PREFACE.

I

TWENTY-FOUR years have passed since, while residing in Denmark, I first entertained the design of one day producing an edition of Beowulf; and it was in prosecution of that design that, immediately on my arrival in England in 1830, I carefully collated the text of Thorkelin's edition with the Cottonian manuscript. Fortunately, no doubt, for the work, a series of cares, together with other literary engagements, intervened and arrested my progress. had, in fact, abandoned every thought of ever resuming the task: it was therefore with no slight pleasure that I hailed the appearance of Mr. Kemble's first edition of the text of Beowulf in 1833a. Still a translation was wanting, and this was a few years later supplied by the same eminent Anglo-Saxon scholar, accompanied by a new and revised edition of the text, a copious and valuable glossary, and notes b.

a The Anglo-Saxon Poems of Beowulf, the Traveller's Song, and the Battle of Finnesburh; edited together with a Glossary of the more difficult words and an Historical Preface, by John M. Kemble, Esq. M. A. of Trin. Coll. Camb. London, Pickering, 1833.

b 1. The Anglo-Saxon Poems of Beowulf, etc. Second edition, 18352. A Translation of the Anglo-Saxon Poem of Beowulf, with a copious Glossary, Preface, and Philological Notes, by John M. Kemble, Esq. Pickering, 1837.

Copies of Mr. Kemble's editions having for some time past been of rare occurrence, I resolved on resuming my suspended labour, and, as far as I was able, supplying a want felt by many an Anglo-Saxon student both at home and abroad. A plan was then to be adopted.

My first impulse was to print the text of the poem as it appears in the manuscript, with a literal translation in parallel columns, placing all conjectural emendations at the foot of each page; but, on comparing the text with the version in this juxta-position, so numerous and so enormous and puerile did the blunders of the copyist appear, and, consequently, so great the discrepance between the text and the translation, that I found myself compelled to admit into the text the greater number of the conjectural emendations, consigning to the foot of the page the corresponding readings of the manuscript. In every case which I thought might by others be considered questionable, I have followed the more usual course, of retaining in the text the reading of the manuscript, and placing the proposed correction at foot.

With respect to this the oldest heroic poem in any Germanic tongue, my opinion is, that it is not an original production of the Anglo-Saxon muse, but a metrical paraphrase of an heroic Saga composed in the south-west of Sweden, in the old common language of the North, and probably brought to this country during the sway of the

• For when the poet (11. 35-38) says that the renown of Beowulf the Scylding was widely known in the Scanian lands (Scede-landum in), he evidently means that it had reached him at his own home in Skåne (Scania), the limits of which were then more extended than those of the modern province so called. Let us cherish the hope that the original Saga may one day be discovered in some Swedish library.

Danish dynasty. It is in this light only that I can view a work evincing a knowledge of Northern localities and persons hardly to be acquired by a native of England in those days of ignorance with regard to remote foreign parts. And what interest could an Anglo-Saxon feel in the valorous feats of his deadly foes, the Northmen? in the encounter of a Sweo-Gothic hero with a monster in Denmark? or with a fire-drake in his own country? The answer, I think, is obvious-none whatever.

This hypothesis may, perhaps, serve to account for some at least of the deviations from the historic or, as our continental brethren would prefer to regard them, mythic traditions contained in the early annals of England and the North, many of which may, no doubt, be placed to the account of the paraphrast. Let those to whom this view may appear rash, consult any Anglo-Saxon version of a Latin author, or even a metrical paraphrase of a prose writer in his own tongued, and, on seeing its numerous misconceptions of the original, he will, unless I greatly err, considerably qualify, if not change, his opinion. From the allusions to Christianity contained in the poem, I do not hesitate to regard it as a Christian paraphrase of a heathen Saga, and those allusions as interpolations of the paraphrast, whom I conceive to have been a native of England of Scandinavian parentage.

As a monument of language the poem of Beowulf is highly valuable, but far more valuable is it as a vivid and faithful picture of old Northern manners and usages, as they existed in the halls of the kingly and the noble at the

As instances may be cited Alfred's Orosius, and the metrical Legend of St. Guthlac, in the Codex Exoniensis.

remote period to which it relates. In this respect, where are we to look for its like? Who presents them almost to our gaze like the poet of Beowulf? The whole economy of the high hall he sets before us the ranging of the vassals and guests, the mead-cup borne round by the queen and her daughter, the gifts bestowed on the guests, the decorations on the walls (ll. 1986-1997), and the gleeman's tale e.

The following extracts from Petersen's Danmark i Hedenold, descriptive of an old Northern guest-hall, are singularly corroborative of what we find in Beowulf:

"The hall was an oblong parallelogram, having its two longer sides facing the north and south, with a door at each end exactly opposite the one to the other; the door was hung on hinges, and provided with a sort of lock. A row of benches was on each side, the higher of which was the most honourable, and in the middle of which was the high seat of the master or chief, having his face towards the north. On the opposite or lower bench was a somewhat lower high seat, exactly opposite the chief's, for the noblest guest. The high seats were separated from the lower benches by side-pieces, but were more particularly distinguished by two high pillars (öndvegis sûlur, setstokkar), on which were carved the deeds of famous men and the like, and which were also adorned with the image of some god. On each side of the master or chief sat his men according to their rank, the higher on his right, the inferior on his left hand, each in his appropriate seat, behind which his weapons were suspended. If it was a royal hall, the queen sat in a high seat on the king's left side. Before the long benches, which were covered with carpeting, and, for distinguished guests, provided with cushions, stood small tables, which after refection could be removed. A large vessel on the middle of the floor contained the drink, which was baled out in cups or horns, and (like the presents made to the chief) was given across the fire (trans foculum). Along the walls, at least for the master and his family, beds were arranged, which could be shut in as in an alcove, and were sometimes ornamented with carved work. The walls were usually hung with painted and gilded shields, helmets and coats of mail, and with tapestry of some costly stuff; sometimes of many colours, at others, as in mourning, of black or blue; and, when intended to be particu