting, they were
"going on a viking" (farar i vikingr). In other words: pirate raiding.
After some 70 years of harrying Britain in amphibious hit-and-run raids, the
Vikings stepped up a gear and decided to invade properly, sending armies from
Norway and Denmark to conquer parts of England, Ireland, and Western
Scotland.
As the Vikings never did anything by halves, their conquests were so
successful that the legacy can still be felt tangibly today — in social structures, in
place names like Cawdor, Fishguard, Grimsby, Keswick, Thurso, and hundreds of

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others, and even in first names like Eric, Garth, Howard, and Ivor.
But perhaps their biggest contribution was linguistic. Many modern
everyday English words come directly from the Old Norse: anger, berserk, birth,
cake, club, crawl, die, dregs, egg, fellow, fog, guest, haggle, Hell, hit, husband, ill,
knife, knot, law, loose, mistake, muck, muggy, outlaw, plough, ransack, rotten,
shirt/skirt, slaughter, steak, troll, ugly. And even the word "gun", amazingly, is
Norse – from a 1330 inventory of weapons in the Tower of London listing a
spectacular balista called "Lady Gunilda" (the name Gunnhildr means war or
battle).
But Viking expansionism was not just about Britain. The indefatigable
wanderers went virtually everywhere on the map. And beyond.
American schoolchildren still sing, “In fourteen hundred ninety-two,
Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” But what the classroom ditty misses is that in c.
AD 1000, the Icelander, Leif Ericson, was off on a spot ofvikingr when he stumbled
into the New World. Newfoundland in Canada, to be precise, which he named
Vinland.
Having rooted around a bit, it seems he was largely unimpressed with his
discovery, perhaps at modern-day L’Anse-aux-Meadows. Anyway, he soon packed
everything up and headed home, where he did not make a great deal out of his
voyage once he got back.
Columbus, in fact, never even reached North America — he only found the
Caribbean and northern Venezuela.
Leif Ericson’s low profile in the history books is a spectacular injustice. He
was happily running around in North America a full five centuries before Zuan
Chabotto (sponsored by King Henry VII of England), who is widely credited as the
"first" European to set foot there.
But the Scandinavians did not only go on vikings to the west. They struck
east, too – where they soon set up lucrative trading routes with Russia, and even
found good money as bodyguards to the emperor of Constantinople.
Yet perhaps the most extraordinary of all Viking adventurers was Sigurd I

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Magnusson “Jórsalafari” (Jerusalem-farer), king of Norway. On pondering the
news that Latin Crusaders had seized Jerusalem in 1099, Sigurd jumped into his
longboat and led a flotilla to join in. After a winter stop in England, he set sail
properly. Pausing only to loot in Spain, al-Andalus, Formentera, Ibiza, and
Minorca, he made his final landfall in Sicily before drawing up his longboats at the
crusader port of Acre. King Baldwin I of Jerusalem was mightily impressed, and
Sigurd willingly accepted a royal invitation to join in the successful siege of Sidon
(now in Lebanon). Baldwin was so thrilled with his new best friend that he had a
piece hacked off his favourite relic, the True Cross, which he presented to a
delighted Sigurd in thanks.
Needless to say, Sigurd was never one to take the easy option. When he again
felt restless, he left King Baldwin and sailed to Cyprus, then caught the winds up
through the Aegean and on to Constantinople. Maybe tired of sailing, or perhaps
merely looking for a new adventure, he gifted the emperor all his boats, then rode
and walked the two thousand miles home to tell the astonishing tale of "Sigurd the
Crusader".
Alcuin, I suspect, would have approved.
Yet, thanks largely to
the heavy dollop of
romanticism accompanying
the 1800s revival in Viking
studies, the roving
Scandinavians are
universally now seen as
barbarous savages — good
for nothing
but rannsaka andslátr.
In fact, this view could
not be more wrong.
It cannot be denied

