Anglo-Saxon Riddles of the Exeter Book/Annotated/32

32 (k-d 21)

My beak is downward     and low I move and dig in the ground.     The hoar foe of the forest directs my movements;     and so my master goes bent over,     the guide at my tail, drives across the field,     pushes me and crowds me, and sows in my swath.     I go sniffing along, brought from the woodland,     stoutly fastened, borne on a wagon.     I have many strange ways. I leave green on one side     and black on the other. Driven through my back     there hangs beneath a well-sharpened point;     on my head another, firm and forward-moving.     What I tear with my teeth falls to the side,     if he serves me well, my lord who behind me     heeds me and guides me.

10

Neb is min niþerweard     neol ic fere ⁊ be grunde græfe     geonge swa me wisað har holtes feond     ⁊ hlaford min · woh færeð     weard æt steorte wrigaþ on wonge     wegeð mec ⁊ þyð saweþ ōn swæð mīn     ic snyþige forð brungen of bearme     bunden cræfte wegen on wægne     hæbbe wundra fela me biþ gongendre     grene on healfe ⁊ min swæð sweotol     sweart on oþre me þurh hrycg wrecen     hongaþ under ān orþoncpil     oþer on heafde fæst ⁊ forðweard     fealleþ on sidan ꝥ ic toþum tere     gif me teala þenaþ hindeweardre     þæt biþ hlaford min

Plow, as would be easily recognized by those familiar with its structure. The “hoar foe of the forest” may mean the man who clears the woodland for his field, the plowman, or the plowshare (“the iron which, in the shape of an axe, bears ill-will to the tree”). See B. Colgrave, MLR xxxii (1937), 281–83. The beak or nose is the plowshare; the wagon is the fore-carriage; the sharp point underneath is the coulter.