Poetic Style and Innovation in Old English, Old Norse, and Old Saxon 9781501513688, 9781501518324

Table of contents :
Acknowledgement
Contents
List of Tables
Introduction
Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis
Chapter 2: Old English Wisdom Poetry: The Influence of Formulaic Diction
Chapter 3: Old Norse Ljóðaháttr and Málaháttr: Dividing Hypermetrics
Chapter 4: The Old Saxon Heliand: Working through Ambiguity
Chapter 5: Late Old English Hypermetrics: Linguistic Change and Stylistic Adaptation in the Old English Judith
Conclusion
Works Cited
Index

Citation preview

Megan E. Hartman Poetic Style and Innovation in Old English, Old Norse, and Old Saxon

Richard Rawlinson Center Series for Anglo-Saxon Studies

Editorial Board and Special Advisors Lindy Brady, University of Mississippi, USA Kees Dekker, Rijksuniversiteit Groningen, the Netherlands Nicole Guenther Discenza, University of South Florida Helen Foxhall Forbes, Durham University Timothy Graham, University of New Mexico, USA Catherine Karkov, University of Leeds, England (Series Editor) Rosalind Love, Robinson College, Cambridge University, England

Megan E. Hartman

Poetic Style and Innovation in Old English, Old Norse, and Old Saxon

ISBN 978-1-5015-1832-4 e-ISBN (PDF) 978-1-5015-1368-8 e-ISBN (EPUB) 978-1-5015-1355-8 Library of Congress Control Number: 2020946063 Bibliographic information published by the Deutsche Nationalbibliothek The Deutsche Nationalbibliothek lists this publication in the Deutsche Nationalbibliografie; detailed bibliographic data are available on the Internet at http://dnb.dnb.de. © 2020 Walter de Gruyter GmbH, Berlin/Boston Cover image: © The British Library Board (Cotton MS Vespasian A.i f030v) Typesetting: Integra Software Services Pvt. Ltd. Printing and binding: CPI books GmbH, Leck www.degruyter.com

For my parents

Acknowledgement It is my great honor to thank the many people who helped me make this book a reality. First and foremost, I would like to thank my consummate mentor Robert D. Fulk, who showed me how to make interesting claims using meter and who has continued to offer advice and support long after he was obligated to do so. I will always be deeply indebted to him for the knowledge he shared and the kind support he provided. Kari Ellen Gade has also been a generous teacher who taught me everything I know about Old Norse and Old Saxon metrics. In addition to these two, a number of other senior scholars, whom I met at school, at conferences, and elsewhere, saw fit to share their expertise with me, and I would not have been able to reach this point without them, so I would like to thank Michael Adams, Thomas Carnicelli, John Galton, Shannon Gayk, Patricia Clare Ingham, James Krasner, Donka Minkova, and Geoffrey Russom. In addition to these fabulous teachers, I have had many fabulous colleagues who have discussed ideas with me, offered feedback at conferences, and generally supported me throughout this process. I therefore owe my thanks to Rachel Anderson, Lisa Hicks, Jessica Hollander, Emily Houlik-Ritchey, Lesley Jacobs, Brent Moberly, Brad Modlin, Leonard Neidorf, Rafael J. Pascual, Douglas Simms, Erin Sweany, Arwen Taylor, and Elizabeth Williamsen. I would particularly like to thank my colleagues here at the University of Nebraska at Kearney who read various parts of the book as I was working to complete it, helping me refine my argument and pushing me to stronger conclusions: Michelle Beissel Heath, Susan Honeyman, Amanda Sladek, Annarose Steinke, and Marguerite Tassi. I would like to express my thanks to UNK as well, specifically the Research Service Council, for support throughout the processes, especially in the form of a scholarly release fellowship. I also had extensive support throughout the publishing process. I owe a great deal of thanks to the MIP team who helped at various stages (and were very understanding about deadlines), particularly Michaela Göbels, Jonathan Hoare, Ilse Schweitzer, and the two generous anonymous reviewers who provided invaluable suggestions on how to improve my manuscript. For help with editing and indexing, I owe many thanks to Mike Hartman, Kaitlin Schneider, and Danielle Williams. And, of course, to complete these acknowledgements, I wish to express my gratitude toward my family, who supported me throughout this long process as well as everything that led up to it. For being proud of their kid sister in spite of her being too nerdy for words, I should like to thank Dave and Michelle Sneiderman and Becca and Matt Cattabriga. For always giving their auntie a reason to smile, I should like to thank Ella MacLean, Kayla Sneiderman, and https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501513688-202

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Cora Cattabriga. And for long phone calls when I was struggling, for listening to my ideas even if they didn’t quite understand them, and for believing in me without fail, I should like to thank my parents, Carol and Mike Hartman. You guys are the best.

Contents Acknowledgement List of Tables Introduction

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis 15 Introduction 15 Metrical Properties of Conservative Hypermetrics 16 The Structure of the Onset 17 The Structure of the Cadence 20 Distribution Patterns 23 Verse Grammar 27 Points of Continuity 28 Hypermetric Innovations 31 Rhetorical Uses and Practical Purposes of Hypermetric Verse Conclusions 50 Chapter 2: Old English Wisdom Poetry: The Influence of Formulaic Diction 53 Introduction 53 The Structure of Gnomic Hypermetrics 56 The Structure of the Line 56 The Distribution of the Line 60 Kuhn’s Laws in Gnomic Verse 62 Placement of the Finite Verb 65 Oral Formulaic Diction and Syntax 67 Oral Formulaic Theory and Gnomic Formulae 68 Formulaic Diction and the Structure of Gnomic Hypermetrics Syntax in Gnomic Hypermetrics 74 The Rhetorical Functions of Gnomic Hypermetrics 77 Hypermetrics in The Fortunes of Men 79 Hypermetrics in Maxims II 81 Hypermetrics in Maxims I 84 Conclusion 87

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Chapter 3: Old Norse Ljóðaháttr and Málaháttr: Dividing Hypermetrics 89 Introduction 89 Linguistic and Metrical Differences in Old Norse 91 Effect of Linguistic Differences in Old Norse Meter Features of Old Norse Hypermetrics 94 The Syntactic Style of Old Norse Hypermetrics 98 Narrative Convenience in Málaháttr 99 The Flexibility of the Ljóðaháttr Full Line 103 Style Shifting in the Eddic Praise Poems 112 Building up Battle in Hákonarmál 113 Shifting views of Valhǫll in Eiríksmál 117 Speech Patterning in Haraldskvæði 120 Conclusion 124

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Chapter 4: The Old Saxon Heliand: Working through Ambiguity 125 Introduction 125 Linguistic Differences and Increased Flexibility in the Old Saxon Tradition 127 Flexibility within the Verse Types 128 Flexibility of Distribution Patterns 130 Determining the Corpus 134 The Composition of Old Saxon Hypermetrics 135 The Structure of the Old Saxon Line 136 Verse Grammar in Old Saxon 138 Two Modes of Hypermetric Composition 142 Converting the Bible through Hypermetrics 145 The Sermon on the Mount 147 Mary Magdalena 150 Short Hypermetric Passages 154 Conclusion 156 Chapter 5: Late Old English Hypermetrics: Linguistic Change and Stylistic Adaptation in the Old English Judith 159 Introduction 159 Developments in Late Old English 162 Hypermetric composition in Judith 167 Hypermetric Structure in Judith 167 Verse Grammar in Judith 171 The Style and Possible Uses of Judith’s Hypermetric Passages

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Repetition and Variation in Judith 175 Thematic Expansion in Hypermetric Passages Conclusion 192 Conclusion Works Cited Index

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List of Tables Table 1.1 Poetic diction in hypermetric versus normal verses 28 Table 1.2 Finite verb placement in conservative hypermetric lines 32 Table 1.3 Subordinating conjunctions in hypermetric verses versus normal verses 43 Table 2.1 Length of onsets in conservative versus gnomic hypermetric verses Table 2.2 Finite verb placement in gnomic hypermetric lines 65 Table 3.1 Finite Verb placement in the line in málaháttr 100 Table 4.1 Finite verb placement in Old Saxon hypermetrics 140 Table 5.1 Percentage of normal verse types in late poems as compared to Beowulf 164 Table 5.2 Percentage of verses with independent words in the drop 165 Table 5.3 Percentage of verses with a polysyllabic drop 166 Table 5.4 Finite verb placement in the hypermetric lines of Judith 173

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Introduction John C. Pope begins his metrical study The Rhythm of Beowulf by saying, “Metrical studies of ancient poetry have at least two immediate aims, the establishment of the text and the recovery of the pleasure inherent in verse” (1966: 3). Work on Old English meter both prior and subsequent to his has gone a long way towards accomplishing these two aims: studies such as A. J. Bliss’s The Metre of Beowulf (1962) have mapped out the various verses in such detail that we can make more accurate emendations to the text, if not metri causa, at least with meter accurately informing each surmise, while studies such as Geoffrey Russom’s later Old English Meter and Linguistic Theory (1987) have started us thinking about how the poets and the audience might have understood the line. In spite of these two modes of metrical study, however, current metrical scholarship on the Germanic alliterative long-line remains largely divorced from literary study. The field of metrical study has become increasingly robust, with studies that seek to refine our understanding of the long-line (see, for example, Kendall 1991, Hutcheson 1995, Suzuki 1996, 2004, and 2014, and Putter, Jefferson, and Stokes 2007), studies that theorize on why the line developed the way that it did (see, for example, Russom 2017), and studies that use meter as a tool for such tasks as textual editing and dating poetry (see, for example, Fulk 1992 and Neidorf 2017). Yet few metrical scholars consider the literary implications of Germanic meter and fewer literary scholars use metrical patterning directly to inform their readings of Germanic poetry.1 This general paucity of scholarship that combines metrical study with literary analysis leaves a hole in the field of Germanic philology because metrical style is an important aspect of the poets’ art and could therefore serve as a key component to understanding poems as a whole. The idea that certain types of meter are appropriate for certain topics has been around for a long time, as evidenced by Aristotle’s Poetics. Poets of the Renaissance and afterwards wrote prolifically on the various effects of metrical patterns. For example, Samuel Daniel, in his Defense of Rhyme, explains how “all verse is but a frame of words confined within certain measure, differing from the ordinary speech, and introduced the better to express men’s conceits, both for delight and memory” (1998: 201). In addition to

1 In general, Old Norse scholarship includes more work in this area than Old English or Old Saxon scholarship, and the recent Handbook of Eddic Poetry: Myths and Legends of Early Scandinavia includes three such essays: Gunnel 2016 and Schorn 2016a and 2016b. Some examples of such work in Old English can be found in a small amount of scholarship on the metrical charms in Roper 2000 and Stanley 1984b. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501513688-001

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Introduction

tracts on poetry, poems were also glossed with commentary on the meter, providing another window into the mind of poets or audiences at the time. A gloss of Spenser’s Shepheardes Calender clearly implies a connection between meter and mood, saying it is similar to music which may “be many kinds, some sadder, some lighter, some martiall, some heroical: and so diversely eke affect the mynds of men” (see Hardison 1989: 27). Modern scholars have subsequently used such commentary to inform their metrical analysis and suggest clear connections between meter and tone. In terms of Shakespeare’s poetry, George T. Wright, for example, notes how different ways of lengthening the line can create slightly different effects (for instance, feminine endings can seem more chaotic or more comic, triple endings give the impression of ordinary speech, and the epic caesura creates tension), but that overall “the effect of all these devices is almost always of intense and hurried speech” (1988: 160–73). Such observations have clear interpretive value and have been used to further literary readings of various poems written after the Middle Ages. While numerous studies have been made of diction and word patterning in the scholarship of the alliterative long-line, similar studies that focus on the effect of stress patterns are rare. Though problematic, the lack is hardly surprising given the structure of Germanic alliterative poetry: verse types are interchanged constantly and even the individual sub-types are relatively fluid in the ways they can be realized, so any argument that rests on a minor aberration is tenuous at best. Furthermore, only one clavis metrica exists for early Germanic verse, Snorri Sturlason’s Prose Edda, particularly the section Háttatal. This text provides descriptions of the different meters with example stanzas and has been invaluable for understanding poetry; it is probably the reason why more scholarship has been done in this area in Old Norse than other Germanic languages. Nevertheless, it does not analyze the literary value of the metrical patterns to the same depth as some of the Early Modern texts, so it does not provide as clear a model of how to build on such ideas. As I seek to move forward and fill this gap, my goal is to do so in a systematic way that addresses a wide range of questions using a variety of evidence that allows for a degree of objectivity in my analysis. Relations between poetic form and meaning have been very difficult to theorize and often depend too much on the authority of the interpreter. Consider the attempt to relate a feature of experimental poetic form to a unique modernist insight into human life. This might qualify as the most common kind of speculation, but it is clearly the most difficult kind imaginable. To justify and theorize such speculations, we need to consider the many relevant topics that lie between poetic form and unique insight, and it will be most convenient to start with the codified elements of meaning in formulaic traditions. In particular, what figures of speech

Introduction

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(for example, Old English kennings) does a given meter facilitate? How does it support rhetorical devices like parallelism and Old English “variation”? How does meter relate to genre? How does the poetic line lend itself to the “sententious” authority of proverbial wisdom or to the immediacy of “blow-by-blow” description, along with their partial analogues in rhetorical grammar, hypotaxis, and parataxis? What is the relation between metrical-grammatical form and tonal contrasts such as formal/informal? What is the relation between traditional authority within a particular culture and the poetic archaisms that serve partly, but not entirely, to facilitate formulaic composition—or between a colloquial tone and more idiomatic grammatical constructions that may be more difficult to implement metrically? How do larger-scale poetic units like stanzas correlate with important themes or narrative actions? In short, what generally useful kinds of meaningful effects does a poetic meter facilitate? Exploration of these topics will leave the interpreter in a much better position to show how form relates to meaning in particular cases and how particular poets exploit the expressive opportunities that a given meter provides. One especially elucidating place to begin this sort of analysis is the study of hypermetric verse. In Old English, a hypermetric verse is one that is half-again as long as a normal verse, through the addition of either a stressed and unstressed position or two unstressed positions. As such, these verses are not minor aberrations: they are clearly a very different mode of composition that poets used only rarely, and they must therefore have a distinct purpose. Thus, a study of hypermetric meter can illustrate one way in which poets used metrical features to alter the tone or otherwise produce an important rhetorical effect. Up to this point, hypermetric meter has received only limited attention. Mostly, studies of hypermetric verse appear in chapters (often short ones) in longer studies of Old English or Old Saxon meter overall (see Bliss 1962, Russom 1987, Hofmann 1991, Suzuki 1996 and 2004, and Bredehoft 2005) or else in shorter notes that elucidate a specific point without expanding further (see Timmer 1951 and Bredehoft 2003). Such studies have laid a strong foundation for our understanding of hypermetric meter, but their limited scope creates two shortcomings. First, most of the studies group all hypermetric lines together. Even studies such as Bliss’s and Russom’s that look specifically at Beowulf turn to the entire corpus when analyzing hypermetrics and treat them all as a group.2 While looking at the corpus as a whole is not unusual for metrical studies, it is problematic because so many of the poems use hypermetrics differently, and attention to different subsets

2 The one major exception is Suzuki 1996. However, Suzuki’s study is also limiting because he looks only at Beowulf and therefore has a very small data set to draw from.

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of hypermetrics would therefore be useful in determining the standards of composition in different contexts and how the contexts might influence how the line is being used. Second, most analysis of the hypermetric line has focused almost exclusively on the patterns of stress and alliteration. While such analysis is fundamental to the understanding of hypermetrics, indeed, of any older Germanic verse, it ignores differences in a variety of extra-metrical features that also distinguish the hypermetric from the normal line. Attention to such lexical and syntactic patterns could help us understand both how the stress patterns are formed and why lines structured this way would be preferable to normal lines in certain contexts. Therefore, my goal with this study is to show how hypermetric meter is used and adapted in different contexts to become a tool for various stylistic effects and to show how understanding these different adaptations can lead to richer interpretations of the poems. To expand upon previous studies, I take two important steps. First, I divide the poems into different contexts to study how poets use hypermetric meter differently depending on the linguistic input and their desired outcome. In part, this means analyzing how poets adapt to linguistic change over time. This mode of analysis is somewhat controversial since the extant manuscripts of medieval texts post-date the composition of most poems, so that the poems cannot be dated with any surety. However, scholars have employed a variety of techniques that use linguistic and metrical features to provide a rough date for the poems (see especially Cable 1974, Fulk 1992, Russom 2002, and Neidorf 2014). Significantly, even though these studies use different criteria, they come to similar conclusions about the dates of the various poems. The dates are not universally accepted because some scholars argue that poets could have been using conservative metrical features regardless of when they were composing.3 However, even if the poets were merely imitating early features, their poems still create a conservative metrical context for the hypermetric lines. I therefore use linguistic and metrical features, together with external features where possible, to group the longer poems into conservative and late poems. In addition to analyzing the effect of linguistic differences produced by language change within Old English, I also consider the effect of linguistic difference in cognate languages, specifically Old Norse and Old Saxon. Old Saxon provides an interesting comparison because the poetic system is very similar to Old English’s, yet linguistic difference means that Old Saxon has far more unstressed syllables than Old English does. The poet must therefore adapt the lines to the extreme to accommodate the necessary language material in each line. Old

3 Though for a counterargument, see Hartman 2014.

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Norse provides a very different example since it did not develop an equivalent hypermetric option in the cognate fornyrðislag meter. Nevertheless, the poetry does contain alternate meters that have some similarities to hypermetric structure, and I show how these meters developed and how poets were able to use them. Alternate linguistics contexts do not result solely from language change; another motivator is genre. While genre cannot be definitively codified in early Germanic poetry, there are still some poems that can clearly be linked together through similar subject material as well as stylistic and syntactic norms that set them apart, such as gnomic poetry. Gnomic poetry uses metrical standards different from those of many narrative poems, and so analysis of the metrical variants and the reasons why they might have occurred shows how content can influence typical metrical patterns as well. In large part, the innovations taken by the gnomic poets look similar to other poems that maximize the length of these longer verses, yet in some ways, the gnomic innovations are unique to this set of poems. Together, these different groups of poems illustrate the wide variety of metrical patterns that are used in hypermetric composition, and they also show how and why different variants are used in different contexts. The second way my study differs from earlier studies of hypermetric meter is that I give equal consideration to a variety of metrico-syntactic features that can further inform the structure of and purpose behind the lines.4 The first of these are the set of principles known as Kuhn’s laws. Kuhn’s laws describe stress patterns within the clause on the bases of three different lexical categories: stress words, which consist of nouns, adjectives, lexical adverbs, and non-finite verbs; clitics (Kuhn’s Satztielpartikeln), which consist of prepositions, determiners, and conjunctions that join phrases; and particles (Kuhn’s Satzpartikeln), which consist of finite verbs, pronouns, conjunctions that join complete clauses, quantitative adjectives (though when they appear attributively, quantitative adjectives are sometimes treated as clitics), and non-lexical adverbs.5 Kuhn’s first law, or the law of sentence particles, states that all particles must be stressed unless they are in the first drop of the verse clause. His second law states that any clause upbeat, by which he means unstressed material that begins a clause, must contain at least one particle. Therefore, hīe hyne þā ætbǣron

4 One of the most influential studies in the syntactic patterning of verse as it differs from prose is Kuhn 1969. Further studies include Kendall 1991, Momma 1997, and Blockley 2001. 5 Exactly which words should be considered particles is somewhat controversial. I have included the most complete list here. Other scholars would prefer to see words that always appear at the start of a clause and therefore must always be unstressed treated differently than the particles that can be displaced (see especially Hutcheson 1992: 133–34).

