Gering
proposes
hlēor-bergan = _cheek-protectors_; cf.
Beowulf
gen.
?
See C.
, _Beit.
_ viii.
568.
l. 224. eoletes may = (1) _voyage_; (2) _toil, labor_; (3) _hurried
journey;_ but _sea_ or _fjord_ appears preferable.
ll. 229-257. "The scenery . . . is laid on the coast of the North Sea and the
Kattegat, the first act of the poem among the Danes in Seeland, the second
among the Geats in South Sweden. "--Br. , p. 15.
l. 239. "A shoal of simple terms express in _Bēowulf_ the earliest
sea-thoughts of the English. . . . The simplest term is Sǣ. . . . To this they
added Wǣter, Flod, Stream, Lagu, Mere, Holm, Grund, Heathu, Sund, Brim,
Garsecg, Eagor, Geofon, Fifel, Hron-rad, Swan-rad, Segl-rad,
Ganotes-bǣð. "--Br. , p. 163-166.
l. 239. "The infinitive is often used in poetry after a verb of motion
where we should use the present participle. "--Sw. Cf. ll. 711, 721, 1163
1803, 268, etc. Cf. German _spazieren fahren reiten_, etc. , and similar
constructions in French, etc.
l. 240, W. reads hringed-stefnan for helmas bǣron. B. inserts (? ) after
holmas and begins a new line at the middle of the verse. S. omits B. 's "on
the wall. "
l. 245. Double and triple negatives strengthen each other and do not
produce an affirmative in A. -S. or M. E. The neg. is often prefixed to
several emphatic words in the sentence, and readily contracts with vowels,
and h or w; cf. ll. 863, 182, 2125, 1509, 575, 583, 3016, etc.
l. 249. seld-guma = _man-at-arms in another's house_ (Wood); = _low-ranking
fellow_ (Ha. ); stubenhocker, _stay-at-home_ (Gr. ), Scott's "carpet knight,"
_Marmion_, i. 5.
l. 250. næfne (nefne, nemne) usually takes the subj. , = _unless_; cf. ll.
1057, 3055, 1553. For ind. , = _except_, see l. 1354. Cf. būtan, gif, þēah.
l. 250. For a remarkable account of armor and weapons in _Bēowulf_, see S.
A. Brooke, _Hist. of Early Eng. Lit. _ For general "Old Teutonic Life in
Bēowulf," see J. A. Harrison, _Overland Monthly_.
l. 252. ǣr as a conj. generally has subj. , as here; cf. ll. 264, 677, 2819,
732. For ind. , cf. l. 2020.
l. 253. lēas = _loose_, _roving_. Ettmüller corrected to lēase.
l. 256. This proverb (ofest, etc. ) occurs in _Exod. _ (Hunt), l. 293.
l. 258. An "elder" may be a very young man; hence yldesta, = _eminent_, may
be used of Beowulf. Cf. _Laws of AElfred_, C. 17: Nā þæt ǣlc eald sȳ, ac
þæt hē eald sȳ on wīsdōme.
l. 273. Verbs of hearing and seeing are often followed by acc. with inf. ;
cf. ll. 229, 1024, 729, 1517, etc. Cf. German construction with _sehen,
horen_, etc. , French construction with _voir, entendre_, etc. , and the
classical constructions.
l. 275. dǣd-hata = _instigator_. Kl. reads dǣd-hwata.
l. 280. ed-wendan, n. (B. ; cf. 1775), = edwenden, limited by bisigu. So ten
Br. = _Tidskr. _ viii. 291.
l. 287. "Each is denoted . . . also by the strengthened forms ǽghwæðer
(ǽgðer), éghwæðer, etc. This prefixed ǽ, óe corresponds to the Goth, _aiw_,
OHG. _eo_, _io_, and is umlauted from á, ó by the i of the gi which
originally followed. "--Cook's Sievers' Gram. , p. 190.
l. 292. "All through the middle ages suits of armour are called
'weeds. '"--E.
