Chapter XXXIX: Appendix: A. a Postscript on Mythology in Beowulf (1)

(1) _Beowulf the Scylding and Beowulf son of Ecgtheow_

It is now ten years since Prof. Lawrence attacked the mythological theories which, from the time when they were first enunciated by Kemble and elaborated by Muellenhoff, had wielded an authority over _Beowulf_ scholars which was only very rarely disputed[523].

Whilst in the main I agree with Prof. Lawrence, I believe that there _is_ an element of truth in the theories of Kemble. It would, indeed, be both astonishing and humiliating if we found that a view, accepted for three-quarters of a century by almost every student, had no foundation. What is really remarkable is, not that Kemble should have carried his mythological theory too far, but that, with the limited information at his disposal, he at once saw certain aspects of the truth so clearly.

The mythological theories involve three propositions:

(_a_) That some, or all, of the supernatural stories told of Beowulf the Geat, son of Ecgtheow (especially the Grendel-struggle and the dragon-struggle), were originally told of Beowulf the Dane, son of Scyld, who can be identified with the Beow or Beaw[524] of the genealogies.

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(_b_) That this Beow was an ancient "god of agriculture and fertility."

(_c_) That therefore we can allegorize Grendel and the dragon into culture-myths connected with the "god Beow."

Now (_c_) would not necessarily follow, even granting (_a_) and (_b_); for though a hero of story be an ancient god, many of his most popular adventures may be later accretion. However, these two propositions (_a_) and (_b_) would, together, establish a very strong probability that the Grendel-story and the dragon-story were ancient culture-myths, and would entitle to a sympathetic hearing those who had such an interpretation of them to offer.

That Beow is an ancient "god of agriculture and fertility," I believe to be substantially true. We shall see that a great deal of evidence, unknown to Kemble and Muellenhoff, is now forthcoming to show that there _was_ an ancient belief in a corn-spirit Beow: and this Beow, whom we find in the genealogies as son of Scyld or Sceldwa and descendant of Sceaf, is pretty obviously identical with Beowulf, son of Scyld Scefing, in the _Prologue_ of _Beowulf_.

So far as the _Prologue_ is concerned, there is, then, almost certainly a remote mythological background. But before we can claim that this background extends to the supernatural adventures attributed to Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, we must prove our proposition (_a_): that these adventures were once told, not of Beowulf, son of Ecgtheow, but of Beowulf or Beow, son of Scyld.

When it was first suggested, at the very beginning of _Beowulf_-criticism, that Beowulf was identical with the Beow of the genealogies, it had not been realized that there were in the poem _two_ persons named Beowulf: and thus an anonymous scholar in the _Monthly Review_ of 1816[525], not knowing that Beowulf the slayer of Grendel is (at any rate in the poem as it stands) distinct from Beowulf, son of Scyld, connected both with Beow, son of Scyld, so initiating a theory which, for almost a century, was accepted as ascertained fact.

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Kemble's identification was probably made independently of the work of this early scholar. Unlike him, Kemble, of course, realized that in our poem Beowulf the Dane, son of Scyld, is a person distinct from, is in fact not related to, Beowulf son of Ecgtheow. But he deliberately identified the two: he thought that two distinct traditions concerning the same hero had been amalgamated: in one of these traditions Beowulf may have been represented as son of Scyld, in the other as son of Ecgtheow, precisely as the hero Gunnar or Gunter is in one tradition son of Gifica (Giuki), in another son of Dankrat.

Of course such duplication as Kemble assumed is conceivable. Kemble might have instanced the way in which one and the same hero reappears in the pages of Saxo Grammaticus, with somewhat different parentage or surroundings, as if he were a quite different person. The _Lives of the Two Offas_ present another parallel: the adventures of the elder Offa have been transferred to the younger, so that, along with much that is historical or semi-historical, we have much in the _Life of Offa II_ that is simply borrowed from the story of Offa I. In the same way it is conceivable that reminiscences of the mythical adventures of the elder Beowulf (Beow) might have been mingled with the history of the acts of the younger Beowulf, king of the Geatas. A guarantee of the intrinsic reasonableness of this theory lies in the fact that recently it has been put forward again by Dr Henry Bradley. But it is not enough that a theory should be conceivable, and be supported by great names. I cannot see that there is any positive evidence for it at all.

The arguments produced by Kemble are not such as to carry conviction at the present day. The fact that Beowulf the Geat, son of Ecgtheow, "is represented throughout as a protecting and redeeming being" does not necessarily mean that we must look for some god or demigod of the old mythology--Frey or Sceaf or Beow--with whom we can identify him. This characteristic is strongly present in many Old English monarchs and magnates of historic, Christian, times: Oswald or Alfred or Byrhtnoth. Indeed, it might with much plausibility be argued that we are to see in this "protecting" character {294} of the hero evidence of Christian rather than of heathen influence[526].

Nor can we argue anything from the absence of any historic record of a king Beowulf of the Geatas; our records are too scanty to admit of argument from silence: and were such argument valid, it would only prove Beowulf fictitious, not mythological--no more necessarily an ancient god than Tom Jones or Mr Pickwick.

There remains the argument of Dr Bradley. He points out that

"The poem is divided into numbered sections, the length of which was
probably determined by the size of the pieces of parchment of which an
earlier exemplar consisted. Now the first fifty-two lines, which are
concerned with Scyld and his son Beowulf, stand outside this numbering.
It may reasonably be inferred that there once existed a written text of
the poem that did not include these lines. Their substance, however, is
clearly ancient. Many difficulties will be obviated if we may suppose
that this passage is the beginning of a different poem, the hero of
which was not Beowulf the son of Ecgtheow, but his Danish
namesake[527]."

In this Bradley sees support for the view that "there were circulated in England two rival poetic versions of the story of the encounters with supernatural beings: the one referring them to Beowulf the Dane" [of this the _Prologue_ to our extant poem would be the only surviving portion, whilst] "the other (represented by the existing poem) attached them to the legend of the son of Ecgtheow."