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(A3: ×××××–́×) “they then carried him” (Beowulf 28a) can appear at the beginning of a clause because the clause upbeat has several particles and all of the particles are grouped together in the first drop, but it could not appear in the middle of a clause because the unstressed particles would no longer be in the first drop of the clause and would therefore violate Kuhn’s first law. Likewise, on bearm scipes (C3: ×–́ ͜ ́ ×) “into the bosom of the ship” (Beowulf 35b) can appear in the middle of a clause because the initial unstressed word is a clitic, but it could not open a clause because the verse begins with an unstressed position without any particles, and so it would violate Kuhn’s second law in clause-initial position. Analyzing the laws is not entirely straightforward. There are many exceptions, which have led to controversy over whether or not they are valid, as well as proposals for other explanations.6 Furthermore, early Germanic poetic syntax can be difficult to analyze in terms of where clause breaks fall. For example, a single subject followed by two finite verbs would be considered a continuous clause with a compound verb in Modern English, but it could be analyzed differently in earlier, largely synthetic syntax. Especially in poetry, words that are implied by the inflections are frequently left out. Because the construction could be considered two clauses if the subject is implied, that analysis should be considered. In spite of these difficulties, though, Kuhn’s observations identify distinct patterns in how the verse is constructed, so I will compare the different ways these patterns are realized in hypermetric verse. By describing this interaction among syntax, stress patterns, and word placement, Kuhn shows one way in which poetic syntax differs from normal prose syntax, perhaps making for a more formal, or at least codified, type of sentence structure. I will therefore analyze the degree to which poets maintain this heightened syntax within their hypermetric composition to show whether, where, and to what degree the poets maintain the poetic sentence structure. Furthermore, I consider the placement of the three different lexical categories— the stress words, clitics, and particles—outside the context of Kuhn’s laws as well. In part, this information can help to analyze the structure of the line: the filler of the drops in particular can help to distinguish lighter from heavier

6 Haruko Momma provides a detailed study in which she concludes that Kuhn’s first law is a valid metrical principle, but Kuhn’s second law is more of a strong tendency (1997: 55–75). Among Kuhn’s detractors, most advocate for solutions that abandon the combination of meter and syntax that characterizes Kuhn’s laws and try to explain the phenomenon through constraints posed by either one or the other. For purely metrical solutions, see Russom 1996 and Cable 1991. For purely syntactic solutions see Orton 1999 and Stockwell and Minkova 1992. Donoghue (1997) reviews several alternate solutions and argues that while each of the theories can explain part of Kuhn’s observations, it takes a combination of meter and syntax to explain them in their entirety.

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positions. At the same time, paying attention to the distribution and frequency of the more heavily stressed words can illustrate the tone of the poem. Poems tend to take a more formal tone when the heavier words fill the stressed positions but are limited in the unstressed positions. This tone can be augmented by a particularly dense concentration of nouns, which can be created through reliance on features such as variation and enumeration. The degree to which the hypermetric sections adhere to the overall distribution of the different types of words, together with the overall concentration of the heaviest stress words, can, therefore, shed light on the register and how it changes in different sections. Another metrico-syntactic feature that I examine in each chapter is the placement of verbs in the line. This feature is important for two reasons. First, as an especially heavy particle, verbs are some of the most likely words to disrupt the meter and so are treated with care in these poems. In normal verse, particularly when they do not alliterate, poets ensure that they appear only in the heaviest of drops, or else in the final stressed position of the line. I consider the degree to which poets act similarly when composing hypermetric verse in order to gauge the degree of continuity between the two types of composition and to consider what sorts of innovations hypermetric meters allows. In addition, finite verbs also mark separate clauses, which is an important syntactic feature of the line. My analysis shows that hypermetric composition allows for greater syntactic progress than normal composition, so I consider how poets choose to take advantage of this significant syntactic difference. Such alternate syntactic patterns also have an effect on one of the most ubiquitous features of early Germanic verse: variation. Arthur Brodeur defines variation as “double or multiple statements of the same concept or idea in different words, with a more or less perceptible shift in stress” (1969: 40–41). Although not as common in Old Norse poetry, variation is a key feature of Old English and Old Saxon poetry that aids poets in finding alliterative staves while also adding formality and emphasis by repeating key ideas in new and creative ways. Because the longer hypermetric lines provide more non-alliterating stressed positions and extended unstressed positions, variation does not fulfill the same practical purpose in hypermetric verse as it does in normal verse. Analyzing the degree to which poets maintain or abandon variation therefore represents a stylistic choice that affects the formality of the different hypermetric passages. Variation can also lead to increased use of the specialized poetic koine. The poetic koine provides the poets with a large number of words, many of them synonyms, that are never found in prose. Often these words are used in variation for the sake of alliteration. For example, in addition to the word wer “man,” there are also the poetic terms beorn, guma, and scealc. While some of these can have different connotations in certain contexts – beorn can also mean “hero” and

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scealc “retainer”– they all share the basic meaning “man.” In addition, some words have meanings that have been extended in poetry, so that while the words themselves appear in prose, they can have a separate poetic meaning that does not appear in prose. For example, æsc, which literally refers to the wood from an ash tree, is used in poetry to mean “spear.” Many words in the koine are also compounds and kennings, some of which can even be hapax legomena. Such compounds add to the variety of word choice and metrical patterns while also adding metaphor to the diction of the poetry. They can also add to the weight of each line since they contribute to the noun-heavy diction and often create verses with a half-stress in addition to the two fully stressed positions. Less motivation for the poets to employ variation also means less motivation for them to employ the koine and a variety of kennings in the hypermetric sections. Thus, analyzing the use of these features in hypermetric verse can reveal whether poets had strong non-metrical motivations to use them and what that suggests about their craft. The combination of metrical, metrico-syntactic, and extra-metrical features will therefore provide as full an understanding of hypermetric composition as possible and show the motivation behind the choices that the poets made. To define the corpus I used to undertake this study, I began by looking at the lists of hypermetric verse already identified by previous authors. For Old English, I relied largely on the list of hypermetric lines in A. J. Bliss’s The Metre of Beowulf and cross-referenced B. R. Hutcheson’s Old English Poetic Meter. For the Old Saxon Heliand, I compared Seiichi Suzuki’s The Metre of Old Saxon Poetry: The Remaking of Alliterative Tradition with D. Hofmann’s Die Versstrukturen des altsächsischen Stabreimgedichte Heliand und Genesis. In both cases I reconciled any differences I found between the two sources and eliminated any verses that seemed to be a result of scribal error, and then included the complete set of remaining hypermetric verses in my corpus.7 I needed to treat Old Norse literature differently, since the

7 Scribal error and textual emendations are particularly controversial subjects. Theories of textual editing went from relatively liberal to relatively conservative at the start of the twentieth century, and they have only continued to get more conservative. Conservative scholars such as Hoops (1936), Busse (1981), Stanley (1984a), Doane (1990), and Liuzza (2006) argue that as much as modern scholars might know about the language and the poetry, contemporary scribes knew more and that manuscripts are our best record of the original poem, and we should therefore not presume to emend in all but the most certain cases of scribal corruption. Frantzen (1990) and O’Brien O’Keefe (1990) further complicate the controversy by arguing that there is no original or authorial reading because the process of passing down a poem within an oral tradition is an interactive one, with everyone who had a hand it in, including the scribes, contributing. Fulk (1997: 47–48) concurs that no original text can be found, but points out that textual editors are not necessarily trying to create an original text, but instead attempting to uncover and possibly eliminate problematic spots. Other scholars, such as Sisam

Introduction

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complete corpus of extended meters is much larger. I included my scansion for Átlamál in its entirety, since that is the main poem in málaháttr, and made a selection of lines in ljóðaháttr from a variety of poems: Hávamál, Fáfnismál, Sigrdrífumál, and Skírnismál. Together, these selections create the foundation of my statistical data, and then I included three more unusual poems that switch between the two meters, Eiríksmál, Hákonarmál, and Haraldskvæði, for my literary analysis. To analyze my corpus, I also needed to choose a method of scansion. The scansion of hypermetric meter is not at all settled, though within the Sieversian tradition there are two main schools of thought that stem from two different modes of analysis undertaken by Eduard Sievers: that the line should be analyzed as a cadence, formed by a normal verse, that is proceeded by a twoposition onset (see Sievers 1887 and Russom 1987) or that the line should be analyzed as two separate lines that overlap in the middle (see Luick 1888, Sievers 1893, Bliss 1962, and Suzuki 1996).8 I argue in Hartman 2015 that the system of regular cadence plus an onset seems to be the more accurate way to describe the hypermetric line and that, furthermore, the onset is not equivalent to two normal positions but instead has a greater range of flexibility. I therefore use Sievers’s system of scansion and notation in this study. For this notation, the onset can consist of a stressed plus an unstressed position (–́×) or an extended unstressed position (××). The first of these I refer to as a heavy onset, which is labeled with an H before the verse type of the cadence. The second I refer to as a light onset, which is marked with an h before the verse type. Thus, a line of poetry would be scanned as follows: gān under gyldnum bēage (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) þǣr þā gōdan twēgen (hA1: ××–́×–́×) “[Wealhþeow,] went under the golden ring where the two good ones [sat]” (Beowulf 1163).9

(1953), Baker (1992), and Lapidge (1990), agree with Fulk’s perspective and argue that editors have a high degree of expertise that should not be discounted and that it is worse for them to support a bad manuscript reading, which could then be treated as unproblematic and used to support other arguments about the text, than to propose an emendation. Neidorf (2017) further supports this argument by providing evidence that scribes seemed to be paying attention to their exemplar more on the level of the word than the poetic line, so such scribal errors might even be expected. I will therefore point out the possibilities of scribal errors and will not include any particularly doubtful lines in my statistical analysis. 8 Bliss’s argument is slightly different from the other three’s in that he argues that the second line replaces the second foot of the first line rather than overlapping it. This argument results in slightly different analyses, but it follows the same principles that the line is formed from two combined verse patterns. 9 All references to Beowulf come from Fulk, Bjork, and Niles (2008). All other references to Old English poems refer to Krapp and Dobbie (1931–1953, ASPR). The Anglo-Saxon Poetic

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Introduction

Although I use Sievers’s system of notation, I also inform his system with other more recent studies in metrical theory. One such study that is of particular relevance is Geoffrey Russom’s Old English Meter and Linguistic Theory (1987) together with his subsequent work using the same methodology. According to Russom, each verse consists of two feet and the possible foot patterns are based on word patterns. Therefore, for the audience to understand and appreciate the metrical forms employed by the poet, the ideal foot is a single word long, and the poet tries to stay as close to the ideal as possible by diverging from that norm as little as possible. Of course, some divergence is necessary to tell a narrative, since the poets must employ function words for the sake of the syntax, but good poets seem to keep such divergence to a minimum, using stress words in stressed positions; placing heavier words such as particles in opening drops, as opposed to medial drops, where they tend to be less disruptive; and limiting the number of unstressed words in each verse. This theory is important to my study because it allows me to theorize about the poets’ stylistic choices, specifically where poets seem to be exercising more license and what might motivate the different stylistic decisions that they make. Such analysis is particularly important for hypermetric meter, where more flexibility is allowed in the form of the hypermetric onsets: these onsets give the poets a place to expand their drops, and the degree to which they do so says a lot about their goals and the type of style they wish to employ. The chapters, then, provide a broad account of the different groups of poems that take all of these features into consideration and then use that understanding to analyze the poems in question. Chapter 1, “Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis” provides the foundation for my analysis and contains an investigation of the most linguistically and metrically conservative Old English poems: Beowulf, Genesis A, Guthlac A, Exodus, and Daniel. Analyzing the combination of metrical and extra-metrical principles described above, I show what the conservative metrical patterns look like and how the lines demonstrate both points of continuity, such as the degree to which they adhere to Kuhn’s laws, and points of discontinuity, such as the typical length and complexity of the clause, as compared to normal verse. I also point out some unique stylistic choices that the poets make in the hypermetric sections. Guthlac A in particular stands apart from the rest of these poems because the poet chose to adopt an unusual compositional style—using pairs of light hypermetric verses to imitate a conversational tone—that expands upon

Records (ASPR) does not include marks of vowel length in the text, but because they are useful for metrical studies, I have added them here.

Introduction

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the traditional norm. The varying syntactic and metrical patterns, which result both from the inherent flexibility of the hypermetric form and from some poets’ willingness to explore their individual artistry, indicate that poets had a variety of reasons, often going beyond the basic wish to sound more formal or excited, to switch to hypermetric verse. I demonstrate that poets might also wish to increase the narrative progress, turn to a more straightforward syntax, or more closely emulate normal speech patterns, and they may well have had several of these motivations in mind each time they turn to hypermetric meter. Whereas my first chapter examines the most conventional meter in Old English poetry, my second chapter, “Old English Wisdom Poetry: The Influence of Formulaic Diction,” turns to the metrically most unusual poems: Old English wisdom poetry. Building on A. J. Bliss’s analysis of this genre, perhaps counterintuitively, I argue that their formulaic diction is the cause of their irregularity. Oral formulaic theory conceptualizes oral poetry as composed by means of a few key systems, which poets adapt to fit individual moments. In wisdom poetry, poets employ a small number of distinctive formulas repeatedly, frequently expanding them into longer, hypermetric adaptations. Because gnomic diction requires specific collocations of nouns and verbs, the poets must adapt the metrical patterns to contain longer opening drops, and they make use of heavy hypermetric verse patterns more often than poets of narrative verse. Hence they take simple phrases such as Dol bið sē þe gǣð (E: –́–×× ̀ –́) “wretched is he who goes” (Solomon and Saturn 225a) and expand them into longer ones such as Ēadig bið sē þe in his ēþle geþīhð (HA1: –́××××××–́××–́×) “fortunate is he who thrives in his native land” (Maxims I 37a) that draw on the same formulaic elements but add a greater sense of importance through the extra length and detail. By shifting the focus of analysis of these poems to formulaic diction, I demonstrate that the features of the formulas together with the changes they bring about in the metrical patterns produce a sound and style specific to gnomic poetry. Beginning with the third chapter, “Old Norse Ljóðaháttr and Málaháttr: Dividing Hypermetrics,” I turn more specifically to the constitutive relationship between linguistics and hypermetric patterns. I start by investigating Old Norse poetry, which developed a poetic tradition with very tightly structured lines that are normally organized into stanzas. Two meters in particular, ljóðaháttr “song meter” and málaháttr “speech meter,” consistently use hypermetrics, by which I here mean patterns that have been expanded beyond the typical fornyrðislag verses. These lines are relatively compact as compared to Old English hypermetrics, but they are also more complex in some ways because they use a wider variety of verse types. In spite of the differences, they exhibit some of the same underlying features as other hypermetric lines: they permit more unstressed words near the beginning of the line while the ending remains quite

