The Composition of Beozuulf 313 



Beowulf, lays down these conditions,^ as postulated by the nature 

 of what he considers to be the nucleus of the poem : 



( 1 ) The enhancement of national consciousness in the body of 

 the people, or of a sense of solidarity on the part of the comitatus 

 — the hird, as the Norsemen came to call it. 



(2) A refinement and gentleness of manners, suggesting a 

 relatively advanced stage of civilization, and therefore a certain 

 stability of the body corporate. 



(3) The Christianity^ following upon the heathenism in which 

 the mythical elements originated must have been of a tolerant and 

 relatively undogmatic character, and in harmony with the national 

 temper. All these conditions he finds fulfilled in the Northumbria 

 of the first half of the seventh century. The Durham Liber Vita 

 contains a surprisingly large number of the names which occur in 

 Beoivulf,^ and the nuclear legend might well have come to Eng- 

 land with the expeditions which resulted in the founding of the 

 Bernician kingdom by Ida in 547. He points* out in detail how 

 the above formulated conditions were fulfilled in the period pre- 

 ceding 642 or 650, but hardly continuing much later than this. 

 Hereupon he goes off in an endeavor to show that the further 

 evolution of the poem belongs to ]\Iercia, though, in contrast with 

 his statement about Northumbria, he in one place expresses him- 

 self thus^ : 'In IMercia there were fewer clergy, and fewer institu- 



^ Beozmlf, p. 223. 



^ Incidentally he says : 'Der Kern von A durchaus christlich . . . ist' 

 See Brandl, p. 62, and compare the valuable study by Klaeber, 'Die Christ- 

 lichen Elemente im Beowulf,' in Anglia, Vols. 35 and 36 (191 1-2), and, for 

 essential agreement. Chambers, Beowulf, 1921, pp. 126-8; Gerould, Saints' 

 Legends, p. 60; Emerson, in Mod. Lang. Rev. 16. 113-9. 



' Cf . Brandl, p. 59. Chadwick says, pp. 43-4: 'The total number of 

 personal names found in the five poems, Beowulf, Finn, Waldhere, Widsith, 

 and Deor, is 132. . . . Over forty of these names belonged to persons who 

 appear to have lived, or at any rate to have been born, before the end of 

 the seventh century^ while at least thirteen of them are unknown after the 

 same period. To the latter class belong the important names, Widsith and 

 Beowulf. . . . If we add the place-names to the personal names, the total 

 number of heroic names found in England in historical documents seems 

 to be 76. Out of this number only seven, apparently, are limited to persons 

 born after the end of the seventh century.' 



* Beowulf , p. 224 ff. 



' Pp. 228-9. 



