PART I · Section 2

PART I

CHAPTER I

THE HISTORICAL ELEMENTS

SECTION I. THE PROBLEM.

The unique MS of _Beowulf_ may be, and if possible should be, seen by the student in the British Museum. It is a good specimen of the elegant script of Anglo-Saxon times: "a book got up with some care," as if intended for the library of a nobleman or of a monastery. Yet this MS is removed from the date when the poem was composed and from the events which it narrates (so far as these events are historic at all) by periods of time approximately equal to those which separate us from the time when Shakespeare's _Henry V_ was written, and when the battle of Agincourt was fought.

To try to penetrate the darkness of the five centuries which lie behind the extant MS by fitting together such fragments of illustrative information as can be obtained, and by using the imagination to bridge the gaps, has been the business of three generations of scholars distributed among the ten nations of Germanic speech. A whole library has been written around our poem, and the result is that this book cannot be as simple as either writer or reader might have wished.

The story which the MS tells us may be summarized thus: Beowulf, a prince of the Geatas, voyages to Heorot, the hall of Hrothgar, king of the Danes; there he destroys a monster Grendel, who for twelve years has haunted the hall by night and slain all he found therein. When Grendel's mother in revenge makes an attack on the hall, Beowulf seeks her out and kills her also in her home beneath the waters. He then {2} returns to his land with honour and is rewarded by his king Hygelac. Ultimately he himself becomes king of the Geatas, and fifty years later slays a dragon and is slain by it. The poem closes with an account of the funeral rites.

Fantastic as these stories are, they are depicted against a background of what appears to be fact. Incidentally, and in a number of digressions, we receive much information about the Geatas, Swedes and Danes: all which information has an appearance of historic accuracy, and in some cases can be proved, from external evidence, to be historically accurate.

* * * * *

SECTION II. THE GEATAS--THEIR KINGS AND THEIR WARS.

Beowulf's people have been identified with many tribes: but there is strong evidence that the Geatas are the Goetar (O. N. _Gautar_), the inhabitants of what is now a portion of Southern Sweden, immediately to the south of the great lakes Wener and Wetter. The names _Geatas_ and _Gautar_ correspond exactly[3], according to the rules of O. E. and O. N. phonetic development, and all we can ascertain of the Geatas and of the Gautar harmonizes well with the identification[4].

We know of one occasion only when the Geatas came into violent contact with the world outside Scandinavia. Putting together the accounts which we receive from Gregory of Tours and from two other (anonymous) writers, we learn that a piratical raid was made upon the country of the Atuarii (the O. E. _Hetware_) who dwelt between the lower Rhine and what is now the Zuyder Zee, by a king whose name is spelt in a variety of ways, all of which readily admit of identification with that of the Hygelac of our poem[5]. From the land of the Atuarii this king carried much spoil to his ships; but, remaining on shore, he was overwhelmed and slain by the army which the {3} Frankish king Theodoric had sent under his son to the rescue of these outlying provinces; the plunderers' fleet was routed and the booty restored to the country. The bones of this gigantic king of the "Getae" [presumably = Geatas] were long preserved, it was said, on an island near the mouth of the Rhine.

Such is the story of the raid, so far as we can reconstruct it from monkish Latin sources. The precise date is not given, but it must have been between A. D. 512 and 520.

Now this disastrous raid of Hygelac is referred to constantly in _Beowulf_: and the mention there of Hetware, Franks and the Merovingian king as the foes confirms an identification which would be satisfactory even without these additional data[6].

Our authorities are:

(1) Gregory of Tours (d. 594):

_His ita gestis, Dani cum rege suo nomine Chlochilaico evectu navale per mare Gallias appetunt. Egressique ad terras, pagum unum de regno Theudorici devastant atque captivant, oneratisque navibus tam de captivis quam de reliquis spoliis, reverti ad patriam cupiunt; sed rex eorum in litus resedebat donec naves alto mare conpraehenderent, ipse deinceps secuturus. Quod cum Theudorico nuntiatum fuisset, quod scilicet regio ejus fuerit ab extraneis devastata, Theudobertum, filium suum, in illis partibus cum valido exercitu et magno armorum apparatu direxit. Qui, interfecto rege, hostibus navali proelio superatis opprimit, omnemque rapinam terrae restituit._

The name of the vanquished king is spelt in a variety of ways: _Chlochilaichum_, _Chrochilaicho_, _Chlodilaichum_, _Hrodolaicum_.

See _Gregorii episcopi Turonensis Historia Francorum_, p. 110, in _Monumenta Germaniae Historica (Scriptores rerum merovingicarum, I)_.