12

Introduction

strict. While these principles of composition allow for similar rhetorical uses of the two hypermetric meters, they are not used in the same way as in Old English because the two meters split up the typical aims of the Old English lines. Furthermore, the stanzaic patterns in Old Norse meters tend to limit the amount of material that can be joined in a single thought, particularly in the more highly stylized ljóðaháttr, so the resulting interactions between meter and syntax look different from both Old English and each other. Málaháttr tends to employ a simpler sentence structure and more frequent syntactic breaks, so as to facilitate a fast-paced narrative for heroic poems such as Átlamál. In contrast, the ljóðaháttr stanza creates a heightened tone, making the meter appropriate for distinguished topics such as the wisdom of Hávamál. At the end of this chapter, I use the distinctive properties of these two meters to analyze a group of poems called the eddic praise poems, which alternate between these two meters, showing that the poets can switch strategically to further goals of their narrative. In contrast to the Old Norse of my third chapter, the Old Saxon hypermetric verses that my fourth chapter, “The Old Saxon Heliand: Working through Ambiguity,” examines are long and employed with less regulation throughout the poem, with single hypermetric verses occurring by themselves and normal verses interrupting hypermetric passages. In this tradition, the distinction between hypermetric verse and normal verse appears to be on the verge of breaking down, as the poet alternates between hypermetric and normal verses wherever it is useful to him. Significantly, though, the poet seems to be aware of the changes in the metrical system and has adapted hypermetric lines into a new tool, using some of them in quite long passages and others in very short groupings, with a clear break between the two. Just as the Old English poets do, the Heliand poet employs these lines at rhetorically heightened moments, especially when those moments involve direct speech or require clear syntax, as in the delivery of the Sermon on the Mount. As such, they can increase the clarity of important moments even as they add emphasis to each point, thereby serving as a tool for the Old Saxon poet to help him get his message of conversion across with this biblical adaptation. Chapter 5, “Late Old English Hypermetrics: Linguistic Change and Stylistic Adaptation in the Old English Judith,” turns back to Old English and uses the observations made about the effect of linguistic contexts in Old Norse and Old Saxon to investigate how the hypermetric lines change in form and function within the Old English tradition as the language shifts from a relatively synthetic to a relatively analytic one, creating a greater need for smaller function words such as adverbs and prepositions. In contrast to most late Old English poets, who eschew the use of hypermetric lines, the Judith poet makes extensive use of hypermetrics, even creating a profound stylistic adaptation. Unlike

Introduction

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what we might expect from a comparison with Old Saxon verse, the Judith poet does not increase the length of the hypermetric lines; if anything, he makes the drops in the lines shorter. At the same time, he increases the amount of variation in the hypermetric passages, together with other forms of repetition, quite deliberately slowing down the narrative pace as much as possible in these passages. Even more than the Guthlac A poet, then, the Judith poet seems to be veering away from a standard mode of composition in order to develop his individual artistry in a way that shapes how his poem should be understood. Because the poet consistently switches into hypermetric mode at key moments in the narrative— such as when Judith calls on God to aid her in defeating the Assyrian oppressors of her people by giving her the strength to behead their general, Holofernes—it appears that the poet employs this innovative style for purely rhetorical reasons to highlight the major themes of the poem. Each of these chapters illustrates how poets use hypermetric meter for a variety of reasons and how attention to their composition can illustrate so much more about the poems than just how they ought to be edited. This is not to say that editing is not an important concern, but rather that metrical analysis can be of use to a larger cross-section of Old English and early Germanic scholars. These lines demonstrate a clear rhetorical shift at important moments of the poems. In addition, the ways that the poets adapt this very flexible metrical device illustrate just how innovative the poets can be. These innovations can be in reaction to linguistic contexts, formulaic constraints, or rhetorical need, but they all serve to aid the poets’ goal to compose a poem that engages their audience on the levels of both an oral and a literary aesthetic. By moving systematically outward from meter and grammar through rhetoric, stylistics, and poetic tradition, this study shows how these two goals overlap and each consistently inform the other, giving modern readers a tool to unpack what the poet may have been trying to do at any given moment of a poem.

Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis Introduction To set a baseline for hypermetric analysis, I will first examine the most metrically conservative poems in the corpus. Logically, these would be the earliest poems, but dating the corpus has always been a controversial issue. Nevertheless, R. D. Fulk (1992) shows that some poems exhibit a higher tendency than others to adhere to certain linguistic and metrical patterns that are more conservative,1 and several subsequent studies have supported his findings.2 Even if these poems were composed later than the cited studies suggest, they all show multiple instances of various archaic features that are structurally required by the meter, and, regardless of the actual dates of composition, the poems that use the most conservative patterns overall should likewise exhibit the most conservative patterns for the hypermetric lines. The poems that are long enough to test reliably and are cited by Fulk as showing consistently early features are Beowulf, Genesis A, Guthlac A, Daniel, and Exodus. According to Bliss (1962), there are a total of 244 hypermetric verses in these five poems.3 While the status of some of the verses as hypermetric has been questioned, in general they present some of the clearest hypermetric patterns in the corpus. I begin my analysis by examining the structure of the meter, through observing the metrical patterns themselves in terms of the length and arrangement of

1 Fulk analyzes a wide range of linguistic features, such as vowel contraction and analogical restoration of syncopated vowels, and he argues that poems with features that demonstrate later linguistic developments should be dated later. Because many scribes alter their exemplar by changing alternate spellings of a word into their own dialect, Fulk focuses on the instances in which the meter dictates which form of the word the poet must have originally employed. In addition to linguistic features, Fulk looks at some metrical features, most notably Kaluza’s Law, which regulates resolution in secondary stress based on the etymological length of syllables, a feature which would not have been known to later poets. 2 See in particular Russom 2002, Neidorf 2017, and the articles published in Neidorf 2014. 3 The verses in question are Beowulf 1163–66, 1167b–68, 1705–7, 2173a, 2297a, 2995–96; Guthlac A 1–3, 5, 25, 80, 88–92, 190–91, 239–42, 289–91, 363, 376–79a, 465–69, 510, 636, 701–2, 741; Genesis A 44–46, 155–56a, 913, 1015–19, 1522b–23, 2167–70, 2174, 2328–29, 2406–7, 2411–12, 2855–57a, 2858–59, 2866–69; Exodus 570b–74; Daniel 59a, 106, 203–5, 207, 224–25, 226b–27, 232a, 233, 234b–35, 237–38, 240–41a, 242–44, 261a, 262a, 263–64, 265b–73, 434–37a, 440b, 446b–47, 449, 451–52, 453b–57. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501513688-002

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the line in order to establish what seems to be permissible in hypermetric composition. I then move to other compositional features that take into account the interaction of meter, syntax, and diction in the composition of these lines. My research shows that while freer than normal composition, hypermetric meter is bounded by a clear set of rules and that many of the metrico-syntactic features that govern normal verse are maintained in hypermetric composition. Nevertheless, some features, particularly those related to syntax, show innovation in the hypermetric sections, illustrating that hypermetric composition afforded some significantly different options for the poets. I set up this baseline in part to provide a point of comparison for the rest of the book. To understand what sort of innovations occurred in different linguistic and historical contexts, we must first understand the norm from which the poets were innovating. At the same time, I also use this close analysis of hypermetric structure to consider why poets might have chosen to switch to hypermetric composition. The combination of consistent and innovative features, together with the restrictions and options that the traditions seem to have imposed on the poets, makes hypermetric composition a unique tool in the poets’ repertoire. Considering what poets could have done with this tool allows scholars to analyze why poets might have switched into hypermetric meter and what particular effects they could be trying to produce by the metrical patterns they create. Ultimately, the standard interpretation proposed by scholars such as Sievers (1887), Pope (1966), and Timmer (1951), that hypermetric meter is for excited, solemn, and rhetorically heightened moments, holds true, but the lines also seem to have some syntactic features that allow poets to create a more natural diction that might have provided additional motivations to use the meter.

Metrical Properties of Conservative Hypermetrics This section analyzes the actual patterns of stress in the hypermetric line. As I illustrated in the introduction, hypermetric verse consists of an onset plus a normal verse, with two distinct options for onsets. Statistical analysis of these onsets demonstrates that the onset has a greater degree of flexibility than a normal line in terms of the length and filler of the drop, but that the positions are still relatively bounded. In addition to the arrangement of stressed and unstressed positions in the actual line, hypermetric composition is also governed in terms of how the verses are distributed across the line and how the lines are distributed across the poem. Where the stress patterns seem to be relatively consistent for the different poems,

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though, the distribution patterns show a greater variety of options and might be a way in which the poets exercised their individual stylistic creativity.

The Structure of the Onset The hypermetric onset comes in two different forms: the heavy onset (–́×) and the light onset (××). The onsets follow the general principles of verse composition, in that the drop in a heavy onset, which appears verse medially, tends to be relatively short, whereas the light onset, which opens a verse and constitutes the equivalent of two metrical positions, tends to be longer. Within the confines of these general tendencies, however, the hypermetric onsets developed a different set of conventions that make for slightly longer, heavier positions. The heavy onset often looks similar to the opening two positions of a type-A verse; very frequently, it consists of a single word with a stressed root syllable followed by an unstressed syllable, as in gyrde grǣgan sweorde (HA1: –́×–́×–́) “girt with a silvery sword” (Genesis A 2866a); specifically, such verses occur in 50.4% of the heavy onsets (this number includes seven verses with secondary stress instead of zero stress in the drop). However, the onset is expanded beyond this most simple version more frequently than a type-A verse, often through the addition of unstressed words. In total, 58.95% of the onsets have at least one independent word in the drop, and 11.58% have more than one. These words are generally clitics, but particles are also acceptable and occur in 31.37% of the drops. In terms of length, longer verses are not the preference, but they occur more often than in a type-A verse, on average: 28.4% of the onsets have two syllables in the drop and 11.6% have three. In spite of this general tendency toward longer and heavier verses, though, the heavy onset does not accede the limits to a medial drop overall: the longest drop is only four syllables long and only one such verse occurs in the conservative poems (Daniel 237a). Therefore, it would appear that conservative poets can expand the drop of the heavy onset beyond what is typical of a verse-medial drop, particularly by adding heavy material to the drop, but that they nevertheless keep these drops relatively short. One question that has come up about the heavy onset is whether it can have no drop at all: five verses exist with no drop between the onset and the cadence: men mid sīðian (HD2: –́–́–́ ͜ × ̀ ) (Genesis A 2869) “depart with men” to cwale cnihta fēorum (× ͜ ́͜ ×–́×–́×) (Daniel 225a) “for the destruction of the lives of the young men”

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

in fæðm fȳres līge (×–́–× ́ –́×) (Daniel 233a) “in the power of the flame of the fire” ne feax fȳre beswǣled (×–́–́××–́×) (Daniel 437a) “nor [was] hair burned by the fire” ealle him brimu blōdige þūhton (××× ͜ × ́͜ –́××–́×) (Exodus 573a) “the seas seemed all bloody to them”

Sievers uses the first as an example of an onset with only one syllable, but Pope (1966: 103), following Schmitz (1910) and Holthausen (1914), emends the verse to mannan mid siðian, so it is more likely a perfectly regular verse. Significantly, the rest of the verses all open with a drop. This drop could be anacrusis, which does occur on eight other heavy hypermetric verses,4 but Sievers argues instead that they should be considered inverted hypermetric patterns (1887: 468–69) With so few examples, it is impossible to tell which analysis is better. As anacrustic verses, these four would be irregular because anacrusis normally consists only of a verbal prefix or the negative clitic ne (see Cable 1974: 32–44, Suzuki 1995: 148–50). Nevertheless, other words do occur infrequently in anacrusis, and two examples of such exist among the anacrustic hypermetric verses: æt fōtum sæt frēan Scyldinga (aHD1: ×–́××–́–– ́ ×̀ ) “sat at the feet of the lord of the Scyldings” (Beowulf 1166a), which contains a preposition in anacrusis, and þa wearð yrre ānmōd cyning (aHA2k: ××–́×–́–̀ ͜ ́ ×) “then the proud king became angry” (Daniel 224a), which contains two particles.5 A third possibility is that the four verses are corrupt. Perhaps the best conclusion, then, is to say that the vast majority of heavy onsets takes the form of a lift plus a drop, with the possibility of anacrusis. Given the flexibility inherent in the onset, some variants in this regular pattern exist, but poets limit the difference by continuing to include two positions, and these are rare and should not be considered standard. The relative flexibility seems to be the most important feature of these onsets, given that it is the feature that distinguishes them from normal composition. The poets mostly use the extra two positions of the onset to add an additional lexical word to the verse, which frequently leads to a more descriptive verse. In normal verse, a verse often consists of either a noun and a verb or a noun and its modifiers. There are, of course, many variations on these word patterns, but these are

4 The verses in question are Beowulf 1166a, Daniel 224a, Daniel 262a, Daniel 268a, Genesis A 1015a, Guthlac A 3a, Guthlac A 25a, and Guthlac A 289a. 5 One possible explanation for the non-prefixal anacrusis among hypermetric verses is that the length of the line allows for heavier anacrusis. If it is true that verses tend to be balanced and that anacrusis should assist rather than disrupt that balance, as Bliss (1962: 40–43) and Russom (1987: 34) suggest, it would make sense that the imbalance between the onset and the cadence would encourage longer anacrusis.

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the most common. By adding an extra lexical word, the poets can include a modifier with a noun even if there is a verb in the passage, as is often the case in Guthlac A. Other poems do not have verbs in as many verses, so the passage can have a noun and two modifiers—mostly adjectives or another noun in the genitive—making it particularly descriptive. Again, the pattern of three stress words is not absolute, but it is the most common, especially for the more regular hypermetric verses. The drop in the onset leaves a convenient space for function words, which the poets use frequently, while still keeping the drop relatively short and straightforward. The light onset creates a comparatively simple structure that conforms to what one might expect. Because it opens with an extended unstressed position that takes the place of two positions, the structure should be similar to that of the opening drop of a type-A3 verse, which does the same. In a type A3, the opening is always polysyllabic, so that its length can distinguish it from anacrusis (see Russom 1987: 35–36). It also has heavier words to compensate for the lack of stress (see Suzuki 1996: 54–59). These features allow the opening to be more easily distinguished from anacrusis or a normal drop. The light onset does likewise. Of the 149 verses that begin with a light onset, 16.11% have two syllables, 32.25% have three, 35.57% have four, and 14.09% have five. This seems to be the preferred range for the light opening, although there are two examples of a verse with six syllables and one with seven.6 The light opening, therefore, does not grow to be exceptionally long in these conservative poems, but multiple syllables are the norm. The light onsets also tend to have relatively heavy words for a drop. Some typical examples are þe in þām bēote wǣron (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “who were in the danger” (Daniel 264b) and Heht þā geond þæt rǣdlēase hof (hE: ××××–́–×̀ –́) “commanded then throughout that wretched dwelling” (Genesis A 44b). Like most light onsets, these examples all begin with several separate words. As with the example from Daniel, some of the verses have only one particle among these words, but most, as in the other example, have several. Oftentimes these particles, as in the example from Genesis A, include a nonalliterating finite verb. There are six examples of openings that contain only clitics, but all of these have at least two words. As a relatively long drop that normally contains particles, the light onset has some clear practical value. It becomes an easy place for a poet to put numerous

6 The particularly long verses are from Guthlac A, which tends toward longer verses than the other poems; in addition to these few especially long lines, Guthlac A has almost twice as many verses that open with four syllables as with three, as opposed to the other poems, in which the onsets are split fairly evenly between three and four syllables.

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

particles, keeping the rest of the line clear and simple. Because particles can sometimes be difficult to fit into a line, poets do not tend to skimp on them in these light onsets, which are consequently relatively regular in terms of length and filler. Nevertheless, the conservative poets do not expand these onsets to extremes. While longer than a normal drop, the light onsets are rarely over five syllables long. It seems clear that, as a whole, the onset of a hypermetric verse consists of a pair of positions with slightly more flexibility than the equivalent positions in normal verse. Both types of onset, with or without a stressed element, therefore create space for extra function words. Although the onsets are independent metrically, they still seem to influence the rest of the line, for the cadences are simpler and the word order and nature of the material in the entire verse take on a different character as a result of the extra space that the onset creates.

The Structure of the Cadence The cadence of the verse presents the inverse pattern to the onset: it uses the stress patterns of normal verse but with less variety.7 Therefore, the overwhelming majority of the verses end in a type-A pattern, 208 out of 244 (85.24%). Of these, only five have the heavy drop that creates the A2 pattern: –́–̀–× ́ . The remaining 203 (83.20%) have the more standard type A1, formed with normal drops: –́×–́×. The next most common verse types are type D and E, with an incidence of 6.97% and 6.15% respectively. Types B and C are almost never used, with three possible examples each, not all of which should likely be considered these types. The complexity is further minimized by the words used to fill these final four positions. The vast majority of the verses end in two words that receive stress, with the drops filled entirely by non-root syllables. The next most common method of filling these four positions, which occurs 5.33% of the time, is a single word with two fully stressed positions. In a further 4.92% of the verses, the drop includes a separate function word—six have prepositions, four have ne, and two have adverbs. These drops are more complicated, but only marginally so, since the words are all small with minimal lexical prominence. Clearly the preference was to avoid any complicating material in the cadence. All twelve verses that do

7 Russom argues that this simplicity is the result of the relative complexity of hypermetric verse: since the extra length adds complexity in one way, poets try to reduce complexity in another.