But surely many objections have to be met. Firstly, as Dr Bradley admits, the mention of Beowulf the Dane is not confined to the _Prologue_; this earlier Beowulf "is mentioned at the beginning of the first numbered section" and consequently Dr Bradley has to suppose that "the opening lines of this section have undergone alteration in order to bring them into connection with the prefixed matter." And why should we assume that the "passus" of _Beowulf_ correspond to pieces of {295} parchment of various sizes of which an earlier exemplar consisted? These "passus" vary in length from 43 lines to 142, a disproportion by no means extraordinary for the sections of one and the same poem, but very awkward for the pages of one and the same book, however roughly constructed. One of the "passus" is just twice the average length, and 30 lines longer than the one which comes next to it in size. Ought we to assume that an artificer would have made his book clumsy by putting in this one disproportionate page, when, by cutting it in two, he could have got two pages of just about the size he wanted? Besides, the different "passus" do not seem to me to show signs of having been caused by such mechanical reasons as the dimensions of the parchment upon which they were written. On the contrary, the 42 places where sections begin and end almost all come where a reader might reasonably be expected to pause: 16 at the beginning or end of a speech: 18 others at a point where the narrative is resumed after some digression or general remark. Only eight remain, and even with these, there is generally some pause in the narrative at the point indicated. In only two instances does a "passus" end at a flagrantly inappropriate spot; in one of these there is strong reason to suppose that the scribe may have caused the trouble by beginning with a capital where he had no business to have done so[528]. Generally, there seems to be some principle governing the division of chapter from chapter, even though this be not made as a modern would have made it. But, if so, is there anything extraordinary in the first chapter, which deals with events three generations earlier than those of the body of the poem, being allowed to stand outside the numbering, as a kind of prologue?

The idea of a preface or prologue was quite familiar in Old English times. The oldest MSS[529] of Bede's _History_ have, at the end of the preface, _Explicit praefatio incipiunt capitula_. So we have in one of the two oldest MSS[530] of the _Pastoral Care_ "Dhis is seo forespraec." On the other hand, the prologue or preface might be left without any heading or colophon, and the next {296} chapter begin as No. I. This is the case in the other MS of the _Pastoral Care_[531]. Is there, then, such difficulty in the dissertation on the glory of the ancient Danish kings being treated as what, in fact, it is: a prologue or preface; and being, as such, simply left outside the numbering?

Still less can we argue for the identification of our hero, the son of Ecgtheow, with Frotho, and through him with Beow, from the supposed resemblances between the dragon fights of Beowulf and Frotho. Such resemblances have been divined by Sievers, but we have seen that it is the dissimilarity, not the resemblance, of the two dragon fights which is really noteworthy[532].

To prove that Beow was the original antagonist of Grendel there remains, then, only the mention in the charter of a _Grendles mere_ near a _B[=e]owan hamm_[533]. Now this was not known to Kemble at the time when he formed his theory that the original slayer of Grendel was not Beowulf, but Beow. And if the arguments upon which Kemble based his theory had been at all substantial, this charter would have afforded really valuable support. But the fact that two names occur near each other in a charter cannot confirm any theory, unless that theory has already a real basis of its own.

(2) _Beow_

Therefore, until some further evidence be discovered, we must regard the belief that the Grendel and the dragon stories were originally myths of Beow, as a theory for which sufficient evidence is not forthcoming.

But note where the theory breaks down. It seems indisputable that Beowulf the Dane, son of Scyld Scefing, is identical with Beo(w) of the genealogies: for Beo(w) is son of Scyld[534] or Sce(a)ldwa[535], who is a Scefing. But here we must stop. There is, as we have seen, no evidence that the Grendel or dragon adventures were transferred from him to their present hero, {297} Beowulf the Geat, son of Ecgtheow. It would, of course, be quite possible to accept such transference, and _still_ to reject the mythological interpretation of these adventures, just as it would be possible to believe that Gawain was originally a sun-hero, whilst rejecting the interpretation as a sun-myth of any particular adventure which could be proved to have been once told concerning Gawain. But I do not think we need even concede, as Boer[536] and Chadwick[537] do, that adventures have been transferred from Beowulf the Dane to Beowulf the Geat. We have seen that there is no evidence for such transference, however intrinsically likely it may be. Till evidence _is_ forthcoming, it is useless to build upon Kemble's conjecture that Beowulf the Scylding sank into Beowulf the Waegmunding[538].

But it is due to Kemble to remember that, while he only put this forward as a tentative conjecture, what he _was_ certain about was the identity of Beowulf the Scylding with Beow, and the divinity of these figures. And here all the evidence seems to justify him.

"The divinity of the earlier Be['o]wulf," Kemble wrote, "I hold for
indisputable.... Beo or Beow is ... in all probability a god of
agriculture and fertility.... It strengthens this view of the case that
he is the grandson of Sce['a]f, _manipulus frumenti_, with whom he is
perhaps in fact identical[539]."

Whether or no Beow and Sceaf were ever identical, it is certain that Beow (grain) the descendant of Sceaf (sheaf) suggests a corn-myth, some survival from the ancient worship of a corn-spirit.

Now _b[=e]ow_, 'grain, barley,' corresponds to Old Norse _bygg_, just as, corresponding to O.E. _tr[=i]ewe_, we have O.N. _tryggr_, or corresponding to O.E. _gl[=e]aw_, O.N. _gl[o,]ggr_. Corresponding to the O.E. proper name _B[=e]ow_, we might expect an O.N. name, the first letters in which would be _Bygg(v)-_.

And pat he comes, like the catastrophe of the Old Comedy. When Loki strode into the Hall of Aegir, and assailed with clamour and scandal the assembled gods and goddesses, there were present, among the major gods, also Byggvir and his wife {298} Beyla, the servants of Frey, the god of agriculture and fertility. Loki reviles the gods, one after the other: at last he exchanges reproaches with Frey. To see his lord so taunted is more than Byggvir can endure, and he turns to Loki with the words:

Know thou, that were my race such as is that of Ingunar-Frey, and if I
had so goodly a seat, finer than marrow would I grind thee, thou crow
of ill-omen, and pound thee all to pieces[540].

