Old English 449-1066
Middle English (1066-1485)
Modern English (1485 (ascension of Henry VII to the English throne) to the present day)
THE ANGLOSAXON INVASION. Julius Caesar invaded Britain in 55 BC (The Celts were living in Britain and offered stiff resistance). In 43 AD the Roman conquest was concluded under Emperor Claudius, but the Romans did not reach the North. Early in the 5th century the evacuation of the Romans was completed. Bede talks about the invasion of Angles, Saxons & Jutes, that took place around AD 449. They came originally to help one of the kings & then decided to stay.
ANGLO-SAXON LITERARY CULTURE. A long oral tradition developed when the Germanic tribes still inhabited the European continent. Early German poetry was composed & recited by the scop. At court feasts the scop would sing the deeds of real or legendary heroes. These illustrious figures were part of the legacy which the Anglo-Saxon invaders brought with them to England. With the conversion of England to Christianity things became different.
THE COMING OF CHRISTIANITY. English history begins in the year 597: the Roman & Irish Missionaries taught the English how to write. The Missionaries brought with them parchment (the skin of an animal prepared for writing on), pen & ink & the custom of writing literary compositions down & also the roman alphabet. The English of heathen times knew how to write, they brought from the continent a runic alphabet of 24 letters, & they added others later. No English poem has been preserved in runic inscription (too expensive). It is impossible to overestimate the importance of the coming of Christianity to England. The new religion brought Mediterranean civilization to the island. Monasteries at Canterbury, York & Jarrow were internationally esteemed for their Latin & Greek scholarship. Literature had been transmitted orally but now the clerics put the works in writing. The problem was that the clerics generally preserved only the materials they considered useful to Christianity. So they either used Christian material or tried to fit subjects of pagan derivation into the framework of the Christian universe. Besides copying Latin manuscripts, clerics began to create original compositions both in Latin & in the English vernacular.
Verse patterns. The poetic line, which was really 2 half-lines separated by a distinct pause, contained 4 accented syllables & a varying number of unaccented syllables. It rarely used end rhyme, but regularly used a system of alliteration. This alliteration came to England from their German forefathers & it involved the initial sounds, whether vowels or consonants, of the 4 stressed syllables. As a rule 3 of the stressed syllables were alliterated, & it was the initial sound of the 3rd accented syllable that normally determined the alliteration.
Poetical devices: alliteration, rhythm, kenning & variation. Rhythm was achieved by a process of metrical heightening & lowering. Only a syllable that took a main stress was subject to metrical heightening & only the one that lacked stress was subject to metrical lowering. Probably the singer used different pitch patterns (Baugh 23)
But rhythm & alliteration were not the only poetic devices. In order to achieve variety, as well as to suggest important attributes of his subject, the scop would frequently introduce a kind of metaphor called the kenning, a compound of two terms used in place of a common word; a two member circumlocution for an ordinary noun.
Variation: the use of equivalents for poetical purposes, for ex, “Wiglaf spoke, the son of Wihstan”; “Widsith spoke, [he] unlocked the word-hoard.” (“word-hoard” is a kenning for mouth).
All these stylistic features did not have in English the luxuriant growth that they had in Iceland (Baugh 30)
Kind of poems: Thulas, Rhunic Poems, Menologium, legal verse.
Thulas: metrical lists of names (Baugh 32). Widsith is a thula.
Menologium or calendar poem. Another notable piece of mnemonic verse. Its purpose was to mention those feasts of the saints we were bound to keep (Baugh 35)
Legal verse: The English of old times, unlike their continental contemporaries made legal records in the mother tongue as well as in Latin. Some used some kind of rhyme that was going to be very common in Middle English literature but that wasn't before.
THE DANISH INVASION. Viking raids near the end of the 8th century to the mid of the 9th century ravaged Northumbria & turned Southward to Wessex. There Alfred the Great (849-899) stopped them & they converted or retired to the North. Wessex became the new center of English culture. At the end of the 10th century the Danes renewed their attacks. In 1017, a Danish military leader, Cnut, or Canute, occupied the English throne (he also became king of Denmark). In spite of that the Anglo-Christian culture survived.