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have some extra clitic are type-A verses. While this distribution results mostly from the overwhelming predominance of type-A verses, the fact that the poets never add a separate word to a cadence of another type may also suggest that the poets avoid adding multiple complicating features to the cadence at once. A few verses diverge from this very basic pattern. First are those that could be scanned as types B and C. Max Kaluza (1895: 377) notes that these are the rarest verse types in hypermetric meter (in contrast to normal verse, where types B and C appear more frequently than D and E), and he argues that such verses are rare because the onset generally ends with a drop, so if the cadence were to begin with a drop, the two unstressed positions would run together and the verse would appear to have five positions instead of six. In these early poems, Bliss analyzes six verses as ending in a type B or C: Type B: Ǣled wæs ungescēad micel (Daniel 242a) “the fire was exceedingly great” ārfæst wið Ābraham sprecan (Genesis A 2407a) “the gracious one [began] to speak with Abraham” engel ond sēo ēadge sāwl (Guthlac A 2a) “angel and the wealthy soul”

Type C: wrǣtlicne wundurmāððum (Beowulf 2173a) “splendid wondrous jewel” wīdlond ne wegas nytte (Genesis A 156a) “wide land nor uses of waves” wlitige to woruldnytte (Genesis A 1016a) “beautiful for worldly use”

Two verses on this list could be analyzed differently. B. R. Hutcheson (1995: 317–19) reanalyzes Beowulf 2173a, which Bliss scans as his type 3E1(2C1): –́–×̀ –́–×́ , by taking each u in wundurmāððum as a parasite vowel and scanning it as a type A with extra secondary stress: –́–×̀ –́–.̀ Although this scansion is still irregular, it seems preferable because this verse is not in a hypermetric section.8 The scansion of Genesis A 2407a depends on a biblical name, and vowel length can be difficult

8 The editors of Klaeber’s Fourth likewise acknowledge this possibility in their notes, although they indicate uncertainty and do not underpoint the two “u”s in the text.

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to determine in biblical names. While the medial syllabus in Ābraham could be short, it could also be long, creating a type HE: –́–×̀ –́–×̀ ͜ ́͜ ×.9 The paucity of verses with these types calls into question whether they are authorial, especially given the legitimate problems that Kaluza raises about types HB and HC. They do demonstrate a few features, however, that suggest that the poets may have chosen to compose them and tried to minimize any ambiguity. Firstly, unlike other verse types, which are evenly distributed across the on- and off-verses, these verses all appear in the on-verse. This way, even though some ambiguity is created by the adjacent unstressed positions, the verses are not identical to normal type-B and -C verses, as they would be if the first three positions formed a single extended drop. Secondly, all four verses have several words in the adjacent drops. While the presence of several words does not distinguish these drops from the typical drop of a heavy onset, it at least makes it possible to understand the stretch of unstressed syllable as two positions rather than one. The type-B and -C cadences may therefore be a minimally realized variant of the preferred hypermetric pattern: they are generally avoided but possible to employ from time to time. Bliss scans two other verses as irregular due to a fourth stressed position: æt fōtum sæt frēan Scyldinga (Beowulf 1166a) “sat at the feet of the lord of the Scyldings” Engel in þone ofn innan becwōm (Daniel 237a) “the angel came into the oven on the inside”

However, both of these verses could be scanned as regular hypermetric verses. Bliss argues that Beowulf 1166a must have four stressed positions because leaving sæt unstressed would create a violation of Kuhn’s first law. Yet as Douglas Simms shows, putting stress on the word would violate another constraint, namely the tendency in Indo-European languages to give an accent to finite verbs only in dependent clauses, not independent clauses (see Árnason 2002: 228, Anderson 1993: 69–72, Whitney 1993: 223–36, Wackernagle 1892: 427). With this information in mind, Simms argues that sæt should not be stressed, which allows this verse to be scanned as a regular type aHD1: ×–́××–́–– ́ ×̀ (Simms 2003: 69–71). The verse from Daniel has four words that must receive a degree of stress, but there is no reason why all four words must receive full stress. In normal meter, many verses have three stress words, one of which receives secondary stress. In 9 The name appears both ways in the poem. For example, the syllable must be short in Ābraham eastan (A1: –́××–́×) “[went] from the east” (Genesis A 1794a) so that the verse does not have five positions, but it must be long in Ābrāham þā (E: –́–× ́ –́) “Abraham then” (Genesis A 1805a) so that the medial syllable can receive stress and create a fourth position.

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23

fact, a similar verse exists in Bewoulf: stefn in becom (D4: –́–×́ –̀) “voice came in” (Beowulf 2552b). Therefore, this verse seems to be quite literally an onset plus a normal cadence, and it can be scanned as a type HD4 (–́××××–́–×́ ×–̀). This verse is certainly unusual as a hypermetric verse, since poets tend to avoid complexity in hypermetrics and the cadence of this verse is particularly complex, but it is still completely regular and perhaps even easily recognizable to an audience who have heard verses that use that formula before. As a whole, hypermetric stress patterns in conservative verse appear relatively regular. The verses can clearly be split into two sections: a cadence made up of a normal verse and an onset that is added to the beginning. The cadence in particular is formed from a normal verse type, and the simplest of patterns is preferred. The onset has more variation, but not a great deal more. The light onset is the least constrained and admits a large number of unstressed words, but it tends not to be expanded beyond five syllables. The heavy onset is more constrained in terms of both length and filler of the drop, but it can still be expanded more than a medial drop in normal verse. There are some outlying patterns in both the heavy onset and the cadence, but these are limited and do not occur often. In conservative verse, then, variability in the onset seems to be the major metrical feature that sets these longer verses apart from normal composition, and the options are relatively limited. Thus, the stress patterns are stable, and the lines, though longer, are tightly structured.

Distribution Patterns In addition to limiting the length and filler of the different positions of the hypermetric line, poets also seemed to follow guidelines about how the lines could be used in terms of both distributing the lines throughout the poem and distributing the different types of onsets across the line. In this case, more variants seem to be common. While there is a standard—hypermetric verses tend to come in groups, with a heavy onset in the on-verse and a light onset in the off-verse—alternate distribution patterns occur and can even be preferred by some poets. Perhaps, then, this aspect of hypermetric composition is at least in part a matter of style. As Sievers shows, hypermetric verses appear in groups of more than one line the vast majority of the time. In these conservative poems, they do so 84.0% of the time, making this distribution the clear standard.10 Another way that verses

10 Because hypermetric sections can start on an off-verse or end on an on-verse, there are some hypermetric verses paired with regular verses at the edge of a passage.

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

sometimes occur is in a lone hypermetric line in the middle of a passage of normal lines. Bliss identifies twelve such lines in the five poems.11 Two of these lines could be the result of some sort of error, because both have an irregular cadence in the off-verse,12 but the other ten lines are completely regular, in terms of both stress and alliterative patterns. It is improbable that these lines are corrupt, for it would be difficult to make an entire line into a regular hypermetric pattern through an error. The majority occur in Guthlac A, seven regular lines plus one of the irregular ones. The prevalence of this distribution pattern in this one poem reinforces the possibility that the lone hypermetric line is a stylistic choice. Apparently, then, sustained, consistent groupings of hypermetric verses are the standard distribution pattern, but lone verses are a stylistic option that poets could take advantage of, and some poets chose to do so more than others. Another possible stylistic variant is the mixed hypermetric line—a hypermetric verse paired with a normal verse, either in the middle of a hypermetric passage or as a lone hypermetric verse among normal verses. These verses are more difficult to evaluate, since it is possible that they are the result of scribal error rather than a stylistic choice by the poet. Such mixed lines occur in hypermetric passages frequently in Daniel and once each in Genesis A and Beowulf. The two lines in Genesis A and Beowulf, (Genesis A 2857) and (Beowulf 1167a), could be examples of each poet using this pattern one time, but they could also be examples of scribal corruption, as Pope argues is the case for Genesis A 2857b (1966: 103). Because hypermetric passages are unusual, and because the metrical organization is looser, it would be easy for a scribe to make an error in one of the cases that would change the metrical pattern into that of a normal verse. The case of Daniel is harder to dismiss because the mixed lines appear in hypermetric passages ten times. They occur in four major sections: 203–7 (the four youths first refuse to worship the idols), 224–44 (they are thrown into the fire and an angel protects them), 261–73 (the fire burns the slaves who are feeding it but not the youths, causing the king to realize the event is a miracle), and 434–57 (the youths emerge from the furnace unharmed and become honored councilors). Each of these sections, in addition to having several normal verses in the middle of the longer hypermetric sections, is broken up by short sections of normal lines. Nevertheless, the style is relatively consistent throughout the passages. Many of the normal verses are similar to hypermetric verses in form, such as type-D* verses made up of three independent words or type-B and -C verses with long opening

11 Bliss’s lone hypermetric lines are Guthlac A 5, 25 80, 363, 510, 636, and 741; Daniel 106, 207, and 449; and Genesis A 913 and 2174. 12 The two irregular verses are Daniel 106 and Guthlac A 741.

Metrical Properties of Conservative Hypermetrics

25

drops in the normal passage. By using these verses, the poet is able to maintain a consistent tone and pacing throughout these poems even as he switches back and forth between meters. It is possible, then, that the Daniel poet chose to compose larger sections that were mostly hypermetric but did not feel compelled to stay in hypermetric meter, instead using a hybrid meter that makes use of transitional verses. While this would be an interesting stylistic choice, it is not entirely clear that we can interpret the evidence that way because of the uncertainty of scribal transmission. The poem is known to be corrupt in other places, and some of these verses could easily have been changed from hypermetric to normal over the course of copying them down. Sievers (1887: 455) scans several of these sections as consisting of mostly hypermetric lines, with fewer intervening normal lines than are found on the list of hypermetric verses according to Bliss. Pope’s list of hypermetric verses is more similar to Bliss’s, but he does scan several of Bliss’s normal verses as hypermetric, noting that there might be a corruption in the line as we have it. Thus, it is possible that each of the four sections could have been composed entirely of hypermetric lines, some of which were changed through scribal transmission, making Daniel one of the most heavily hypermetric poems outside of the gnomic poems. Yet the possibility does remain that the poet was more willing to switch back and forth between hypermetric and normal verses within a section of narrative, a practice that would have set him apart from other poets and made for a more fluid style.13 The second type of mixed line, a lone hypermetric verse in the middle of a normal passage, is almost undoubtedly the result of scribal error in these poems. Bliss identifies three lone verses: berēafodon þā receda wuldor “they deprived the marvel of buildings” (Daniel 59a), wrǣtlicne wundurmāððum “splendid wondrous jewel” (Beowulf 2173a), and ealne ūtanweardne “all outside” (Beowulf 2297a). All of these verses seem problematic in some way. As discussed above, Hutcheson shows that Beowulf 2173a can feasibly be scanned as a normal verse. Russom suggests that Beowulf 2297a contains a scribal error. He argues that the verse originally read hlǣw ūtanweardne, but that the poet was using an archaic form of hlǣw, which the scribe misunderstood, and he therefore changed the word to something that made sense to him (1987: 130–31).14 As we have already seen, Daniel is very corrupt in general, and Pope argues that Daniel 59a should be

13 Although there may be some scribal corruption in all these lines that contain an unpaired hypermetric verse, I still include the hypermetric verses in my corpus since it is most likely that it is the normal verse that contains the corruption. 14 Russom shows that hlǣw was originally a neuter noun, which was later reinterpreted as masculine. The neuter form would take no ending in the accusative case, making the sentence

26

Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

interpreted as two normal verses, though with some corruption here again (1966: 103). Because there are so few possible examples of lone hypermetric verses and all of them can be explained in another way, I do not include these verses as part of my corpus. In addition to varying the way that they distribute the lines within the poem, poets can also vary the way they distribute the types of onset over the lines. Again, these conservative poems reveal a standard that seems to be common to most of the poets: the heavy onset in the on-verse and the light onset in the offverse. In the conservative poems, 76.0% of the verses conform. However, while the Beowulf and Exodus poets never vary from this norm, several other combinations can and do occur.15 One possibility, a heavy onset in both verses, is quite rare in these conservative poems; it occurs only at Genesis A 2869b. A second possibility, a light onset in both verses, is used in Genesis A, Daniel, and Guthlac A, making for a total of twenty-nine on-verses in these poems that begin with a light onset. These verses were clearly composed for the on-verse because in all but two instances (Daniel 207a and 447a), they have double alliteration, postponing it until the second part of the line. The onsets, though, do not differ substantially when they appear in the on-verse from when they appear in the off-verse. They still have similar length and the same preference for particles as filler. The one major difference is that openings of only two syllables are comparatively rare: only 10.4% of the on-verses have a light opening of two syllables, versus 27.59% with three, 34.48% with four, 20.69% with five, and 3.45% with seven. This rarity of verses with two syllables probably results from an extra desire for clarity. In the on-verse, an unstressed opening followed by a normal type-A verse resembles a type A with anacrusis. As long as the onset is long and contains particles, however, the chances for confusion are quite small. Thus, by changing the alliterative patterning and staying away from shorter onsets, the poets were able to adapt a hypermetric verse with a light onset to the on-verse, giving them another option for how they might want to compose.

perfectly acceptable. But the scribe, expecting a masculine ending, would have thought it ungrammatical. 15 Thomas A. Bredehoft argues that the distribution patterns can be split into three distinctive types of composition, where Type 1 uses the standard H/h distribution, Type 2 allows for H/h or h/h, and Type 3 is any combination of the two onsets in any order. He notes that Type 1 distribution is the most common and Type 3 is quite rare, though it does occur in more than one poem (2003: 153–56). While I do not believe that these strict categories are necessary or indicative of the poets’ thinking, they certainly show the prominence of the different distribution patterns that poets use.

Verse Grammar

27

While these light onsets appear in various poems, they seem to be a particular preference for the poet of Guthlac A. Of the thirty-five hypermetric on-verses in Guthlac A, eighteen have a light onset. Some of these appear in the middle of a group of lines with a more standard structure, but many are grouped together near the end of the poem, where the poet all but stops using heavy onsets for the hypermetric lines. Like the abundance of mixed hypermetric lines in Daniel, these light onsets in the on-verse are likely a stylistic choice. In this case, the choice cannot be explained away as scribal error because the delayed alliteration shows a systematic change in the verse structure, which confirms the idea that some poets developed their own unique style within the confines of the alliterative tradition. Thus, the various distribution patterns of both the lines and the onsets suggest a degree of standardization that did not preclude individual innovations for hypermetric composition. The basic pattern of grouped hypermetric lines that have a heavy onset in the on-verse and a light onset in the off-verse seems the most versatile of the distribution patterns in many ways. The differentiated line allows the poet to include both an extra stress word and a number of unstressed words, and the length of the passage allows him to make ample use of these features. For some specific reasons, a poet might choose another style of composition, such as including only verses with light onsets in a passage that would benefit from a large number of particles or inserting a lone hypermetric line into a normal passage for a degree of emphasis. These options have various applications, which I will discuss at the end of the chapter.

Verse Grammar In addition to the basic patterns of stress, Old English verse can also be described in terms of its verse grammar, which is formed from the poets’ style of accommodating their syntax and lexicon to the poetic features of the line.16 Several features that distinguish Old English poetry from prose are retained in hypermetric composition, showing a degree of continuity between normal and hypermetric verse. The first is the poetic koine—words that either never appear in prose or appear only with more general meanings—that poets use to add formality to the verse and to facilitate alliteration. Likewise, the set of metrico-syntactic constraints on particles described by Kuhn’s laws are followed relatively faithfully.

16 Parts of this section were published in an earlier version in English Studies as “The Syntax of Old English Hypermetrics” (2010).

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

At the same time, the different structure of hypermetric meter alleviates some of the constraints that normal verse structure creates, which allows the poets to alter some of the syntactic patterns that they use to accommodate those constraints. On a specific level, the verb placement in hypermetric lines differs from that in normal lines, providing more options for the poets. Because of these options, the overall syntactic patterns can have a greater simplicity than is generally found in normal verse. This shift allows for a greater ease of narration, so the poet can combine some of the defining features of poetry with a quick narrative progress that is more difficult to obtain in normal verse.

Points of Continuity The specialized poetic koine, which poets use to instill the poem with heroic vocabulary and to provide options for variation, is the first poetic feature that is maintained throughout hypermetric passages. Poets have no single standard for employing poetic diction—the conservative poems differ widely from one another— but each poet consistently maintains the same level of poetic diction throughout the hypermetric passages that he does in the normal sections (Table 1.1). In Beowulf and Exodus there is a poetic word in just over a third of the verses. For Genesis A and Daniel, the ratio drops to closer to one poetic word in every four verses. In Guthlac A there is almost no poetic diction at all: there are just two words in the sixty-nine hypermetric verses. Yet all of these ratios are roughly comparable to the ratio in the normal lines in each individual poem, given some variation that is to be expected with such small samples. Exodus has a significant difference between the hypermetric and the normal lines, but with such a small sample, the results should

Table 1.1: Poetic diction in hypermetric versus normal verses. Poem

Number of verses

Simplex

Compound

hyp norm hyp norm

Non-poetic Compound hyp

Total

Percent

norm hyp norm

hyp norm

Beowulf

















 .

.

Exodus

















 .

.

Genesis A

















 .

.

Guthlac A

















Daniel



















.

.

 .

.