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A memorial dragon-rune from about 1080 AD
that they were quite spectacularly violent. But they did not have a monopoly in
treating life cheaply. The British Museum's exhibition will highlight a recently
excavated mass grave in Dorset where a group of Vikings had been summarily
executed by the locals. And anyone who wants to read the medieval chronicles will
quickly find good old British warriors also looting monasteries and villages,
mutilating and hacking apart anyone who got in their way. Extreme and random
violence was part of day-to-day life. Even allowing for exaggeration in the
chronicles, no one can overlook the many mangled, brutalized, and decapitated
bodies in early medieval graves, or even the poor souls it seems were buried alive.  
But leaving bloodlust aside, the Vikings were far from being ignorant,
unclean, and boorish.  In fact, they were rather advanced.
For a start, they were highly literate. Great stones carved with jagged
Tolkeinesque runes (called futhark) carpet Scandinavia, some going back as far as
the AD 300s.
There is more traditional writing, too — especially in the Eddas and Skaldic
poetry, whose sophisticated forms record and preserve the wondrous mythology of
the Nine Worlds hinging around the cosmic tree,Yggdrasil.
As for the idea the Vikings were unkempt and unwashed, the truth is the
polar opposite. Archaeology reveals endless combs, tweezers, razors, earwax
scrapers, and other grooming items. They used special strong soap for cleaning
and bleaching their hair blond. And the grubby Anglo-Saxons, for whom an
annual wash was excessive, could not believe that the Vikings bathed religiously
every weekend. (The Old Norse word for Saturday literally meant "washing day".)
Finally, anyone who thinks that all the Vikings did was get Mjöllnired on
mead and break things needs to pay an urgent visit to the Gold Room at
Stockholm’s Swedish History Museum, where the eye-popping complexity of the
silver- and gold-work is up to the highest standards of anything made by anyone in
any period.
So, it is time to rehabilitate the Vikings.
Their classic warrior brew of tribal loyalty and vengeance for wrongs was no

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more nor less barbaric than that of the contemporary residents of Britain.
Back in the 700s, on the eve of the Viking sack of Lindisfarne, the Anglo-
Saxons in England were still praising the Vikings to the rafters of their wooden
halls. One needs look no further than the highpoint of Anglo-Saxon epic
poetry, Beowulf. It is a paean to Danish and Norwegian warrior values: 3,182 lines
of celebration extolling the heroic deeds and hearts of their Viking cousins.
The truth is that there was not a lot separating the Anglo-Saxons and the
Vikings. Their backgrounds and warrior cultures was very similar, not least
because many of the original Anglo-Saxon invaders came from the exact same
lands — "beyond the whale-road", as the North Sea is so magically described
in Beowulf.
The Viking invasions only strengthened these ancient ties.
In the 1000s, England had four Danish monarchs. The last Anglo-Saxon king
to follow them, Harold II, was half-Danish. And William the Conqueror, who
defeated Harold at Hastings and changed everything again, was himself more
Viking than French. He was directly descended from Rollo the Danish Viking, who
had invaded and settled northern France with his Norsemen, whom the centuries
had not-so-quietly turned into the Normans.
So, one way or another, it is time to give the Vikings back their magnificent
and rich history, their unparalleled adventurousness, their beautiful runes and
writing, their exemplary hygiene, and their preeminent place in our national
history. They are clearly one of our many minority groups who need a bit more
understanding.

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 A Guide to Writing in Norse
Runes
If you want to write something in Norse runes, you have probably discovered
that the task is rather challenging. This guide will help you through all the
necessary steps. To begin, one has to look into how it works, and then figure out
what kind of inscription is needed, since each type of converting into runes
requires a separate approach.