The MANUSCRIPTS. Most of the extant Old English poetry is contained in 4 mss (manuscripts), compiled around the year 1000 in the West Saxon dialect. 1) The Beowulf ms (in the Cotton collection of the British Museum. Which contains BeowulfJudith ; 2) the Junius Ms (Bodleian Library at Oxford), which contains Genesis, Exodus, Daniel Christ & Satan. 3) The Exeter Book in Exeter Cathedral: Christ, Juliana, The Wanderer, The Seafarer, Widsith, Deor & many other short pieces. 4) The Vercelli Book: Andreas, the Fates of the Apostles, Address of the Soul to the Body, The Dream of the Rood, & Elene.
The earliest forms of English literature, like those of other national literatures, have perished. The fragments we posses are not those of a literature in the making, for the poets of Beowulf, Widsith, the Ruin or the Seafarer knew what they wished to say & said it without any trace of struggle for word or form. (Sampson’s Concise Cambridge 1).
Fiend: (fi:nd) evil spirit, demon, (Con mayus. “The Devil”)
BEOWULF (3182 lines). An epic poem, that is a long narrative poem about aristocratic persons involved in a series of actions usually significant in the development of a nation, & a central hero unifies the action. Folk epics —The Iliad or Beowulf— rise from the people, are orally transmitted & finally written down. Literary epics, The Aeneid, are the work of an author who decides to write about it. The text of Beowful is divided into a prologue & 43 fits (cantos?). It is the only complete extant epic of its kind in an ancient Germanic Lang. Nowhere else there is a traditional theme handled in a long narrative poem against a background that reveals the culture & society of the Heroic Age of the Germanic people. (Daiches 8)
Norton (24-28) Though the poem is English in language & origin, it deals not with native English but with their Germanic ancestors, especially with two South Scandinavian tribes, the Danes & the Geats. The events took place some 2 centuries (?) before the poem was written; that is, it concerns a time following the initial invasion of England by Germanic tribes in 449, but before the Anglo-Saxon migration was completed.
It is generally agreed that the poet who put the old materials into their present form was a Christian. There are Christian references especially to the Old Testament: God is Creator of all (lines 27-33), his will is identical with Fate (wyrd); Grendel is a descendant of Cain (L. 41); the sword of the dam’s lair has the story of the Giants (summarized after L. 390); the dead await God’s judgment; & Hell & Devil are ready to receive the souls of Grendel & Dam, while believers will find the Father’s embrace. Hrothgar’s speech of advice to Beowulf (XXV; L. 397-431) seems to reflect the patristic doctrine in its emphasis on conscience & the Devils lying in wait for the unwary. But there are no references to the real bases of Christianity: Christ & his sacrifice. In some of the scenes there are Christian values but in others these values seem to belong to an ancient, pagan, warrior society. Even Hrothgar’s speech is more directed toward making a good Germanic leader of men than a good Christian.
The relationship between the warrior-thane and his king. The Warriors should take pride in defending him & fighting in his wars. In return the lord was expected to reward them richly for their valor.
Relationship between kinsmen. If one of the kinsmen had been slain, a man had the duty of either killing the slayer or exacting from him the payment of wergild (“manprice”). Each rank of society was evaluated at a definite price, even if the killing had been accidental. Relatives who failed either to exact wergild or take vengeance could never be happy.
The need to take vengeance would create never-ending feuds, which the practice of marrying royal princesses of hostile tribes did little to mitigate. And it is because of these feuds that the potentiality of sudden attacks or swift death is omnipresent in Beowulf: men seem to be caught in a vast web of reprisals & counter-reprisals from which there is little hope of escape. This gives the impression of a strong sense of doom.