Byggvir is evidently no great hero: he draws his ideas from the grinding of the homely hand-mill, with which John Barleycorn has reason to be familiar:

A miller used him worst of all,
For he crushed him between two stones[541].

Loki, who has addressed by name all the other gods, his acquaintances of old, professes not to know who is this insignificant being: but his reference to the hand-mill shows that in reality he knows quite well:

What is that little creature that I see, fawning and sneaking and
snuffling: ever wilt thou be at the ears of Frey, and chattering at the
quern[542].

Byggvir replies with a dignity which reminds us of the traditional characteristics of Sir John Barleycorn, or Allan O'Maut. For:

Uskie-bae ne'er bure the bell
Sae bald as Allan bure himsel[543].

{299} Byggvir adopts the same comic-heroic pose:

Byggvir am I named, and all gods and men call me hasty; proud am I, by
reason that all the children of Odin are drinking ale together[544].

But any claims Byggvir may make to be a hero are promptly dismissed by Loki:

Hold thou silence, Byggvir, for never canst thou share food justly
among men: thou didst hide among the straw of the hall: they could not
find thee, when men were fighting[545].

Now the taunts of Loki, though we must hope for the credit of Asgard that they are false, are never pointless. And such jibes as Loki addresses to Byggvir _would_ be pointless, if applied to one whom we could think of as in any way like our Beowulf. Later, Beyla, wife of Byggvir, speaks, and is silenced with the words "Hold thy peace--wife thou art of Byggvir." Byggvir must have been a recognized figure of the old mythology[546], but one differing from the monster-slaying Beow of Muellenhoff's imagination.

Byggvir is a little creature (_et l['i]tla_), and we have seen above[547] that Scandinavian scholars have thought that they have discovered this old god in the Pekko who "promoted the growth of barley" among the Finns in the sixteenth century, and who is still worshipped among the Esthonians on the opposite side of the gulf as a three year old child; the form _Pekko_ being derived, it is supposed, from the primitive Norse form *_Beggwuz_. This is a corner of a very big subject: the discovery, among the Lapps and Finns, of traces of the heathendom of the most {300} ancient Teutonic world, just as Thomsen has taught us to find in the Finnish language traces of Teutonic words in their most antique form.

The Lappish field has proved the most successful hunting ground[548]: among the Finns, apart from the Thunder-god, connection with Norse beliefs is arguable mainly for a group of gods of fruitfulness[549]. The cult of these, it is suggested, comes from scattered Scandinavian settlers in Finland, among whom the Finns dwelt, and from whom they learnt the worship of the spirits of the seed and of the spring, just as they learnt more practical lessons. First and foremost among these stands Pekko, whom we know to have been especially the god of barley, and whose connection with Beow or Byggvir (*_Beggwuz_) is therefore a likely hypothesis enough[550]. Much less certain is the connection of Saempsae, the spirit of vegetation, with any Germanic prototype; he may have been a god of the rush-grass[551] (Germ. _simse_). Runkoteivas or Rukotivo was certainly the god of rye, and the temptation to derive his name from Old Norse (_rugr-tivorr_, "rye-god") is great[552]. But we have not evidence for {301} the worship among Germanic peoples of such a rye-god, as we have in the case of the barley-god Byggvir-Beow. These shadowy heathen gods, however, do give each other a certain measure of mutual support.

And, whether or no Pekko be the same as Byggvir, his worship is interesting as showing how the spirit of vegetation may be honoured among primitive folk. His worshippers, the Setukese, although nominally members of the Greek Orthodox Church, speak their own dialect and often hardly understand that of their Russian priests, but keep their old epic and lyric traditions more than almost any other section of the Finnish-Esthonian race. Pekko, who was honoured among the Finns in the sixteenth century for "promoting the growth of barley," survives among the present-day peasantry around Pskoff, not only as a spirit to be worshipped, but as an actual idol, fashioned out of wax in the form of a child, sometimes of a three year old child. He lives in the corn-bin, but on certain occasions is carried out into the fields. Not everyone can afford the amount of wax necessary for a Pekko--in fact there is usually only one in a village: he lodges in turn with different members of his circle of worshippers. He holds two moveable feasts, on moonlight nights--one in spring, the other in autumn. The wax figure is brought into a lighted room draped in a sheet, there is feasting, with dancing hand in hand, and singing round Pekko. Then they go out to decide who shall keep Pekko for the next year--his host is entitled to special blessing and protection. Pekko is carried out into the field, especially to preside over the sowing[553].

I doubt whether, in spite of the high authorities which support it, we can as yet feel at all certain about the identification of Beow and Pekko. But I think we can accept with fair certainty the identification of Beow and Byggvir. And we can at any rate use Pekko as a collateral example of the way in which a grain-spirit is regarded. Now in either case we find no support whatever for the supposition that the activities of {302} Beow, the spirit of the barley, could, or would, have been typified under the guise of battles such as those which Beowulf the Geat wages against Grendel, Grendel's mother, and the dragon. In Beowulf the Geat we find much that suggests the hero of folk-tale, overlaid with much that belongs to him as the hero of an heroic poem, but nothing suggestive of a corn-myth. On the other hand, so long as we confine ourselves to Beow and his ancestor Sceaf, we _are_ in touch with this type of myth, however remotely. The way that Sceaf comes over the sea, as recorded by William of Malmesbury, is characteristic. That "Sheaf" should be, in the language of Muellenhoff, "placed in a boat and committed to the winds and waves in the hope that he will return new-born in the spring" is exactly what we might expect, from the analogy of harvest customs and myths of the coming of spring.

In Saetersdale, in Norway, when the ice broke up in the spring, and was driven ashore, the inhabitants used to welcome it by throwing their hats into the air, and shouting "Welcome, Corn-boat." It was a good omen if the "Corn-boats" were driven high and dry up on the land[554]. The floating of the sheaf on a shield down the Thames at Abingdon[555] reminds us of the Bulgarian custom, in accordance with which the venerated last sheaf of the harvest was floated down the river[556]. But every neighbourhood is not provided with convenient rivers, and in many places the last sheaf is merely drenched with water. This is an essential part of the custom of "crying the neck."