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 How it Works
All European and many other languages use
Roman letters. It may seem that taking an alphabet
devised for one language (Latin in this example) and
using it for another one or a whole set of different
languages works all right. In fact it took about a
millennium to adapt the alphabet we know today for
various vernacular uses. The same applies to runes.
Runic alphabets cannot and should not transcribe
modern languages. We may use them to this end, but we
have to invent some rules for this new and unnatural
application. The nature of these rules may be illustrated by the following mental
experiment: force Seneca who spoke Latin and knew no other language to write
the modern German word schwarz (‘black’). To be sure, he would be stuck with
both ‘sch’ and ‘z’, since no such sounds (phonemes) existed in his mother tongue.
For ‘w’ and ‘r’ he would have only similar counterparts. Perhaps ‘a’ would create
no problem. This example might seem forced, but ancient Greek historians had
exactly the same difficulties with ancient Persian names. Europeans needed
centuries to invent rules that everybody accepted for Roman letters to represent
the sounds of their languages. We know these rules as orthography. However,
there are no accepted rules for using runes to stand for modern English phonemes.
No rules means no way to do it ‘right’.
What’s worse, ancient Germanic tribes did not have any orthography,
either. Like both ‘through hardships to the stars’ and ‘thru hardships 2 the stars’
having equal rights to be ‘right’ variants. Runes were used phonetically, that is
literally as people heard what they pronounced. So even if you don’t write in
modern English, it doesn’t solve all of the riddle. Besides, some words, such as
personal names, simply cannot be translated into the ancient Germanic languages
for which the original runic systems were invented.
Types of Tasks

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 1. Elder Futhark used to write in Migration period Germanic dialects
2. Younger Futhark used to write in Old Norse
3. Any of the above runic alphabets used to write in modern English or
represent a personal name.
On Right and Wrong
Even though there were no orthographic rules at the age when the runes
were in usage, some ways to write them are more or less in line with the historical
evidence, while others are not. Thus instead of ‘right’ ways to spell something in
runes, I suggest to speak about more or less ‘authentic’ or ‘historical’ variants.
Below are some recommendation based on my personal understanding of what
‘authentic’ or ‘historical’ is. By no means do I think that other approaches are
‘wrong’.
1. Elder Futhark
The Elder Futhark runes were used for the Proto-Norse language between
about 3rd and 7th centuries. We know very little about that language, that is we
don’t have a grammar and a dictionary for it. We have numerous Elder Futhark
inscriptions but their meaning is largely obscure and the attempts to reconstruct
the language that stood behind them are not very fruitful. Viking Age runestone
inscriptions were not carved in Elder Futhark runes. Vikings spoke the Old Norse
language, not Proto-Norse.
Recommended: Finding an existing inscription with clear meaning and
copying it — you may be interested in so called formulaic words that often occur in
the inscriptions.
Not recommended: Using Elder Futhark for Old Norse. Even worse is using
it for Old Norse words in their Anglicized form, like words Odin or Mjolnir spelt in
Elder Futhark (I see them time and again in tattoo designs). When the Elder
Futhark was in use, these words were perhaps pronounced *wōðanaz and
*melðunii̯ az but no one is sure, it’s a reconstruction.
2. Younger Futhark
The Younger Futhark runes were used for the early form of the Old Norse

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language during the Viking Age. We do have a grammar and a dictionary for that
language but it doesn’t mean that any Old Norse phrase or quote can be easily
represented in Younger Futhark runes. The distinguishing trait of this runic
alphabet is its use of the same runic sign for voiceless and voiced consonants (p and
b, t and d, etc.) and even less logical indiscriminate use of the same runes for
various vowels (for instance, the rune úr could stand for u, o, y, au etc.).
Recommended: Same as above — find an existing inscription and use it (you
may be interested in Younger Futhark love quotes). However, writing in runes an
Old Norse word or a quote that you have in Roman letters is also possible, since
the conventions used by Younger Futhark rune carvers are more or less clear.
Not recommended: Permanent use if you converted an inscription into runes
yourself. Your own later research or advice from an expert may reveal that you
made a mistake.
3. Modern English to Runes
This task is usually much more complex than the previous ones.
Transcribing words having sounds that never existed in the languages for which
runic alphabets were created requires a lot of research. 