Beowulf himself is concerned not with tribal feuds but with fatal evil. Grendel & the dragon are threats to the security of the land but they don’t have anybody to avenge them. Because they are outside the normal order of things they require a greater conqueror. It is the duty of the King & his companions, but the King is old--however, Beowulf, in his own case, will fight the dragon--& his companions unenterprising.
J. E. Cross tells that when Beowulf goes to help Hrothgar, this gladly leaves the young man to face Grendel, & the poet emphasizes that he doesn’t feel guilty, but old Beowulf, however, feels it is his duty to face the dragon. The problem is that he dies without an heir, Hygelac had raided the Frisians & there was also conflict with the Swedes. When Beowulf is dead a messenger forecasts the destruction of the Geats by these avenging nations now that their defense, a strong king, is gone.
Baugh: The English poet pictures a society heathen & heroic, but colored by Christian ideals. The hero is a Christ-like figure: he fights chiefly against forces of evil, & in the end dies for his people. Baugh believes that the English poet knew the Aeneid & was influenced by it in designing & composing his own poem. This poet did not compose a song after the manner traditional of the scops but used, instead, an elaborate, sophisticated narrative form reminiscent of the Aeneid.
John Niles believes that the structure of Beowulf follows the pattern of what is known as a ring composition, a type of design in which the last element in a series in some ways echo the first, the next to the last the second, & so on. Often the series centers on a key element so that the design is ABC...x...CBA, a form very much used in classical literature. The center would be the hero’s struggle against Grendel’s dam, surrounded by 2 contrasting pairs Grendel’s & dragon’s fights. The fight against Grendel’s dam, would be the structural center because it is when Beowulf is closer to death. The Danes give him up for dead. Here he suffers a symbolic death: correspondences with The AeneidThe Odissey. Grendel & his Dam have been called creatures of hell, & Beowulf’s descent in terms that resemble the harrowing of hell in the apocryphal (doubtful authority) gospel of Nicodemus.
Christian elements: “how th maker ... circling waters” L. 28, Cain & Abel L. 41-43, “& th one ... God’s grace!” L. 124, “his soul / ... th just” L. 494-95. Biblical: L. 48.
Duties of thanes to lord & lord to thanes: L. 451-462.
Bragging: L. 30-31, 93-94; 102-109, 161, 168.
Exaggeration: 5 nights in th water (L. 135)
Fate: L. 158, Gloom: L. 222-23.
Digression (the audience was familiar with it): L. 247-48.
Kennings: L. 56, 380, 156 (bright beacon of God), Heaven’s high arch” = the sky.
Expressions by pairs: L. 94, 97, 100, 102, 185, 263.
Moralizing, didactic note: “Better ... death” 343-46; Hrothgar’s speech 397 & fl.; 447; 453.
(All the lines refer to the abridged copy used in class)
(Vocabulary: Flagon: large rounded bottle in which cider, wine, etc. is sold; vessel with a handle, lip & lid for serving wine.)
According to Anderson in The Literature of the Anglo Saxons the 20 lines that describe the lair of Grendel & his dam (1357-1377; abridged version L. 372) constitute one of the earliest pieces of landscape poetry in English Literature.
Elegiac verse: the lament of a father for his hanged son (2444-2462) “So it is a sorrowful thing ... Nor joy in the home as there was of yore.” & the excellent piece of lyric poetry uttered by the last survivor of that race of men guarding the gold-hoard which the dragon later kept (2247-2266)”Hold thou now ... death touched his heart”.
The poet must have been a man of considerable literary background for his times: Grendel’s cave (Virgilian echoes), Hrothgar’s homily (scriptural atmosphere). In the deeds of the hero we may see the ideals of the Germanic hero. It also depicts the loyalty of warrior to chieftain; of freeman, churl & thane to their king: “Death is better for every earl than a life of shame” Wiglaf at his lord Beowulf’s passing (2890-91).