Verse Grammar

29

not be given too much weight. These findings suggest that the poet does not change his personal manner of composition in terms of word choice when switching into hypermetric lines. Another way these lines adhere to normal principles of verse construction is through their adherence to Kuhn’s laws. As the introduction explains, Kuhn’s first law states that all particles must be stressed unless they are in the first drop of the verse clause. His second law states that any clause upbeat must contain at least one particle. Even though there is no consensus on why exactly the particles are arranged this way, the arrangement itself creates a more stylized syntax that the hypermetric lines maintain. The ease with which these lines adhere to Kuhn’s laws is not surprising because the structure of the lines allows poets to group particles naturally at the start of the clause. The light onset of the off-verse generally contains a particle, oftentimes several, as in, þu scealt gēomor hwearfan (hA1: ××–́×–́×) “you shall wander sad” (Genesis A 1018b), which has two particles. This tendency creates a place to gather all of the unstressed particles in the clause. Because clauses most frequently begin at the caesura, the light onset also serves as a clause upbeat, and so the clause upbeat generally has particles. In addition, most, if not all, of the particles needed for the clause can be placed in the light onset, so they will not disrupt the rest of the clause. The heavy onset is more likely to have only clitics, and since that drop comes after a lift, a drop with only clitics does not violate Kuhn’s second law. The verse could potentially create a violation of the first law if it contains particles while not opening a new verse, but this does not tend to happen. Verses with anacrusis consistently create violations, but they do so in normal verses as well. There are two verses in particular which violate Kuhn’s second law because they open a clause with an unstressed position without a particle: forlǣteð þās lǣnan drēamas (aHA1: ×–×́ ×–́×–́×) “lets go of these temporary joys” (Guthlac A 3a), and oferwinnað þā āwyrgdan gǣstas (aA1: ××–́×××–́×–́×) “they will overcome the spirits of the devil” (Guthlac A 25a). This verse pattern, which begins with the unstressed prefix in anacrusis before an alliterating verb, creates the majority of the violations of Kuhn’s in normal verse.17 Presenting the same

17 Kuhn himself argues that these are not violations because even when a particle is stressed, it can still count as part of the clause upbeat. Some subsequent scholars have reinforced this analysis by arguing that alliterating verbs do not necessarily have to receive stress (see Bliss and Kendall). Others, however, argue that such defenses are ad hoc and therefore invalid (see especially Russom 1996: 37–38). Momma takes a different tack and argues that Kuhn’s second law is violated much more often than the first and should be considered a strong stylistic tendency, in contrast to the first law which she characterizes as a metrical principle (1997: 65–74).

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

violations, then, is a point of continuity between the normal and hypermetric verse. Because the adherence to Kuhn’s laws in hypermetric verse is largely facilitated by the verse structure, the place where uniquely hypermetric violations might occur would be in places that the structure differs. The mostly likely location for a problem would be in the light onset of an off-verse that does not open a new clause. The conservative poems have eleven possible examples: þā þis hēgan ne willað, nē þysne wīg wurðigean (Daniel 207) (hA1: ××–́××–́×) (hD2: ×××–́–́ ͜ ̀ ×) “they did not wish to worship this, nor to honor this idol” frēobearn fæðmum beþeahte under þām fȳrenan hrōfe (Daniel 238) (HA1: –́–̀–× (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) ́ ×–́×) “protected the children of gentle birth with embraces under the roof of fire” Næs him sē swēg tō sorge ðon mā þe sunnan scīma (Daniel 263) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “The tumult was not as a sorrow to them the more than the light of the sun” hwearf on þā hǣðenan hæftas fram þām hālgan cnihton (Daniel 266) (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) (hA1: ××–́×–́×) “turned on the heathen servants from the holy youths” Hyssas hāle hwurfon in þām hātan ofne (Daniel 270) (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) (hA1: ××–́×–́×) “The youths moved healthy in the hot oven” lāðsearo lēoda cyninges, and hyra līce geborgen (Daniel 435) (HA1: –́ ͜ ̀ ×–́× ͜ ́͜ ××) (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) “[burned] the hateful contrivance of the king of the people and saved their limbs” Næs hyra wlite gewemmed, nē nǣnig wrōht on hrægle (Daniel 436) (hA1: ××× ͜ ́͜ ××–́×) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “Their appearance was not destroyed, nor any injury on their clothing” Đa gewāt se engel ūp sēcan him ēce drēamas (Daniel 440) (B1: ××××–́×–́) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “Then the angel departed up to seek for himself eternal joy” hālig heofonrīces weard, wið þone hearm gescylde (Daniel 457) (HE: –́× ͜ ́͜ ×–̀×–́) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “the holy guardian of heaven, shielded them against harm” sunu mid sweordes ecge, and þonne sweartan līge (Genesis A 2858) (HA1: ͜ ́͜ ××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “[sacrifice] your son with the edge of a sword, and then with black fire” lēofes lic forbærnan and me lac bebēodan (Genesis A 2859) (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) (hA2: ××–́×–́́×) “cause to be burned the limbs of the dear one, and offer the sacrifice to me”

Although all of these lines would be considered continuous clauses in Modern English, several could be considered multiple clauses when implied words are supplied. Daniel 207, 435, and 436 and the two lines from Genesis A all contain

Verse Grammar

31

a second infinitive or participle that depends upon an earlier verb, and a second instance of that verb could be supplied.18 In Daniel 263b, the underlying verb wæs could be assumed. Thus, these lines may all have been perceived as two clauses by the original audience. The rest of the verses all do not begin a new clause, but they also do not all violate Kuhn’s first law because Daniel 207, 238, 266, 270, and 457 contain only clitics, not particles, in the onset. These are, in fact, most of the examples of off-verses that begin with only clitics, which suggests that the poet might have constructed these unusual verses because he was quite deliberately attempting to adhere to the principles of verse construction that motivate Kuhn’s laws. The only violation of Kuhn’s laws among these lines, then, is in Daniel 440b. Therefore, these verses show that the poets may have altered the typical structure of the hypermetric line in order to adhere to one of the normal principles of versecraft. Only one other hypermetric verse in the conservative poems violates Kuhn’s first law: Beowulf 1166a (æt fōtum sæt frēan Scyldinga). If this verse is scanned as a regular hypermetric verse with only three stresses, as I argue it ought to be, sæt stands in violation of Kuhn’s first law because it is a particle and it stands outside of the first drop of the verse clause because this verse completes a clause that opened in the previous verse. Since atypical violations of Kuhn’s laws occur only in one unusual verse from Beowulf and one verse from Daniel that occurs in a highly problematic position, it is clear that the poets generally maintained these salient metrico-syntactic features in hypermetric composition.

Hypermetric Innovations While the basic principles of verse grammar are the same in hypermetric and normal verse, some very specific differences also arise. These differences seem to result from the structure of the hypermetric verse, which allows the poets a greater degree of flexibility and more options than normal verse does. Fulk (1995) shows that one key difference in the verse grammar is in the distribution of finite verbs. He points out that in normal verse patterns, the finite verb tends to fall in the last foot of the line, presumably because the non-alliterating lift has the weakest stress and is therefore the best place for a displaced particle, which would have less stress than a stress word. Yet Fulk notes that in hypermetric lines there is

18 See also Momma 1997: 61.

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

a second common position for the finite verb: the light onset that opens the offverse and occasionally the on-verse as well. In these early poems, the final lift is still the most common position for the finite verb, as Table 1.2 demonstrates, but the light onset has become the next most preferred position. The heavy onset can also contain verbs, though much less frequently. All other unstressed positions never have a verb, presumably because the poets avoided creating any complications in the cadence. In terms of lifts, the first and third lift can also contain verbs, though not as often as the final lift, and no others. Significantly, the types of verbs that can appear in these positions also differ. It is not surprising that lexical verbs favor the lifts and auxiliary verbs and copulas favor the drops, though the degree to which the placement is regulated is. In the on-verse, the split is nearly absolute (the one exception is sæt in the unusual æt fōtum sæt frean Scyldinga), and not even auxiliaries occur in the drop of the heavy onset. In the off-verse, the lift heavily favors lexical verbs, although some exceptions occur. The light onset shows a high degree of flexibility, as it is the one place that all three types of verbs appear frequently. Table 1.2: Finite verb placement in conservative hypermetric lines. Position ana

st Heavy lift onset drop

nd nd lift drop

rd rd Light lift drop onset

th th lift drop

Final lift

th drop

Auxiliary

























Copula

























Lexical

























Total

























This verb placement demonstrates not that poets rework the verse grammar when it comes to verbs in hypermetric verse but rather that hypermetrics expand their options. In addition to the easiest place for verbs, the final lift of the line, several more options are opened up. The final lift of the on-verse, since it does not alliterate, becomes a more viable option. Even better, the light onset of the off-verse quite easily accepts verbs. At the same time, the increased

19 Note that while I have listed the drop of the heavy onset and the light onset where they would normally appear in a hypermetric line, I have counted for these positions heavy onsets in the off-verse and light onsets in the on-verse. I do this in all of the tables.

Verse Grammar

33

options overall allow poets to tighten some of the regulations on verb placement because more options mean that the poets can avoid putting verbs in the most strongly stressed positions of the line, the second lift in each verse, and maintain mostly lexical verbs in other lifts. Such regulations on verbs allow the strongly stressed positions to stand out all the more, since the poets avoid filling them with weakly stressed particles. In addition to shifting stress patterns, the position of the verb allows for shifting syntactic patterns as well. Because hypermetric verses have more positions that a verb can appear without disrupting the meter, they can fit finite verbs into the line more frequently. On average, 69% of the hypermetric verses in these early poems contain a verb, as compared to 39% in the first hundred lines of Beowulf. These numbers can vary from poem to poem: Beowulf and Genesis A minimize the use of verbs in hypermetric passages with around 50% of the verses, while Guthlac A uses far more than the other poems, with 91% of the verses. Though the numbers vary in the individual poems, each poem uses more finite verbs in the hypermetric passages than in normal ones, making for sections in which the narrative and the action can progress much more smoothly and quickly. The relative ease of working verbs into the line combines with other syntactic features that add to an overall simplicity of hypermetric syntax, as a comparison of normal and hypermetric passages show. The opening of Beowulf is a clear example of the complex syntax of the normal line. Hwæt, wē Gār-Dena in gēardagum (C3: ××–́ ͜ ́ ×) (C3: ×–́ ͜ ́ ×) Þēodcyninga þrym gefrūnon, (D3: –́ ͜ ́–̀×) (A1: –́×–́×) hū ðā æþelingas ellen fremedon. (C2: ×× ͜ ́͜×–́×) (A1:–́× ͜ ́͜ ××) Oft Scyld Scēfing sceaþena þrēatum, (C1: ×–́–́×) (A1: ͜ ́͜ ××–́×) monegum mǣgþum meodosetla oftēah (A1: ͜ ́ ͜××–́×) (E: ͜ ́ ͜×–̀××–́) egsode eorl[as], syððan ǣrest wearð (A1: –́××–́×) (B1: ××–́×–́) fēasceaft funden. Hē þæs frōfre gebād, (A2l: –́–̀–́×) (B2: ××–́××–́) wēox under wolcnum weorðmyndum þāh, (A1: –́××–́×) (E: –́–̀×–́) oð þæt him ǣghwylc þ ̣ạṛạ ymbsittendra (A3: ×××–́×) (D1: –́–́–̀×) ofer hronrāde hȳran scolde, (C1: ××–́–́×) (A1: –́×–́×)

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

gomban gyldan. (A1: –́×–́×)

Þæt wæs gōd cyning. (1–11) (C3: ××–́ ͜ ́×)

“Lo, we have heard in days of yore of the might of the people’s kings of the Spear-Danes, how the lords performed valor. Often Scyld Scefing deprived crowds of enemies, many nations, of mead-benches, terrified earls, after he was first found destitute; he experienced consolation for that, grew under the skies, prospered with glories, until each of neighboring people over the whale-road should obey him, pay tribute to him; that was a good king.”

One typical syntactic feature found in this passage is the way that the syntactic groups can extend beyond a single verse or even a line. The opening lines are an extreme example of the way syntax can be jumbled in poetry; in this case, they are so jumbled that they have produced several divergent analyses. The subject comes first, but the verb is held off for two more verses, putting it after the direct object. Directly after the subject comes a noun in the genitive that is not at all clearly linked to a second noun. Bruce Mitchell and Fred C. Robinson suggest that it ought to depend on þēodcyninga in the following line (1998: 45). Alfred Bammesberger objects to this reading on the grounds that splitting a genitive from the word it depends on by a separate adverbial phrase violates the normal rules of word order too much, and argues that Gār-Dena should rely on gēardagum and be translated as “in the ancient times of the Spear-Danes” (2006: 4).20 Both possibilities present some syntactic irregularities, and it is difficult to judge which the poet actually meant. Even if an Anglo-Saxon audience would not have found the meaning as ambiguous as we do today, the placement of Gār-Dena must still have been considered unusual, and the rest of the sentence around it takes further liberties with standard word order. These opening lines provide an extreme example of how jumbled sentences can become, but while the syntax is not always quite that convoluted, features such as postponing the verb until the end of the clause, even in independent clauses, are certainly not rare. Even in sentences in which the related material is grouped together, the overall idea tends to extend into several lines. This type of syntactic arrangement is evident in the penultimate clause of this passage, which starts in line 9 with oþ þæt, in which the direct object comes immediately after the conjunction, but the verb is held off for several more verses, which contain both necessary materials, namely the subject, and a more tangential phrase, ofer hronrāde, that provides a bit of extra poetic color. 20 He supports this reading, which was first proposed by James B. Spamer, with other examples of a genitive that is split from the word it depends on by a preposition, but he can find only one example from Daniel, which also has a contested reading, in which the two nouns fall in separate verses.

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Adding to the freedom of this style is the feature that in some ways defines Old English poetry: variation. This passage has noun phrases in variation, sceaþena þrēatum and monegum mǣgþum, as well as infinitives that rely on the same verb, hȳran and gyldan. Even when two ideas are not strictly in variation, the poet often expands upon the same idea, as when Scyld both monegum mǣgþum meodosetla oftēah and egsode eorl[as]; the poet is describing different ways Scyld was able to dominate other tribes, but he is still ultimately describing the same thing. In part, the variation, which causes some of the more convoluted syntax, is purely practical: it allows the poet to fulfill the alliterative requirements. For instance, sceaþena provides the alliterative stave to go with Scyld Scefing, while the monegum mǣgþum in variation with it alliterates with meodosetla. Likewise egsode eorl[as], which repeats the whole idea, also alliterates with the ǣrsest that introduces the momentary reminiscence over Scyld’s past. It would be difficult to adhere to the alliterative constraints of the poetry without the variation. At the same time, variation adds a degree of stateliness to the poetry in the way it dwells on the important details. Because of this style, the poet goes into minute detail and explains things from many different angles, and he is in no hurry to do so. The style of the normal line also allows for the integration of more than one topic into one sentence. In this passage, the poet discusses Scyld’s early childhood as a foundling simultaneously with his later life as a great lord. Because the passage shows minimal narrative progress, it is easy to slip into the past in the middle of the passage by use of a simple conjunction and just as quickly return to the present again. The style makes for clear connections between the past and the present with little explanation—it juxtaposes the two and allows the listeners to draw the connections for themselves—but it also creates a far more convoluted syntax while at the same time undercutting any sort of continuous narrative. Renée Trilling argues that this mode of narration, which she terms “constellative” after a concept discussed by Walter Benjamin, is a key element of heroic poetry and that “[b]y invoking fragments of legendary history and removing them from their original narrative context, Anglo-Saxon vernacular poetry forges thematic links between people and events of the past and those of the present, resulting in a view of history as a constitutive element of the present rather than as a prelude to it” (2009: 23). According to Trilling, then, the complex syntax serves not only to accommodate poetic features but also to connect thematic material in a way that reflects an alternate mode of history. It is, therefore, an important aspect of the poetic tradition that characterizes normal verse for a number of reasons.

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

Compared to this passage, the average hypermetric passage looks much more straightforward: Gearo wæs sē him gēoc gefremede; þēah þe hīe swā grome nȳdde (C2: ×××× ͜ ́͜ ×–́×) (HA1: ͜ ́ ͜××××–́× ͜ ́͜ ××) in fæðm fȳres līge, hwæðere heora feorh generede (aHA1: ×–́–× (hA1: ×××××–́× ͜ ́͜ ××) ́ –́×) mihtig metodes weard. Swā þæt mænige gefrūnon (D*4: –́× ͜ ́͜ ××–̀) (hA1: ×× ͜ ́͜ ×××–́×) hālige him þǣr help getēode, sende him of hec an rodore (HA1: –́××××–́×–́×) (hA1: ××××–́× ͜ ́͜ ××) god, gumena weard, gāst þone hālgan. (D4: –́ ͜ ́͜ ××–̀) (A1: –́××–́×) Engel in þone ofn innan becwōm þǣr hīe þæt āglāc drugon (HD4: –́××××–́–× (hA2k: ×××–́–̀ ͜ ́ ×) ́ ×–̀) frēobearn fæðmum beþeahte under þām fȳrenan hrōfe. (Daniel 232–38) (HA1: –́–̀–́××–́×) (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) “Then help was prepared for them; although they were thus cruelly forced into the grasp of the flame of the fire, however the mighty guardian of fate protected their lives. Thus many learned by asking that God, guardian of the people, the Holy Ghost, prepared holy help for them there, sent help to them from the high heaven. An angel entered inside into the oven where they endured that suffering, protected the children of gentle birth with embraces under the roof of fire.”