The precise ritual of "crying the neck" or "crying the mare" was confined to the west and south-west of England[557]. But there is no such local limitation about the custom of drenching the {303} last sheaf, or its bearers and escort, with water. This has been recorded, among other places, at Hitchin in Hertfordshire[558], in Cambridgeshire[559], Nottinghamshire[560], Pembrokeshire[561], Wigtownshire[562] as well as in Holstein[563], Westphalia[564], Prussia[565], Galicia[566], Saxon Transsylvania[567], Roumania[568] and perhaps in ancient Phrygia[569].

Now it is true that drenching the last sheaf with water, as a rain charm, is by no means the same thing as floating it down the river, in the expectation that it will come again in the spring. But it shows the same sense of the continued existence of the corn-spirit. That the _seed_, when sown, should be sprinkled with water as a rain charm (as is done in places) seems obvious and natural enough. But when the _last sheaf_ of the preceding harvest is thus sprinkled, to ensure plenteous rain upon the crops of next year, we detect the same idea of continuity which we find expressed when Sceaf comes to land from over the sea: the spirit embodied in the sheaf of last year's harvest returning, and bringing the renewed power of vegetation.

The voyage of the Abingdonian sheaf on the Thames was conducted upon a shield, and it may be that the "vessel without a rower" in which "Sheaf" came to land was, in the original version, a shield. There would be precedent for this. The shield was known by the puzzling name of "Ull's ship" in Scaldic poetry, presumably because the god Ull used his shield as a boat. Anyway, Scyld came to be closely connected with Sceaf and Beow. In Ethelwerd he is son of the former and father of the latter: but in the _Chronicle_ genealogies five names intervene between Scyld and Sceaf, and the son of Sceaf is Bedwig, or as he is called in one version, Beowi. _Bedwig_ and _Beowi_ are probably derived from _Beowius_, the Latinized {304} form of _Beow_. A badly formed _o_ might easily be mistaken for a _d_, and indeed _Beowius_ appears in forms much more corrupt. In that case it would appear that while some genealogies made Beow the son of Scyld, others made him son of Sceaf, and that the compiler of the pedigree got over the difficulty in the usual way, by adding the one version to the other[570].

But all this is very hypothetical; and how and when Scyld came to be connected with Sceaf and with Beow we cannot with any certainty say. At any rate we find no trace of such connection in Danish traditions of the primitive King Skjold of the Danes. But we can say, with some certainty, that in Beowulf the Dane, the son of Scyld Scefing, in our poem, we have a figure which is identical with Beow, son of Scyld or of Sceldwa and descendant of Sceaf, in the genealogies, and that this Beow is likely to have been an ancient corn-spirit, parallel to the Scandinavian Byggvir. That amount of mythology probably _does_ underlie the _Prologue_ to _Beowulf_, though the author would no doubt have been highly scandalized had he suspected that his pattern of a young prince was only a disguised heathen god. But I think that any further attempt to proceed, from this, to mythologize the deeds of Beowulf the Great, is pure conjecture, and probably quite fruitless conjecture.

I ought not to conclude this note without reference to the admirable discussion of this subject by Prof. Bjoerkman in _Englische Studien_[571]. This, with the elucidation of other proper names in _Beowulf_, was destined to be the last big contribution to knowledge made by that ripe and good scholar, whose premature loss we all deplore; and it shows to the full those qualities of wide knowledge and balanced judgment which we have all learnt to admire in him.

* * * * *

B. GRENDEL

It may be helpful to examine the places where the name of Grendel occurs in English charters.

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A.D. 708. Grant of land at Abbots Morton, near Alcester, co. Worcester, by Kenred, King of the Mercians, to Evesham (extant in a late copy).

_[=Ae]rest of grindeles pytt on w[=i]dhimaere; of w[=i]dhimaere on
thaet r[=e]ade sl[=o]h ... of dh[=e]re d[=i]ce on thene blace p[=o]l;
of th[=a]m p[=o]le aefter long pidele in t[=o] th[=a]m mersce; of
th[=a]m mersce th[=a] aeft on grindeles pytt[572]._

The valley of the Piddle Brook is about a mile wide, with hills rising on each side till they reach a height of a couple of hundred feet above the brook. The directions begin in the valley and run "From Grindel's 'pytt' to the willow-mere; from the willow-mere to the red morass"; then from the morass the directions take us up the hill and along the lea, where they continue among the downs till we again make our descent into the valley, "from the ditch to the black pool, from the pool along the Piddle brook to the marsh, and from the marsh back to Grindel's 'pytt.'" In modern English a "pit" is an artificial hole which is generally dry: but the word is simply Latin _puteus_, "a well," and is used in this sense in the Gospel translations. Here it is a hole, and we may be sure that, with the willow-mere and the red slough on the one side, and the black pool and the marsh on the other, the hole was full of water.

A.D. 739. Grant of land at Creedy, co. Devon, by Aethelheard, King of Wessex, to Bishop Forthhere.

_of doddan hrycge on grendeles pyt; of grendeles pytte on ifigbearo_
(ivy-grove)...[573].

The spot is near the junction of the rivers Exe and Creedy, with Dartmoor in the distance. The neighbourhood bears uncanny names, _C[=a]ines aecer, egesan tr[=e]ow_. If, as has been suggested by Napier and Stevenson, a trace of this pit still survives in the name Pitt farm, the mere must have been in the uplands, about 600 feet above sea level.

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A.D. 931. Grant of land at Ham in Wiltshire by Athelstan to his thane Wulfgar. Quoted above, p. 43. It is in this charter that _on B[=e]owan hammes hecgan, on Grendles mere_[574] occur. "Grendel pits or meres" are in most other cases in low-lying marshy country: but this, like (perhaps) the preceding one, is in the uplands--it must have been a lonely mere among the hills, under Inkpen Beacon.

_Circa_ A.D. 957. A list of boundaries near Battersea[575].

