Battle of Brunanburh (poem)
Encyclopedia
The Battle of Brunanburh is an Old English poem. It is preserved in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
, a historical record of events in Anglo-Saxon England which was kept from the late ninth to the mid-twelfth century. The poem records the Battle of Brunanburh
, a battle fought in 937 between an English army and a combined army of Scots, Vikings, and Britons. The battle resulted in an English victory, celebrated by the poem in style and language like that of traditional Old English battle poetry. The poem is notable because of those traditional elements and has been praised for its authentic tone, but it is also remarkable for its fiercely nationalistic tone, which documents the development of a unified England ruled by the House of Wessex
.
s at York
in 928, Constantine II
, the Scottish King, recognised the threat posed by the House of Wessex to his own position, and began forging alliances with neighbouring kingdoms to attempt a pre-emptive strike against Æthelstan. He married his daughter to Amlaíb mac Gofraid (also called Olaf Guthfrithsson, and Anlaf in the poem), the Norse-Gael King of Dublin
. Amlaíb had a claim to the throne of Northumbria
, from which Æthelstan expelled his father in 927. Thus, the invading army combined "Vikings, Scots, and Strathclyde Britons." On the English side, Æthelstan was joined by his brother, the later King Edmund. In the ensuing battle, the combined forces of Wessex and Mercia won a decisive victory.
celebrating the victory of Æthelstan and Edmund I.
The text begins by praising King Æthelstan and his brother Edmund I for their victory. It mentions the fall of "Scots and seafarers" in a battle that lasted an entire day, while "the battlefield flowed / with dark blood." "Norse seafarer[s]" and "weary Scot[s]" were killed by "West Saxons [who] / pursued those hateful people", killing them from behind with their swords; neither did "the Mercians...stint / hard handplay". "Five young kings" are killed in battle along with "seven / of Anlaf's earls". Amlaíb mac Gofraid ("Anlaf") flees by boat, and Constantine flees to the north, leaving "his son / savaged by weapons on that field of slaughter, / a mere boy in battle." The poem concludes by comparing the battle to those fought in earlier stages of English history:
, the language resembles that of the Old English Genesis A. The poem is not without its detractors: an early critic, Walter J. Sedgefield, in a 1904 study of the poems in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, said "even the longest and best written of their number, the Battle of Brunanburh, is but a simulacrum, a ghost of the older epos". That the poem should not be treated as a historical text, and that panegyric was the appropriate genre, was argued by Alistair Campbell: "The poet's subjects are the praise of heroes and the glory of victory. When this is realised, the oft-repeated criticism, that he does not greatly add to our knowledge of the battle, falls to the ground. It was not his object to do so. He was not writing an epic or a 'ballad.' He was writing a panegyric." Townend agrees, and notes that praise-poems on contemporary men are completely missing from the Anglo-Saxon period until a cluster of four panegyrics including Brunanburh in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.
Compared to The Battle of Maldon
, an Old English poem that commemorates a battle between English and Vikings half a century later, Brunanburh is notable for its nationalist overtones, whereas Maldon celebrates Christian over non-Christian values. Indeed, the poem is seen as celebrating a logical progression in the development of England as a unified nation ruled by the House of Wessex
; the battle reports "the dawning of a sense of nationality, ....a crisis in which a nation is involved". In this respect, Brunanburh is closer to the Anglo-Saxon poem The Taking of the Five Boroughs, also found in the Chronicle under the year 942, celebrating King Edmund's recapture of the Five Boroughs of the Danelaw. But while the poet claims veracity, Michael Swanton
notes, "it is ironic in view of his primarily historic concerns that he is in fact more successful than the Maldon-poet in transmitting the traditional poetic style." Peter Clemoes
argues in Interactions of Thought and Language in Old English Poetry that Brunanburh, as opposed to Maldon, relies on "uncomplicated patriotic triumphalism". The poem does not treat "personal responsibility" as Maldon does, but leans on an expansive view of history which sees the battle, in line with the Chronicles view of contemporary history as the "epitome of Anglo-Saxon, especially West Saxon, history with antecedents in the history of Britain", as "straightforwardly traditional". According to Patrick Wormald
, the poem builds on the "sense of ideological identity that the English had been given by Bede."
Accompanying the combatants are the usual "beasts of battle
" found in other Old English poems—the wolf, the raven, and the eagle. The Battle of Brunanburh, however, seems to include a fourth animal, the guþhafoc, or "war-hawk," in line 64. However, editors and scholars of the poem have suggested that graedigne guþhafoc, "greedy war-hawk", is actually a kenning
for the hasu-padan, / earn æftan hwit, the "dusky coated, white-tailed eagle" of lines 62b-63a.