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 Should I Write in Runes
Phonetically?
The idea of writing phonetically is probably the first thing people hear when
they delve into the problem of having a runic inscription. Vikings used runes
phonetically, they say, so should we, if we want to get something authentic, do the
same?
A few points have to be cleared up with respect to the way runes were used
in the early Middle Ages. Where does the whole notion of ‘writing phonetically’
come from? This is simply another way to state that Old Norse inscriptions carved
with the Younger Futhark runes did not have a stable spelling.
This is not something unique or characteristic for the Viking Age Old Norse
language. Spelling variants are found throughout the ancient literatures. Even
today we have orthographical differences between British English and US English.
Any writing system develops from a relative lack of uniformity to a growing
number of generally accepted rules. Runes are no exception. Roman letters — used
for modern English — went through the same stages.
An authentic runic inscription should not deviate far from the original ways
of using runes, agreed. But this does not mean that runes should be written
‘phonetically’. Actually, it is not possible altogether. Let us consider a couple of
practical examples.
Case A. We have to write an Old Norse saying with the Younger Futhark
runes. Classic sagas were composed, or at least written down, in 1200s. These texts
are the basis for our knowledge of the Old Norse language. Viking Age runic
inscriptions are also in Old Norse, but a few hundred years earlier the language

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was not the same. There were regional differences as well. If you have a quote from
a saga and want to get a 100% authentic runic inscription, you should: a) have a
Norseman, who lived during the Viking Age, say it the way he used to speak Old
Norse in his time; b) have him spell it in runes the way he would have done it in his
time. All the other ways would not be 100% authentic. Reconstructing possible
spelling requires years of research and even then it is a mere guess. Solution? Keep
the standard Old Norse spelling.
Case B. We have to write an English saying in runes. The runes were
invented for the languages that existed during the periods when these runes were
in use and were adapted for the respective phonological systems. Did you ever
compare the English and Old Norse phonology? Believe me, the number and
character of the phonemes is not the same. For instance, Old Norse did not have
[dʒ] as in gin, joy or edge, [ʃ] as in she, sure or emotion, [tʃ] as
in chair, nature or teach, [z] as in zoo or rose, [ʒ] as in pleasure, vision or beige. To
be sure, Old Norse did not have any runes for such sounds as well. So how can we
write in English with runes phonetically, if we have no runes for a whole range of
phonemes? There is no way to do so. Solution? Keep the standard English spelling.
Substituting runes for letters with a certain degree of authenticity is feasible,
whereas substituting runes for modern English phonemes (writing phonetically) is
technically impossible if we do not invent additional runes (that is what Anglo-
Saxons did adapting the Elder Futhark for their language).

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 Viking Words in English
How many loanwords from
Old Nose are there in the standard
English language? Viking origin of
the words ‘ransack’ and
‘slaughter’ probably would not
surprise anyone, but very
“peaceful” words like ‘leg’, ‘sky’
or ‘window’ are also of
Scandinavian provenance. The
verb ‘get’, one of the most used in
English, was actually borrowed from Old Norse. Meaning of the loanwords and
the grammatical category to which they belong, if properly interpreted, may be a
rich source of information on Viking settlement and subsequent assimilation of
Norsemen into the culture of England.This is what the research of Dr Sara Pons-
Sanz of the School of English Studies (University of Nottingham) aims at. The
project, which is funded by the British Academy, examines all the Viking words
that were borrowed from Old Norse to Old English. Words such as ‘husband’ that
point to social relationships show that Norsemen integrated quickly. The other sign
of cultural assimilation is disappearance of Old Norse as a spoken language in
England by the 12th century. How deep the assimilation was is seen in the
loanword ‘they’. It is a pronoun, a very difficult word to adapt into a new
language. Dr Pons-Sanz researched the texts of legal codes, homilies, charts,
literary works and inscriptions. Chronological and dialectal analysis allowed to
track the process of integration for certain words. For instance, the word ‘fellow’

