The Waning Sword E Conversion Imagery and Celestial Myth in Beowulf DWARD The Waning Sword Conversion Imagery and EDWARD PETTIT P The image of a giant sword mel� ng stands at the structural and thema� c heart of the Old ETTIT Celestial Myth in Beowulf English heroic poem Beowulf. This me� culously researched book inves� gates the nature and signifi cance of this golden-hilted weapon and its likely rela� ves within Beowulf and beyond, drawing on the fi elds of Old English and Old Norse language and literature, liturgy, archaeology, astronomy, folklore and compara� ve mythology. In Part I, Pe� t explores the complex of connota� ons surrounding this image (from icicles to candles and crosses) by examining a range of medieval sources, and argues that the giant sword may func� on as a visual mo� f in which pre-Chris� an Germanic concepts and prominent Chris� an symbols coalesce. In Part II, Pe� t inves� gates the broader Germanic background to this image, especially in rela� on to the god Ing/Yngvi-Freyr, and explores the capacity of myths to recur and endure across � me. Drawing on an eclec� c range of narra� ve and linguis� c evidence from Northern European texts, and on archaeological discoveries, Pe� t suggests that the T image of the giant sword, and the characters and events associated with it, may refl ect HE an elemental struggle between the sun and the moon, ar� culated through an underlying W myth about the the� and repossession of sunlight. ANING The Waning Sword: Conversion Imagery and Celesti al Myth in Beowulf is a welcome contribu� on to the overlapping fi elds of Beowulf-scholarship, Old Norse-Icelandic literature and Germanic philology. Not only does it present a wealth of new readings that shed light on the cra� of the Beowulf-poet and inform our understanding of the poem’s S major episodes and themes; it further highlights the merits of adop� ng an interdisciplinary WORD approach alongside a compara� ve vantage point. As such, The Waning Sword will be compelling reading for Beowulf-scholars and for a wider audience of medievalists. As with all Open Book publica� ons, this en� re book is available to read for free on the publisher’s website. Printed and digital edi� ons can also be found at www.openbookpublishers.com Cover image: Freyr, adapted from an illustrati on by Johannes Gehrts (1855-1921), public domain, htt ps://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Freyr_by_Johannes_Gehrts.jpg Cover design: Anna Gatti book ebooke and OA edi� ons also available OPEN ACCESS www.openbookpublishers.com EDWARD PETTIT OBP https://www.openbookpublishers.com © 2020 Edward Pettit This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license (CC BY 4.0). This license allows you to share, copy, distribute and transmit the work; to adapt the work and to make commercial use of the work providing attribution is made to the authors (but not in any way that suggests that they endorse you or your use of the work). Attribution should include the following information: Edward Pettit, The Waning Sword: Conversion Imagery and Celestial Myth in Beowulf. Cambridge, UK: Open Book Publishers, 2020, https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0190 In order to access detailed and updated information on the license, please visit https://doi. org/10.11647/OBP.0190#copyright Further details about CC BY licenses are available at http://creativecommons.org/licenses/ by/4.0/ All external links were active at the time of publication unless otherwise stated and have been archived via the Internet Archive Wayback Machine at https://archive.org/web Digital material and resources associated with this volume are available at https://doi. org/10.11647/OBP.0190#resources Some of the images have been reproduced at 72 dpi in the digital editions of this book due to copyright restrictions. Every effort has been made to identify and contact copyright holders and any omission or error will be corrected if notification is made to the publisher. ISBN Paperback: 978-1-78374-827-3 ISBN Hardback: 978-1-78374-828-0 ISBN Digital (PDF): 978-1-78374-829-7 ISBN Digital ebook (epub): 978-1-78374-830-3 ISBN Digital ebook (mobi): 978-1-78374-831-0 ISBN Digital (XML): 978-1-78374-832-7 DOI: 10.11647/OBP.0190 Cover image: Freyr, adapted from an illustration by Johannes Gehrts (1855-1921). Wikimedia, Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Freyr_by_Johannes_Gehrts.jpg Cover design by Anna Gatti. 