(2) The _Liber Historiae Francorum_ (commonly called the _Gesta Francorum_):

_In illo tempore Dani cum rege suo nomine Chochilaico cum navale hoste per alto mare Gallias appetent, Theuderico paygo [i.e. pagum] Attoarios vel alios devastantes atque captivantes plenas naves de captivis alto mare intrantes rex eorum ad litus maris resedens. Quod cum Theuderico nuntiatum fuisset, Theudobertum filium suum cum magno exercitu in illis partibus dirigens. Qui consequens eos, pugnavit cum eis caede magna atque prostravit, regem eorum interficit, preda tullit, et in terra sua restituit._

The _Liber Historiae Francorum_ was written in 727, but although so much later than Gregory, it preserves features which are wanting in the earlier historian, such as the mention of the Hetware (_Attoarii_). Note too that the name of the invading king is given in a form which {4} approximates more closely to _Hygelac_ than that of any of the MSS of Gregory: variants are _Chrochilaico_, _Chohilaico_, _Chochilago_, etc.

See _Monumenta Germaniae Historica_ (_Scriptores rerum merovingicarum, II_, 274).

(3) An anonymous work _On monsters and strange beasts_, appended to two MSS of Phaedrus.

_Et sunt [monstra] mirae magnitudinis: ut rex Huiglaucus qui imperavit Getis et a Francis occisus est. Quem equus a duodecimo anno portare non potuit. Cujus ossa in Reni fluminis insula, ubi in Oceanum prorumpit, reservata sunt et de longinquo venientibus pro miraculo ostenduntur._

This treatise was first printed (from a MS of the tenth century, in private possession) by J. Berger de Xivrey (_Traditions t['e]ratologiques_, Paris, 1836, p. 12). It was again published from a second MS at Wolfenbuettel by Haupt (see his _Opuscula_ II, 223, 1876). This MS is in some respects less accurate, reading _Huncglacus_ for _Huiglaucus_, and _gentes_ for _Getis_. The treatise is assigned by Berger de Xivrey to the sixth century, on grounds which are hardly conclusive (p. xxxiv). Haupt would date it not later than the eighth century (II, 220).

The importance of this reference lies in its describing Hygelac as king of the Getae, and in its fixing the spot where his bones were preserved as near the mouth of the Rhine[7].

But if _Beowulf_ is supported in this matter by what is almost contemporary evidence (for Gregory of Tours was born only some twenty years after the raid he narrates) we shall probably be right in arguing that the other stories from the history of the Geatas, their Danish friends, and their Swedish foes, told with what seems to be such historic sincerity in the different digressions of our poem, are equally based on fact. True, we have no evidence outside _Beowulf_ for Hygelac's father, king Hrethel, nor for Hygelac's elder brothers, Herebeald and Haethcyn; and very little for Haethcyn's deadly foe, the Swedish king Ongentheow[8].

And in the last case, at any rate, such evidence might {5} fairly have been expected. For there are extant a very early Norse poem, the _Ynglinga tal_, and a much later prose account, the _Ynglinga saga_, enumerating the kings of Sweden. The _Ynglinga tal_ traces back these kings of Sweden for some thirty reigns. Therefore, though it was not composed till some four centuries after the date to which we must assign Ongentheow, it should deal with events even earlier than the reign of that king: for, unless the rate of mortality among early Swedish kings was abnormally high, thirty reigns should occupy a period of more than 400 years. Nothing is, however, told us in the _Ynglinga tal_ concerning the deeds of any king Angantyr--which is the name we might expect to correspond to Ongentheow[9].

But on the other hand, the son and grandson of Ongentheow, as recorded in _Beowulf_, _do_ meet us both in the _Ynglinga tal_ and in the _Ynglinga saga_.

According to _Beowulf_, Ongentheow had two sons, Onela and Ohthere: Onela became king of Sweden and is spoken of in terms of highest praise[10]. Yet to judge from the account given in _Beowulf_, the Geatas had little reason to love him. He had followed up the defeat of Hygelac by dealing their nation a second deadly blow. For Onela's nephews, Eadgils and Eanmund (the sons of Ohthere), had rebelled against him, and had taken refuge at the court of the Geatas, where Heardred, son of Hygelac, was now reigning, supported by Beowulf. Thither Onela pursued them, and slew the young king Heardred. Eanmund also was slain[11], then or later, but Eadgils escaped.

It is not clear from the poem what part Beowulf is supposed to have taken in this struggle, or why he failed to ward off disaster from his lord and his country. It is not even made clear whether or no he had to make formal submission to the hated Swede: but we are told that when Onela withdrew he succeeded to the vacant throne. In later days he took his revenge upon Onela. "He became a friend to Eadgils in his distress; he supported the son of Ohthere across the broad water with men, with warriors and arms: he wreaked his {6} vengeance in a chill journey fraught with woe: he deprived the king [Onela] of his life."

This story bears in its general outline every impression of true history: the struggle for the throne between the nephew and the uncle, the support given to the unsuccessful candidate by a rival state, these are events which recur frequently in the wild history of the Germanic tribes during the dark ages, following inevitably from the looseness of the law of succession to the throne.