There is a suggestion that in his early youth Beowulf was a kind of loser (2183-2189); common theme of the folklore: the unpromising stripling (youth) who makes good, the male Cinderella. But as a young man he is a fabulous swimmer & diver & his superb lung-capacity: he can dive into the mere for a day (1495-96; “Nigh unto a day he endured the depths / Ere he first had view of the vast sea-bottom” L. 355-356). He possesses the strength of 30 men in his handgrip (Xerox 377-381), sufficient to tear out the arm of Grendel (815 & fl; Xerox 216-289)
Macabre details typical of Old English. battle poetry. “the black raven with the wolves pillaged the corpses” (3020-3027)
Parallels with other Germanic literatures: the conception of the fire-drake guarding a treasure is established in Germanic folklore; references to a hero Siegmund & such a dragon. In spite of its digressions it tells the story well.
Old English Christian Poetry. The first English poet known to us by name is Caedmon (670), who as Bede tells us in a beautiful passage of his Ecclesiastical History, dwelt till middle age in the monastery ruled by the abbes Hild at Streoneshalh (Whitby). Then in a vision he was called by name, and bidden to sing of God the Creator. He made his verses, and, when he awoke, remembered and made others like them. Bede, a careful and exact historian tell us that Caedmon turned into song the story of Genesis and Exodus, the settlement of the chosen people in the promised land, the life and death of the Savior, and the Revelation of the judgment to come. In the Junian ms. at Oxford there are poetical versions of those themes, but critical research has proved they don’t belong to Caedmon. The Caedmonian Hymn itself, possibly the oldest surviving piece of English poetry composed on English soil, is all we possess of the first known English poet. It is quoted by Bede. The most interesting of the Junian poems is Genesis. The main body is known as Genesis A & an interpolation Genesis B. Genesis A follows the Scriptures closely. The Old Saxon poet of Geneis B had a more daring nature. He gave his imagination wings.
All the religious poems that were not assigned to Caedmon
"THE WANDERER" in R.F.Leslie's "Theme & Structure" in Stevens & Mandel's O.E.LIT (139-162)”The Wanderer": one of a group of O.E. poems similar in elegiac tone & lyrical feeling. The situations they portray are universal, typically human but seen through the eyes of individuals. "The Wanderer" preserves its individuality in the midst of generalizations.
In the XIX century it was believed to be a pagan poem with Christian interpolations added by the scribes. Now the general belief is that of a juxtaposition between the transience of this world & th changelessness & security of the heavenly kingdom. The poem shouldn't be taken as the utterance of the poet because there is reference to other speakers.
1st 5 lines: generalizations by the Wanderer. L. 1-2a: contrast between mercy of God "Maker's mercy" with inexorability of fate "Wierd is set fast"(2b-5). However, these are not being contrasted. The Wanderer is maintaining that God in his mercy often chooses to override the course of events. There is also an allusion to an exiled wanderer that is developed in the next passage.
Ll. 6-7: monologue interrupted to emphasize wanderer's experience, his suffering. Monologue resumed in Ll. 8-9 "Alone am I driven ..." on a more personal note. Some critics see a guilty secret (10-12), but what he is really saying that there is nobody with whom he would open up, because those of his generation are dead, or maybe his gold-friend. L. 13-15 male society, & male considered virtues: a man should keep things to himself, though it is not easy "no mean virtue". 2 kennings in these lines. L. 17-20: it is not good to worry because a sad spirit cannot defy fate & men desirous of a high reputation keep their sorrows to themselves.
Ll. 19-29: Wanderer's specific application to his own past "must I also curb (keep feelings under control) my mind" & gives more information about his life "cut off from country". His troubles began with the burial of his lord (22-23), his depart from his native land: "from kind far distant" (20b) & his voyage across the sea "I went ... over the waves bound" to seek another lord (25-29a). He sought a "gold-giver" (25), one who would comfort him (28) that takes us to the closing lines of the poem where he says: "Well it is for him who seeks forgiveness, / the Heavenly Father's solace, in whom all our fastness stands." Leslie believes that in spite of the change of pronoun the monologue continues and is resumed in the first person at l. 58-62, connected in theme & pronoun with L. 8-29a.