Beowulf:
The Personification of Supernatural Beings in Relation to the Swedish-Geatish Wars
by: Nicole Janice Wallace
Disclaimer: This is a college paper, I don't claim to be as knowledgeable as the scholars on this topic but here are my thoughts. Do not plagarize or steal my work!]
Beowulf is the first full-length heroic epic written in any Germanic language. It survives to this day by a partly singed anonymous manuscript. There are many historical facts in Beowulf that are backed up by other external sources. These facts prove and reinforce that these events did happen as are portrayed. If this manuscript is studied with that idea in mind, then the supernatural beings in the poem are personified problems of events that were occurring to the Geatish people and the wyrd that controls these events.
Historically, Beowulf belonged to the Geatish clan, a seafaring people who resided in the south of Sweden. There was a lot of tension between the Geats and the Swedes up to and including Beowulf's time on the throne. The fact that the Geats were able to maintain themselves among such adversity for so long and until the reign of Beowulf would suggest to people at that time that fate can only be postponed but it is still inevitable.
Fate started to play a role in the turn for the worst when the bonds of kinship were broken among the ruling house of the Geats. Haethcyn, prince of the Geats, accidentally killed his brother Herebeald, causing their father Hrethel to die of grief. Haethcyn then became king. Then the sons of the Swedish king Ongentheow attacked the Geats. Haethcyn retaliated and attacked Ongentheow and was killed at Ravenswood after the first success. Men commanded by his brother, Hygelac, killed Ongentheow and Onthere became king of the Swedes. His brother Onela seized the Swedish throne, driving out his nephews. The exiled nephews went to Hygelac's son, Hearded, who later lost his life to Onela because of his hospitality. Onela then allowed Beowulf, nephew of Hygelac and Haethcyn, to become the king of the Geats. In the story Beowulf is the last hero of the Geatish nation and his death marks the demise of this ethnically distinct group.
The first supernatural being, Grendel, is a perfect personified example of ethnic hatred.
"Thus this lordly people lived in joy, blessedly, until one began to work his foul crimes - a fiend from hell. This grim spirit was called Grendel, mighty stalked of the marshes, who held the moors and fens; this miserable man lived for a time in the land of giants, after the Creator had condemned him among Cain's race - when he killed Abel the eternal Lord avenged that death. No joy in that feud - the Maker forced him far from mankind for his foul crime. From thence arose all misbegotten things, trolls and elves and the living dead, and also the giants who strove against God for a long while."
He spent many nights terrorizing and tormenting Hrothgar's kingdom because Grendel absolutely hated Danes. By his association with Cain's race, the author implies that, by nature, Grendel is excluded from this mead hall and kinship. Grendel uses this exclusion to power his violence towards this close-knit kin group. Grendel is a cannibalistic monster who would devour the Danes while they sleep in the hall. Taking the warriors one by one each night symbolizes the slow genocide of the Geats. Beowulf comes to attack Grendel in order to repay a favor to Hrothgar for keeping his father Ecgtheow safe in his time of need. Grendel manages to kill and eat one of the men in the hall before Beowulf is able to attack him. Grendel, severely wounded, then leaves and returns to his lair.
According to wyrd in the context of Germanic times, the moment of success is the same moment of damnation. Just as Beowulf thought he had defeated Grendel, a second monster comes to avenge Grendel's death. This monster is Grendel's mother.
"It was clearly seen, obvious to all men, that an avenger still lived on after that enemy for a long time after that grim battle - Grendel's mother, monster-woman, remembered her misery, she who dwelt in those dreadful waters, the cold streams, ever since Cain killed with his blade his only brother, his father's kin; he felt bloodstained, marked for murder, left the joys of men, dwelled in the wasteland."
Unlike Grendel, whose violence was fueled by ethnic hatred, love and kinship fuel her violence. Her love for her son makes her go mad and in a fit of violence she breaks into the hall and kills Hrothgar's most beloved advisor. Her character and actions represent the cyclic nature of war and feud. In feuding societies, it is common to avenge the death of a loved one or one of the kin group. This is the an eye for an eye principle. However, Grendel and his mother, foiled against the men in Hrothgar's hall, are an example of a flawed kin group due to the fact that their ancestor Cain broke the laws of kinship when he killed his brother. This caused their exclusion from the functional kin group of the Danes.
After Beowulf's success battling these creatures,
"then came the broad kingdom into Beowulf's hands; he held it will for fifty winters - he was then a wise king, old guardian of his homeland - until in the dark nights a dragon began his reign who guarded his hoard in the high heaths and the steep stone barrows; the path below lay unknown to men. Some sort of man went inside there, found his way to the heathen hoard"
This third monster, the dragon, is wyrd personified. It is the discontent that broods in the internal structure of a nation, as well as the ethnic hatred from the outside. The dragon comes "with surging flames, seeking out his enemies, the hated men," foreshadowing the destruction and collapse of the Geatish nation to their tribal enemies, the Swedes.
"The worm's warfare was widely seen, his ferocious hostility, near and far, how the destroyer hated and harmed the Geatish people, then hastened to his hoard, his dark and hidden hall, before the break of day. He had surrounded the people of that region with fire, flames, and cinders; he took shelter in his barrow, his walls and warfare"
At this point, Beowulf and his men realize that this trial could not possibly turn out the way his previous battles had. While fighting Grendel and Grendel's mother only postponed the fate prescribed to the Geatish people, the dragon concludes what had been postponed. Fate prevails.
There are several metaphorical ways that the dragon manifests itself as fate. For example, he dragon is also fifty feet in length, which symbolizes the length of Beowulf's fifty year rule. This would signify that fate grows and waits for the right moment to prevail implying the longer the wait, the worse the demise. Also, the dragon burns Beowulf's hall, which is symbolic for his kingdom. Beowulf is also killed by the dragon, marking the death of his kingship as well as the defeat and destruction of the Geatish nation. The destructive forces of this dragon and the inevitable outcome of fate is best portrayed in this quote which states how devastating it is to have lost a nation, kinship bonds, and the hall in which all social transactions take place.
"Death in war and awful deadly harm have swept away all of my people who have passed from life, and left the joyful hall. Now have I none to bear the sword or burnish the bright cup, the precious vessel - the host has fled."
In conclusion, wyrd can only be postponed but it can not be avoided forever. As outlined in the third paragraph, there are many historical events that may have postponed fate but at the same time, continued to move the sequence of events onwards. The three monsters in Beowulf accompolish the same function. Overcoming these symbolic monsters only postpones the fate of the Geatish people but even Beowulf, the great warrior of the Geatish people, is no match for fate. The Geats succumb to the Swedes and disappear eternally as an ethnically distinctive group.