Now the _Ynglinga tal_ contains allusions to these events, and the _Ynglinga saga_ a brief account of them, though dim and distorted[12]. We are told how Athils (=Eadgils) king of Sweden, son of Ottar (=Ohthere), made war upon Ali (=Onela). By the time the _Ynglinga tal_ was written it had been forgotten that Ali was Athils' uncle, and that the war was a civil war. But the issue, as reported in the _Ynglinga tal_ and _Ynglinga saga_, is the same as in _Beowulf_:

"King Athils had great quarrels with the king called Ali of Uppland; he was from Norway. They had a battle on the ice of Lake Wener; there King Ali fell, and Athils had the victory. Concerning this battle there is much said in the _Skjoldunga saga_."

From the _Ynglinga saga_ we learn more concerning King Athils: not always to his credit. He was, as the Swedes had been from of old, a great horse-breeder. Authorities differed as to whether horses or drink were the death of him[13]. According to one account he brought on his end by celebrating, with immoderate drinking, the death of his enemy Rolf (the _Hrothulf_ of _Beowulf_). According to another:

"King Athils was at a sacrifice of the goddesses, and rode his horse through the hall of the goddesses: the horse tripped under him and fell and threw the king; and his head smote a stone so that the skull broke and the brains lay on the stones, and that was his death. He died at Uppsala, and there was laid in mound, and the Swedes called him a mighty king."

{7}

There can, then, hardly be a doubt that there actually was such a king as Eadgils: and some of the charred bones which still lie within the gigantic "King's mounds" at Old Uppsala may well be his[14]. And, though they are not quite so well authenticated, there can also be little doubt as to the historic existence of Onela, Ohthere, and even of Ongentheow.

_The Swedish Kings._

The account in the _Ynglinga saga_ of the fight between Onela and Eadgils is as follows:

_Adhils konungr ['a]tti deilur miklar vidh konung thann, er ['A]li h['e]t inn upplenzki: hann var ['o]r N['o]regi. Their ['a]ttu orrostu ['a] Vaenis ['i]si; thar fell ['A]li konungr en Adhils hafdhi sigr; fr['a] thessarri orrostu er langt sagt ['i] Skj[o,]ldunga s[o,]gu._ (_Ynglinga saga_ in _Heimskringla_, ed. J['o]nsson, Kjoebenhavn, 1893, I, 56.)

The _Skjoldunga saga_ here mentioned is an account of the kings of Denmark. It is preserved only in a Latin abstract.

_Post haec ortis inter Adilsum illum Sveciae regem et Alonem Opplandorum regem in Norvegia, inimicitiis, praelium utrinque indicitur: loco pugnae statuto in stagno Waener, glacie jam obducto. Ad illud igitur se viribus inferiorem agnoscens Rolphonis privigni sui opem implorat, hoc proposito praemio, ut ipse Rolpho tres praeciosissimas res quascunque optaret ex universo regno Sveciae praemii loco auferret: duodecim autem pugilum ipsius quilibet 3 libras auri puri, quilibet reliquorum bellatorum tres marcas argenti defecati. Rolpho domi ipse reses pugilos suos duodecim Adilso in subsidium mittit, quorum etiam opera is alioqui vincendus, victoriam obtinuit. Illi sibi et regi propositum praemium exposcunt, negat Adilsus, Rolphoni absenti ullum deberi praemium, quare et Dani pugiles sibi oblatum respuebant, cum regem suum eo frustrari intelligerent, reversique rem, ut gesta est, exponunt._ (See _Skjoldungasaga i Arngrim Jonssons Udtog, udgiven af Axel Olrik_, Kjoebenhavn, 1894, p. 34 [116].)

There is also a reference to this battle on the ice in the _K['a]lfsv['i]sa_, a mnemonic list of famous heroes and their horses. It is noteworthy that in this list mention is made of Vestein, who is perhaps the Wihstan of our poem, and of Biar, who has been thought (very doubtfully) to correspond to the O. E. Beaw.

_Dagr reith Dr[o,]sle en Dvalenn M['o]thne..._ _['A]le Hrafne es til ['i]ss ritho,_ _enn annarr austr und Athilse_ _gr['a]r hvarfathe geire undathr._ _Bj[o,]rn reith Blakke en Biarr Kerte,_ _Atle Glaume en Athils Slungne..._ _Lieder der Edda_, ed. Symons and Gering, I, 221-2.

"Ale was on Hrafn when they rode to the ice: but another horse, a grey one, with Athils on his back, fell eastward, wounded by the spear." This, as Olrik points out, appears to refer to a version of the story in which Athils had his fall from his horse, not at a ceremony at Uppsala, but after the battle with Ali. (_Heltedigtning_, I, 203-4.)

