English 202
Kent-Drury

Lecture #2. Notes on Anglo-Saxon Life and Poetry

Germanic-pagan world view in "The Wanderer" and "The Wife's Lament"

We have already talked about some aspects of the ways in which the earlier Germanic-pagan warrior ethic can be identified in literature; in fact, much of what we know about what people thought we actually have learned from the literature we are reading. For instance,

  1. Social groups were more tribal than national. Our idea of the nation-state as the primary political structure is much more recent (and some would say this too is changing to a more global perspective today).
  2. Leadership of the tribal groups in Beowulf is sometimes based on one's parentage, but more often leadership was based upon who was considered by the tribe to be the most capable of leading.
  3. Relationships between people were based more on reciprocity and individual bonds of loyalty between people, rather than on the hierarchies we expect today. That is, bonds were formed personally and locally, rather than in terms of national identities.
  4. The lord-thegn relationship, based upon absolute loyalty, was extremely important. The lord was expected to take care of his thegns (also called thanes or retainers in some literature), offering them a place at the hearth in the hall, food, shelter, safety, weapons, horses, fellowship, beer and mead, gifts that were usually portable (gold jewelry, cups, etc) because one had to be ready to move quickly. In return, the thegn owed his lord absolute loyalty; the worst thing that could happen to a thegn was for his lord to die first in battle and for the thegn not to die too. A thegn without a lord could become a wanderer, or exile.

Be sure to think about these relationships as you read the poems "The Wanderer" and "The Wife's Lament" in your textbook. (Do your best with "The Wife's Lament"; no one is really 100% sure what has happened to the wife and why.)

Germanic-pagan world view & Christian thought in "The Dream of the Rood

We also talked about the Christian references that appear in the small quantity of Anglo-Saxon poetry we have. It is important to remember that most scholars believe that these Christian ideas were not originally part of much of the poetry that was in oral circulation before it was recorded in manuscript form. Some scholars talk about this as a "Christian overlay" on texts that were actually based in the Germanic-pagan world view, which was not Christian.

One of our readings, though, definitely seems to be a Christian poem anchored in the heroic tradition: "The Dream of the Rood." Here are some notes to help you read this poem:

  1. "The Dream of the Rood" is part of a genre of medieval poetry known as the dream vision: in these poems, the narrator goes to sleep and has a dream, which the narrator then describes in the poem.
  2. A rood is a cross; specifically, in this case, the cross on which Christ was crucified.
  3. Much of action in the poem is actually narrated by the cross itself, which tells the story of the crucifixion. Consequently, the cross is personified, or given features of a human being as crosses can't literally talk.
  4. Watch for the elements of the Germanic-pagan warrior ethic in the poem. In an account very different from any other account I have ever read of of the crucifixion, Christ is depicted as a young, heroic warrior lord, whereas the cross/rood is depicted as his thegn. In an absolutely amazing passage, Christ moves onto the cross is a heroic leap!

More Special Features of Anglo-Saxon Poetry

We have also already covered some of the ways Anglo-Saxon poetry is different from contemporary poetry, and we have looked at some pieces actually written down in Anglo-Saxon (or, West Saxon as it is sometimes called by linguists, those who study languages). The remainder of the Anglo-Saxon literature we will read is translated into modern English so that we can read it today. It has also been formatted in your book into block style rather than the half-lines we saw in "Caedmon's Hymn," but the poems that we have were written down in half-lines as well.

We've talked about some of the features of that poetry, here are a few more you will encounter in this week's and next week's readings:

  1. Kennings--Why do the kennings in the linked handout work?
  2. Ubi sunt motif--Most medieval scholars know many languages, including Latin, the international language of the time. Consequently, some of their terms are in Latin. Don't be intimidated--ubi sunt just means "where are they?" and motif just means an element repeated across various works. In Anglo-Saxon elegies (or, poems of mourning), like "The Wanderer," at some point the narrator begins to ask where the things he once valued have gone. See if you can find that portion of the poem.

What are Medieval Manuscripts?

All of the poetry we are reading probably was in originally in circulation as part of a bardic tradition; that is, it was performed, possibly accompanied by music, as part of the evening entertainment in the hall. Also, different versions probably circulated that changed over time as one performer taught a poem to another. Books, which were incredibly labor-intensive, valuable objects, were copied out by hand in monasteries on parchment made of animal skins. (To see how medieval manuscripts were produced, check out the Medieval Manuscript Handbook, on the web.) People consequently relied a great deal more on their memories than we do today (really, books, and increasingly, the Internet stands in for us as our memories). Because these poems came from oral tradition, we can't really talk about what we have as the "right" versions; they are just the versions that happened to survive to the present day.

 

 

Instructor