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(ON félagi ‘business partner’) was first attested in East Anglia.
The list of Old Norse loanwords below is far from being complete. However,
it gives rather representative examples of Viking cultural assimilation in England.
anger – (ON angr ‘grief’) [1220-1250]
birth – (ON burðr) [1016-1150]
bleak – (ON bleikr ‘pale’) [1250-1300]
bloom – (ON blóm) [1016-1150]
call – (ON kalla) [before 1016]
cast – (ON kasta) [1016-1150]
crawl – (ON krafla) [c.1350]
crook – (ON krókr) [1016-1150]
die – (ON deyja) [1016-1150]
fellow – (ON félagi) [before 1016]
gear – (ON gervi ‘equipment’) [1300-1450]
get – (ON geta) [c.1250]
hit – (ON hitta ‘to come upon’) [1016-1150]
husband – (ON hús ‘house’ and bóndi ‘householder’) [before 1016]
ill – (ON illr) [1016-1150]
kid – (ON kiþ) [1220-1250]
kindle – (ON kynda) [1016-1150]
knife – (ON knífr) [1016-1150]
law – (ON lag ‘law’)
leg – (ON leggr) [1016-1150]
lift – (ON lypta) [1250-1300]
loan – (ON lán) [1016-1150]
loose – (ON lauss) [1300-1450]
low – (ON lágr) [1016-1150]
meek – (ON mjúkr ‘gentle, soft’) [1016-1150]
rag – (ON rögg) [1016-1150]
raise – (ON rísa to rise) [1016-1150]

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ransack – (ON rann-saka ‘to search a house’) [1220-1250]
sale – (ON sala) [1016-1150]
scare – (ON skjarr ‘timid’) [1016-1150]
seem – (ON sæma ‘to conform to’) [1250-1300]
skill – (ON skil) [1016-1150]
skin – (ON skinn) [1016-1150]
skirt – (ON skyrt) [after 1450]
sky – (ON skie ‘cloud’) [1220-1250]
slaughter – (ON sláter ‘butcher’s meat’) [1300-1450]
sly – (ON slœgr) [c.1250]
snare – (ON snara) [1016-1150]
take – (ON taka) [1016-1150]
thrive – (ON þrífa ‘to grasp’) [1016-1150]
trust – (ON traust) [c.1250]
ugly – (ON uggr ‘fear’) [1220-1250]
wand – (ON vöndr) [1016-1150]
want – (ON vanta) [1016-1150]
weak – (ON veikr) [1250-1300]
window – (ON vindauga ‘wind eye’) [1220-1250]
wing – (ON vengr) [1016-1150]
wrong – (ON rangr ‘awry, unjust’) [before 1016]

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For notes

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 Учебное издание

Майборода Алексей Анатольевич

Чемезова Екатерина Рудольфовна

The Anglo-Saxon Period. 449-1066.

Учебник подготовлен для изучения дисциплин «История литературы

англоязычных стран» и «История английского языка» для студентов, изучающих
зарубежную филологию. Он состоит из информационного раздела, переводов
оригинальных текстов на английский язык, афоризмов, статей и заданий к
текстам, рассчитанные как на выполнение на занятиях, так и на самостоятельную
работу студентов. Разнообразные задания учебника также готовят студентов к
общению на английском языке в сфере языкознания и литературоведения и
вносят значительный вклад в формирование их профессиональной
компетентности.

Учебник
Редактор – Чемезова Е. Р.
Компьютерный макет – Чемезова Е. Р.
Корректор – Чемезова Е. Р.

________________________________________________________________

Сдано к составлению 10.09.2015 г. Подписано к печати 12.11.2015 г. Формат 60Х84

1/16. Бумага офсетная. Гарнитура Times New Roman. Печать ризографическая.
Усл. печ. листов 4,4. Наклад 100 экз. Зак. № 55

Издательство Гуманитарно-педагогическая академия (филиал)

ФГАОУ ВО «КФУ им. В.И. Вернадского» в г. Ялте

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