_Dhis synd dh[=a] landgem[=ae]re t[=o] Batriceseie. [=Ae]rst at
h[=e]gefre; fram h[=e]gefre to gaetenesheale; fram gaeteneshaele to
gryndeles syllen; fram gryndeles sylle to russemere; fram ryssemere to
baelgenham...._

All this is low-lying land, just south of the Thames. _H[=e]gefre_ is on the river; _Baelgenham_ is Balham, co. Surrey. "From Grendel's mire to the rushy mere" harmonizes excellently with what we know of the swampy nature of this district in early times.

A.D. 958. Grant of land at Swinford, on the Stour, co. Stafford, by King Eadred to his thane Burhelm[576].

_Ondlong baeces widh neothan eostacote; ondlong d[=i]ces in
grendels-mere; of grendels-mere in st[=a]nc[=o]fan; of st[=a]nc[=o]fan
ondlong d[=u]ne on stiran mere...._

A.D. 972. Confirmation of lands to Pershore Abbey (Worcester) by King Edgar[577].

_of Grindles bece sw[=a] thaet gem[=ae]re ligdh...._

A.D. 972. Extract from an account of the descent of lands belonging to Westminster, quoting a grant of King Edgar[578].

_andlang hagan to grendeles gatan aefter kincges mearce innan
braegentan...._

The property described is near Watling Street, between Edgware, Hendon, and the River Brent. It is a low-lying {307} district almost surrounded by the hills of Hampstead, Highgate, Barnet, Mill Hill, Elstree, Bushey Heath and Harrow. The bottom of the basin thus formed must have been a swamp[579]. What the "gate" may have been it is difficult to say. A foreign scholar has suggested that it may have been a narrow mountain defile or possibly a cave[580]: but this suggestion could never have been made by anyone who knew the country. The "gate" is likely to have been a channel connecting two meres--or it might have been a narrow piece of land between them--one of those _enge [=a]npadhas_ which Grendel and his mother had to tread. Anyway, there is nothing exceptional in this use of "gate" in connection with a water-spirit. Necker, on the Continent, also had his "gates." Thus there is a "Neckersgate Mill" near Brussels, and the name "Neckersgate" used also to be applied to a group of houses near by, surrounded by water[581].

All the other places clearly point to a water-spirit: two meres, two pits, a mire and a beck: for the most part situated in low-lying country which must in Anglo-Saxon times have been swampy. All this harmonizes excellently with the _fenfreodho_ of _Beowulf_ (l. 851). Of course it does not in the least follow that these places were named after the Grendel of our poem. It may well be that there was in England a current belief in a creature Grendel, dwelling among the swamps. Von Sydow has compared the Yorkshire belief in Peg Powler, or the Lancashire Jenny Greenteeth. But these aquatic monsters are not exactly parallel; for they abide in the water, and are dangerous only to those who attempt to cross it, or at any rate venture too near the bank[582], whilst Grendel and even his mother are capable of excursions of some distance from their fastness amid the fens.

{308}

Of course the mere-haunting Grendel _may_ have been identified only at a comparatively late date with the spirit who struggles with the hero in the house, and flees below the earth in the folk-tale.

At any rate belief in a Grendel, haunting mere and fen, is clearly demonstrable for England--at any rate for the south and west of England: for of these place-names two belong to the London district, one to Wiltshire, one to Devonshire, two to Worcester and one to Stafford. The place-name _Grendele_ in Yorkshire is too doubtful to be of much help. (_Domesday Book_, I, 302.) It is the modern village Grindale, four miles N.W. of Bridlington. From it, probably, is derived the surname _Grindle, Grindall_ (Bardsley).

Abroad, the nearest parallel is to be found in Transsylvania, where there is a _Graendels m[^o]r_ among the Saxons of the Senndorf district, near Bistritz. The Saxons of Transsylvania are supposed to have emigrated from the neighbourhood of the lower Rhine and the Moselle, and there is a _Grindelbach_ in Luxemburg which may possibly be connected with the marsh demon[583].

Most of the German names in _Grindel-_ or _Grendel-_ are connected with _grendel_, "a bar," and therefore do not come into consideration here[584]: but the Transsylvanian "Grendel's marsh[585]," anyway, reminds us of the English "Grendel's marsh" or "mere" or "pit." Nevertheless, the local story with which the Transsylvanian swamp is connected--that of a peasant who was ploughing with six oxen and was swallowed up in the earth--is such that it requires considerable ingenuity to see any connection between it and the _Beowulf-Grendel_-tale[586].

{309}

The Anglo-Saxon place-names may throw some light upon the meaning and etymology of "Grendel[587]." The name has generally been derived from _grindan_, "to grind"; either directly[588], because Grendel grinds the bones of those he devours, or indirectly, in the sense of "tormentor[589]." Others would connect with O.N. _grindill_, "storm," and perhaps with M.E. _gryndel_, "angry[590]."

It has recently been proposed to connect the word with _grund_, "bottom": for Grendel lives in the _mere-grund_ or _grund-wong_ and his mother is the _grund-wyrgin_. Erik Rooth, who proposes this etymology, compares the Icelandic _grandi_, "a sandbank," and the common Low German dialect word _grand_, "coarse sand[591]." This brings us back to the root "to grind," for _grand_, "sand" is simply the product of the grinding of the waves[592]. Indeed the same explanation has been given of the word "ground[593]."

However this may be, the new etymology differs from the old in giving Grendel a name derived, not from his grinding or tormenting others, but from his dwelling at the bottom of the lake or marsh[594]. The name would have a parallel in the Modern English _grindle_, _grundel_, German _grundel_[595], a fish haunting the bottom of the water.

The Old English place-names, associating Grendel as they do with meres and swamps, seem rather to support this.

As to the Devonshire stream _Grendel_ (now the Grindle or Greendale Brook), it has been suggested that this name is also {310} connected with the root _grand_, "gravel," "sand." But, so far as I have been able to observe, there is no particular suggestion of sand or gravel about this modest little brook. If we follow the River Clyst from the point where the Grindle flows into it, through two miles of marshy land, to the estuary of the Exe, we shall there find plenty. But it is clear from the charter of 963 that the name was then, as now, restricted to the small brook. I cannot tell why the stream should bear the name, or what, if any, is the connection with the monster Grendel. We can only note that the name is again found attached to water, and, near the junction with the Clyst, to marshy ground.

