Anglo-Saxon literature - Beowulf

The Anglo-Saxons spoke what is now called Old English. The first literary works in this language go back to around 650 AD. Old English, or Anglo-Saxon, came from (quite unsurprisingly) the Angles and the Saxons. Well, them and the Jutes. All these three where germanic tribes, and when they started inhabiting England, their languages formed Old English. Originally this was written down in a runic Alphabet, but it changed to the Latin letters around the 8th century due to influence from Christian missionaries.

The language of the Anglo-Saxons

The Anglo-Saxon language is known for having had certain characteristics that are quite different from language today. In Old English, many stylistic devices were used in literary works. For instance, things such as kennings, alliteration, assonance, and rime were used in practically every text. This was not purely because they looked nice, but more because most people in the early middle ages could not read. Adding these stylistic devices to a text would make it easier to remember.

Characteristics of the Anglo-Saxon language

As was mentioned before, the Anglo-Saxons made use of stylistic devices. Here is a list of the most often used ones:

Stylistic devices

-Kenning: A kenning is a collection of words that poetically describe another. In Beowulf, we can find an example of a kenning in 'wave cutter', which refers to a ship.

-Alliteration: Alliteration is the term for when multiple words in the same sentence start with the same sound. For example:'...walked in the night; the warriors slept whose task was...'

-Assonance: Assonance is quite similar to Alliteration, only differing in the sense that assonance applies to vowels, usually in the middle of a word. An example of Assonance would be:'...with sour hearts and mourning mood.'

-Litotes: A litotes is a stylistic device where you deny the opposite of what you mean to express what you mean. For example:'This hoard was not less great...'

-Rythm and Meter: The term Rythm refers to the pace of a poem, and the term meter refers to what parts of the poem are stressed or emphasised, and what parts are not.

The Anglo-Saxons loved riddles, so here are some examples of Anglo-Saxon riddles and their answers:

-'what hangs down by the thigh of a man, under his cloak, yet is stiff and hard? When the man pulls up his robe, he puts the head of this hanging thing into that familiar hole of matching length which he has filled many times before.' The answer to this riddle is: a key.

-'The wave, over the wave, a strange thing I saw, thoroughly wrought, and wonderfully ornate: a wonder on the wave: water became bone.' The answer to this riddle is: 'water became bone' refers to ice.

-'I am a wondrous thing, and to woman I am a thing of joyful expectation, to close-lying companions serviceable. I harm no city-dweller with the exception of my slayer. My stem is erect and tall – I stand up in bed – and I am whiskery somewhere down below. Sometimes a countryman’s attractive daughter will venture, bumptious girl, to get a grip on me. She assaults my red self and seizes my head and clenches me in a cramped place. She will soon feel the effect of her encounter with me, this curl-locked woman who squeezes me. Her eye will be wet.' The answer to this riddle is: an onion.

The Anglo-Saxon love for riddles