Waldere (Lost Sagas)

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At the banquet soon to be de- scribed, Hrothgar sat in the south or chief high-seat, and Beowulf op- posite to him. The scene for a flyting see below, v. Planks on trestles — the "board "of later English literature — formed the tables just in front of the long rows of seats, and were taken away after banquets, when the retainers were ready to stretch themselves out for sleep on the benches. Some additional com- ment will be found in the excellent notes in Mr. Clark Hall's translation of Beowulf, p.

One thinks of the splendid scene at the end of the Xibelungen, of the Xialssaga, of Saxo's story of Amlethus, and many a less famous instance.

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He too thinks that " warfare and hatred will wake again. So lived the clansmen in cheer and revel a winsome life, till one began to fashion evils, that fiend of hell. On kin of Cain was the killing avenged yby sovran God for slaughtered Abel. The Danes are heathens, as one is told presently; but this lay of beginnings is taken from Genesis. This probably pagan nuisance is now furnished with biblical credentials as a fiend or devil in good stand- ing, so that all Christian Englishmen might read about him.

Of Cain awoke all that woful breed, Etins 2 and elves and evil-spirits, as well as the giants that warred with God weary while: Found within it the atheling band asleep after feasting and fearless of sorrow, of human hardship. Then at the dawning, as day was breaking, the might of Grendel to men was known ; then after wassail was wail uplifted, loud moan in the morn.

The mighty chief, 1 Cain's. The "giants" of v. See also the apocrjrphal book of Enoch, noted by Kittredge, Paul und Braune's Beitrdge, xiii, , who accounts for this tradition that Cain was the ancestor of evil monsters. The reader will note the meagreness and haste of this account of the actual attack. No details are given. This brevity is of course due to the poet ; and one can only guess at his motive. Such held themselves far and fast who the fiend outran! Thus ruled unrighteous and raged his fill one against all ; until empty stood that lordly building, and long it bode so.

Twelve years' tide the trouble he bore, sovran of Scyldings, sorrows in plenty, boundless cares. Grendel, by his ravaging, is master of the hall ; and there is no need to change to " hell-thane. Such heaping of horrors the hater of men, lonely roamer, wrought unceasing, harassings heavy. Their practice this, 1 He would of course pay no wergild for the men he had slain. So boasted a Norse bully once. But well for him that after death-day may draw to his Lord, and friendship find in the Father's arms! This heard in his home Hygelac's thane, great among Geats, of Grendel's doings.

He was the mightiest man of valor in that same day of this our life, stalwart and stately. A stout wave-walker he bade make ready. Certainly " bore" or " suffered " is too pale a rendering. Thset fram hSm gefrsegn HygelS. On board they climbed, warriors ready; waves were churning sea with sand; the sailors bore on the breast of the bark their bright array, their mail and weapons: Many of these old customs are preserved in tradition or by record ; and the chapter of Tacitus's Germania is familiar which describes one of them in detail.

By Hygelac's own account vv. Die rehten wazzerstrS,ze sint mir wol bekant. In the next stanza the start of the ship is described ; and Siegfried him- self helps to push off from shore, using " a pole. Their haven was found, their journey ended. God they thanked for passing in peace o'er the paths of the sea.

A warden I, sentinel set o'er the sea-march here, lest any foe to the folk of Danes with harrying fleet should harm the land. No aliens ever at ease thus bore them, 1 One of the auxiliary names of the Geats, who by the reckoning of Bugge, Gering, and others, were Jutes.

Jutland, says Gering, is truly called the Wettermark, "the land of storms. Saxon pirates would well remember him. The stone-paved street below, v, points to similar traditions. No henchman he worthied by weapons, if witness his features, his peerless presence! I pray you, though, tell your folk and home, lest hence ye fare suspect to wander your way as spies in Danish land. Now, dwellers afar, ocean-travellers, take from me simple advice: To folk afar was my father known, noble atheling, Ecgtheow named.

Full of winters, he fared away aged from earth ; he is honored still through width of the world by wise men all.

To thy lord and liege in loyal mood we hasten hither, to Healfdene's son, people-protector: Not thus openly ever came warriors hither ; yet. March, then, bearing weapons and weeds the way I show you. I will bid my men your boat meanwhile to guard for fear lest foemen come, — your new-tarred ship by shore of ocean faithfully watching till once again it waft o'er the waters those well -loved thanes, — winding-neck'd wood, — to Weders' bounds, heroes such as the hest of fate 1 Hrothgar.

