The Oldest English Epic/Chapter 1/Beowulf 34
XXXIV
The fall of his lord he was fain to requite
in after days; and to Eadgils he proved
friend to the friendless, and forces sent
over the sea to the son of Ohtere,
2395weapons and warriors: well repaid he
those care-paths cold when the king he slew.[1]
Thus safe through struggles the son of Ecgtheow
had passed a plenty, through perils dire,
with daring deeds, till this day was come
2400that doomed him now with the dragon to strive.
With comrades eleven the lord of Geats
swollen in rage went seeking the dragon.
He had heard whence all the harm arose
and the killing of clansmen; that cup of price
2405on the lap of the lord had been laid by the finder.
In the throng was this one thirteenth man,
starter of all the strife and ill,
care-laden captive; cringing thence
forced and reluctant, he led them on
2410till he came in ken of that cavern-hall,
the barrow delved near billowy surges,
flood of ocean. Within ’twas full
of wire-gold and jewels; a jealous warden,
warrior trusty, the treasures held,
2415lurked in his lair. Not light the task
of entrance for any of earth-born men!
Sat on the headland the hero king,
spake words of hail[2] to his hearth-companions,
gold-friend of Geats. All gloomy his soul,
2420wavering,[3] death-bound. Wyrd full nigh
stood ready to greet the gray-haired man,
to seize his soul-hoard, sunder apart
life and body. Not long would be
the warrior’s spirit enwound with flesh.
2425Beowulf spake, the bairn of Ecgtheow:—
“Through store of struggles I strove in youth,
mighty feuds; I mind them all.
I was seven years old when the sovran of rings,
friend-of-his-folk, from my father took me,
2430had me, and held me, Hrethel the king,
with food and fee, faithful in kinship.
Ne’er, while I lived there, he loathlier found me,[4]
bairn in the burg, than his birthright sons,
Herebeald and Hæthcyn and Hygelac mine.
2435For the eldest of these, by unmeet chance,
by kinsman’s deed, was the death-bed strewn,
when Hæthcyn killed him with horny bow,
his own dear liege laid low with an arrow,
missed the mark and his mate shot down,
2440one brother the other, with bloody shaft.
A feeless fight[5] and a fearful sin,
horror to Hrethel; yet, hard as it was,
unavenged must the atheling die!
Too awful it is for an agéd man
2445to bide and bear, that his bairn so young
rides[6] on the gallows. A rime he makes,
sorrow-song for his son there hanging
as rapture of ravens; no rescue now
can come from the old, disabled man!
2450Still is he minded, as morning breaks,
of the heir gone elsewhere;[7] another he hopes not
he will bide to see his burg within
as ward for his wealth, now the one has found
doom of death that the deed incurred.
2455Forlorn he looks on the lodge of his son,
wine-hall waste and wind-swept chambers
reft of revel. The rider sleepeth,
the hero, far-hidden;[8] no harp resounds,
in the courts no wassail, as once was heard.
- ↑ That is, Beowulf supports Eadgils against Onela, who is slain by Eadgils in revenge for the “care-paths” of exile into which Onela forced him. Bugge, relying on the Norse story, translates “by care-paths cold”; that is, Eadgils revenged himself by marches fraught with care or sorrow for Onela. As the battle in the Ynglingasaga takes place on the ice, Bugge reads “cold” literally. But it is the technical adjective for exile; “winter-cold exile,” e.g. in Deor’s Song.
- ↑ Hǣlo.—Surely not “farewell,” in spite of the lugubrious context, which is quite in line with the usual epic anticipation of ill success and death. It is his beat really, his vow, largely reminiscent of other struggles, but closing with an explicit promise of valorous deed.
- ↑ Animula vagula.—The personification of Wyrd should be noticed; it occurs so in the Heliand itself.
- ↑ Usual litotes: “he held me no less dear.”
- ↑ That is, the king could claim no wergild, or man-price, from one son for the killing of the other. The casus is peculiarly Germanic in detail; in general scope it is like the great kin-tragedies of the world’s literature. A similar story is told in the Thithrekssaga of Herbort, Herdegen, and Sintram, but, as Müllenhoff points out, with a different ending. In the Scottish ballad of The Twa Brothers, one kills the other while wrestling (though with a knife); but the ballad touches the parent only by messages to account for the disappearance of John. It is important to understand that the picture of the old king’s grief is hypothetical. There is no wergild, says the poet, and revenge is out of the question. For let one but fancy the feelings of a father who has caused his son to be hanged! The picture of such a state of things then follows. Then (v. 2462) one returns to Hrethel with the remark that his case was really as sad as the hypothetical one. Gering thinks that the poet took his picture of the broken-hearted parent from the story of Ermanric, of whom the Volsungasaga relates that he caused his only son to be hanged on an accusation of misconduct with Swanhild, the young man’s stepmother. Ermanric’s story was known to English poetry. See above, v. 1201, and the stanza in Dear’s Song.
- ↑ The regular metaphor in this case. The traditional phrase held for a long while. Wright and Halliwell, Reliquiae Antiquae, II, 119, print from a Harleian Ms. these verses where Christ calls on man to consider the sacrifice on the cross:—
Restles I ride,—
Lok upon me, put fro [thee] pride!
Mi palefrey is of tre. . . .”that is, “my horse is made of wood.” Vigfusson, in one of the Grimm centenary papers, says that gallows were horse-shaped. [“Traces of Old Law in the Eddic Lays.”]
- ↑ Usual euphemism for death.
- ↑ Sc. in the grave.