. A "casebook" edited by Michael Livingston was published by the University of Exeter Press
in 2011, and broadens the investigation of the poem to include the historical battle.
The twelfth-century Anglo-Norman chronicler Geoffrey Gaimar
likely used the account in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for his treatment of Æthelstan in his L'Estoire des Engles. English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson translated (or "modernized") the poem in 1880, publishing it as part of his Ballads and Other Poems (and his son Hallam Tennyson published a prose translation of the poem). In contrast to many other translations of poetry, Tennyson's is still praised as "a faithful, sensitive, even eloquent recreation of its source." The Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges
wrote a short poem, "Brunanburh 937 AD," a translation of which was published in The New Yorker
. In a 1968 lecture at Harvard University
, Borges praised Tennyson's translation, stating that in some locutions Tennyson sounds "more Saxon than the original." A translation by Burton Raffel
is included in Alexandra Hennessey Olsen's anthology Poems and prose from the Old English.
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is a collection of annals in Old English chronicling the history of the Anglo-Saxons. The original manuscript of the Chronicle was created late in the 9th century, probably in Wessex, during the reign of Alfred the Great...
, a historical record of events in Anglo-Saxon England which was kept from the late ninth to the mid-twelfth century. The poem records the Battle of Brunanburh
Battle of Brunanburh
The Battle of Brunanburh was an English victory in 937 by the army of Æthelstan, King of England, and his brother Edmund over the combined armies of Olaf III Guthfrithson, the Norse-Gael King of Dublin, Constantine II, King of Scots, and Owen I, King of Strathclyde...
, a battle fought in 937 between an English army and a combined army of Scots, Vikings, and Britons. The battle resulted in an English victory, celebrated by the poem in style and language like that of traditional Old English battle poetry. The poem is notable because of those traditional elements and has been praised for its authentic tone, but it is also remarkable for its fiercely nationalistic tone, which documents the development of a unified England ruled by the House of Wessex
House of Wessex
The House of Wessex, also known as the House of Cerdic, refers to the family that ruled a kingdom in southwest England known as Wessex. This House was in power from the 6th century under Cerdic of Wessex to the unification of the Kingdoms of England....
.
Historical background
The Battle of Brunanburh was a culmination of the conflict between King Æthelstan and the northern kings. After Æthelstan had defeated the VikingViking
The term Viking is customarily used to refer to the Norse explorers, warriors, merchants, and pirates who raided, traded, explored and settled in wide areas of Europe, Asia and the North Atlantic islands from the late 8th to the mid-11th century.These Norsemen used their famed longships to...
s at York
York
York is a walled city, situated at the confluence of the Rivers Ouse and Foss in North Yorkshire, England. The city has a rich heritage and has provided the backdrop to major political events throughout much of its two millennia of existence...
in 928, Constantine II
Constantine II of Scotland
Constantine, son of Áed was an early King of Scotland, known then by the Gaelic name Alba. The Kingdom of Alba, a name which first appears in Constantine's lifetime, was in northern Great Britain...
, the Scottish King, recognised the threat posed by the House of Wessex to his own position, and began forging alliances with neighbouring kingdoms to attempt a pre-emptive strike against Æthelstan. He married his daughter to Amlaíb mac Gofraid (also called Olaf Guthfrithsson, and Anlaf in the poem), the Norse-Gael King of Dublin
Kings of Dublin
The Vikings invaded the territory around Dublin in the 9th century, establishing the Norse Kingdom of Dublin, the earliest and longest lasting Norse kingdom in all of Europe outside of Scandinavia, excepting the so-called Kingdom of Mann and the Isles. This corresponded to most of present-day...
. Amlaíb had a claim to the throne of Northumbria
Northumbria
Northumbria was a medieval kingdom of the Angles, in what is now Northern England and South-East Scotland, becoming subsequently an earldom in a united Anglo-Saxon kingdom of England. The name reflects the approximate southern limit to the kingdom's territory, the Humber Estuary.Northumbria was...
, from which Æthelstan expelled his father in 927. Thus, the invading army combined "Vikings, Scots, and Strathclyde Britons." On the English side, Æthelstan was joined by his brother, the later King Edmund. In the ensuing battle, the combined forces of Wessex and Mercia won a decisive victory.