{8}

For various theories as to the early history of the Swedish royal house, as recorded in _Beowulf_, see Weyhe, _Koenig Ongentheows Fall_, in _Engl. Stud._, XXXIX, 14-39; Schueck, _Studier i Ynglingatal_ (1905-7); Stjerna, _Vendel och Vendelkr[oa]ka_, in _A.f.n. F._ XXI, 71, _etc._

_The Geatas._

The identification of Geatas and Goetar has been accepted by the great majority of scholars, although Kemble wished to locate the Geatas in Schleswig, Grundtvig in Gotland, and Haigh in England. Leo was the first to suggest the Jutes: but the "Jute-hypothesis" owes its currency to the arguments of Fahlbeck (_Beovulfsqvaedet s[oa]som kaella foer nordisk fornhistoria_ in the _Antiqvarisk Tidskrift foer Sverige_, VIII, 2, 1). Fahlbeck's very inconclusive reasons were contested at the time by Sarrazin (23 _etc._) and ten Brink (194 _etc._) and the arguments against them have lately been marshalled by H. Schueck (_Folknamnet Geatas i den fornengelska dikten Beowulf_, Upsala, 1907). It is indeed difficult to understand how Fahlbeck's theory came to receive the support it has had from several scholars (e.g. Bugge, _P. B. B._ XII, 1 _etc._; Weyhe, _Engl. Stud._, XXXIX, 38 _etc._; Gering). For his conclusions do not arise naturally from the O. E. data: his whole argument is a piece of learned pleading, undertaken to support his rather revolutionary speculations as to early Swedish history. These speculations would have been rendered less probable had the natural interpretation of Geatas as Goetar been accepted. The Jute-hypothesis has recently been revived, with the greatest skill and learning, by Gudmund Schuette (_Journal of English and Germanic Philology_, XI, 574 _etc._). But here again I cannot help suspecting that the wish is father to the thought, and that the fact that that eminent scholar is a Dane living in Jutland, has something to do with his attempt to locate the Geatas there. No amount of learning will eradicate patriotism.

The following considerations need to be weighed:

(1) _Geatas_ etymologically corresponds exactly with O. N. _Gautar_, the modern Goetar. The O. E. word corresponding to Jutes (the Iutae of Bede) should be, not _Geatas_, but in the Anglian dialect _Eote_, _Iote_, in the West Saxon _Iete_, _Yte_.

Now it is true that in one passage in the O. E. translation of Bede (I, 15) the word "Iutarum" _is_ rendered _Geata_: but in the other (IV, 16) "Iutorum" is rendered _Eota_, _Ytena_. And this latter rendering is supported (_a_) by the _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_ (_Iotum_, _Iutna_) and (_b_) by the fact that the current O. E. word for Jutes was _Yte_, _Ytan_, which survived till after the Norman conquest. For the name _Ytena land_ was used for that portion of Hampshire which had been settled by the Jutes: William Rufus was slain, according to Florence of Worcester, in _Ytene_ (which Florence explains as _prouincia Jutarum_).

From the purely etymological point of view the Goetar-hypothesis, then, is unimpeachable: but the Jute-hypothesis is unsatisfactory, since it is based upon one passage in the O. E. Bede, where _Jutarum_ is incorrectly rendered _Geata_, whilst it is invalidated by the other passage in the O. E. Bede, by the _Chronicle_ and by Florence of Worcester, where _Jutorum_ is correctly translated by _Ytena_, or its Anglian or Kentish equivalent _Eota_, _Iotna_.

(2) It is obvious that the Geatas of _Beowulf_ were a strong and independent power--a match for the Swedes. Now we learn from Procopius that in the sixth century the Goetar were an independent {9} and numerous nation. But we have no equal evidence for any similar preponderant Jutish power in the sixth century. The _Iutae_ are indeed a rather puzzling tribe, and scholars have not even been able to agree where they dwelt.

The Goetar on the other hand are located among the great nations of Scandinavia both by Ptolemy (_Geog._ II, 11, 16) in the second century and by Procopius (_Bell. Gott._ II, 15) in the sixth. When we next get clear information (through the Christian missionaries) both Goetar and Swedes have been united under one king. But the Goetar retained their separate laws, traditions, and voice in the selection of the king, and they were constantly asserting themselves during the Middle Ages. The title of the king of Sweden, _rex Sveorum Gothorumque_, commemorates the old distinction.

From the historical point of view, then, the Goetar comply with what we are told in _Beowulf_ of the power of the Geatas much better than do the Jutes.

(3) Advocates of the Jute-hypothesis have claimed much support from the geographical argument that the Swedes and Geatas fight _ofer s[=ae]_ (e.g. when Beowulf and Eadgils attack Onela, 2394). But the term _s[=ae]_ is just as appropriate to the great lakes Wener and Wetter, which separated the Swedes from the Goetar, as it is to the Cattegatt. And we have the evidence of Scandinavian sources that the battle between Eadgils and Onela actually _did_ take place on the ice of lake Wener (see above, p. 6). Moreover the absence of any mention of ships in the fighting narrated in ll. 2922-2945 would be remarkable if the contending nations were Jutes and Swedes, but suits Goetar and Swedes admirably: since they could attack each other by land as well as by water.