l. 299. MS. reads gōd-fremmendra. So H. -So.
l. 303. "An English warrior went into battle with a boar-crested helmet,
and a round linden shield, with a byrnie of ringmail . . . with two javelins
or a single ashen spear some eight or ten feet long, with a long two-edged
sword naked or held in an ornamental scabbard. . . . In his belt was a short,
heavy, one-edged sword, or rather a long knife, called the seax . . . used
for close quarters. "--Br. , p. 121.
l. 303. For other references to the boar-crest, cf. ll. 1112, 1287, 1454;
Grimm, _Myth. _ 195; Tacitus, _Germania_, 45. "It was the symbol of their
[the Baltic AEstii's] goddess, and they had great faith in it as a
preservative from hard knocks. "--E. See the print in the illus. ed. of
Green's _Short History_, Harper & Bros.
l. 303. "See Kemble, _Saxons in England_, chapter on heathendom, and
Grimm's _Teutonic Mythology_, chapter on Freyr, for the connection these
and other writers establish between the Boar-sign and the golden boar which
Freyr rode, and his worship. "--Br. , p. 128. Cf. _Elene_, l. 50.
l. 304.
Gering proposes hlēor-bergan = _cheek-protectors_; cf. _Beit. _ xii.
26. "A bronze disk found at Öland in Sweden represents two warriors in
helmets with boars as their crests, and cheek-guards under; these are the
hlēor-bergan. "--E. Cf. hauberk, with its diminutive habergeon, < A. -S.
heals, _neck_ + beorgan, _to cover_ or _protect_; and harbor, < A. -S. here,
_army_ + beorgan, id. --_Zachers Zeitschr. _ xii. 123. Cf. cinberge, Hunt's
_Exod. _ l. 175.
l. 305. For ferh wearde and gūðmōde grummon, B. and ten Br. read
ferh-wearde (l. 305) and gūðmōdgum men (l. 306), = _the boar-images . . .
guarded the lives of the warlike men_.
l. 311. lēoma: cf. Chaucer, _Nonne Preestes Tale_, l. 110, ed. Morris:
"To dremen in here dremes Of armes, and of fyr with rede _lemes_. "
l. 318. On the double gender of sǣ, cf. Cook's Sievers' Gram. , p. 147; and
note the omitted article at ll. 2381, 318, 544, with the peculiar tmesis of
_between_ at ll. 859, 1298, 1686, 1957. So _Cǣdmon_, l. 163 (Thorpe),
_Exod. _ l. 562 (Hunt), etc.
l. 320. Cf. l. 924; and _Andreas_, l. 987, where almost the same words
occur. "Here we have manifestly before our eye one of those ancient
causeways, which are among the oldest visible institutions of
civilization. " --E.
l. 322. S. inserts comma after scīr, and makes hring-īren (= _ring-mail_)
parallel with gūð-byrne.
l. 325. Cf. l. 397. "The deposit of weapons outside before entering a house
was the rule at all periods. . . . In provincial Swedish almost everywhere a
church porch is called våkenhus,. . . i. e. _weapon-house_, because the
worshippers deposited their arms there before they entered the house. "--E. ,
after G. Stephens.
l. 333. Cf. Dryden's "mingled metal _damask'd_ o'er with gold. "--E.
l. 336. "ǣl-, el-, kindred with Goth. _aljis_, other, e. g. in ǣlþéodig,
elþéodig, foreign. "--Cook's Sievers' Gram. , p. 47.
l. 336. Cf. l. 673 for the functions of an ombiht-þegn.
l. 338. Ho. marks wræc- and its group long.
l. 343. Cf. l. 1714 for the same bēod-genēatas,--"the predecessor title to
that of the Knights of the Table Round. "--E. Cf. _Andreas_ (K. ), l. 2177.
l. 344. The future is sometimes expressed by willan + inf. , generally with
some idea of volition involved; cf. ll. 351, 427, etc. Cf. the use of
willan as principal vb. (with omitted inf. ) at ll. 318, 1372, 543, 1056;
and sculan, ll. 1784, 2817.