7. Freyr, Skírnir and Gerðr Further possible clues to the relevance of myths concerning the god Yngvi-Freyr and his circle may be found in Beowulf’s adventure in the mere. This episode displays a lengthy series of correspondences—to my knowledge, previously unrecognized—to an Old Norse story involving Freyr, his emissary Skírnir and a giantess called Gerðr. This myth is recounted principally in the Eddic poem Fǫr Skírnis ‘Skírnir’s Journey’ (alias Skírnismál ‘Skírnir’s Words’), briefly referred to in Lokasenna, and retold by Snorri in Gylfaginning.1 Despite many differences of detail, the correspondences between Fǫr Skírnis and Beowulf’s mere-episode may well indicate that they are related as independent variations, which employ similar story-patterns, on essentially the same mythic theme.2 This theme, I propose, concerned a sun-controlling god who suffered anguish because of an encounter with a hostile lunar giantess whose body contained sunlight, and who is subsequently overcome by the sun- god’s armed emissary when he visits her in her water-enclosed home. It is of particular interest that the two weapons wielded by either hero may well correspond, as this could shed light on the nature of Hrunting and the giant sword. 1 SnEGylf, 30–1, largely an expurgated prose adaptation of Fǫr Skírnis. For a study of these accounts, see P. Bibire, ‘Freyr and Gerðr: The Story and its Myths’, in R. Simek, Jónas Kristjánsson and H. Bekker-Nielsen (ed.), Sagnaskemmtun: Studies in Honour of Hermann Pálsson on his 65th Birthday, 26th May 1986 (Vienna, 1986), 19–40. For a comparison of Fǫr Skírnis to another Old English poem, see P. R. Orton, ‘The Wife’s Lament and Skírnismál: Some Parallels’, in R. McTurk and A. Wawn (ed.), Úr Dölum til Dala: Guðbrandur Vigfússon Centenary Essays (Leeds, 1989), 205–37. 2 For a review of prior scholarship (including nature-mythological studies) and a detailed commentary on the Norse poem, see K. von See, B. La Farge, E. Picard, I. Priebe and K. Schulz, Kommentar zu den Liedern der Edda, Bd. 2: Götterlieder (Heidelberg, 1997), 45–151. A significant edition of the poem is Dronke, Poetic Edda, II, 373–414. © Edward Pettit, CC BY 4.0 https://doi.org/10.11647/OBP.0190.07 172 The Waning Sword In this chapter, therefore, I focus on the similarities between Fǫr Skírnis and Beowulf’s mere-episode,3 many of which are neither obvious nor compelling individually, but which may impress as a quite lengthy sequence. Additionally, I examine the evidence of Lokasenna, the further adventures of Hjálmþér and Snarvendill in Hjálmþés saga, and an episode from the medieval English Historia monasterii de Abingdon ‘History of the Monastery of Abingdon’. Fǫr Skírnis and Beowulf’s Mere-Episode Fǫr Skírnis records that Freyr looked into Jǫtunheimar ‘Giant Homes’, the land of giants, and suffered hugsóttir miklar ‘great mind/heart-sicknesses’ after seeing a fair maiden walk from her father’s halls to her bower. Freyr’s parents instructed his servant, Skírnir (whom scholars generally identify as a hypostasis of his master), to persuade him to talk.4 Skírnir asked Freyr why he sat alone for days on end. In reply, Freyr asked why he should tell Skírnir of his mikinn móðtrega ‘great mood- grief’, before adding obscurely ‘þvíat álfrǫðull lýsir um alla daga / ok þeygi at mínum munum’ (4) ‘“because the elf-halo shines through all days, and yet not to my desires.’’’ Skírnir pressed Freyr to explain, which he did: ‘Í Gymis g rðum ek sá ganga mér tíða mey; ǫ armar lýstu, en af þaðan alt lopt ok l gr. ǫ ‘Mær er mér tíðari en manni hveim ungum í árdaga; Ása ok álfa þat vill engi maðr, at vit sátt sém.’ (6–7) ‘In Gymir’s courts I saw walking a girl for whom I long; her arms gleamed, and from them all the sky and sea. 3 See additionally Chapter 9. 4 In addition to his role as emissary in the following story, Skírnir was sent by Óðinn down to the world of black-elves to command some dwarves to make a fetter for the monstrous wolf Fenrir; see SnEGylf, 28; S. A. Mitchell, ‘Skírnir’s Other Journey: The Riddle of Gleipnir’, in S. Hansson and M. Malm (ed.), Gudar på jorden: Festskrift till Lars Lönnroth (Stockholm, 2000), 67–75. Later in this study I discuss events relating to Fenrir’s binding in connection with myths of the sun and moon. 7. Freyr, Skírnir and Gerðr 173 ‘The girl is lovelier to me than [any girl was?] to any young man in ancient days; of the Æsir and the elves no-one will wish it, that we should be united.’ It seems that this radiant girl has replaced in Freyr’s affections the sun, the ‘elf-halo’,5 of which he was normally in cheerful command.6 She is subsequently named as Gerðr ‘She of the Garðr/Gerði [i.e., (Inhabited) Enclosed Space]’ (probably), daughter of the giant Gymir.7 That her arms illuminated the sky and sea, but not (explicitly at least) the land, might be significant, as we shall find that Gymir, in whose garðar ‘enclosed spaces’ Gerðr lived, may well have been a sea-giant;8 this suggests that his giantess daughter lived in or by the sea—judging from her name, on sea- enclosed ground.