As with many passages in Daniel, a few normal verses intervene here, but for the most part the passage is in the hypermetric mode. The clearest trend in this passage is that there are far more frequent syntactic breaks in these lines. Every hypermetric line begins a new clause at the caesura, and there is also a clause break between lines 237 and 238. Because of the frequent clauses, the ideas are also mostly contained within each verse. Even when a clause extends over more than one verse, as with the clause from 232b through 233a, each verse tends to contain a distinct unit; in this case, the first verse has the verb and the object (with the subject implied) and the next verse has a complete prepositional phrase. This is not to say the syntax in these lines is equivalent to that of prose. For example, the units that make up the half-lines can sometimes appear in unusual order, as in line 234a, which contains the subject noun phrase but comes after the verb. Word order can be shuffled within the verse as well, as 236b, where the noun is followed by its determiner and modifier. Aside from such smaller rearrangements, though, the syntax of these lines appears more similar to that of prose than of normal verses. The poet further simplifies the syntax in this passage by minimizing variation. This passage contains only one string of variation: gumena weard, and gāst þone hālgan for god. Variation is probably lacking because in this meter it is not

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necessary. The on-verse provides an extra non-alliterating stressed position, so it is easier to fit stress words into the verse pattern. In addition, the off-verse has the extra unstressed position that can accommodate more weakly stressed words, such as verbs or connective words, that may be important to the meaning of the sentence but do not alliterate. While variation is not completely absent from hypermetric passages, it is much rarer. Without the repetition created by the variation, the action becomes more continuous, further increasing the poets’ ability to narrate more events more quickly in these passages. Again, the style varies from poem to poem. Poems that use fewer verbs also maintain some of the other features of the normal lines. Genesis A does not have as much variation in the hypermetric passage as in normal passages, but it still has more than most other poems, allowing the poet to linger over some of the ideas longer. Beowulf does not rely as much on variation, but it does not have as many syntactic breaks at the end of lines and therefore dwells on the same idea with added detail through longer clauses. Guthlac A, on the other hand, has the least amount of variation of all the early poems, and the extra light onsets allow the poet to begin a new clause with almost every verse, making the syntax least like that of the normal verses. For all of these poems, the use of the verbs and the other syntactic features allow for clear-cut and progressive clauses. Even when the poets employ variation, it tends to be minimal, and it follows closely on the first utterance, rather than with the word or phrase repeated multiple times or inserted several verses after the idea was first mentioned. Furthermore, the focus of the narrative remains in the present, quite unlike the beginning of Beowulf, in which the narrator explains Scyld’s past. The closest a hypermetric passage comes to integrating a scene from the past into the present narrative is when the Beowulf poet adds to his description of Unferth in Hrothgar’s court þēah þe hē his māgum nǣre (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) / ārfæst æt ecga gelācum (HA1: –́××–́××–́×) “although he was not kind to his kinsmen at the plays of swords” (Beowulf 1167b–68a). Even this aside is only two lines long and does not bring up a second storyline. It is also the most tangential aside in any of the hypermetric passages; most everywhere else the poets might put in an extra verse to add details to what has been said, but they generally push the action continually forward. Because this alternate mode of narration creates a different aesthetic for the poem—one that focuses on a single moment rather than juxtaposing multiple timeframes in a constellative mode— each hypermetric moment becomes all the more significant. So, the extended description of the help provided for the youths in the fire in Daniel must stand out to the audience even more than it would based on the extended lines alone. Of course, the contrast is not absolute; there are plenty of passages in normal verse in which more happens than in the opening lines of Beowulf and even a few hypermetric passages in which continuous action is held to a minimum.

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

Nor do these syntactic changes cause hypermetric passages to resemble prose entirely. In terms of diction, the hypermetric sections retain a focus on nouns, not only using poetic nouns but also using a higher concentration of nouns, which is another way Old English poetry can be distinguished from prose, with the stressed positions filled with stress words more often than not. By combining prosaic syntax and poetic diction in hypermetric passages, poets can make more happen in less space, oftentimes crystalizing a key moment in the narrative, while still maintaining poetic stress patterns.

Rhetorical Uses and Practical Purposes of Hypermetric Verse Because hypermetric verse has such an unusual form and is used only on rare occasions, poets must have had some specific ideas in mind when they switched into the hypermetric mode. The meter would have stood out to the audience among the other lines, since the hypermetric sections had a different sound. While it is impossible to know exactly how these lines would have been recited, it is probable that the unstressed syllables would have run together and been spoken more quickly than the stressed syllables, as is also the case in Modern English.21 If so, the larger number of syllables in the light onset would be spoken especially quickly, meaning that the lines would present a slower pace to start out with but would also speed up in the middle. The relative consistency of this pattern also creates a noticeable change from normal verse. While type-A verses are the most common, Old English poets generally avoid strings of identical verse types, which means that the overall contour of the lines changes with almost every verse. Hypermetric lines do not vary in their structure nearly as much. Not only do most of them end in a type-A cadence, even the lines of a different type have an overall pattern of a longer verse followed by the quicker section in the middle. On top of all that, the increased length would make the lines take longer to say. Thus, these hypermetric lines have a longer metrical form that remains relatively consistent throughout, creating a pattern that must have alerted the audience that something different was going on. Scholars have had trouble determining just what effect poets might have been trying to have and tend to provide very broad explanations. Sievers originally suggests that the emphasis could create either more solemn or more excited 21 This supposition is supported by the way, in the manuscripts, stressed second elements of compounds can be written as two words, while unstressed clitics often get attached to adjacent words. Since the spacing does not reflect word boundaries, it probably reflects how the words would have sounded when spoken aloud (see Hartman 2008).

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speech (1887: 456), yet elsewhere he downplays the idea of speech and excitement and says they are for solemn and emphatic moods (1893: 216). Most scholars have focused on the idea of heightened solemnity created by the slow, stately pace of the meter. Pope (1966: 121–25) bases his isochronous analysis of these lines largely on that premise; he argues that the major difference between these and normal lines in his system of scansion is that the time signature should be changed from 4/8 to 4/4, meaning that the lines would take twice as long to say. In many instances, solemnity does seem central. For example, the passage from Beowulf that describes Hrothgar and the men seated around him just before Wealhtheow enters (Beowulf 1163–68) has a slow and solemn tone as the poet presents this stately and possibly tragic tableau,22 and in Genesis A, several of the hypermetric passages are used when God speaks, which is an undeniably solemn moment. Yet solemnity cannot account for all of the hypermetric passages. The Guthlac A poet employs hypermetric lines for speeches in emphatic moments, but not necessarily solemn ones. For instance, at line 465 a devil has been speaking, insulting Guthlac. As his speech comes to a close, the poem switches into hypermetric mode, and his insults grow the most personal and the most vicious as the devil tells Guthlac that he is evil and hides his deeds before men. Both the positioning and the content of the passage suggest that this moment would have been the highpoint of the speech, so the transition into hypermetric meter might have been used to give it further emphasis. However, the mood is not nearly as solemn as when God speaks in Genesis A, for the devils are being threatening and insulting rather than formal. The structure of the verses in Guthlac A further distinguishes them from verses with a solemn character because the on-verse starts with a light onset rather than a heavy onset. Even though the lines are longer, the long stretches of function words in the two light onsets would have been spoken quickly, causing the pace of the recitation to speed up rather than slow down. Hence, these lines accord with Sievers’s original idea of excitement, which does relate to emphasis, but not with the solemn characteristics often ascribed to hypermetric lines. Even the more general idea that these lines serve an emphatic function does not account for every hypermetric verse in these early poems. B. J. Timmer

22 Many scholars argue that the poet lingers over this moment to allow the audience to consider Hrothulf’s future treachery and Unferth’s complicity in it; see, for example, Bonjour 1950, Brodeur 1969: 153–57 and Robinson 1984: 109; but cf. Sisam 1965, Niles 1983: 174–75, Mitchell 1992: 10–14, Hill 2000, and Cooke 2007: 193–97, which argue that such an analysis is not necessary. For a summary of scholarship on Hrothulf’s potential treachery, see Fulk, Bjork, and Niles 2008: 177 and 191.

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

(1951: 229) notes that Sievers’s characterization of the purpose of the hypermetric lines is incomplete and offers the following list of possible purposes: 1) they slow down the reading-tempo for artistic effect, as in Beowulf 1163–68; 2) they introduce a speech or a unit of composition; 3) they conclude a speech or a unit of composition; 4) they open a whole poem; 5) they conclude a poem; 6) they are the expression of emphasis or, sometimes, solemnity; 7) they occur in gnomic poetry with its proverbial or didactic character. What is most striking about this list is how wide reaching it is. In some ways, this makes the list seem less useful because it does not define a specific purpose for hypermetric verse that could be true across the board. However, the list could also be characterized as more accurate and inclusive because it illustrates the range of possibilities for hypermetric verse. Any attempt to define the purpose of the hypermetric line definitively is muddled by the lack of a clear break between the hypermetric and normal lines. The poets do not always choose to switch from one to the other at a particularly decisive moment; oftentimes the switch is not even marked by a syntactic break. Sometimes, as in moments of transition, the hypermetric passage will either start or end a clause, but often only one or the other, not both. The longer hypermetric passages frequently occur in the middle of a scene and do not have a syntactic break on either end. Therefore, there is a certain amount of fluidity between the normal and hypermetric lines that precludes our defining an absolute reason why the poet may have switched into hypermetric verse at every given moment. A second reason that no single explanation for hypermetric composition can be defined is that the different poets use the hypermetric lines quite differently. The Guthlac A poet uses the lines almost exclusively for direct speech while the Daniel poet uses them in a long descriptive narrative. Beowulf and Genesis A both use the lines in a variety of contexts, including speech, summary, and description. Furthermore, the structure of the lines used can differ. The Beowulf poet and the Exodus poet prefer hypermetric passages that are several lines long, while the other poets use passages of varying lengths. These two poets also use a relatively small number of hypermetric lines, while the other poets use more. In these two poems, therefore, the appearance of the lines creates a more striking contrast and the length of the passages creates a more dramatic change in tempo, so these passages fit clearly in the standard analysis of creating a solemn moment. The structure of Guthlac A does not do so nearly as well, however. While some of the passages seem to have that effect, the frequent use of one- or

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two-line sections does not create nearly so stately a tone, and the use of light onsets in both the on-verse and the off-verse could do just the opposite. Because the poets use hypermetric verse in such a wide variety of ways, any theory that attempts to explain why poets might have used them must be flexible enough to accommodate the variability of the line. Most importantly, it should take into account the various features of hypermetrics that poets might be trying to take advantage of. As this chapter has shown, hypermetric verse differs from normal verse in a number of ways: the long line produces a noticeably different sound, the length of the line gives the poets more space, and the structure creates different syntactic options. When switching into hypermetric mode, poets can choose a particular style that takes advantage of one feature over another, or perhaps uses a combination thereof. Analysis of hypermetrics must therefore be an analysis of an individual poet’s choices that shows how he manipulates the style for a particular effect at that moment in the poem. One purely structural reason that a poet might have chosen hypermetric lines is simply that they afford more space. Russom (1987: 52–53) suggests that the extra space has a primarily practical value: some large compounds such as middangeard are a normal verse by themselves when inflected, so if the poet wants to use prepositions with such compounds, a hypermetric verse is required.23 This argument makes sense, but the need for space also goes beyond compounds. The extra space is also useful for added descriptive words. The light onset provides a good place for adverbs of low salience, so the verb can more often be qualified in these sections. The on-verse, on the other hand, has an extra space for a stress word, which can often be filled by an adjective that further describes a noun without requiring an extra verse. Such particularly descriptive verses can occur in the long passages, but they are also quite frequent in the lone lines, as in the following: sē ðe him hālig gǣst (B1: ×××–́×–́) wīsað on willan ond his weorc trymað, (A1: –́××–́×) (C3: ××–́ ͜ ́×) lāþað hine līþum wordum, gehateð him līfes ræste (Guthlac A 261–63) (HA1: –́×××–́×–́×) (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) “he whom the Holy Ghost direct in his will, and strengthens his work, summons him with gentle words and promises him rest after life”

23 Russom argues that no whole-verse compound may be preceded by an extrametrical word, because that would add undue complexity to the verse (1987: 62).

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

This passage is a relative clause that describes how the Holy Ghost treats a faithful person. It gives two simpler descriptions of actions that the Holy Ghost takes toward him in the first complete line, then in the second line, which ends the relative clause, it adds more description, particularly by qualifying wordum in a way that characterizes the Holy Ghost as a kind benefactor. This lone hypermetric line could be considered purely practical—the poet switches in order to fit in the extra description—but it also seems that the extra description builds up the statement just a little bit, giving extra importance to this description of the Holy Ghost even as it characterizes him in more depth. Another practical motivation to keep in mind is the syntax; poets often switch into the hypermetric mode when they wish to write with straightforward diction or quick narrative progress, as shown by the hypermetric passage in Exodus. The passage comes near the end of the poem, when the Israelites are celebrating their successful escape. After a speech by Moses, the poet describes the joy of the Israelites, at first using normal verse patterns: Æfter þām wordum werod wæs on sālum (A3: ×××–́×) (A1: ͜ ͜× ́ ××–́×) sungon sigebȳman, (segnas stōdon), (D*1: –́× ͜ ͜× (A1: –́×–́×) ́ –̀×) on fægerne swēg; folc wæs on lande, (B1: × ͜ ͜× (A1: –́××–́×) ́ ×–́) hæfde wuldres beam werud gelǣded, (B1: ××–́×–́) (A1: ͜ ́͜××–́×) hālige hēapas, on hild godes. (Exodus 565–69) (A1: –́××–́×) (C3: ×–́ ͜ ́ ×) “After these words the company was happy, the trumpets of victory sang (the banners stood) in a beautiful tone, the people were on the land, the tree of glory had brought the troop, the holy host, into the protection of God.”

These lines present a relatively static description of the celebration. The first few lines give several individual snapshots of the many actions taking place during the celebration, without clearly connecting them. Twice, these snapshots are interrupted by asides: the description of the banners divides the statement about the trumpets from the description of their tone, and the phrase hālige hēapas, which stands in variation with werud, comes in the middle of the description of what the wuldres beam accomplished. Even though this scene does not refer to earlier events, it still has the feeling of the constellative narrative because it juxtaposes different elements of the scene with paratactic syntax. These lines therefore present a clear picture of the various things that are happening concurrently, highlighting the connections between them, but do not give a progressive narrative.

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After painting this picture, however, the poet shifts into the hypermetric mode: Līfe gefēgon þā hīe oðlǣded hæfdon (A1: –́××–́×) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) feorh of fēonda dōme, þēah ðe hīe hit frēcne genēðdon, (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) (hA1: ××××–́××–́×) weras under wætera hrōfas. Gesāwon hīe þǣr weallas standan, (HA1: ͜ ́͜ ××× ͜ ́͜ ××–́×) (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) ealle him brimu blōdige þūhton, þurh þā heora beadosearo wǣgon. (aHA1: ××× ͜ ́ ͜×–́××–́×) (hA2l: ×××× ͜ ́ × ͜ ͜ ̀ ͜×–́×) Hrēðdon hildespelle, siððan hīe þām herge wiðfōron; (570–74) (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) (hA1: ××××–́××–́×) “Then they had led their life away from the authority of the enemy, although they risked it boldly, the men under the roofs of water. They saw there the walls standing, all the seas seemed bloody to them, through which they carried their war equipment. They exulted with warlike speech, after they escaped the army;”

At this point, the poet switches from describing the scene to summarizing, in broad terms, how the Israelites made their escape. Narrative progress is therefore imperative, since the poet needs to describe several actions in a few lines, which he does in chronological order; in these lines, he includes a new lexical verb every single line, occasionally two per line. The extra extended drops facilitate the increase of verbs in part, though only one verb actually appears in the drop at this point. The drop is also used for multiple connectives. Such conjunctions can be used in passages made up of normal lines, but poets often prefer juxtaposing clauses asyndetically, as the Exodus poet frequently does in the passage above; in hypermetric verses, conjunctions appear in a higher concentration, as Table 1.3 shows. Table 1.3: Subordinating conjunctions in hypermetric verses versus normal verses. Poems

# of verses

# of conjunctions

Percent

Daniel





.

Guthlac A





.

Genesis A





.

Exodus





.

Beowulf





.

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

Table 1.3 (continued ) Poems Total Normal lines (opening of Beowulf)

# of verses

# of conjunctions

Percent





.





.

On average, the hypermetric passages have a subordinating conjunction in 18.9% of the verses, just higher than the number of conjunctions found in the sample of normal verse, but the numbers differ substantially from poem to poem. The percentages suggest another stylistic option for the poets. While a large number of conjunctions is not universal, for those moments in which a poet finds it useful, he can use subordinating conjunctions more freely than is feasible in normal verse, allowing the narrative both to be clearer, since the relationship between the clauses is explicit, and to progress more quickly, since there is space for both the conjunctions and the other stress words in a single line. By switching into the hypermetric mode for this particular passage, then, the Exodus poet is able to succinctly and accurately retell the story of the poem in a way that adds to the celebration that ends the poem and increases the warrior’s dōm. Scholarly consensus suggests that, among the Old English biblical poems, Exodus is one of the most thoroughly steeped in Germanic ideology; as Trilling puts it, “the thoroughly Germanic aesthetic of the poem predominates” and the martial imagery of the poem “casts the Israelites in the role of heroic warriors almost to the point of absurdity” (2009: 102).24 Trilling particularly emphasizes that, while many scholars read these details in an allegorical or typological way,25 a historical reading may exist alongside these other readings, which can create a connection to the distant past by establishing “bonds of commonality” through these heroic ideals (2009: 76–77). In this context, the concept of dōm becomes particularly important. While the passage does not mention it explicitly, the way that the poet ties the past and the present together with the use of connective words such as þā and siþþan shows how the glorious deeds connect to the final celebration of victory. By retelling the story within the poem, the poet is able to emphasize the bravery of the warriors’ actions, adding to the reputation of the men involved. Essentially, they are remembered twice—once through the poem itself and again

24 For additional analysis of traditional Germanic warrior imagery and motifs in Exodus, see, for example, Exodus ed. Lucas 1977: 64–66, Irving 1974, Howe 1989: 73–75, and Hopkins 2018. 25 See in particular Cross and Tucker 1960, Earl 1970, and Exodus ed. Lucas 1977.