(4) There is reason to think that the old land of the Goetar included a great deal of what is now the south-west coast of Sweden[15]. Hygelac's capital was probably not far from the modern Goeteborg. The descriptions in _Beowulf_ would suit the cliffs of southern Sweden well, but they are quite inapplicable to the sandy dunes of Jutland.

Little weight can, however, be attached to this last argument, as the cliffs of the land of the Geatas are in any case probably drawn from the poet's imagination.

(5) If we accept the identification Beowulf = Bjarki (see below, pp. 60-1) a further argument for the equation of Geatas and Goetar will be found in the fact that Bjarki travels to Denmark from Gautland just as Beowulf from the land of the Geatas; Bjarki is the brother of the king of the Gautar, Beowulf the nephew of the king of the Geatas.

(6) No argument as to the meaning of _Geatas_ can be drawn from the fact that Gregory calls Chlochilaicus (Hygelac) a Dane. For it is clear from _Beowulf_ that, whatever else they may have been, the Geatas were not Danes. Either, then, Gregory must be misinformed, or he must be using the word _Dane_ vaguely, to cover any kind of Scandinavian pirate.

(7) Probably what has weighed most heavily (often perhaps not consciously) in gaining converts to the "Jute-hypothesis" has been the conviction that "in ancient times each nation celebrated in song its own heroes alone." Hence one set of scholars, accepting the identification of the Geatas with the Scandinavian Goetar, have argued that _Beowulf_ is therefore simply a translation from a Scandinavian Goetish original. Others, accepting _Beowulf_ as an English poem, have {10} argued that the Geatas who are celebrated in it must therefore be one of the tribes that settled in England, and have therefore favoured the "Jute theory." But the _a priori_ assumption that each Germanic tribe celebrated in song its own national heroes only is demonstrably incorrect[16].

But in none of the accounts of the warfare of these Scandinavian kings, whether written in Norse or monkish Latin, is there mention of any name corresponding to that of Beowulf, as king of the Geatas. Whether he is as historic as the other kings with whom in our poem he is brought into contact, we cannot say.

It has been generally held that the Beowulf of our poem is compounded out of two elements: that an historic Beowulf, king of the Geatas, has been combined with a mythological figure Beowa[17], a god of the ancient Angles: that the historical achievements against Frisians and Swedes belong to the king, the mythological adventures with giants and dragons to the god. But there is no conclusive evidence for either of these presumed component parts of our hero. To the god Beowa we shall have to return later: here it is enough to note that the current assumption that there _was_ a king Beowulf of the Geatas lacks confirmation from Scandinavian sources.

And one piece of evidence there is, which tends to show that Beowulf is not an historic king at all, but that his adventures have been violently inserted amid the historic names of the kings of the Geatas. Members of the families in _Beowulf_ which we have reason to think historic bear names which alliterate the one with the other. The inference seems to be that it was customary, when a Scandinavian prince was named in the Sixth Century, to give him a name which had an initial letter similar to that of his father: care was thus taken that metrical difficulties should not prevent the names of father and son being linked together in song[18]. In the case of Beowulf himself, however, this rule breaks down. Beowulf seems an intruder {11} into the house of Hrethel. It may be answered that since he was only the offspring of a daughter of that house, and since that daughter had three brothers, there would have been no prospect of his becoming king, when he was named. But neither does his name fit in with that of the other great house with which he is supposed to be connected. Wiglaf, son of Wihstan of the Waegmundingas, was named according to the familiar rules: but Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, seems an intruder in that family as well.

This failure to fall in with the alliterative scheme, and the absence of confirmation from external evidence, are, of course, not in themselves enough to prove that the reign of Beowulf over the Geatas is a poetic figment. And indeed our poem _may_ quite possibly be true to historic fact in representing him as the last of the great kings of the Geatas; after whose death his people have nothing but national disaster to expect[19]. It would be strange that this last and most mighty and magnanimous of the kings of the Geatas should have been forgotten in Scandinavian lands: that outside _Beowulf_ nothing should be known of his reign. But when we consider how little, outside _Beowulf_, we know of the Geatic kingdom at all, we cannot pronounce such oblivion impossible.

What tells much more against Beowulf as a historic Geatic king is that there is always apt to be something extravagant and unreal about what the poem tells us of his deeds, contrasting with the sober and historic way in which other kings, like Hrothgar or Hygelac or Eadgils, are referred to. True, we must not disqualify Beowulf forthwith because he slew a dragon[20]. Several unimpeachably historical persons have done this: so sober an authority as the _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_ assures us that fiery dragons were flying in Northumbria as late as A. D. 793[21].