l. 353. sīð here, and at l. 501, probably means _arrival_. E. translates
the former by _visit_, the latter by _adventure_.
l. 357. unhār = _hairless, bald_ (Gr. , etc. ).
l. 358. ēode is only one of four or five preterits of gān (gongan, gangan,
gengan), viz. gēong (gīong: ll. 926, 2410, etc. ), gang (l. 1296, etc. ),
gengde (ll. 1402, 1413). Sievers, p. 217, apparently remarks that ēode is
"probably used only in prose. " (? ! ). Cf. geng, _Gen. _ ll. 626, 834; _Exod. _
(Hunt) l. 102.
l. 367. The MS. and H. -So. read with Gr. and B. glædman Hrōðgār, abandoning
Thorkelin's glædnian. There is a glass. hilaris glædman. --_Beit. _ xii. 84;
same as glæd.
l. 369. dugan is a "preterit-present" verb, with new wk. preterit, like
sculan, durran, magan, etc. For various inflections, see ll. 573, 590,
1822, 526. Cf. _do_ in "that will _do_"; _doughty_, etc.
l. 372. Cf. l. 535 for a similar use; and l. 1220. Bede, _Eccles. Hist. _,
ed. Miller, uses the same expression several times. "Here, and in all other
places where cniht occurs in this poem, it seems to carry that technical
sense which it bore in the military hierarchy [of a noble youth placed out
and learning the elements of the art of war in the service of a qualified
warrior, to whom he is, in a military sense, a servant], before it bloomed
out in the full sense of _knight_. "--E.
l. 373. E. remarks of the hyphened eald-fæder, "hyphens are risky toys to
play with in fixing texts of pre-hyphenial antiquity"; eald-fæder could
only = _grandfather_. eald here can only mean _honored_, and the hyphen is
unnecessary. Cf. "old fellow," "my old man," etc. ; and Ger. _alt-vater_.
l. 378. Th. and B. propose Gēatum, as presents from the Danish to the
Geatish king. --_Beit.
l. 224. eoletes may = (1) _voyage_; (2) _toil, labor_; (3) _hurried
journey;_ but _sea_ or _fjord_ appears preferable.
ll. 229-257. "The scenery . . . is laid on the coast of the North Sea and the
Kattegat, the first act of the poem among the Danes in Seeland, the second
among the Geats in South Sweden. "--Br. , p. 15.
l. 239. "A shoal of simple terms express in _Bēowulf_ the earliest
sea-thoughts of the English. . . . The simplest term is Sǣ. . . . To this they
added Wǣter, Flod, Stream, Lagu, Mere, Holm, Grund, Heathu, Sund, Brim,
Garsecg, Eagor, Geofon, Fifel, Hron-rad, Swan-rad, Segl-rad,
Ganotes-bǣð. "--Br. , p. 163-166.
l. 239. "The infinitive is often used in poetry after a verb of motion
where we should use the present participle. "--Sw. Cf. ll. 711, 721, 1163
1803, 268, etc. Cf. German _spazieren fahren reiten_, etc. , and similar
constructions in French, etc.
l. 240, W. reads hringed-stefnan for helmas bǣron. B. inserts (? ) after
holmas and begins a new line at the middle of the verse. S. omits B. 's "on
the wall. "
l. 245. Double and triple negatives strengthen each other and do not
produce an affirmative in A. -S. or M. E. The neg. is often prefixed to
several emphatic words in the sentence, and readily contracts with vowels,
and h or w; cf. ll. 863, 182, 2125, 1509, 575, 583, 3016, etc.
l. 249. seld-guma = _man-at-arms in another's house_ (Wood); = _low-ranking
fellow_ (Ha. ); stubenhocker, _stay-at-home_ (Gr. ), Scott's "carpet knight,"
_Marmion_, i. 5.
l. 250. næfne (nefne, nemne) usually takes the subj. , = _unless_; cf. ll.