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in the summary of their story within the poem—which serves to solidify their dōm. The switch to hypermetric lines at this moment is therefore a calculated move on the poet’s part, since it emphasizes the moment while also allowing the connection of the warriors’ actions to the final celebration to be explicit. The establishment of this dōm is important both on the level of the Germanic heroic ethos, since being remembered was a key goal of the warrior, and on the level of biblical interpretation, since these figures are exemplars to be remembered and held up. Another place the syntax of hypermetric lines can be useful is in direct speech. Speech is particularly important in Guthlac A, since, as scholars such as Angela Abdou and Robin Norris have noted, it appears to be Guthlac’s weapon of choice against the devils he faces off against in the wilderness, where “the saint most often defeats the demons rhetorically, after heated debate” (Norris 2003: 166). Abdou points particularly to Guthlac’s passivity, suggesting that he is ultimately battling for control of language, a battle that he wins because he can state the truth in the face of the devils’ deceptions (2000: 204–10). At some of the most important moments in these debates, the Guthlac A poet switches into hypermetric meter, which allows Guthlac to utter very natural and yet powerful retorts to the devils, as in the following: Næfre gē mec of þissum wordum onwendað þendan mec mīn gewit gelǣsteð. (hA1: ×××××××–́××–́×) (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) Þēah þe gē hine sārum forsǣcen, ne mōtan gē mīne sāwle grētan, (hA1: ×××××–́××–́×) (hA1: ××××××–́×–́×) ac gē on betran gebringað. Forðan ic gebīdan wille (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) þæs þe mē mīn dryhten dēmeð. Nis mē þæs dēaþes sorg. (Guthlac A 376–79) (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) (B1: ×××–́×–́) “Never will you change me from these words while my intelligence serves me. Although you attack it with afflictions, you cannot approach my soul, but you bring it into better state. Therefore I wish to await those things which my lord judges for me. There is not for me anxiety about death.”

The increased number of verbs and lack of variation give the passage some similarities to prose, which might have been considered more natural for speech patterns. The feature that is especially useful here is the light onset, in this case because of all of the pronouns involved. Unlike many passages of Old English poetry, this passage always explicitly states the subject, even when that subject is a pronoun. Because Guthlac is addressing the devils directly, the subject is very often a pronoun, as is often the object, which makes for many particles in this passage. The hypermetric lines, in this case lines in which both the on-verse

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

and the off-verse begin with a light onset, provide a suitable location for the large number of unstressed particles that the context requires. Thus, Guthlac is able to make an argument that is effective not only because it is theologically accurate, as Abdou and Norris show, but also because it is intensely personal in terms of the way Guthlac lays out his own expectations and the way he attacks the devils directly with his verbal assault. This speech comes in the middle of a larger speech in which Guthlac tells the devils that they have no control over his body. He speaks of the devil’s inevitable failure to control him and his body in longer, more detailed sentences up to this point. Then, when the poet switches into hypermetric mode, Guthlac’s speech becomes more direct. In the first sentence, every single verse begins a new clause, and four out of those five clauses contain the pronoun ge. This repeated and explicit direct address shows the power of Guthlac’s words and the clauses pile up on one another, driving home what the devils can and cannot do. The second sentence is similar, although instead of addressing the devils, Guthlac speaks of his own relationship with God. Even so, he still gives several precise statements about that relationship, again making it clear with the unusually large number of explicit first-person pronouns. Thus, the particular structure of hypermetric composition, and in this case, a passage that exclusively consists of light onsets, allows the speaker to shift from the descriptive and expansive to the personal and explicit, highlighting the importance of his words and his commitment. Significantly, the practical reasons alone do not explain everything that is going on in these hypermetric passages. Summary and direct speech are not unique to hypermetric passages: as narratives, all of these poems have plenty of passages in normal verse that summarize events, and Guthlac A in particular uses a prosaic style, even in normal lines, that involves little variation and clear narrative progress. The hypermetric lines allow poets to use these features more easily and also to use them with distinctive stylistic features that draw attention to what they are doing. For this reason, there seem to be important rhetorical reasons for the change in meter as well. One particularly useful rhetorical purpose is to create a transition. Reasons 2–5 on Timmer’s list of hypermetric uses are all different forms of transitions. Guthlac A exemplifies this use because the poet turns to hypermetric verse where the manuscript itself marks the end of a section. The poem begins with general observations on what happens when a soul meets an angel, a passage that ends with five hypermetric lines. When the poet subsequently turns to the specific topic of Guthlac himself, the manuscript marks the new section by leaving a blank space of about a line and beginning the next word, Magun, with a large capital M and a smaller capital A. Likewise, in Daniel, one of the long hypermetric passages, this one detailing the torments Nebuchadnezzar prepares

Rhetorical Uses and Practical Purposes of Hypermetric Verse

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for the youths, begins at the opening of a new section, again marked by a large capital letter. So the hypermetric lines can mark either an end or a beginning. The transitional function is especially important for individual hypermetric lines. While Beowulf and Exodus do not have any, there are several examples of lone hypermetric lines in the other three poems. The syntax of the lines does not always seem important, but several of them could serve as a transition, presumably with the extra length and weight of the unusual line serving to draw notice to the transition. In some cases, a hypermetric line could make a close to a section, as in wōp to wīdan ealdre; (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) | nǣfre gē þæs wyrpe gebīdað (hA1: ××××–́××–́×) “weeping forever; you will never experience relief for that” (Guthlac A 636), which ends a long section on the evil of the devils before Guthlac goes on to explain his own coming rewards. Or the line itself can make the switch, as in Oft gē in gestālum stondað; (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) | þæs cymeð stēor of heofonum (hA1: ×××–́× ͜ × ́͜ ×) “often you will stand in accusation; because of that will come punishment from heaven” (Guthlac A 510), in which Guthlac finishes telling the devils about their transgressions and begins to explain the punishments that are to come. While not all of the lone lines can be seen as a clear transition, many seem quite deliberately to be so. All of these different hypermetric uses ultimately work because of the contrast they create. Hypermetric lines can potentially create contrast on many levels: the length of the line, the pacing of the recitation, the syntactic progress, and the content of the lines. Hypermetric verses can therefore stand out for several reasons at once, creating a variety of effects with one passage. In poems that do not employ particularly prosaic structures, the syntax itself creates a contrast, for upon the conclusion of a particularly convoluted passage, the straightforward character of a hypermetric passage is striking. For example, after Beowulf completes his feats at Heorot, Hrothgar compliments him by saying, Þæt, lā, mæg secgan sē þe sōð ond riht (A3: ×××–́×) (B1: ××–́×–́) fremeð on folce, feor eal gemon, (A1: ͜ ́ ͜××–́×) (E: –́–̀×–́) eald ēþelweard, þæt ðes eorl wǣre (D4: –́–́×–̀) (C1: ××–́–́×) geboren betera! Blǣd is ārǣred (C2: × ͜ ́ ͜× ͜ ́ ͜××) (A1: –́××–́×) geond wīdwegas wine mīn Bēowulf, (C3: ×–́ ͜ ́×) (A1: ͜ ́ ͜××–́×) þīn ofer þēoda gehwylce. Eal þū hit geþyldum healdest, (HA1: –́××–́××–́×) (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) mægen mid mōdes snyttrum. Ic þē sceal mīne gelǣstan (HA1: ͜ ́ ͜××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××–́××–́×)

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frēode, swā wit furðum sprǣcon. (Beowulf 1700–707a) (HA1: –́×××–́×–́×) “That, indeed, can say he who performs truth and right among the people, remembers all from far back, the old guardian of the land, that this earl was born better! Renown is established throughout the distant regions, my dear Beowulf, yours over each of people. You hold it all with patience, strength with wisdom of spirit. I shall fulfill my friendship with you, as we two spoke a short time ago.”

The first sentence in this passage is very convoluted. It starts with the object of the verb, but that object is only a pronoun that stands in for a later clause. The subordinate clause in question, however, þæt ðes eorl wǣre | geboren betera, does not appear for another two lines. In between comes the subject, sē þe sōð ond riht | fremeð on folce, which is stated as a relative clause and which follows the verb. The main clause is further complicated by the variation for the unnamed subject, eald ēþelweard, in this case probably inspired by alliterative necessity, which comes after two separate verb phrases that characterize the man. Clearly, the word order makes it more difficult than it could be to understand the grammatical function of each word, and the not-quite-parallel repetitions complicate matters further. As the passage continues, however, it gets much simpler. The next sentence is relatively straightforward, although it still holds þīn ofer þēoda gehwylce, the description of the renown that Hrothgar first mentions, until the end of the sentence. The hypermetric lines are then the simplest of all; although the subject and object pronouns are grouped together, the subject always comes before the verb, and none of the extra explanatory material appears further away from the antecedent than the next verse. The language therefore makes the hypermetric lines stand out from the rest of the passage because of their clarity. The contrasting syntax also produces a contrasting pacing of the line. There are four sentences in this passage: one describing how people ought to regard Beowulf, one describing the status of his renown, one complimenting him on the way he bears himself, and one making a promise. The first takes up three-and-a-half lines, the second two lines, and the last two only one line each. The hypermetric passage therefore switches from a slow, stately pace, with a lot of extra detail and explanation, to a relatively fast pace that moves quickly from one idea to the next. This noticeable shift creates the appropriate introduction to the following speech, the so-called “sermon” that Hrothgar delivers to Beowulf after Beowulf defeats Grendel’s mother. The opening lines in normal verse provide a particularly formal introduction to the speech. The first sentence opens with the idea that something can be said, but the audience has to wait for the direct object. The long subject, complete with two verses of variation, gives a sense of

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grandeur to the eald ēþelweard while increasing the anticipation for the direct object, making Hrothgar’s final conclusion feel particularly important. By using the second sentence to reiterate the sentiment of the first, this time with an emphasis on the idea of Beowulf’s reputation, the poet expands upon the praise, situating it specifically within the concept of the heroic ideal and how one is remembered after death. The poet then turns to the simpler hypermetric lines, and, because they were introduced by the particularly formal opening lines and because they are composed in longer lines, there is a dignity to their simplicity that acts as a very effective transition into the rest of the speech. In this way, the short hypermetric section serves to frame the speech as a whole. Many scholars have written about this speech, arguing that it functions as a warning against greed (for example, Brodeur 1959, Goldsmith 1962, and Tripp 2011), advice on how to maintain social order (for example, Niles 1983: 232–33 and Kroll 1986), how to be a good king in the face of inevitable change (for example, Kaske 1958, Moorman 1967, Irving 1968, and Shippey 1991), and how to be a good king overall (for example, Bonjour 1950 and Leyerle 1965). In all likelihood, the sermon touches on most, if not all, of these subjects. This introduction characterizes all of the advice by framing it with the major theme that runs throughout the speech: the necessity to temper all actions with wisdom. This idea is introduced in the first full sentence of the hypermetric section. This sentence has a delay that mirrors the anticipation from the first sentence that Hrothgar utters: he claims that Beowulf holds eal hit with patience in the first verse of the sentence, and only in the second verse does he name all that as mægen mid mōdes snyttrum. By creating a level of anticipation, the word order emphasizes the importance of the qualities that Beowulf holds. However, because the sentence is still short, the poet is able to get to the important qualities quickly, making the sentiment stand out because it is straightforward. Furthermore, the length of the on-verse allows the poet to include the two qualities, strength and wisdom of spirit, together within the verse, making for a verse with much weight that gets a lot across while closely linking the key ideas. Significantly, though, the two ideas are not equally balanced: mægen fills only the lift in the onset while mid mōdes snyttrum finishes the onset and fills the entire cadence. The longer phrase ending the sequence makes the wisdom of spirit appear more important, a perception that is augmented by the previous verse in which Hrothgar praises the way that Beowulf holds everything with patience. In both cases, the mental quality is what governs the rest of Beowulf’s attributes, suggesting that Hrothgar praises Beowulf not just for having both qualities, but for having the ability to control his power with his mental

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Chapter 1: Conservative Old English Hypermetrics: A Basis for Analysis

faculties. The rest of the speech, then, illustrates ways in which Beowulf will need to use his wisdom to manage the other attributes that make him a great leader. At the same time as this introduction frames the message of the speech to come, it also gives Hrothgar’s words their purpose. The second hypermetric sentence, Hrothgar’s promise, reminds the audience of Hrothgar’s responsibility to Beowulf: he now owes Beowulf friendship and a reward. The speech can serve as part of the reward because Hrothgar is giving Beowulf the gift of his own knowledge and personal experience, which he earlier demonstrates is quite extensive.26 Though only three lines long, this small hypermetric section is a key to contextualizing and interpreting the speech that is to come. The contrast created by the shift in syntax, together with the line length, makes these lines stand out to the audience so that listeners would have recognized its importance and used it to understand the significance of Hrothgar’s words. In consideration of the various ways poets used hypermetric lines, a single generalization that could cover their purpose seems impossible. There are several uses for these lines, both practical and rhetorical, so poets employed them in many different circumstances. Even the list of reasons provided by Timmer does not seem adequate because it suggests that hypermetric lines were used for certain finite reasons. Instead, the uses seem so closely bound together that each poet might have had several of them in mind when he decided to switch into hypermetric mode. The formality instilled by the line length is probably always a consideration, but poets can enhance that formality by using it to describe a stately scene that includes an instance or two of variation or undercut it by using a syntax and style more similar to prose. Hence, when considering what significance the hypermetric line has to the tone of the poem, we must consider the various ways the possible rhetorical moves overlap with practical syntactic considerations, as well as how the lines compare with each poet’s individual style.

Conclusions This survey of early hypermetrics has shown that, at least in its most formal iteration, the structure of hypermetric meter is fairly strict. The last part of the verse maintains the form of a very simple and tightly structured normal verse. The first half of the verse is more flexible, but the poets still adhere to relatively

26 For more on how Hrothgar’s words can constitute a gift, perhaps even a parental one, see Hansen 1982 and Bjork 1994.

Conclusions

51

short and simple patterns. A few lines vary from the norm, but such lines are rare, and even the deviation is not particularly dramatic. At least in terms of stress patterns, then, hypermetric lines are very conservative. In spite of these regularities, hypermetric verse gives poets enough flexibility to show a degree of individual style. This comes in part with the verse grammar and the way it can vary from the verse grammar in normal verse. While some aspects of verse grammar, such as Kuhn’s laws and the use of the poetic koine remain the same, the syntax and verb placement differ to a larger degree. In addition, the distribution patterns, though relatively strict, show some common variants: extended passages are the norm and mixed lines are most likely a scribal error, but lone lines are an acceptable option and lines that use two light onsets are acceptable variants. Furthermore, even within the relatively strict confines, the drops in both onsets provide more flexibility than the drops in normal verses. Hypermetric passages can therefore look very different in different poems and even within certain poems: Exodus has just the one, very traditional passage; Daniel and Guthlac A use unusual conventions, but mostly maintain their preferred style throughout; and Beowulf and Genesis A use the lines in various ways throughout the poem. Paying attention to this hypermetric style is therefore important to understanding the hypermetric passages themselves and what the poets were trying to do with them, stylistically and rhetorically. Although there is no one purpose for hypermetric verse, close attention to the style of each passage can show what effect the poet may have been trying to have. Thus we can see that the Beowulf poet wishes to create rhetorically heightened passages that frame the thematically significant moments of the poem, giving them more emphasis and formality; the Guthlac A poet, in contrast, wishes to draw attention to the transitions in his poem while still creating a character with authentic speech patterns whose words hold power over the devils who attempt to persecute him; and the Exodus poet saves his hypermetric passage until the end, where it can stand apart from the rest of the poem and immortalize the story the poet is trying to tell in totem. All three poets use hypermetrics differently, all three take advantage of different features of hypermetric composition, but all three still integrate them into the traditional form of the Germanic long-line overall.