{12}

But (and this is the serious difficulty) even when Beowulf is depicted in quite historic circumstances, there is still something unsubstantial about his actions. When, in the midst of the strictly historical account of Hygelac's overthrow, we are told that Beowulf swam home bearing thirty suits of armour, this is as fantastic as the account of his swimming home from Grendel's lair with Grendel's head and the magic swordhilt. We may well doubt whether there is any more kernel of historic fact in the one feat than in the other[22]. Again, we are told how Beowulf defended the young prince Heardred, Hygelac's son. Where was he, then, when Heardred was defeated and slain? To protect and if necessary avenge his lord upon the battlefield was the essential duty of the Germanic retainer. Yet Beowulf has no part to play in the episode of the death of Heardred. He is simply ignored till it is over. True, we are told that in later days he _did_ take vengeance, by supporting the claims of Eadgils, the pretender, against Onela, the slayer of Heardred. But here again difficulties meet us: for the Scandinavian authorities, whilst they agree that Eadgils overthrew Onela by the use of foreign auxiliaries, represent these auxiliaries as Danish retainers, dispatched by the Danish king Hrothulf. The chief of these Danish retainers is Bothvar Bjarki, who, as we shall see later, has been thought to stand in some relation to Beowulf. But Bothvar is never regarded as king of the Geatas: and the fact remains that _Beowulf_ is at variance with our other authorities in representing Eadgils as having been placed on the throne by a Geatic rather than by a Danish force. Yet this Geatic expedition against Onela is, with the exception of the dragon episode, the only event which our poem has to narrate concerning Beowulf's long reign of fifty years. And in other respects the reign is shadowy. Beowulf, we are told, came to the throne at a time of utter national distress; he had a long and prosperous reign, and became so powerful that he was able to dethrone the mighty[23] Swedish king Onela, and place in his stead the miserable fugitive[24] Eadgils. Yet, after this half century of success, the {13} kingdom is depicted upon Beowulf's death as being in the same tottering condition in which it stood at the time when he is represented as having come to the throne, after the fall of Heardred.

The destruction one after the other of the descendants of Hrethel sounds historic: at any rate it possesses verisimilitude. But the picture of the childless Beowulf, dying, after a glorious reign, in extreme old age, having apparently made no previous arrangements for the succession, so that Wiglaf, a youth hitherto quite untried in war, steps at once into the place of command on account of his valour in slaying the dragon--this is a picture which lacks all historic probability.

I cannot avoid a suspicion that the fifty years' reign of Beowulf over the Geatas may quite conceivably be a poetic fiction[25]; that the downfall of the Geatic kingdom and its absorption in Sweden were very possibly brought about by the destruction of Hygelac and all his warriors at the mouth of the Rhine.

Such an event would have given the Swedes their opportunity for vengeance: they may have swooped down, destroyed Heardred, and utterly crushed the independent kingdom of the Geatas before the younger generation had time to grow up into fighting men.

To the fabulous achievements of Beowulf, his fight with Grendel, Grendel's dam, and the dragon, it will be necessary to return later. As to his other feats, all we can say is that the common assumption that they rest upon an historic foundation does not seem to be capable of proof. But that they have an historic background is indisputable.

* * * * *

SECTION III. HEOROT AND THE DANISH KINGS.

Of the Danish kings mentioned in _Beowulf_, we have first Scyld Scefing, the foundling, an ancient and probably a mythical figure, then Beowulf, son of Scyld, who seems an intruder among the Danish kings, since the Danish records know nothing {14} of him, and since his name does not alliterate with those of either his reputed father or his reputed son. Then comes the "high" Healfdene, to whom four children were born: Heorogar, Hrothgar, Halga "the good," and a daughter who was wedded to the Swedish king. Since Hrothgar is represented as an elder contemporary of Hygelac, we must date[26] Healfdene and his sons, should they be historic characters, between A. D. 430 and 520.

Now it is noteworthy that just after A. D. 500 the Danes first become widely known, and the name "Danes" first meets us in Latin and Greek authors. And this cannot be explained on the ground that the North has become more familiar to dwellers in the classical lands: on the contrary far less is known concerning the geography of the North Sea and the Baltic than had been the case four or five centuries before. Tacitus and Ptolemy knew of many tribes inhabiting what is now Denmark, but not of the Danes: the writers in Ravenna and Constantinople in the sixth century, though much less well informed on the geography of the North, know of the Danes as amongst the most powerful nations there. _Beowulf_ is, then, supported by the Latin and Greek records when it depicts these rulers of Denmark as a house of mighty kings, the fame of whose realm spread far and wide. We cannot tell to what extent this realm was made by the driving forth of alien nations from Denmark, to what extent by the coming together (under the common name of Danes) of many tribes which had hitherto been known by other distinct names.