Father Almighty in grace and mercy guard you well, safe in your seekings. Seaward I go, 'gainst hostile warriors hold my watch. In other words, the ship will carry back the survivors. Other translators take " the well-loved man " to be Beowulf, and read: The boar was sacred to Freyr, who was the favorite god of the Germanic tribes about the North Sea and the Baltic. Rude representations of warriors show the boar on the helmet quite as large as the helmet itself.

Messenger, I, Hrothgar's herald! Heroes so many ne'er met I as strangers of mood so strong. Asser in his Life of Alfred ed. Stevenson, 91, 23, and p. The common Germanic hatred of cities and of stone houses is familiar from the rhetoric of Tacitus. I am seeking to say to the son of Healfdene this mission of mine, to thy master-lord, the doughty prince, if he deign at all grace that we greet him, the good one, now.

This boon they seek, that they, my master, may with thee have speech at will: In weeds of the warrior worthy they, methinks, of our liking ; their leader most surely, a hero that hither his henchmen has led. And seamen, too, have said me this, — who carried my gifts to the Geatish court, thither for thanks, — he has thirty men's heft of grasp in the gripe of his hand, the bold-in-battle.

Blessed God out of his mercy this man hath sent to Danes of the West, as I ween indeed, against horror of Grendel. I hope to give the good youth gold for his gallant thought.

Be thou in haste, and bid them hither, clan of kinsmen, to come before me; and add this word, — they are welcome guests to folk of the Danes. So Hildebrand, try- ing to make his son believe that the paternal claim is true, asks to be put to the test of genealogies and kinship: Then hied that troop where the herald led them, under Heorot's roof: Hygelac's I, kinsman and follower.

Fame a plenty have I gained in youth! Dryden notes in his Essay on Dramatic Poetry that only the later heroes made anything of reticence as a manly virtue. These "seafarers" are not necessarily sailors by profession, but any persons who fare over sea aud bring the news ; cf. Themselves had seen me from slaughter come blood-flecked from foes, where five I bound, and that wild brood worsted. Grendel now, monster cruel, be mine to quell in single battle! So, from thee, thou sovran of the Shining-Danes, Scyldings'-bulwark, a boon I seek, — and, Friend-of-the-folk, refuse it not, O Warriors'-shield, now I've wandered far, — that I alone with my liegemen here, this hardy band, may Heorot purge!

But that water-goblin who covers the space from Old Nick of jest to the Neckan and Nix of poetry and tale, is all one needs, and Nicor is a good name for him. Dan Michel in the fourteenth century renders sirens or sea-fairies by this word nicor. A glance, too, at Vigfusson's Icelandic Dictionary, s. To square this story with vv.

There was genuine fear of sea-beasts among these men of the coast, and Horace's nionstra natantia I, iii, 18 would have appealed to them as no matter for jests. They enhance the horror of Nicor's Mere, below, v. Whales are specified in v. Fain, I ween, if the fight he win, in this hall of gold my Geatish band will he fearless eat, — as oft before, — my noblest thanes. But the common aud ancient belief that " Wyrd goes as she must " is in the background. That personal and mythological force lingers in the word seems clear from its uses in poetry.

Heorogar was dead, my elder brother, had breathed his last, Healf dene's bairn: See below, Deor''s Song, and notes. This mighty power, whom the Christian poet can still revere, has here the general force of " Destiny. Hrothgar sees in Beowulf's mission a heritage of duty, a return of the good offices which the Danish king ren- dered to Beowulf's father in time of dire need. Seebohm, Tribal Cus- toms in Anglo-Saxon Laxo, London, , comments on this ethical side of the feud, and makes great use of the material in Beowulf. Hall-folk fail me, my warriors wane ; for Wyrd hath swept them into Grendel's grasp.

But God is able this deadly foe from his deeds to turn! I had heroes the less, doughty dear-ones that death had reft. A henchman attended, carried the carven cup in hand, served the clear mead. Oft minsjtrels sang blithe in Heorot. As in the Indian war-dance, so at the Germanic feast in hall or camp before battle, the warrior was expected to make his be6t or promise of prowess, — and to keep it. No living man, or lief or loath, from your labor dire could you dissuade, from swimming the main.