Anyone who will hunt Grendel through the shires, first on the 6-in. ordnance map, and later on foot, will probably have to agree with the Three Jovial Huntsmen

This huntin' doesn't pay,
But we'n powler't up an' down a bit, an' had a rattlin' day.

But, if some conclusions, although scanty, can be drawn from place-names in which the word _grendel_ occurs, nothing can be got from the numerous place-names which have been thought to contain the name _B[=e]ow_. The clearest of these is the _on B[=e]owan hammes hecgan_, which occurs in the Wiltshire charter of 931. But we can learn nothing definite from it: and although there are other instances of strong and weak forms alternating, we cannot even be quite certain that the Beowa here is identical with the Beow of the genealogies[596].

The other cases, many of which occur in _Domesday Book_ are worthless. Those which point to a weak form may often be derived from the weak noun _b[=e]o_, "bee": "The Anglo-Saxons set great store by their bees, honey and wax being indispensables to them[597]."

_B[=e]as br[=o]c_, _B[=e]as feld_ (_Bewes feld_) occur in charters: but here a connection with _b[=e]aw_, "horsefly," is possible: for parallels, one has only to consider the long list of places enumerated by Bjoerkman, the names of which are derived from those of beasts, {311} birds, or insects[598]. And in such a word as _B[=e]ol[=e]ah_, even if the first element be _b[=e]ow_, why may it not be the common noun "barley," and not the name of the hero at all?

No argument can therefore be drawn from such a conjecture as that of Olrik, that _B[=e]as br[=o]c_ refers to the water into which the last sheaf (representing Beow) was thrown, in accordance with the harvest custom, and in the expectation of the return of the spirit in the coming spring[599].

* * * * *

C. THE STAGES ABOVE WODEN IN THE WEST-SAXON GENEALOGY

The problems to which this pedigree gives rise are very numerous, and some have been discussed above. There are four which seem to need further discussion.

(I) A "Sceafa" occurs in _Widsith_ as ruling over the Longobards. Of course we cannot be certain that this hero is identical with the Sceaf of the genealogy. Now there is no one in the long list of historic or semi-historic Longobard kings, ruling after the tribe had left Scandinavia, who bears a name at all similar. It seems therefore reasonable to suppose that Sceafa, if he is a genuine Longobard king at all, belongs to the primitive times when the Longobardi or Winnili dwelt in "Scadan," before the historic or semi-historic times with which our extant list deals. And Old English accounts, although making Sceaf an ancestor of the Saxon kings, are unanimous in connecting him with Scani or Scandza.

Some scholars[600] have seen a serious difficulty in the weak form "Sceafa," as compared with "Sceaf." But we have the exactly parallel cases of _Horsa_[601] compared with _Hors_[602], and _Hr[=ae]dla_[603] compared with _Hr[=ae]del_[604], _Hr[=e]dhel_. Parallel, but not quite so certain, are _Sceldwa_[605] and _Scyld_[606], _G[=e]ata_[607] and _G[=e]at_[608], _B[=e]owa_[609] and _B[=e]aw, B[=e]o(w)_[610].

{312}

I do not think it has ever been doubted that the forms _Hors_ and _Horsa_, or _Hr[=e]dhel_ and _Hr[=ae]dla_, relate to one and the same person. Prof. Chadwick seems to have little or no doubt as to the identity of _Scyld_ and _Sceldwa_[611], or _B[=e]o_ and _B[=e]owa_[612]. Why then should the identity of _Sc[=e]af_ and _Sc[=e]afa_ be denied because one form is strong and the other weak[613]? We cannot demonstrate the identity of the figure in the genealogies with the figure in _Widsith_; but little difficulty is occasioned by the weak form.

(II) Secondly, the absence of the name _Sc[=e]af_ from the oldest MS of the _Chronicle_ (the _Parker MS_, _C.C.C.C._ 173) has been made the ground for suggesting that when that MS was written (_c._ 892) Sceaf had not yet been invented (Moeller, _Volksepos_, 43; Symons in _Pauls Grdr_. (2), III, 645; Napier, as quoted by Clarke, _Sidelights_, 125). But Sceaf, and the other names which are omitted from the _Parker MS_, are found in the other MSS of the _Chronicle_ and the allied pedigrees, which are known to be derived independently from one and the same original. Now, unless the names were older than the _Parker MS_, they could not appear in so many independent transcripts. For, even though these transcripts are individually later, their _agreement_ takes us back to a period earlier than that of the _Parker MS_ itself[614].

An examination of the different versions of the genealogy, given on pp. 202-3, above, and of the tree showing the connection between them, on p. 315, will, I think, make this clear.

The versions of the pedigree given in the _Parker MS_ of the _Chronicle_, in Asser and in _Textus Roffensis I_, all contain the stages _Frithuwald_ and _Frithuwulf_. Asser and _Roff. I_ are connected by the note about _G[=e]ata_: but _Roff. I_ is not derived from that text of Asser which has come down to us, as that {313} text has corrupted _Fin_ and _Godwulf_ into one name and has substituted _Seth_ for _Sc[=e]af_ ["Seth, _Saxonice_ Sceaf": Florence of Worcester]. _Roff. I_ is free from both these corruptions.

Ethelwerd is obviously connected with a type of genealogy giving the stages _Frithuwald_ and _Frithuwulf_, but differs from all the others in giving no stages between _Scyld_ and _Sc[=e]f_.

None of the other versions contain the names _Frithuwald_ and _Frithuwulf_. They are closely parallel, but fall into groups showing special peculiarities.

_MSS Tib. A. VI_ and _Tib. B. I_ of the _Chronicle_ show only trifling differences of spelling. The MSS belong respectively to about the years 1000 and 1050, and are both derived from an Abingdon original of about 977[615].

_MS Cott. Tib. B. IV_ is derived from a copy of the _Chronicle_ sent North about 892[616].