The pedigree of the house of Healfdene can be constructed from the references in _Beowulf_. Healfdene's three sons, Heorogar, Hrothgar, Halga, are presumably enumerated in order of age, since Hrothgar mentions Heorogar, but not Halga, as his senior[27]. Heorogar left a son Heoroweard[28], but it is in accordance with Teutonic custom that Hrothgar should have succeeded to the throne if, as we may well suppose, Heoroweard was too young to be trusted with the kingship.

{15}

The younger brother Halga is never mentioned during Beowulf's visit to Heorot, and the presumption is that he is already dead.

The Hrothulf who, both in _Beowulf_ and _Widsith_, is linked with King Hrothgar, almost as his equal, is clearly the son of Halga: for he is Hrothgar's nephew[29], and yet he is not the son of Heorogar[30]. The mention of how Hrothgar shielded this Hrothulf when he was a child confirms us in the belief that his father Halga had died early. Yet, though he thus belongs to the youngest branch of the family, Hrothulf is clearly older than Hrethric and Hrothmund, the two sons of Hrothgar, whose youth, in spite of the age of their father, is striking. The seat of honour occupied by Hrothulf[31] is contrasted with the undistinguished place of his two young cousins, sitting among the _giogoth_[32]. Nevertheless Hrothgar and his wife expect their son, not their nephew, to succeed to the throne[33]. Very small acquaintance with the history of royal houses in these lawless Teutonic times is enough to show us that trouble is likely to be in store.

So much can be made out from the English sources, _Beowulf_ and _Widsith_. Turning now to the Scandinavian records, we find much confusion as to details, and as to the characters of the heroes: but the relationships are the same as in the Old English poem.

Heorogar is, it is true, forgotten; and though a name Hiarwarus is found in Saxo corresponding to that of Heoroweard, the son of Heorogar, in _Beowulf_, this Hiarwarus is cut off from the family, now that his father is no longer remembered. Accordingly the Halfdan of Danish tradition (Haldanus in Saxo's Latin: = O. E. Healfdene) has only two sons, Hroar {16} (Saxo's Roe, corresponding to O. E. Hrothgar) and Helgi (Saxo's Helgo: = O. E. Halga). Helgi is the father of Rolf Kraki (Saxo's Roluo: = O. E. Hrothulf), the type of the noble king, the Arthur of Denmark.

And, just as Arthur holds court at Camelot, or Charlemagne is at home _ad Ais, [`a] sa capele_, so the Scandinavian traditions represent Rolf Kraki as keeping house at Leire (_Lethra_, _Hleidhar gardhr_).

Accounts of all these kings, and above all of Rolf Kraki, meet us in a number of Scandinavian documents, of which three are particularly important:

(1) Saxo Grammaticus (the lettered), the earlier books of whose _Historia Danica_ are a storehouse of Scandinavian tradition and poetry, clothed in a difficult and bombastic, but always amusing, Latin. How much later than the English these Scandinavian sources are, we can realize by remembering that when Saxo was putting the finishing touches to his history, King John was ruling in England.

There are also a number of other Danish-Latin histories and genealogies.

(2) The Icelandic _Saga of Rolf Kraki_, a late document belonging to the end of the middle ages, but nevertheless containing valuable matter.

(3) The Icelandic _Skjoldunga saga_, extant only in a Latin summary of the end of the sixteenth century.

* * * * *

SECTION IV. LEIRE AND HEOROT.

The village of Leire remains to the present day. It stands near the north coast of the island of Seeland, some five miles from Roskilde and three miles from the sea, in a gentle valley, through the midst of which flows a small stream. The village itself consists of a tiny cluster of cottages: the outstanding feature of the place is formed by the huge grave mounds scattered around in all directions.

The tourist, walking amid these cottages and mounds, may feel fairly confident that he is standing on the site of Heorot.

There are two distinct stages in this identification: it must be proved (_a_) that the modern Leire occupies the site of the Leire (_Lethra_) where Rolf Kraki ruled, and (_b_) that the Leire of Rolf Kraki was built on the site of Heorot.

[Illustration: Leire in the Seventeenth Century

From Saxo Grammaticus, ed. Stephanius, 1644.]

{17} (_a_) That the modern Leire occupies the site of the ancient Leire has indeed been disputed[34], but seems hardly open to doubt, in view of the express words of the Danish chroniclers[35]. It is true that the mounds, which these early chroniclers probably imagined as covering the ashes of 'Haldanus' or 'Roe,' and which later antiquaries dubbed with the names of other kings, are now thought to belong, not to the time of Hrothgar, but to the Stone or Bronze Ages. But this evidence that Leire was a place of importance thousands of years before Hrothgar or Hrothulf were born, in no wise invalidates the overwhelming evidence that it was their residence also.

