Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures and Table
- Preface
- Abbreviations
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Loot and the Economy of Honour
- 3 Unferth's Gift
- 4 The Angel in the Mead Hall
- 5 Three Queens
- 6 The Perils of Peacemaking
- 7 Beowulf's Last Triumph
- Afterword
- Works Cited
- General Index
- Index of Passages
- Index of Words
- Miscellaneous Endmatter
6 - The Perils of Peacemaking
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 May 2013
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- List of figures and Table
- Preface
- Abbreviations
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Loot and the Economy of Honour
- 3 Unferth's Gift
- 4 The Angel in the Mead Hall
- 5 Three Queens
- 6 The Perils of Peacemaking
- 7 Beowulf's Last Triumph
- Afterword
- Works Cited
- General Index
- Index of Passages
- Index of Words
- Miscellaneous Endmatter
Summary
Too much brooding over our inadequate scraps of evidence for the Finn tale has been one of the most unprofitable and time-consuming occupations of Beowulf scholars', wrote Dorothy Whitelock of the song performed by Hrothgar's scop during the celebration in Heorot after Grendel's defeat. Whitelock's observation seems as true now as sixty years ago, and it is no surprise, for the narrative gaps and difficult readings in the textual record invite speculation and conjectural emendation. Our stock of heroic narrative from the early Middle Ages being meagre, the temptation is all the greater to complete the story by all means fair and foul.
Evidence for the Finnesburh story comes from two sources: one is the so-called ‘Finn episode' of Beowulf (1066–1159), which tells the story in an allusive and riddling fashion; the other is an Old English poem, The Battle of Finnesburh, which appears once to have contained a fuller and more intelligible version of the story but unfortunately survives only in a fragment of forty-eight lines represented by a poor early modern transcript, the original manuscript having been mislaid.
Little in the story has been agreed upon by all scholars, but many, perhaps most, would accept the following summary: Hnæf, a Danish king, is visiting Finn, king of the Frisians, who is married to Hnæf's sister Hildeburh, when a fight breaks out between the two kings. At the battle's end, Hnæf is dead along with at least one of Hildeburh's sons, and Finn's force is so depleted that it can neither finish off the pitiful remnants of Hnæf's force nor expel them.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Honour, Exchange and Violence in Beowulf , pp. 167 - 199Publisher: Boydell & BrewerPrint publication year: 2013