17 May 2009
This final fit describes Beowulf’s pyre and barrow and concludes with words of praise for the hero.
The description of the pyre is wonderful and ends with what I think is the best half-line in all the poem, lines 3143–55:
Ongunnon þā on beorge bælfyra mæst
wīġend weċċan; wud(u)rēċ āstāh,
sweart ofer swioðole, swōgende lēġ
wōpe bewunden —windblond ġelæġ—
oð þæt hē ðā bānhus ġebrocen hæfd(e),
hāt on hreðre. Hiġum unrōte
mōdċeare mændon, mondryhtnes cw(e)alm;
swylċe ġiōmorġyd (Ġē)at(isc) meowle
(æfter Bīowulfe b)undenheorde
(sang) sorgċeariġ, sæ(id)e (ġe)neah(he)
þæt hīo hyre (here)ġ(eon)gas hearde ond(r)ēde,
wælfylla wo(r)n, w)erudes eġesan,
hy[n]ðo ond hæf(t)nyd. Heofon rēċe swealg.(Then on the cliff the warriors began to wake
the greatest of funeral fires; the wood-reek rose,
dark over the flames, the roaring fire
was wound about with weeping —the blowing winds subsided—
until it had broken the bone house,
hot at the heart. Sad of mind [they]
lamented their grief, the death of the liege-lord;
also a song of mourning a Geatish woman
for Beowulf with her hair bound up
sang sorrowful, she earnestly told of
the invasions that they sorely dreaded,
the large number of slaughters, the terror of the host,
humiliation and captivity. Heaven swallowed the reek.)
The smoke, mixed with the laments and fears for the future, is rising into an indifferent heaven. Mouths and eating play a large role in the imagery of the poem (remember Grendel devouring Hondscio?), and the use of swelgan, to swallow, here is fitting. Great stuff!
The identity of the woman is the subject of much commentary and speculation. We have no clue who she is. Perhaps Beowulf’s wife? Some suggest that she is Hygd, Hygelac’s widow, who may also have married Beowulf. We’ll never know. She is described as (b)undenheorde, which is usually translated as with hair bound up—this is the only appearance of the compound in the Old English corpus, so we can’t deduce its meaning from its use in other contexts. Some have suggested that married women in Anglo-Saxon society wore their hair up to denote their marital status, indicating that she is a widow, but there is scanty evidence of this practice and it is more likely that all women, married or not, wore their hair covered. The word is sometimes read as (b)undenhearde, or cruelly bound, indicating that she is a slave or servant, possibly a reference to her future as a woman of the now lord-less Geats. The b is missing from the manuscript, and some read the word as (w)undenheorde, or with wavy hair.
Of course we can’t leave without including the final lines of the poem. Note that the Anglo-Saxons did not value modesty as we do today and being eager for praise is not in any way a bad thing, lines 3174b–82:
Swā hit ġedē(fe) bið
þæt mon his winedryhten wordum herġe,
ferhðum frēoġe, þonne hē forð scile
of l(ī)ċhaman (læ)ded weorðan.
Swā begnornodon Ġēata lēode
hlāfordes (hry)re, heorðġenēatas,
cwædon þæt hē wære wyruldcyning[a]
manna mildust ond mon(ðw)ærust,
lēodum līðost ond lofġeornost.( So it is fitting
that a man his lord-friend should praise with words,
should love him in his heart, when he must
from his body be led forth.
So lamented the people of the Geats
the death of their lord, his hearth-companions
said that he was of the kings of the world
the mildest of men and the gentlest,
most gracious to his people and the most eager for praise.)
Se ende.