The poem
The poem is preserved in four of the nine surviving manuscripts of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. In the Parker Chronicle, its verse lines are written out as poetry, following common Anglo-Saxon scribal practice. The 73-line long poem is written in "indeterminate Saxon," that is, the regular West-Saxon dialect in which most surviving Old English poetry is copied. It is referred to as a panegyricPanegyric
A panegyric is a formal public speech, or written verse, delivered in high praise of a person or thing, a generally highly studied and discriminating eulogy, not expected to be critical. It is derived from the Greek πανηγυρικός meaning "a speech fit for a general assembly"...
celebrating the victory of Æthelstan and Edmund I.
The text begins by praising King Æthelstan and his brother Edmund I for their victory. It mentions the fall of "Scots and seafarers" in a battle that lasted an entire day, while "the battlefield flowed / with dark blood." "Norse seafarer[s]" and "weary Scot[s]" were killed by "West Saxons [who] / pursued those hateful people", killing them from behind with their swords; neither did "the Mercians...stint / hard handplay". "Five young kings" are killed in battle along with "seven / of Anlaf's earls". Amlaíb mac Gofraid ("Anlaf") flees by boat, and Constantine flees to the north, leaving "his son / savaged by weapons on that field of slaughter, / a mere boy in battle." The poem concludes by comparing the battle to those fought in earlier stages of English history:
Never, before this,were more men in this island slain
by the sword's edge--as books and aged sages
confirm--since Angles and Saxons sailed here
from the east, sought the Britons over the wide seas,
since those warsmiths hammered the Welsh,
and earls, eager for glory, overran the land.
Style and tone
The style of the poem has been described as "sagalike in its sparse use of language combined with ample specific detail." According to George Anderson, since the poem comes so late in the Old English period, it gives evidence of the continuing attraction of the "warrior tradition": it is "clear and convincing testimony to the vitality of the Old English battle-epic tradition; the authentic ring sounds out years after the Beowulf Poet, Caedmon, and Cynewulf have been laid to rest." Donald Fry compares passages from Beowulf and Brunanburh (concerning the boarding of ships) and remarks on the "similar diction and imagery". According to Malcolm GoddenMalcolm Reginald Godden
Malcolm Reginald Godden is the chair holder of the Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon in the University of Oxford and has occupied the office since May 1991....
, the language resembles that of the Old English Genesis A. The poem is not without its detractors: an early critic, Walter J. Sedgefield, in a 1904 study of the poems in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, said "even the longest and best written of their number, the Battle of Brunanburh, is but a simulacrum, a ghost of the older epos". That the poem should not be treated as a historical text, and that panegyric was the appropriate genre, was argued by Alistair Campbell: "The poet's subjects are the praise of heroes and the glory of victory. When this is realised, the oft-repeated criticism, that he does not greatly add to our knowledge of the battle, falls to the ground. It was not his object to do so. He was not writing an epic or a 'ballad.' He was writing a panegyric." Townend agrees, and notes that praise-poems on contemporary men are completely missing from the Anglo-Saxon period until a cluster of four panegyrics including Brunanburh in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle.
Compared to The Battle of Maldon
The Battle of Maldon
The Battle of Maldon is the name given to an Old English poem of uncertain date celebrating the real Battle of Maldon of 991, at which the Anglo-Saxons failed to prevent a Viking invasion...
, an Old English poem that commemorates a battle between English and Vikings half a century later, Brunanburh is notable for its nationalist overtones, whereas Maldon celebrates Christian over non-Christian values. Indeed, the poem is seen as celebrating a logical progression in the development of England as a unified nation ruled by the House of Wessex
House of Wessex
The House of Wessex, also known as the House of Cerdic, refers to the family that ruled a kingdom in southwest England known as Wessex. This House was in power from the 6th century under Cerdic of Wessex to the unification of the Kingdoms of England....
; the battle reports "the dawning of a sense of nationality, ....a crisis in which a nation is involved". In this respect, Brunanburh is closer to the Anglo-Saxon poem The Taking of the Five Boroughs, also found in the Chronicle under the year 942, celebrating King Edmund's recapture of the Five Boroughs of the Danelaw. But while the poet claims veracity, Michael Swanton
Michael Swanton
Michael James Swanton is a British literary critic, translator, archaeologist and historian specializing in Old English literature and the Anglo-Saxon period....
notes, "it is ironic in view of his primarily historic concerns that he is in fact more successful than the Maldon-poet in transmitting the traditional poetic style." Peter Clemoes
Peter Clemoes
Peter Alan Martin Clemoes was a British historian.Born in Southend-on-Sea and educated at Brentwood School, he originally wished to become an actor and won a scholarship to RADA but the Second World War intervened and he served with the Royal Corps of Signals...