_MS Cott. Tib. B. V_ and _Textus Roffensis II_ are closely connected, but neither is derived from the other. For _Roff. II_ preserves _Tethwa_ and _Hw[=a]la_, who are lost in _Tib. B. V; Tib. B. V_ preserves _Iterman_, who is corrupted in _Roff. II._ Both _Tib. B. V_ and _Roff. II_ carry the pedigree down to Edgar, mentioning his three sons _[=E]adweard and [=E]admund and Aethelred aedhelingas syndon [=E]adg[=a]res suna cyninges_. The original therefore apparently belongs to some date before 970, when Edmund died (cf. Stevenson's Asser, 158, note).

Common features of _MS Cott. Tib. B. V_ and _Roff. II_ are (1) _Eat(a)_ for _Geat(a)_, (2) the omission of _d_ from _Scealdwa_, and (3) the expression _se Sc[=e]f_, "this Scef." Features (1) and (3) are copied in the Icelandic pedigrees. _Scealdwa_ is given correctly there, but the Icelandic transcriber could easily have got it from _Scealdwaging_ above. The Icelandic was, then, ultimately derived either from _Tib. B. V_ or from a version so closely connected as not to be worth distinguishing.

Accordingly _Cott. Tib. B. V_, _Textus Roffensis II_, _Langfedhgatal_ and _Flateyarb['o]k_ form one group, pointing to an archetype _c._ 970.

{314}

The pedigrees can accordingly be grouped on the system shown on the opposite page[617].

(III) Prof. Chadwick, in his _Origin of the English Nation_, draws wide deductions from the fact that the Danes traced the pedigree of their kings back to Skjold, whilst the West-Saxons included Sceldwa (Scyld) in their royal pedigree:

"Since the Angli and the Danes claimed descent from the same ancestor,
there can be no doubt that the bond was believed to be one of
blood[618]."

This belief, Prof. Chadwick thinks, went back to exceedingly early times[619], and he regards it as well-founded:

"It is true that the Angli of Britain seem never to have included
themselves among the Danes, but the reason for this may be that the
term _Dene_ (_Danir_) had not come into use as a collective term before
the invasion of Britain[620]."

Doubtless the fact that the name of a Danish king _Scyld_ or _Sceldwa_ is found in a pedigree of West-Saxon kings, as drawn up at a period certainly not later than 892, points to a belief, at that date, in some kind of a connection. But we have still to ask: How close was the connection supposed to be? And how old is the belief?

Firstly as to the closeness of the connection. Finn also occurs in the pedigree--possibly the Frisian king: Sceaf occurs, possibly, though not certainly, a Longobard king. Noah and Adam occur; are we therefore to suppose that the compiler of the _Genealogy_ believed his kings to be of one blood with the Hebrews? Certainly he did: but only remotely, as common descendants of Noah. And the occurrence of Sceldwa and Sceaf and Finn in the genealogies--granting the identity of these heroes with Skjold of the Danes, Sceafa of the Longobards and Finn of the Frisians, might only prove that the genealogist believed in their common (Germanic) race.

{315}

900 950 1000
| | |

| A. Chron |
_| Parker MS ______________________________|
/ | c. 890-900 |
/ | Asser
/ | MS Cott.
/______________________________________| Otho A.XII,
/ \ | c. 1000
/ \__________________________
/ | B. Chron.
Transcript of \ ................ | MS Cott.
Chronicle from Copy sent to Abingdon, : presumed : | Tib. A. VI,
which all kept there till c. 977__: Abingdon :/| c. 1000
extant \ : copy, c. 977 :\
MSS are \ :..............: \____________
derived \____________
Copy sent to Ripon\
\
\_______________________________
\
\ | Common original
\_| compiled about _
| 970 \
\ \______
\
\ | Genealogy
\_| MS Cott.
| Tib. B. V,_
| c. 1000

.........................................................................

1050 1100 1125
| | |

| W. Chron.
| MS Cott, Otho B. XI, 2.
| c. 1025

___________________________________| Textus Roffensis I,
| c. 1120

| C. Chron.
_______| MS Cott. Tib. B. I,
| c. 1050

| D. Chron.
_______| MS Cott. Tib. B. IV,
| c. 1050

___________________________________| Textus Roffensis II,
| c. 1120

___________________________________| Icelandic
| Genealogies

==>

{316}

Secondly, how old is the belief? The Anglian genealogies (Northumbrian, Mercian and East Anglian), as reproduced in the _Historia Brittonum_ and in the _Vespasian MS_, form part of what is doubtless, as is said above, the oldest extant English historical document. But in this document _there is no mention of Scyld_. Indeed, it contains no pedigree of the West-Saxon kings at all. From whatever cause, the West-Saxon genealogy is not extant from so early a date as are the pedigrees of the Northumbrian, Mercian, East Anglian and Kentish kings[621]. Still, this may well be a mere accident, and I am not prepared to dispute that the pedigree which traces the West-Saxon kings to Woden dates back, like the other genealogies connecting Old English kings with Woden, to primitive and heathen times. Now the West-Saxon pedigree is found in many forms: some which trace the royal house only to Woden, and some which go beyond Woden and contain a list of names by which Woden is connected with Sceaf, and then with Noah and Adam.

(1) The nucleus of the whole pedigree is to be found in the names between Cynric or Cerdic and Woden. These occur in every version. The pedigree in this, its simplest form, is found twice among the entries in the _Chronicle_ which deal with the events of heathen times, under 552 and 597. These names fall into verse:

[Cynr[=i]c Cerdicing], Cerdic Elesing,
Elesa Esling, Esla GiWising,
GiWis W[=i]ging, W[=i]g Fr[=e]awining,
Fr[=e]awine Fridhug[=a]ring, Fridhug[=a]r Bronding,
Brond B[=ae]ldaeging, B[=ae]ldaeg W[=o]dening.

Like the mnemonic lists in _Widsith_, these lines are probably very old. Their object is clearly to connect the founder of the West-Saxon royal house with Woden. Note, that not only do the names alliterate, but the alliteration is perfect. Every line attains double alliteration in the first half, with one alliterating word only in the second half. The lines must go back to times when lists of royal ancestors, both real and imaginary, had to {317} be arranged in correct verse; times when such things were recorded by memory rather than by writing. They are pre-literary, and were doubtless chanted by retainers of the West-Saxon kings in heathen days.

