Beowulf Background: Geography

• Germanic tribes battled for control after causing the downfall of the Western Roman Empire (400s A.D.)• Political, economic, cultural

repercussions

• Bloody warfare many Germanic tribes in Northern Europe left their homelands

• Anglo-Saxon civilization established on island of Britain• G. tribes: Angles, Saxons, Jutes

• Story set on mainland

Beowulf Background: Religion and Culture

• Paganism in northern Germanic tribes• Warrior culture

• Strength, courage, loyalty – principal values

• Mead halls • Center of community, culture & entertainment; offered safety

• Large wooden buildings - men

• Drank mead (alcoholic beverage)

• Storytelling • long epic poems & verse narratives

• Scops – poet-singers, chanted from memory, usually played harp too

Beowulf Background: The Epic Poem

• Beowulf = Geat warrior • crosses the sea to aid Danes in battle

(B’s father helped by Hrothgar)

• returns to Sweden to succeed his uncle, Hygelac, as king of the Geats

• Hygelac was a real historical figure, led a military raid around 525 AD.

• Historians believe the action of Beowulf is set shortly after Hygelac’s raid in 525.• Takes place on mainland, not in Britain.

• Danes (PD Denmark), Geats (PD Sweden)

Beowulf Background: The Epic Poem

• Originally written in Old English, the language spoken in Britain during Anglo-Saxon period•Old English poetry has a strong rhythm with each line divided

into two parts by a pause (caesura) –indicated by an extra space.

• In translation, commas used to reproduce effect of the caesuras

•Old English doesn’t look or sound like modern English

•Usually translated and/or heavily noted for modern readers

• Text written between 8th and 10th centuries•After Anglo-Saxon conversion to Christianity

•Tells story of mostly pagan society (~525 AD)

• Most famous early Germanic heroic poem to survive ( oral tradition)

Beowulf Background: The Poet and the Poem

• Exact author is unknown, only inferred information

• Educated, familiar with ancient epics such as Aeneid by Virgil

• Knowledgeable about Christianity and the Bible

• Differences in scholarly opinions

• Northern England – eighth century AD

• Southwestern England – tenth century AD

• Only one copy of original manuscript has survived • Dates back to 1000 AD

• Preserved by Christian monks who copied manuscripts

• Housed in British Library in London (present day)

• Damaged by various disasters, including fires

• Electronic Beowulf Project

• 2007 film - Ray Winstone, Angelina Jolie, Christian Glover

Does not follow the plot of the poem so don’t rely on it for any information for this course.

Beowulf: Literary Terms

Alliteration

Caesura

Epithet

Kenning

Adjectives that point out special traits of particular people or things; fits metrically into a line

the repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of words, used to help storytellers

memorize poems in oral tradition

a pause that divides a line of poetry; (modern translations use commas, not extra space)

descriptive phrase or compound word that substitutes for simple nouns, common in Germanic

poetry; type of metaphor

“frost bound the earth and hail would fall, the coldest seeds” (“The Seafarer” lines 31-33)

Kennings:descriptive compound words and phrases that take place of simple nouns

“The Seafarer” Excerpts

It would snow from the north; frost bound the earth and hail would

fall, the coldest seeds. (31-33)

So summer’s sentinel, the cuckoo, sings in his murmuring voice,

and our hearts mourn as he urges. (53-55)

My soul roams with the sea, the whales’ home, wandering to the

widest corners of the world. (59-61)

Lines 59-78

“No one/Waited for reparation from his plundering claws;/ That shadow of death hunted in the darkness…”

Lines 327-339

“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/To feud with Almighty God…”

Lines 450-462

“And all at once the greedy she-wolf/Who’d ruled those waters for half a hundred/Years discovered him…”

“…Tried to work her fingers through the tight/Ring-woven mail on his breast, but tore/And scratched in vain.”

Kennings:descriptive compound words and phrases that take place of simple nouns