Ocean-tides with your arms ye covered, with strenuous hands the sea-streets measured, swam o'er the waters. Winter's storm rolled the rough waves. In realm of sea a sennight strove ye. In swimming he topped thee, had more of main! It is rather a report of the spirited way in which Beowulf carried off the laurels in the " hazing" of the guest by a competent official of the host. Probably this test was part of the formal reception ; but it seems a strange survival in epic by the side of the courtly and extravagant com- pliments exchanged between Beowulf and Hrothgar.

In Scandinavian sources one gets the rough flyting in its coarseness and strength. See the Lokasenna, above all, and the cases reported by Saxo. In one the prizes are peculiar: He also notes a parallel swimming-match in the Egilssaga. Truth I claim it, that I had more of might in the sea than any man else, more ocean-endurance.

Naked swords, as we swam along, we held in hand, with hope to guard us against the whales. Not a whit from me could he float afar o'er the flood of waves, haste o'er the billows ; nor him I abandoned. Together we twain on the tides abode five nights full till the flood divided us, churning waves and chillest weather, darkling night, and the northern wind ruthless rushed on us: BEOWULF 47 yet me 'gainst the monsters my mailed coat, hard and hand-linked, help afforded, — battle-sark braided my breast to ward, garnished with gold.

There grasped me firm and haled me to bottom the hated foe, with grimmest gripe. IX Me thus often the evil monsters thronging threatened. With thrust of my sword, the darling, I dealt them due return! Nowise had they bliss from their booty then to devour their victim, vengeful creatures, seated to banquet at bottom of sea ; but at break of day, by my brand sore hurt, on the edge of ocean up they lay, put to sleep by the sword.

And since, by them on the fathomless sea-ways sailor-folk are never molested. For Wyrd oft saveth earl undoomed if he doughty be! It occurs in the Aiidreas of Cynewulf, in part in the Hildebrand Lay, v. Of night-fought battles ne'er heard I a harder 'neath heaven's dome, nor adrift on the deep, a more desolate man! Yet I came unharmed from that hostile clutch, though spent with swimming. Breca ne'er yet, not one of you pair, in the play of war such daring deed has done at all with bloody brand, — I boast not of it!

Prac- tically the same case occurs when Horace tells Lydia III, ix that he would die for Chloe if the fatee would but spare this love of his and let her live ; — Si parcent animaefata superstiti. But the present passage hardly needs this subtle interpretation, and evidently means that fate often spares a man who is not doomed, really devoted to death, if he is a brave man, in a word, favors the brave if favor be possible. Weird sisters and fey folk survived long in Scottish tradition.

He has defended his own reputation, shrugs his shoulders at the necessity of referring to his prowess, and makes a home-thrust at Unferth. The climax of his invective is imputation to Unferth of the two supreme sins in the Germanic list: He forces pledges, favors none of the land of Danes, but lustily murders, , fights and feasts, nor feud he dreads from Spear-Dane men.

But speedily now shall I prove him the prowess and pride of the Geats, shall bid him battle. Blithe to mead go he that listeth, when light of dawn this morrow morning o'er men of earth, ether-robed sun from the south shall beam! Then was laughter of liegemen loud resounding with winsome words. Came Wealhtheow forth, 1 Murderer. The kin-bond, of course, was or should be very strong. See Beda's story of Imma, Eccl. Lustily took he banquet and beaker, battle-famed king. The cup he took, hardy-in-war, from Wealhtheow's hand, and answer uttered the eager-for-combat. Beowulf spake, bairn of Ecgtheow: The Gnomic Verses, preserved in the Exeter Book, are explicit about the duties of a noble dame in such cases.

She must be see Grein-WUlker, I, — fond of her folk, and full of cheer, fast in a secret, and free of hand with steeds and treasure: The Defence-of-Athelings is, of course, the king. BEOWULF 61 " This was my thought, when my thanes and I bent to the ocean and entered our boat, that I would work the will of your people fully, or fighting fall in death, in fiend's gripe fast. I am firm to do an earl's brave deed, or end the days of this life of mine in the mead-hall here. Man to man, he made harangue, Hrothgar to Beowulf, bade him hail, let him wield the wine hall: So in the English Ballads there is a false " true love," — i.

Compare the phrase " excellent iron," v. No wish shall fail thee if thou bidest the battle with bold-won life. The King-of-Glory against this Grendel a guard had sefe, so heroes heard, a hall-defender, who warded the monarch and watched for the mon- ster. In truth, the Geats' prince gladly trusted his mettle, his might, the mercy of God! Not with the sword, then, to sleep of death his life will I give, though it lie in my power.

No skill is his to strike against me, 1 See above, vv. Let wisest God, sacred Lord, on which side soever doom decree as he deeraeth right. None of them thought that thence their steps ' to the folk and fastness that fostered them, to the land they loved, would lead them back!

Full well they wist that on warriors many battle-death seized, in the banquet-hall, of Danish clan. In sooth 'tis told that highest God o'er human kind hath wielded ever! Warriors slept whose best was to guard the gabled hall, — all save one. The weaving, as in classical myths, is work of the Noms, or fates, but God disposes it as he will. Often, however, the Germanic fates stand alone at their loom. The monster was minded of mankind now sundry to seize in the stately house. Under welkin he walked, till the wine-palace there, gold-hall of men, he gladly discerned, flashing with fretwork.

The accretion theory is not ridiculous by any means ; but it does not ex- plain the Beoioidf half so well as the assumption of a single author who wrote the present poem on the basis of old lays, and applied in its general construction the same methods of variation and repetition which obtain for every rhythmic period and almost for every sentence in Anglo-Saxon poetry at large. The first announcement of Grendel's coming empha- sizes the fact that it is by night ; the second lays stress on the start from the moor ; the third brings him to the hall, and to the action. See the same sort of repetition for an arrival, vv.

If we will only apply to the whole web of narrative what we know of the web of sentence and period, much of the supposed awkwardness, "poor mend- ings," "patchwork," and so on, will prove simply the habit of all that national epic. All hastily, then, o'er fair-paved floor the fiend trod on, ireful he strode ; there streamed from his eyes fearful flashes, like flame to see. He spied in hall the hero-band, kin and clansmen clustered asleep, hardy liegemen. Then laughed his heart ; for the monster was minded, ere morn should dawn, savage, to sever the soul of each, life from body, since lusty banquet waited his will!

But Wyrd forbade him to seize any more of men on earth after that evening. Not that the monster was minded to pause! Then farther he hied ; for the hardy hero with hand he grasped, felt for the foe with fiendish claw, for the hero reclining, — who clutched it boldly, prompt to answer, propped on his arm. The fiend made off, but the earl close followed.

The monster meant — if he might at all — to fling himself free, and far away fly to the fens, — knew his fingers' power in the gripe of the grim one. Gruesome march to Heorot this monster of harm had made! Din filled the room ; the Danes were bereft, castle-dwellers and clansmen all, earls, of their ale. But "the ale-bench" is too familiar in the epic for such scruples ; and the hall was primarily intended for the Ger- manic dream, which meant the revel of drinking men.

It is a phrase parallel to the " bulging breast " for anger, and such survivals of the primitive methods of speech ; and, as has been suggested, may well have seemed archaic to the poet who copied traditional lines. This " angry " is also conventional ; " desperate with fear " is the word for the fiend. Wonder it was the wine-hall firm in the strain of their struggle stood, to earth the fair house fell not ; too fast it was within and without by its iron bands craftily clamped ; though there crashed from sill many a mead-bench — men have told me — gay with gold, where the grim foes wrestled.

So well had weened the wisest Scyldings that not ever at all might any man that bone-decked, brave house break asunder, crush by craft, — unless clasp of fire n smoke engulfed it. Danes of the North with fear and frenzy were filled, each one, who from the wall that wailing heard, God's foe sounding his grisly song, cry of the conquered, clamorous pain from captive of hell. Too closely held him he who of men in might was strongest in that same day of this our life.

Now many an earl of Beowulf brandished blade ancestral, fain the life of their lord to shield, their praised prince, if power were theirs ; 1 Kenning for Beowulf. Yet his end and parting on that same day of this our life woful should be, and his wandering soul far off flit to the fiends' domain. Soon he found, who in former days, harmful in heart and hated of God, on many a man such murder wrought, that the frame of his body failed him now. For him the keen-souled kinsman of Hygelac held in hand ; hateful alive was each to other. The outlaw dire took mortal hurt ; a mighty wound showed on his shoulder, and sinews cracked, and the bone-frame burst.

To Beowulf now the glory was given, and Grendel thence death-sick his den in the dark moor sought, noisome abode: Dunstan's affair with Satan. His night-work pleased him, his deed and its honor. To Eastern Danes had the valiant Geat his vaunt made good, all their sorrow and ills assuaged, their bale of battle borne so long, and all the dole they erst endured, pain a-plenty. XIII Many at morning, as men have told me, warriors gathered the gift-hall round, folk-leaders faring from far and near, o'er wide-stretched ways, the wonder to view, trace of the traitor.

His nurse, a giantess, holds the hand while Hadding hews it off, and "corrupt matter" flows from it. Tearing and rending with their claws is the giants' way. The translation "fist" will not do. The concluding nine lines of this section are compared by ten Brink with the last stanza of Tasso's Jerusa- lem Delivered. Indefinite talk of the moorland or fen as home of the monsters here yields to the idea of home in the waters.

Home then rode the hoary clansmen from that merry journey, and many a youth, on horses white, the hardy warriors, back from the mere. Then Beowulf's glory eager they echoed, and all averred that from sea to sea, or south or north, there was no other in earth's domain, under vault of heaven, more valiant found, of warriors none more worthy to rule!

On their lord beloved they laid no slight, gracious Hrothgar: The popular ballads show the same lack of clearness. This thane of Hrothgar may have been a profes- sional minstrel in the eyes of the epic poet who made the Beowulf; but there is a possibility of his amateur standing.

In any case, he improvises a lay on Beowulf's adventure, as he rides along, and uses his store of tradi- tional phrase and comment in the process. If the epithet applied to him BEOWULF 61 who had made many vaunts, and was mindful of verses, stored with sagas and songs of old, bound word to word in well-knit rime, welded his lay; this warrior soon of Beowulf's quest right cleverly sang, and artfully added an excellent tale, in well- ranged words, of the warlike deeds he had heard in saga of Sigemund.

He could probably sing his beot, or vaunt, in good verse. Specimens of such a vaunt, sung, however, by a North American Indian at the war- dance, and improvised to the rhythm of the bystanders' choral singing, can be studied with some application to the Germanic problem, — for the cruder forms of improvisation, to be sure, and not for a finished chant of adventure like this in question, which is followed by traditional verse dealing with the Germanic heroic legend. See the introduction to Deor's Song, below. Beowulf is thus ranged at once with heroes of Germanic legend.

Of Sigemund grew, when he passed from life, no little praise ; for the doughty-in-combat a dragon killed that herded the hoard: Thus had the dread-one by daring achieved over the ring-hoard to rule at will, himself to pleasure ; a sea-boat he loaded, and bore on its bosom the beaming gold, son of Waels ; the worm was consumed. Sigmund is the type with which Beowulf is compared, the good and great hero ; while Heremod, admirably introduced, serves as antitype.

The latter is probably the Lotherus of Saxo's history, son of Dan, of the royal Danish house, the brave king who turns tyrant and is at last slain by a desperate and outraged folk. For further reference to him, see below, vv. Heremod, one is told, might have rivalled and surpassed Sigmund, but the former fell from grace, turned tyrant, and in fact was precisely what the aspiring hero should not be, — quite the opposite, say, of this glorious Beowoilf. Others take the banishment literally, — as if to actual giants, who soon compassed the king's death.

The morning sun was climbing higher. Warden of treasure, crowned with glory, the king himself, with stately band from the bride-bower strode; 1 Bugge emends: With torrents of sorrow he had long lamed his landfolk ; a load of care.

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Sievers refers it to the assumed literal banishment. Or does it mean some wild adventure undertaken when the king should have been caring for his folk at home? The time-relations are not altogether good in this long passage which describes the rejoicings of "the day after" ; but the present shift from the riders on the road to the folk at the hall is not very violent, and is of a piece with the general narrative style.

XIV Xl Hrothgar spake, — to the hall he went, stood by the steps, the steep roof saw, garnished with gold, and GrendeFs hand: A throng of sorrows I have borne from Grendel ; but God still works wonder on wonder, the Warden-of- Glory. It was but now that I never more for woes that weighed on me waited help long as I lived, when, laved in blood, stood sword-gore-stained this stateliest house, — widespread woe for wise men all, who had no hope to hinder ever foes infernal and fiendish sprites from havoc in hall.

This hero now, by the Wielder's might, a work has done that not all of us erst could ever do by wile and wisdom. Lo, well can she say whoso of women this warrior bore among sons of men, if still she liveth, that the God of the ages was good to her in the birth of her bairn. Now, Beowulf, thee, of heroes best, I shall heartily love as mine own, my son; preserve thou ever this kinship new: Thyself hast now fulfilled such deeds, that thy fame shall endure through all the ages.

As ever he did, well may the Wielder reward thee still! Fain, too, were I hadst thou but seen himself, what time the fiend in his trappings tottered to fall I Swiftly, I thought, in strongest gripe on his bed of death to bind him down, that he in the hent of this hand of mine should breathe his last: For rescue, however, he left behind him his hand in pledge, arm and shoulder ; nor aught of help could the cursed one thus procure at all. None the longer liveth he, loathsome fiend, sunk in his sins, but sorrow holds him tightly grasped in gripe of anguish, in baleful bonds, where bide he must, evil outlaw, such awful doom as the Mighty Maker shall mete him out.

Gold-gay shone the hangings that were wove on the wall, and wonders many to delight each mortal that looks upon them. Tapestries were hung on the walls, and willing hands prepared the banquet. Arrived was the hour when to hall proceeded Healfdene's son ; the king himself would sit to banquet. Ne'er heard I of host in haughtier throng more graciously gathered round giver-of-rings!

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Bowed then to bench those bearers-of -glory, fain of the feasting. Featly received many a mead-cup the mighty-in-spirit, kinsmen who sat in the sumptuous hall, Hrothgar and Hrothulf. Beowulf took cup in hall: It would seem that after a long period of amity cf. Widsith, 45 they quarrelled and fought. See also below, v. Ne'er failed his valor in the crush of combat when corpses fell.

To Beowulf over them both then gave the refuge-of-Ingwines right and power, o'er war-steeds and weapons: Manfully thus the mighty prince, hoard-guard for heroes, that hard fight repaid with steeds and treasures contemned by none who is willing to say the sooth aright. Charles Lamb " On the Inconvenience Result- ing from being Hanged'' calls a resuscitated man " the leavings of the rope. He is also the " refuge of the friends of Ing," of v. Ing belongs to myth. The Maker then ruled human kind, as here and now.

Therefore is insight always best, and forethought of mind. The same combination of fate and courage as above, V. As before about Sigemund and Heremod, so now, though at greater length, about Finn and his feud, a lay is chanted or recited ; and the epic poet, counting on hia readers' familiarity with the story, — a fragment of it still exists, and is printed in this volume, — simply gives the headings.

By war were swept, too, support among scholars.

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Finn, a Frisian chieftain, who nevertheless has a " castle " outside the Frisian border, marries Hildeburh, a Danish prin- cess ; and her brother, Hnaef, with many other Danes, pays Finn a visit. Relations between the two peoples have been strained before. Something starts the old feud anew ; and the visitors are attacked in their quarters. Hnaef is killed ; so is a son of Hildeburh. Many fall on both sides.

Peace is patched up ; a stately funeral is held ; and the surviving visitors become in a way vassals or liegemen of Finn, going back with him to Frisia. So matters rest a while. Hengest is now leader of the Danes ; but he is set upon revenge for his former lord, Hnsef. Probably he is killed in feud ; but his clansmen, Guthlaf and Oslaf, gather at their home a force of sturdy Danes, come back to Frisia, storm Finn's stronghold, kill him, and carry back their kinswoman Hildeburh.

The Finnsburg fragment, translated below, describes so Bugge puts it, conforming, as he says, " to the common view" the fight in which Hntef fell, "that is to say, an event which precedes the story told in the Beoiculf,'' and is noted in these introductory lines vv. Another reading makes Finn slay Hengest with a sword " Hun- lafing.

Of course, in this case, Hengest dissembles his real feelings to gain time and opportunity for the subsequent invasion. The ''enemies" must be the Frisians ; the original word is " eoteus," " ettins," monsters ; but it is elsewhere used in speaking of Frisian men. A pact he offered: If, again, one of Finn's Frisians began a quarrel, he should die by the sword. Oaths were given, and ancient gold heaped from hoard.

It was Hildeburh's hest, at Hnsef's own pyre the bairn of her body on brands to lay, his bones to burn, on the balefire placed, at his uncle's side. The clash of kin-duties is the deep note in Germanic tragedy: It could easily be used for the lamentation of a great multitude. Sad by his shoulder sorrowed the woman, wept him with dirges: This vocero or lament of the widow, as in the case of BeowTilf, v.

In the Biad, at the funeral of Hector: Balefire devoured, greediest spirit, those spared not by war out of either folk: XVII Then hastened those heroes their home to see, friendless, to find the Frisian land, houses and high burg. Hengest still through the death-dyed winter dwelt with Finn, holding pact, yet of home he minded, though powerless his ring-decked prow to drive over the waters, now waves rolled fierce lashed by the winds, or winter locked them in icy fetters. Far off winter was driven ; fair lay earth's breast ; and fain was the rover, the guest, to depart, though more gladly he pondered on wreaking his vengeance than roaming the deep, and how to hasten the hot encounter where sons of the Frisians were sure to be.

Compare the pretty lyric "Lenten is comen with love to toune," where " toune,'" like "men's dwellings" in the text, means no definite place, but the whole district in question " where folk live. The burg was reddened with blood of foemen, and Finn was slain, king amid clansmen; the queen was taken. To their ship the Scylding warriors bore all the chattels the chieftain owned, whatever they found in Finn's domain of gems and jewels.

The gentle wife o'er paths of the deep to the Danes they bore, led to her land. Then glad rose the revel; bench-joy brightened. Bearers draw from their "wonder-vats" wine. Unferth the spokesman at the Scylding lord's feet sat: Collecting a force, they return to Frisia and kill Finn in his home. To this attack some writers refer the fragment of Finnshurg.

The uncle and nepliew are Hrothgar and Hrothulf. The Scylding queen spoke: Thy Heorot purged, jewel-hall brightest, enjoy while thou canst, with many a largess; and leave to thy kin folk and realm when forth thou goest to greet thy doom. There is something finely feminine in this speech of Wealhtheow's, apart from its somewhat irregular and irrelevant sequence of topics. Both she and her lord prob- ably distrust Hrothulf ; but she bids the king to be of good cheer, and, turning to the suspect, heaps affectionate assurances on his probity.

Of wounden gold, she offered, to honor him, arm-jewels twain, corselet and rings, and of collars the noblest that ever I knew the earth around. Fairest of gems 1 Legend and myth are interwoven in this allusion, but the Brisings' Brosings' in our Ms. For Eormanric, see the allusion in Deor''s Song, below. Hama is Heime in the Germanic legend. Beowulf gives it to his lord Hygelac, who wears it on his fated raid into Frisian lands, — the historical event which took place between and a.

Theudebert, grandson of Clovis the Frankish king, surprised and slew Hygelac, captured his fleet and the booty, and took many prisoners. Din rose in hall. A passing reference— " Win fame by valiant deeds, and may God guard thee the while" — shows that, like Beowulf the poem had been given a Christianized context. The first portion is a speech given by Hildegyth trying to motivate Waldere for his upcoming fight. In this speech, Paul Cavill finds, Hildegyth tries to inspire Waldere in four main ways: Mimming , the great sword of Waldere, that was made by the renowned smith Weland , is praised; Waldere is reminded that the only two outcomes available to a warrior are glory or death; all the good doings of Waldere are rehearsed, as well as the loftiness of his reputation; all doubt is cleared that it is truly Guthhere at fault for engaging Waldere.

In the story of Walter, this fight results in harm to everyone that has participated. However, in the end the two sides come to a peaceful resolution and eventually Waldere and Hildegyth leave and get married. This ending does not appear in the remaining fragments of Waldere.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia. This article is about the poem. For other uses, see Waldhere. Anglo-Saxon paganism and mythology. However, the part of the poem containing the single combats draws heavily on Latin literature. We welcome suggested improvements to any of our articles. You can make it easier for us to review and, hopefully, publish your contribution by keeping a few points in mind. Your contribution may be further edited by our staff, and its publication is subject to our final approval.

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Learn More in these related Britannica articles: The 9th to the 11th century. The Waltharius epic is set in the years of the invasions of Attila the Hun. The sophistication of its narrative technique contrasts with its Germanic subject matter. The Ruodlieb , a romance written perhaps in about in a language heavily influenced by vernacular usage, reveals a…. Latin literature, the body of writings in Latin, primarily produced during the Roman Republic and the Roman Empire, when Latin was a spoken language. When Rome fell, Latin remained the literary language of the Western medieval world until it was superseded by the Romance languages it had generated….

Ekkehard I the Elder, teacher, monk, hymnist, and poet whom some scholars regard as the author of Waltharius , a celebrated Latin heroic poem based on the life of King Walter of Aquitaine.

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