The equation of the modern Leire with the Leire of Rolf Kraki we may then accept. We cannot be quite so sure of our thesis (_b_): that the ancient Leire was identical with the site where Hrothgar built Heorot. But it is highly probable: for although Leire is more particularly connected with the memory of Rolf Kraki himself, we are assured, in one of the mediaeval Danish chronicles, that Leire was the royal seat of Rolf's predecessors as well: of Ro (Hrothgar) and of Ro's father: and that Ro "enriched it with great magnificence[36]." Ro also, according to this chronicler, heaped a mound at Leire over the grave of his father, and was himself buried at Leire under another mound.

Now since the Danish tradition represents Hrothgar as enriching his royal town of Leire, whilst English tradition commemorates him as a builder king, constructing a royal hall "greater than the sons of men had ever heard speak of"--it becomes very probable that the two traditions are reflections of the same fact, and that the site of that hall was Leire. That Heorot, the picturesque name of the hall itself, should, in English tradition, have been remembered, whilst that of the town where it was built had been forgotten, is natural[37]. For {18} though the names of heroes survived in such numbers, after the settlement of the Angles in England, it was very rarely indeed, so far as we can judge, that the Angles and Saxons continued to have any clear idea concerning the _places_ which had been familiar to their forefathers, but which they themselves had never seen.

Further, the names of both Hrothgar and Hrothulf are linked with Heorot in English tradition in the same way as those of Roe and Rolf are with Leire in Danish chronicles.

Yet there is some little doubt, though not such as need seriously trouble us, as to this identification of the site of Heorot with Leire. Two causes especially have led students to doubt the connection of Roe (Hrothgar) with Leire, and to place elsewhere the great hall Heorot which he built.

In the first place, Rolf Kraki came to be so intimately associated with Leire that his connection overshadowed that of Roe, and Saxo even goes so far in one place as to represent Leire as having been _founded_ by Rolf[38]. In that case Leire clearly could not be the place where Rolf's predecessor built his royal hall. But that Saxo is in error here seems clear, for elsewhere he himself speaks of Leire as being a Danish stronghold when Rolf was a child[39].

In the second place, Roe is credited with having founded the neighbouring town of Roskilde (Roe's spring)[40] so that some have wished to locate Heorot there, rather than at Leire, five miles to the west. But against this identification of Heorot with Roskilde it must be noted that Roe is said to have built Roskilde, not as a capital for himself, but as a market-place for the merchants: there is no suggestion that it was his royal town, though in time it became the capital, and its cathedral is still the Westminster Abbey of Denmark.

What at first sight looks so much in favour of our equating {19} Roskilde with Heorot--the presence in its name of the element _Ro_ (Hrothgar)--is in reality the most suspicious thing about the identification. There are other names in Denmark with the element _Ro_, in places where it is quite impossible to suppose that the king's name is commemorated. Some other explanation of the name has therefore to be sought, and it is very probable that Roskilde meant originally not "Hrothgar's spring," but "the horses' spring," and that the connection with King Ro is simply one of those inevitable pieces of popular etymology which take place so soon as the true origin of a name is forgotten[41].

Leire has, then, a much better claim than Roskilde to being the site of Heorot: and geographical considerations confirm this. For Heorot is clearly imagined by the poet of _Beowulf_ as being some distance inland; and this, whilst it suits admirably the position of Leire, is quite inapplicable to Roskilde, which is situated on the sea at the head of the Roskilde fjord[42]. Of course we must not expect to find the poet of _Beowulf_, or indeed any epic poet, minutely exact in his geography. At the same time it is clear that at the time _Beowulf_ was written there were traditions extant, dealing with the attack made upon Heorot by the ancestral foes of the Danes, a tribe called the Heathobeardan. These accounts of the fighting around Heorot must have preserved the general impression of its situation, precisely as from the _Iliad_ we know that Troy is neither on the sea nor yet very remote from it. A poet would draw on his imagination for details, but would hardly alter a feature like this.

In these matters absolute certainty cannot be reached: but we may be fairly sure that the spot where Hrothgar built his "Hart-Hall" and where Hrothulf held that court to which the North ever after looked for its pattern of chivalry was {20} Leire, where the grave mounds rise out of the waving cornfields[43].

* * * * *

SECTION V. THE HEATHOBEARDAN.

Now, as _Beowulf_ is the one long Old English poem which happens to have been preserved, we, drawing our ideas of Old English story almost exclusively from it, naturally think of Heorot as the scene of the fight with Grendel.

But in the short poem of _Widsith_, almost certainly older than _Beowulf_, we have a catalogue of the characters of the Old English heroic poetry. This catalogue is dry in itself, but is of the greatest interest for the light it throws upon Old Germanic heroic legends and the history behind them. And from _Widsith_ it is clear that the rule of Hrothgar and Hrothulf at Heorot and the attack of the Heathobeardan upon them, rather than any story of monster-quelling, was what the old poets more particularly associated with the name of Heorot. The passage in _Widsith_ runs: