Anglo-Saxon Literature Part 13

The stream hotly rushed with eddy wide, (wall all enclosed) with bosom bright, (There the baths were!) not in its nature!

That was a boon indeed!

"THE WANDERER" (EARDSTAPA).[85]

In patriarchal or sub-patriarchal times social life was still confined within the family pale; and the man who belonged to no household was a wanderer and a vagabond on the face of the earth. Through invasion or war or other accidents a man who had been the honoured member of a well-found home might live to see that home broken up or pa.s.s into strange hands, and he might be thus like a plant uprooted when he was too old to get planted in a fresh connexion. His only chance of any share in social life was to wander from house to house, getting perhaps a brief lodging in each; and such a homeless condition might be well expressed by the compound eardstapa, one who tramps (_stapa_) from one habitation (_eard_) to another. In such an outcast plight the speaker in this piece went to sea, and there he often thought of the old happy days that were gone. He would dream of the pleasure of his old access to the giefstol of his lord, whom he saluted with kiss and head on knee, and then he would wake a friendless man in the wintry ocean, and his grief would be the sorer at his heart for the recollections of lost kindred that the dream had revived. Such a lot is in ready sympathy with old-world ruins, of which there were many in England at that time, and they raise the antic.i.p.ation of a time when a like ruin will be the end of all! "It becomes a wise man to know how awful it will be when all this world's wealth stands waste, as now up and down in the world there are wind-buffeted walls standing in mouldering decay"--and the description which follows is either a reminiscence of "The Ruined City,"

or else it shows that the subject of ruins was familiar with the Scopas.[86]

"THE MINSTREL'S CONSOLATION."[87]

Ettmuller reckoned this the oldest of the Saxon lyrics; influenced, perhaps, by the mythical nature of the contents. But, if we regard the form rather than the material, there is a refinement about the versification which does not look archaic. The poem is cast in irregular stanzas, and it has a refrain. The poet, whose name is Deor, has experienced the fallaciousness of early success. His prospects are clouded; once the favourite minstrel of his patron, he is now superseded by a newer Scop. His consolation is a well-known one; perhaps the oldest and commonest of all the formulae of consolation. Others have been in trouble before him, and have somehow got over it. This is not conveyed as a mere generalisation; it is done poetically through striking examples, of which Weland is the first, and Beadohild the second. After each example comes the refrain:--

thaes ofereode thisses swa maeg!

That [distress] he overwent, So . I . can . this!

The failures of life's hopes and ambitions have been so often lamented, that the subject is rather hackneyed and conventional. Here is a piece out of the beaten track; fresh, though ingenious and artistic. Such a poem is all the more welcome as the subject belongs to an extinct career--the career of a court minstrel.

The Ballads have a peculiar value of their own. There is a sense in which they are the best representatives of the native muse. There are several extant specimens of various merit, but two are pre-eminent, and these are, beyond all doubt, preserved in their original and unaltered form. They were manifestly produced in the moment when the sensation of a great event was yet fresh. They are impa.s.sioned and effusive, and they bear good witness to the characteristics of primitive poetry. One spontaneous element they preserve, which has been quite discarded from modern poetry, and of which the other traces are few. I mean the poetry of derision. The light and shade of the ballad is glory and scorn. The most popular subject of this species of poetry is a battle. Whether your ballad is of victory or of disaster, these two elements, not indeed with the same intensity or the same proportions, but still these two, are the const.i.tuents required. Our best examples are the "Victory of Brunanburh"

(937), and the "Disaster of Maldon" (991).

The battle of Brunanburh was fought by King Athelstan and his brother Edmund (children of Edward), against the alliance of the Scots under Constantinus with the Danes under Anlaf.

Various attempts have been made to present in modern English the Ballad of Brunanburh, the most successful being that by the Poet Laureate. Our language is rather out of practice for kindling a poetic fervour around the sentiment of flinging scorn at a vanquished foe; but the following will serve to ill.u.s.trate this heathenish element, or such relics of it as survived in the tenth century. The person first railed at is Constantinus:--

X.

Slender reason had _He_ to be proud of The welcome of war-knives-- He that was reft of his Folk and his friends that had Fallen in conflict, Leaving his son, too, Lost in the carnage, Mangled to morsels, A youngster in war!

XI.

Slender reason had _He_ to be glad of The clash of the war-glaive-- Traitor and trickster And spurner of treaties-- He nor had Anlaf, With armies so broken, A reason for bragging That they had the better In perils of battle On places of slaughter-- The struggle of standards, The rush of the javelins, The crash of the charges, The wielding of weapons-- The play that they played with The children of Edward.

ALFRED TENNYSON, "Ballads and Other Poems," 1880, p. 174.

The longest of our ballads, though it is imperfect, is that of the "Battle of Maldon." In the year 991 the Northmen landed in Ess.e.x, and expected to be bought off with great ransom; but Brithnoth, the alderman of the East Saxons, met them with all his force, and, after fighting bravely, was killed. The lines here quoted occur after the alderman's death:--

Leofsunu gemaelde, and his linde ahof, bord to gebeorge; he tham beorne oncwaeth; Ic thaet gehate, thaet ic heonon nelle fleon fotes trym, ac wille furthor gan, wrecan on gewinne mine wine drihten!

Ne thurfon me embe Sturmere stede faeste haeleth, wordum aetwitan, nu min wine gecranc, thaet ic hlafordleas ham sithie wende from wige!

ac me sceal waepen niman, ord and iren!

Then up spake Leveson and his shield uphove, buckler in ward; he the warrior addressed: I make the vow, that I will not hence flee a foot's pace, but will go forward; wreak in the battle my friend and my lord!

Never shall about Stourmere, the stalwart fellows, with words me twit now my chief is down, that I lordless homeward go march, turning from war!

Nay, weapon shall take me, point and iron.

Other ballads, or something like ballads, that are embodied in the Saxon chronicles are:--"The Conquest of Mercia" (942); "The Coronation of Eadgar at Bath" (973); "Eadgar's Demise" (975); "The Good Times of King Eadgar" (975); "The Martyr of Corf Gate" (979); "Alfred the Innocent aetheling" (1036); "The Son of Ironside" (1057); "The Dirge of King Eadward" (1065).

Others there are of which only brief sc.r.a.ps remain, almost embedded in the prose of the chronicles:--"The Sack of Canterbury" (1011); "The Wooing of Margaret" (1067); "The Baleful Bride Ale" (1076); "The High-handed Conqueror" (1086).[88]

Our last piece shall be "Widsith, or the Gleeman's Song."[89] This is a string of reminiscences of travel in the profession of minstrelsy; some part of which has a genuine air of high antiquity.[90] In the course of a long tradition it has undergone many changes which cannot now be distinguished. But, besides these, there are some glaring patches of literary interpolation, chiefly from Scriptural sources. I quote the concluding lines:--

Swa scrithende gesceapum hweorfath, gleo men gumena geond grunda fela; thearfe secgath thonc word sprecath, simle suth oththe north sumne gemetath, gydda gleawne geofum unhneawne, se the fore duguthe wile dom araeran eorlscipe aefnan; oth thaet eal scaceth leoht and lif somod: Lof se gewyrceth hafath under heofenum heahfaestne dom.

So wandering on the world about, glee-men do roam through many lands; they say their needs, they speak their thanks, sure south or north some one to meet, of songs to judge and gifts not grudge, one who by merit hath a mind renown to make earlship to earn; till all goes out light and life together.

Laud who attains hath under heaven high built renown.

FOOTNOTES:

[74] In "A Book for the Beginner in Anglo-Saxon," Clarendon Press Series; ed. 2 (1879), p. 70.

[75] The editions and translations are by Thorkelin, Copenhagen, 1815; Kemble, ed. 1, London, 1833; ed. 2, London, 1835; translation, 1837; Ettmuller, German translation, Zurich, 1840; Schaldemose, with Danish translation, Copenhagen, 1851; Thorpe, with English translation, Oxford, 1855; Grundtvig, Copenhagen, 1861; Moritz Heyne, German translation, Paderborn, 1863; Grein, 1867; Arnold, Oxford, 1876; Moritz Heyne, Text, ed. 4, 1879.

[76]

Wulfgar then spoke to his own dear lord: "Here are arrived, come from afar Over the sea-waves, men of the Geats; The one most distinguished the warriors brave Beowulf name. They are thy suppliants That they, my prince, may with thee now Greetings exchange; do not thou refuse them Thy converse in turn, friendly Hrothgar!

They in their war-weeds seem very worthy Contenders with earls; the chief is renowned Who these war-heroes. .h.i.ther has led."

Hrothgar then spoke, defence of the Scyldings; "I knew him of old when he was a child; His aged father was Ecgtheow named; To him at home gave Hrethel the Geat His only daughter: his son has now Boldly come here, a trusty friend sought."

This is from Mr. Garnett's translation, which is made line for line.

Published by Ginn, Heath, & Co., Boston, 1882.

[77] Dr. Karl Mullenhof (papers in Haupt's "Zeitschrift") follows the same line. His treatment is thus described by Mr. Henry Morley:--"The work was formed, he thinks, by the combination of several old songs--(1) 'The Fight with Grendel,' complete in itself, and the oldest of the pieces; (2) 'The Fight with Grendel's Mother,' next added; then (3) the genealogical introduction to the mention of Hrothgar, forming what is now the opening of the poem. Then came, according to this theory, a poet, A, who worked over the poem thus produced, interpolated many pa.s.sages with skill, and added a continuation, setting forth Beowulf's return home. Last came a theoretical interloper, B, a monk, who interspersed religious sayings of his own, and added the ancient song of the fight with the dragon and the death of Beowulf. The positive critic not only finds all this, but proceeds to point out which pa.s.sages are old, older, and oldest, where a few lines are from poet A, and where other interpolation is from poet B."--"English Verse and Prose" in "Ca.s.sell's Library of English Literature," p. 11.

[78] No one needs to be told that the dragon story is of high antiquity.

But even of the elements which have most the appearance of history some may be traced so far back till they seem to fade into legend. Thus Higelac can hardly be any other than that Chochilaicus of whom Gregory of Tours records that he invaded the Frisian coast from the north, and was slain in the attempt. In our poem, this recurs with variations no less than four times as a well-known pa.s.sage in the adventures of Higelac. But it affords a doubtful basis for argument about the date of our poem.

[79] See Dr. Vigfusson's remarks in the Prolegomena to his edition of the "Sturlinga Saga," Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1878.

[80] See Dr. Morris's Preface to the Blickling Homilies.

[81] Cod. Exon., ed. Thorpe, p. 473.

[82] Cod. Exon., ed. Thorpe, p. 476; Grein, i., 248.

[83] Years ago I discussed this little poem before the Bath Field Club; and my arguments were subsequently printed in the "Proceedings" of that society (1872). Professor Wulcker has since agreed with me that the subject of the poem is a city, and not a fortress. My identification of the ruin with Acemanceaster (Bath) has been approved by Mr. Freeman in his volume on "Rufus."

[84] The feeling which pervades this remarkable fragment was strangely recalled by the following pa.s.sage in a recent book that has interested many:--"Ma.s.ses of strange, nameless masonry, of an antiquity dateless and undefined, bedded themselves in the rocks, or overhung the clefts of the hills; and out of a great tomb by the wayside, near the arch, a forest of laurel forced its way, amid delicate and graceful frieze-work, moss-covered and stained with age. In this strangely desolate and ruinous spot, where the fantastic shapes of nature seem to mourn in weird fellowship with the shattered strength and beauty of the old Pagan art-life, there appeared unexpectedly signs of modern dwelling."--"John Inglesant," by J.H. Shorthouse, new edition, 1881, vol. ii., p. 320.

[85] Cod. Exon., ed. Thorpe, p. 286.

[86] A translation of this poem in Alexandrines appeared in the _Academy_, May 14, 1881, by E.H. Hickey.

[87] Cod. Exon., ed. Thorpe, p. 377. His t.i.tle is "Deor the Scald's Complaint." I have adopted the t.i.tle from Professor Wulcker, "Des Sangers Trost."

[88] Sometimes a prose pa.s.sage of unusual energy raises the apprehension that it may be a ballad toned down. Dr. Grubitz has suggested this view of the Annal of 755, in which there is a fight in a Saxon castle (burh).

The graphic description of the place, the dramatic order of the incidents, and the life-like dialogue of the parley, might well be the work of a poet.