argues in Interactions of Thought and Language in Old English Poetry that Brunanburh, as opposed to Maldon, relies on "uncomplicated patriotic triumphalism". The poem does not treat "personal responsibility" as Maldon does, but leans on an expansive view of history which sees the battle, in line with the Chronicles view of contemporary history as the "epitome of Anglo-Saxon, especially West Saxon, history with antecedents in the history of Britain", as "straightforwardly traditional". According to Patrick Wormald
Patrick Wormald
Charles Patrick Wormald was a British historian born in Neston, Cheshire, son of historian Brian Wormald.He attended Eton College as a King's Scholar...
, the poem builds on the "sense of ideological identity that the English had been given by Bede."
Accompanying the combatants are the usual "beasts of battle
Beasts of battle
The Beasts of battle is a poetic trope in Old English and Old Norse literature. It consists of the wolf, the raven, and the eagle, traditional animals accompanying the warriors to feast on the bodies of the slain...
" found in other Old English poems—the wolf, the raven, and the eagle. The Battle of Brunanburh, however, seems to include a fourth animal, the guþhafoc, or "war-hawk," in line 64. However, editors and scholars of the poem have suggested that graedigne guþhafoc, "greedy war-hawk", is actually a kenning
Kenning
A kenning is a type of literary trope, specifically circumlocution, in the form of a compound that employs figurative language in place of a more concrete single-word noun. Kennings are strongly associated with Old Norse and later Icelandic and Anglo-Saxon poetry...
for the hasu-padan, / earn æftan hwit, the "dusky coated, white-tailed eagle" of lines 62b-63a.
Editions, adaptations, and translations
The poem is included in the Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records. The now-accepted standard edition of the poem is the 1938 edition by Alistair CampbellAlistair Campbell (academic)
Alistair Campbell was a British academic who was Rawlinson and Bosworth Professor of Anglo-Saxon, University of Oxford, and Fellow of Pembroke College, Oxford, from October 1963 until his death...
. A "casebook" edited by Michael Livingston was published by the University of Exeter Press
University of Exeter Press
University of Exeter Press is the academic press of the University of Exeter, England.-Main Subject Areas:* Arabic and Islamic Studies* Archaeology* Celtic Studies* Classical Studies and Ancient History* Cultural and Social Studies* Education...
in 2011, and broadens the investigation of the poem to include the historical battle.
The twelfth-century Anglo-Norman chronicler Geoffrey Gaimar
Geoffrey Gaimar
Geoffrey Gaimar , was an Anglo-Norman chronicler. Gaimar's most significant contribution to medieval literature and history is as a translator from Old English to Anglo-Norman. His L'Estoire des Engles translates extensive portions of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle as well as using Latin and French...
likely used the account in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for his treatment of Æthelstan in his L'Estoire des Engles. English poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson translated (or "modernized") the poem in 1880, publishing it as part of his Ballads and Other Poems (and his son Hallam Tennyson published a prose translation of the poem). In contrast to many other translations of poetry, Tennyson's is still praised as "a faithful, sensitive, even eloquent recreation of its source." The Argentine writer Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Luis Borges
Jorge Francisco Isidoro Luis Borges Acevedo , known as Jorge Luis Borges , was an Argentine writer, essayist, poet and translator born in Buenos Aires. In 1914 his family moved to Switzerland where he attended school, receiving his baccalauréat from the Collège de Genève in 1918. The family...
wrote a short poem, "Brunanburh 937 AD," a translation of which was published in The New Yorker
The New Yorker
The New Yorker is an American magazine of reportage, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons and poetry published by Condé Nast...
. In a 1968 lecture at Harvard University
Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States, established in 1636 by the Massachusetts legislature. Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States and the first corporation chartered in the country...
, Borges praised Tennyson's translation, stating that in some locutions Tennyson sounds "more Saxon than the original." A translation by Burton Raffel
Burton Raffel
Burton Raffel is a translator, a poet and a teacher. He has translated many poems, including the Anglo-Saxon epic Beowulf, poems by Horace, and Gargantua and Pantagruel by François Rabelais. In 1964, Raffel recorded an album along with Robert P...
is included in Alexandra Hennessey Olsen's anthology Poems and prose from the Old English.
External links
- Old English text, The Labyrinth: Resources for Medieval Studies, Georgetown UniversityGeorgetown UniversityGeorgetown University is a private, Jesuit, research university whose main campus is in the Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded in 1789, it is the oldest Catholic university in the United States...