1057, 3055, 1553. For ind. , = _except_, see l. 1354. Cf. būtan, gif, þēah.
l. 250. For a remarkable account of armor and weapons in _Bēowulf_, see S.
A. Brooke, _Hist. of Early Eng. Lit. _ For general "Old Teutonic Life in
Bēowulf," see J. A. Harrison, _Overland Monthly_.
l. 252. ǣr as a conj. generally has subj. , as here; cf. ll. 264, 677, 2819,
732. For ind. , cf. l. 2020.
l. 253. lēas = _loose_, _roving_. Ettmüller corrected to lēase.
l. 256. This proverb (ofest, etc. ) occurs in _Exod. _ (Hunt), l. 293.
l. 258. An "elder" may be a very young man; hence yldesta, = _eminent_, may
be used of Beowulf. Cf. _Laws of AElfred_, C. 17: Nā þæt ǣlc eald sȳ, ac
þæt hē eald sȳ on wīsdōme.
l. 273. Verbs of hearing and seeing are often followed by acc. with inf. ;
cf. ll. 229, 1024, 729, 1517, etc. Cf. German construction with _sehen,
horen_, etc. , French construction with _voir, entendre_, etc. , and the
classical constructions.
l. 275. dǣd-hata = _instigator_. Kl. reads dǣd-hwata.
l. 280. ed-wendan, n. (B. ; cf. 1775), = edwenden, limited by bisigu. So ten
Br. = _Tidskr. _ viii. 291.
l. 287. "Each is denoted . . . also by the strengthened forms ǽghwæðer
(ǽgðer), éghwæðer, etc. This prefixed ǽ, óe corresponds to the Goth, _aiw_,
OHG. _eo_, _io_, and is umlauted from á, ó by the i of the gi which
originally followed. "--Cook's Sievers' Gram. , p. 190.
l. 292. "All through the middle ages suits of armour are called
'weeds. '"--E.
l. 299. MS. reads gōd-fremmendra. So H. -So.
l. 303. "An English warrior went into battle with a boar-crested helmet,
and a round linden shield, with a byrnie of ringmail . . . with two javelins
or a single ashen spear some eight or ten feet long, with a long two-edged
sword naked or held in an ornamental scabbard. . . . In his belt was a short,
heavy, one-edged sword, or rather a long knife, called the seax . . . used
for close quarters. "--Br. , p. 121.
l. 303. For other references to the boar-crest, cf. ll. 1112, 1287, 1454;
Grimm, _Myth. _ 195; Tacitus, _Germania_, 45. "It was the symbol of their
[the Baltic AEstii's] goddess, and they had great faith in it as a
preservative from hard knocks. "--E. See the print in the illus. ed. of
Green's _Short History_, Harper & Bros.
l. 303. "See Kemble, _Saxons in England_, chapter on heathendom, and
Grimm's _Teutonic Mythology_, chapter on Freyr, for the connection these
and other writers establish between the Boar-sign and the golden boar which
Freyr rode, and his worship. "--Br. , p. 128. Cf. _Elene_, l. 50.
l. 304.
Gering proposes hlēor-bergan = _cheek-protectors_; cf. _Beit. _ xii.
26. "A bronze disk found at Öland in Sweden represents two warriors in
helmets with boars as their crests, and cheek-guards under; these are the
hlēor-bergan. "--E. Cf. hauberk, with its diminutive habergeon, < A. -S.
heals, _neck_ + beorgan, _to cover_ or _protect_; and harbor, < A. -S. here,
_army_ + beorgan, id. --_Zachers Zeitschr. _ xii. 123. Cf. cinberge, Hunt's
_Exod. _ l. 175.
l. 305. For ferh wearde and gūðmōde grummon, B. and ten Br. read
ferh-wearde (l. 305) and gūðmōdgum men (l. 306), = _the boar-images . . .
guarded the lives of the warlike men_.