(2) An expanded form of this genealogy occurs in _MSS C.C.C.C._ 183 and _Cotton Tib. B. V_. Woden is here furnished with a father Frealaf. We know nothing of any Frealaf as father of the All-Father in heathen days, though Frealaf is found in this capacity in other genealogies written down in the ages after the conversion. Frealaf breaks the correct alliterative system. In both MSS the pedigree is brought down to King Ine (688-726): both MSS are ultimately, no doubt, derived from a list current in the time of that king, that is to say less than a century after the conversion of Wessex.

(3) A further expansion, which Prof. Napier has held on linguistic grounds[622] to have been written down as early as 750, is incorporated in a genealogical and chronological note regarding the West-Saxon kings, which is extant in many MSS[623]. _In its present form_ this genealogical note is a recension, under Alfred, of a document coming down to the death of his father Aethelwulf. It traces the pedigree of Aethelwulf to Cerdic, but it keeps this district from the rhythmical nucleus, in which it traces Cerdic to Woden, and no further.

(4) Then, in the _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_, under the year 855, the pedigree is given in its most elaborate form. There the genealogy of Aethelwulf is traced in one unbroken series, not merely through Cerdic to Woden, but from Woden through a long line of Woden's ancestors, including Frealaf, Geat, Sceldwa and Sceaf, to Noah and Adam.

It has been noted above[624] that none of the _Chronicle_ pedigrees {318} stop at Sceaf. The _Chronicle_, in the stages above Woden, recognizes as stopping places only Geat (Northumbrian pedigree, anno 547) or Adam (West-Saxon pedigree, anno 855).

(5) The Chronicle of Ethelwerd (_c._ 1000) does, however, stop at Scef[625]. Now it has been argued that Ethelwerd's pedigree is merely abbreviated from the pedigree in the _Anglo-Saxon Chronicle_ under 855, and that, in making Scef the final stage, and in what he tells us about that hero, Ethelwerd is merely adapting what he had read in _Beowulf_ about Scyld[626]. But this seems hardly possible. Ethelwerd, it is true, borrows most of his facts from the _Chronicle_, from Bede, and other known sources: but there are some passages which show that he had access to a source now lost. Ethelwerd was a member of the West-Saxon royal house, and he wrote his Chronicle for a kinswoman, Matilda, in order, as he says, to explain their common stock and race. They were both descended from Aethelwulf, the chronicler being great-great-grandson of Aethelred, and the lady to whom he dedicates his work being great-great-granddaughter of Alfred. So he writes to tell "who and whence were their kin, so far as memory adduces, and our parents have taught us." Accordingly, though he begins his Chronicle with the Creation, the bulk of it is devoted to the deeds of his or Matilda's ancestors. Is it credible that he would have cut out all the stages in their common pedigree between Scyld and Scef, that he would have sacrificed all the ancestors of Scef, thus severing relations with Noah and Adam, and that he would have attributed to Scef the story which in _Beowulf_ is attributed to Scyld, all this simply in order to bring his English pedigree into some harmony with what is told about the Danish pedigree in _Beowulf_--a poem of which we have no evidence that he had ever heard?

To suppose him to have done this, is to make him sacrifice, _without any reason_, just that part of the pedigree in the _Chronicle_ under 855 which, from all we know of Ethelwerd, was most likely to have interested him: that which connected his race with Noah and Adam. Further, it is to suppose him to have reproduced just those stages in the pedigree which on critical {319} grounds modern scholars can show to be the oldest, and to have modified or rejected just those which on critical grounds modern scholars can show to be later accretion. When Brandl supposes Ethelwerd to have produced his pedigree by comparing together merely the materials which have come down to us to-day, namely _Beowulf_ and the _Chronicle_, he is, in reality, attributing to him the mind and acumen of a modern critic. An Anglo-Saxon alderman could only have detected and rejected the additions by using some material which has _not_ come down to us. What more natural than that Ethelwerd, who writes as the historian of the West-Saxon royal family, should have known of a family pedigree which traced the line up to Sceaf and his arrival in the boat, and that he should have (rightly) thought this to be more authoritative than the pedigree in the _Chronicle_ under the year 855, which had been expanded from it? Prof. Chadwick, it seems to me, is here quite justified in holding that Ethelwerd had "acquired the genealogy from some unknown source, in a more primitive form than that contained in the _Chronicle_[627]."

But, because the source of Ethelwerd's pedigree is more primitive than that contained in the _Chronicle_ under the year 855, it does not follow that it goes back to heathen times. Wessex had been converted more than two centuries earlier.

We are now in a position to make some estimate of the antiquity of Scyld and Sceaf in the West-Saxon pedigree. The nucleus of this pedigree is to be found in the verses connecting Cynric and Cerdic with Woden. (Even as late as Aethelwulf and Alfred this nucleus is often kept distinct from the later, more historic stages connecting Cerdic with living men.) Pedigrees of other royal houses go to Woden, and many stop there; however, in times comparatively early, but yet Christian, we find Woden provided with five ancestors: later, Ethelwerd gives him ten: the _Chronicle_ gives him twenty-five. It is evidently a process of accumulation.

Now, if the name of Scyld had occurred in the portion of the pedigree which traces the West-Saxon kings up to Woden, {320} it would possess sufficient authority to form the basis of an argument. But Scyld, like Heremod, Beaw and Sceaf, occurs in the fantastic development of the pedigree, by which Woden is connected up with Adam and Noah. The fact that these heroes occur _above_ Woden makes it almost incredible that their position in the pedigree can go back to heathen times. Those who believed in Woden as a god can hardly have believed at the same time that he was a descendant of the Danish king Scyld. This difficulty Prof. Chadwick admits: "It is difficult to believe that in heathen times Woden was credited with five generations of ancestors, as in the _Frealaf-Geat_ list." Still less is it credible that he was credited with 25 generations of ancestors, as in the _Frealaf-Geat-Sceldwa-Sceaf-Noe-Adam_ list.