l. 311. lēoma: cf. Chaucer, _Nonne Preestes Tale_, l. 110, ed. Morris:
"To dremen in here dremes Of armes, and of fyr with rede _lemes_. "
l. 318. On the double gender of sǣ, cf. Cook's Sievers' Gram. , p. 147; and
note the omitted article at ll. 2381, 318, 544, with the peculiar tmesis of
_between_ at ll. 859, 1298, 1686, 1957. So _Cǣdmon_, l. 163 (Thorpe),
_Exod. _ l. 562 (Hunt), etc.
l. 320. Cf. l. 924; and _Andreas_, l. 987, where almost the same words
occur. "Here we have manifestly before our eye one of those ancient
causeways, which are among the oldest visible institutions of
civilization. " --E.
l. 322. S. inserts comma after scīr, and makes hring-īren (= _ring-mail_)
parallel with gūð-byrne.
l. 325. Cf. l. 397. "The deposit of weapons outside before entering a house
was the rule at all periods. . . . In provincial Swedish almost everywhere a
church porch is called våkenhus,. . . i. e. _weapon-house_, because the
worshippers deposited their arms there before they entered the house. "--E. ,
after G. Stephens.
l. 333. Cf. Dryden's "mingled metal _damask'd_ o'er with gold. "--E.
l. 336. "ǣl-, el-, kindred with Goth. _aljis_, other, e. g. in ǣlþéodig,
elþéodig, foreign. "--Cook's Sievers' Gram. , p. 47.
l. 336. Cf. l. 673 for the functions of an ombiht-þegn.
l. 338. Ho. marks wræc- and its group long.
l. 343. Cf. l. 1714 for the same bēod-genēatas,--"the predecessor title to
that of the Knights of the Table Round. "--E. Cf. _Andreas_ (K. ), l. 2177.
l. 344. The future is sometimes expressed by willan + inf. , generally with
some idea of volition involved; cf. ll. 351, 427, etc. Cf. the use of
willan as principal vb. (with omitted inf. ) at ll. 318, 1372, 543, 1056;
and sculan, ll. 1784, 2817.
l. 353. sīð here, and at l. 501, probably means _arrival_. E. translates
the former by _visit_, the latter by _adventure_.
l. 357. unhār = _hairless, bald_ (Gr. , etc. ).
l. 358. ēode is only one of four or five preterits of gān (gongan, gangan,
gengan), viz. gēong (gīong: ll. 926, 2410, etc. ), gang (l. 1296, etc. ),
gengde (ll. 1402, 1413). Sievers, p. 217, apparently remarks that ēode is
"probably used only in prose. " (? ! ). Cf. geng, _Gen. _ ll. 626, 834; _Exod. _
(Hunt) l. 102.
l. 367. The MS. and H. -So. read with Gr. and B. glædman Hrōðgār, abandoning
Thorkelin's glædnian. There is a glass. hilaris glædman. --_Beit. _ xii. 84;
same as glæd.
l. 369. dugan is a "preterit-present" verb, with new wk. preterit, like
sculan, durran, magan, etc. For various inflections, see ll. 573, 590,
1822, 526. Cf. _do_ in "that will _do_"; _doughty_, etc.
l. 372. Cf. l. 535 for a similar use; and l. 1220. Bede, _Eccles. Hist. _,
ed. Miller, uses the same expression several times. "Here, and in all other
places where cniht occurs in this poem, it seems to carry that technical
sense which it bore in the military hierarchy [of a noble youth placed out
and learning the elements of the art of war in the service of a qualified
warrior, to whom he is, in a military sense, a servant], before it bloomed
out in the full sense of _knight_. "--E.
l. 373. E. remarks of the hyphened eald-fæder, "hyphens are risky toys to
play with in fixing texts of pre-hyphenial antiquity"; eald-fæder could
only = _grandfather_. eald here can only mean _honored_, and the hyphen is
unnecessary. Cf. "old fellow," "my old man," etc. ; and Ger. _alt-vater_.
l. 378. Th. and B. propose Gēatum, as presents from the Danish to the
Geatish king. --_Beit.