Chapter 2: Old English Wisdom Poetry: The Influence of Formulaic Diction Introduction As Bliss brings his chapter on hypermetrics to a close, he focuses more and more on gnomic poetry, ultimately concluding that “the gnomic poetry of the AngloSaxons belongs in some respects to a different tradition from the remainder of the poetry” (1962: 97). He comes to this conclusion on the basis of a number of unusual features that are found primarily in three Old English poems: Maxims I, Maxims II, and Solomon and Saturn II. First, he notes that most of the verses in the Old English poetic corpus that he identifies as “double hypermetric verses,” which are hypermetric verses that appear to have four stressed positions, occur in the two Maxims poems (95). Secondly, he finds only six hypermetric lines that he cannot categorize according to his system, five of which are in Maxims I and the last in Solomon and Saturn II. And lastly, all three of these poems have a high proportion of hypermetric verses with a heavy onset in the off-verse (96), a pattern that is found only once in the metrically conservative Old English poems discussed in chapter 1. In addition to these metrical differences on the level of the line, Maxims I also presents a metrical difference on the level of the poem: it has far more hypermetric verses, both proportionally and absolutely, than the most conservative poems. These differences suggest that Bliss is correct that there is some difference in the way these poems were composed, and, therefore, they should be analyzed separately in order to determine what sorts of alternate compositional techniques were used for these poems and why these techniques would have been allowable. For the sake of this investigation, I will consider gnomic poems as those that are primarily concerned with the dissemination of wisdom in the form of gnomic statements.1 Though there is no absolute definition of a gnomic statement or a maxim, many Old English scholars agree upon their general characteristics. Paul Cavill defines gnomes and maxims as “a linkage of a thing and a characteristic” and “a sententious generalization,” respectively (1999: 11), and argues that the

1 Separating Old English poetry into genres is a problematic enterprise, as Shippey 1972, Greenfield 1972, Szarmach 1993 and Fulk and Cain 2003 have shown, though cf. Battles (2014), who argues that poems can be usefully distinguished by the contextualizing features that the poet uses in his openings. I am not here trying to distinguish a particular genre but instead singling out poems that were composed primarily by creating proverbial lists, in one form or another, and therefore have a reason to be metrically distinct from narrative poems. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501513688-003

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Chapter 2: Old English Wisdom Poetry: The Influence of Formulaic Diction

main verb must be in the present tense, the subject cannot be a specific individual, and the statement cannot reference a specific situation (1999: 51).2 Elaine Tuttle Hansen (1988) and Carolyne Larrington (1993), though not articulating a concise definition, similarly describe gnomes as statements that do not refer to any one specific thing, use present-tense verbs, and are often qualified by generalizing adverbs. Susan Deskis also identifies generality and present-tense verbs as two defining characteristics of gnomes and adds that a gnome “must achieve some level of syntactic and semantic completeness when removed from its context” (2005: 328). A general consensus therefore seems to be that gnomic poems are those poems that are primarily filled with partially independent statements made in the present tense that describe the general way that things often are or ought to be. Deskis usefully defines these poems against narrative poems. She defines a narrative passage as one containing “at least two independent clauses temporally arranged so that altering their order would change the original semantic interpretation of the sequence” (2005: 329–30).3 She does not argue that either type of poem must consist entirely of gnomic or narrative statements, but rather that there are poems concerned primarily with one or the other, and that poems can be classified according to their main mode of discourse. With this definition, she identifies six poems that could be considered primarily gnomic: Maxims I, Maxims II, The Fortunes of Men, The Gifts of Men, and Precepts. I would add three more to that list: Solomon and Saturn II, The Rune Poem, and The Order of the World.4 Though a dialogue, which therefore includes features such as questions and discussion, Solomon and Saturn II focuses primarily on Solomon’s wisdom as it is being disseminated through gnomic speech. The Rune Poem presents an odd

2 Cavill makes the distinction between gnomes and maxims because he argues that maxims apply to humans and have a moral quality to them while gnomes apply to the state of things in the natural world. However, he also acknowledges that these two can overlap and the definitions serve more as a continuum than two distinct categories. 3 To formulate these definitions, Deskis refers to the linguistic theories of Virtanen 1992 and Labov 1972. 4 In his 1976 book, Shippey identifies a larger number of poems as wisdom poems: The Wanderer, The Gifts of Men, Precepts, The Seafarer, Vainglory, The Fortunes of Men, Maxims I and II, The Order of the World, The Riming Poem, Soul and Body I and II, Deor, The Judgment Day I and II, Resignation, Almsgiving, Homiletic Fragment II, Homiletic Fragment I, Solomon and Saturn I and II, An Exhortation to Christian Living, and The Rune Poem. According to my definition, many of these poems do not fit into the category of gnomic poetry because they are too narrative. I am not trying to argue that these should not be considered wisdom poetry, but rather that there is a narrower category of purely gnomic poetry that generally adheres to a particular style not used in all of the wisdom poems.

Introduction

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case because it so clearly has an alternate purpose to listing gnomes, but at the same time it equally clearly provides such a list. The Order of the World fits into this list least clearly of all the poems because it is more discursive. Nevertheless, it does not present a narrative. Instead, it provides particularly expansive gnomic utterances, first on the nature of wisdom and then almost exclusively on God’s powers as they can be seen through the creation of the world. I will also remove The Gifts of Men from my list of poems to be discussed because, while clearly gnomic, it does not contain any hypermetric verse. Therefore, the poems discussed in the chapter will be Maxims I, Maxims II, The Fortunes of Men, Precepts, Solomon and Saturn II, The Rune Poem, and The Order of the World. In this chapter, I focus on the overall metrical patterns illustrated in these poems to show how gnomic hypermetrics differ from hypermetrics in the conservative poems; though perhaps not as separate from narrative hypermetrics as some have argued, gnomic hypermetric lines as a group contain longer verse patterns with onsets that are expanded in both length and syntactic complexity. The differences in the meter of the two discourse styles are, in large part, driven by the practical requirements of gnomic diction, namely, shorter clauses and a greater reliance on normally unstressed words such as beon, sculan, or generic pronouns. Accommodating and highlighting those elements in numerous subsequent verses requires different sorts of metrical patterns that employ the drops to a greater extent, and the more a poem relies on that sort of diction, the more the unusual metrical patterns will come to characterize the poem. Rather than showing inferior poetry, however, the patterns might serve a distinct purpose of individuating these poems and marking them as wisdom poetry. John Miles Foley shows that oral poetry creates meaning differently than written poetry, specifically in the way that traditional, formulaic language evokes elements of genre and cultural values. He argues, The key difference lies in the nature of tradition itself: structural elements are not simply compositionally useful, nor are they doomed to a “limited” area of designation; rather they command fields of reference much larger than the single line, passage, or even text in which they occur. Traditional elements reach out of the immediate instance in which they appear to the fecund totality of the entire tradition, defined synchronically and diachronically, and they bear meaning as wide and deep as the tradition they encode. The “how” of the traditional idiom, while overlapping at some points with the “how” of the literary text, also—and crucially—includes an extratextual dimension uniquely the domain of oral traditional art. (1991: 7)

When Foley speaks of the structural elements that make up an oral poem, he is generally speaking of the formulaic statements and language that are used and repeated throughout the tradition. However, these features necessarily influence the meter, and an attuned listener might recognize the resulting distinctive

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Chapter 2: Old English Wisdom Poetry: The Influence of Formulaic Diction

metrical patterning. Traditional metrical patterning might, therefore, be a large part of gnomic poetry. As wisdom poetry, these poems would be especially steeped in tradition, and poets would want their audience to put the wisdom in the context of the greater gnomic tradition. By adapting the meter to fit the traditional gnomic diction comfortably, the gnomic poets give it a pride of place that makes each poem especially echoic of all the wisdom poems that came before it. Using gnomic diction in conjunction with longer, heavier hypermetric lines therefore leads to an elevated style that was particularly appropriate and eminently useful to the elevated content of wisdom poetry.

The Structure of Gnomic Hypermetrics A close analysis of gnomic hypermetric structures shows that, in spite of scholars such as Bliss deeming Maxims I “notoriously difficult and idiosyncratic” (1962: 96), or Cavill and Bredehoft claiming that gnomic hypermetrics have their own system of composition, they basically follow the same principles as conservative hypermetric verse. The vast majority of the verses appear in groups and consist of a hypermetric onset plus a normal-verse (usually type-A) cadence. The perception of these poems as irregular as far as the hypermetric verse is concerned comes from the fact that the poets make maximum use of the more flexible aspects of hypermetric composition. This trend can most clearly be seen in the onsets of the verse, which can accept more words and heavier words, which in turn creates long and complex hypermetric patterns. It can also be seen in the distribution of the verses, because even though the poets generally group the hypermetric lines together, there are more hypermetric verses outside of the typical groupings. This flexibility makes gnomic hypermetrics look quite messy on the surface, but detailed inspection reveals that poets stretch the possibilities of the verse only in ways that already allow for some flexibility and with clear motivations from the content of gnomic speech.

The Structure of the Line The structure of the verse follows the same basic principles as the structure of those in more conservative poems; however, the gnomic verses do not maintain the structural norms as strictly. In terms of the onsets, the verses can be longer and the filler material of the drop heavier. In terms of the cadences, the verses, while still showing a large preference for type-A verses, consist of the other verse types more often than the cadences in conservative poems. These patterns

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The Structure of Gnomic Hypermetrics

together illustrate that the gnomic poets exploit the flexibility of the line to a much greater degree. Both onsets use longer drops than those in the conservative poems, though the difference in the heavy onset is much more pronounced. In terms of length, the maximum onset in the gnomic poems is larger, especially for the heavy onset. The difference is not particularly large in terms of the extremes, but the average length in the gnomic poems is longer as well. Whereas the light onsets in the conservative poems most commonly range from three to four syllables, the light onsets in the gnomic poems have a relatively even distribution from three to five (see Table 2.1). In the heavy onset, the most common number of syllables is one in each case, but the longer drops have a higher incidence in the gnomic poems. Furthermore, not all of the gnomic poems show such a distinctive preference for a single-syllable drop. Maxims I has a similar number of verses with a monosyllabic and a disyllabic drop, 24 and 22 respectively. Table 2.1: Length of onsets in conservative versus gnomic hypermetric verses. 











Conservative heavy onset

   (.%) (.%) (.%)

 (.%)









Gnomic heavy onset

    (.%) (.%) (.%) (.%)

  (.%) (.%)



 

Number of Syllables





Conservative light onset



      (.%) (.%) (.%) (.%) (.%) (.%)

Gnomic light onset



       (.%) (.%) (.%) (.%) (.%) (.%) (.%)

In terms of the type of words used in the onsets, the light onset in the gnomic poems is roughly the same as that in the conservative poems: both mark the weight of the extended drop with one or more particles.5 In contrast, the heavy onsets are quite different in the gnomic poems. At least one particle occurs in that position in sixty-seven verses (57.8%), twenty-six of which (22.4%) have more than one. In the conservative poems, fifteen verses (15.8%) have a particle,

5 The gnomic poems are even more consistent in this regard because only two verses (Maxims I 3b and Solomon and Saturn II 459b) contain no particle, as opposed to seven verses in the conservative poems.

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and of those only five (5.3%) have multiple ones. On the other end of the spectrum, just nineteen verses (16.4%) contain only the unstressed final syllable of a word in the drop of the heavy onset in gnomic poems, as opposed to thirty-two (38.7%) in the conservative poems. These numbers show that the poets are making full use of the flexibility of the onset. The light onset is an ideal place to expand the verse and add a number of function words; the gnomic poets make full use of that space and expand the heavy onset as well. The cadence of the verse basically maintains the norm presented by the conservative verses, with type-A verses making up the cadence an overwhelming 84.3% of the time, the majority of which are formed by a simple pattern of two stress words. In the conservative poems, however, the other verses mostly consist of type-D and -E verses; the gnomic verses present some more complex options: verses of types B and C, which are generally avoided otherwise, since they open with an unstressed position; verses that have four fully stressed positions; and remainders that cannot be scanned as a normal verse:6 Type B: Dol biþ sē þe his dryhten nāt (–́××××–́×–́) (Maxims I 35a) “Foolish is he who does not know his lord” onge þonne hē hit āna wāt (–́×××××–́×–́) (Maxims I 42a) “cruel when he alone knows it” lāð sē þe londes monað (–́××–́× ͜ × ́͜ ) (Maxims I 59a) “hateful is he who demands land” wæsceð his wārig hrægl (–́××–́×–́) (Maxims I 98a) “washes his dirty clothing” gebīdan þæs hē gebǣdan ne mæg (×–́××××–́××–́) (Maxims I 104a) “to endure that which he cannot control” mete bygeþ, gif hē māran þearf ( ͜ ́͜× ͜ ̀͜×××–́×–́) (Maxims I 110a) “acquires food, if he needs more” Sēoc sē biþ þe tō seldan ieteð (–́××××–́× ͜ × ́͜ ) (Maxims I 111a) “Sick is he who eats too seldom”

Type C: ēorod sceal getrume rīdan (–́××× ͜ × ́͜ –́×) (Maxims I 62b) “the troop shall ride in a host”

6 Note that this list differs in several ways from the scansions presented by Bliss. For an explanation of why these verses should be scanned the way they are as well as the significance of these scansions, see Hartman 2014.

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Sceomiande man sceal in sceade hweorfan ( ͜ ́͜×–̀×××× ͜ × ́͜ –́×) (Maxims I 66a)7 “One feeling ashamed shall wander in the shadow” hām cymeð, gif he hāl leofað (–́ ͜ ̀͜×××–́ ͜ ́ ×) (Maxims I 105a) “he comes home, if he survives safe” Mægen mon sceal mid mete fēdan ( ͜ ́͜×××× ͜ × ́͜ –́×) (Maxims I 114a) “One shall feed his strength with food” Wel mon sceal wine healdan (–́×× ͜ ́͜×–́×) (Maxims I 144a) “One shall hold his friends well” Cain, þone cwealm nerede (–́××–́ ͜ × ́͜ ×) (Maxims I 197a) “Cain, whom death preserved” ende ðurh insceafte (–́××–́–́×) (Solomon and Saturn 457a)8 “an end through internal generation”

Four-stress verses: trymman ond tyhtan þæt he teala cunne (–́××–́××× ͜ ́͜×–́×) (Maxims I 46a) “strengthen and lead so that he knows rightly” wīdgongel wīf word gespringeð (–́–̀×–́–́×–́×) (Maxims I 64a) “the wandering wife spreads words” Wīf sceal wiþ wer wǣre gehealdan (–́××–́–́××–́×) (Maxims I 100a) “A woman shall hold faith with her husband” Fela sceōp meotud þæs þe fyrn gewearð ( ͜ ́͜×× ͜ ́͜×××–́×–́) (Maxims I 164a) “The creator created many things, of those things which occurred formerly”

Remainders:9 ofercumen biþ hē, ǣr he ācwele (×× ͜ × ́͜ ××××× ͜ × ́͜ ) (Maxims I 113a) “he is overcome, before he dies” Mūþa gehwylc mete þearf (–́××–̀ ͜ ́͜×–̀) (Maxims I 124a) “Each of mouths needs food”

7 As a wō-noun, sceade would originally have been spelled sceadwe, making for a long root syllable on the noun and a type-A cadence in this verse (see Campbell 1983: §596). This verse therefore presents an uncertain example because there is no way to tell whether the poem was composed late and the spelling is in fact authorial, or it was an earlier poem and the scribe changed the spelling to the later variant. 8 It is possible to analyze this verse as a normal rather than a hypermetric verse by not promoting the stress on the final compound, making the verse a type D*1 (–́××–́–̀×), which is plausible since the verse is short and ends in a compound. Nevertheless, the hypermetric scansion is preferable because the expansion would be particularly heavy for a D* verse and the verse occurs in the middle of a hypermetric passage. 9 It should be noted that with just two remainders, both of which are in the metrically unusual Maxims I, it is quite possible that these verses are not authorial but rather the result of scribal error.

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This list of verses has a few important implications for our understanding of gnomic hypermetrics. First, gnomic poets seem to expand their verses to fit their material to a greater degree than conservative poets do (though, notably, they tend not to ignore the poetic conventions altogether). It is likely that the verbal cues that mark gnomic statements are important enough that the poets allowed for more metrical variants in order to maintain that diction. Second, and related, the changes tend to make the lines longer. As we shall see below, these longer lines serve both to accommodate the gnomic diction, allowing the poet to match metrical units to individual maxims, and to mark its import with greater line length.10 And finally, almost all of the expansive verses occur in Maxims I. The unusual features are probably a result of the unusual nature of Maxims I itself. With the exception of Maxims II, it has the weakest frame and the least amount of narrative material. Listing gnomes can put more pressure on metrical patterns than narrative, so the poet would have been more likely to use alternative patterns. Furthermore, the long lines mark significant moments in a poem, and sharing wisdom was considered particularly important. The poet might have felt that the long lines fit in with his poem and that he should expand the lines further to accommodate longer gnomic statements because matching gnome to verse maximizes the sententious impact. Thus, the gnomic poets in general exploit the flexible structure of hypermetric verse and therefore compose verses that are generally longer and heavier than conservative hypermetrics, and the poet of one of the two quintessential gnomic poems, Maxims I, does this most of all.

The Distribution of the Line Gnomic poets distribute hypermetric lines across the poems in roughly the same way as the conservative poems: the vast majority of the verses appear paired with a second hypermetric verse in a group of hypermetric lines. Unlike in the other poems, however, a hypermetric verse paired with a normal verse, either as a hypermetric verse in the middle of a normal passage or a normal verse in the middle or a hypermetric passage, is common enough that the pattern might not always be attributable to scribal error.11 As a group, the poems

10 For a fuller discussion on how the four-stress verses in particular create a heightened diction, see Simms 2003: 67–87. 11 Like Guthlac A and some of the other conservative poems, these poems also sometimes have a lone hypermetric line in a normal section, though these are less common, occurring twice in both Maxims I and Solomon and Saturn II.

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have ten hypermetric verses paired with normal verses within a hypermetric section12 and fourteen hypermetric verses in a normal section.13 Although scribal error may have occurred in some of these verses, especially as a few of the verses in question contain other problematic features,14 enough of them still occur to suggest that they might be additional cases of the poets, particularly the Maxims I and Solomon and Saturn II poets, using hypermetrics more freely. Significantly, many of the normal verses in the hypermetric passages have features similar to hypermetric verses, such as opening with a drop—either in type-B or -C verses, often with a long opening drop,15 or through anacrusis16—or having three stress words, particularly in a type D.17 In this way, these verses are very similar to the unusually distributed verses in Daniel, since they show continuity of the style even if not the specific meter. Unsurprisingly, these verses again occur largely in Maxims I, as well as, in this case, in Solomon and Saturn II. Once again, the poems that are more broadly gnomic seem to allow for the greater freedom. In addition to the unusual ways that the poets group the lines, the gnomic poets also show some unusual distribution of the types of verses across the lines, varying somewhat from the standard pattern of a heavy onset in the on-verse and a light onset in the off-verse. Some conservative poets likewise vary the placement, specifically by using a light onset in the on-verse: the conservative poems contain twenty-eight such verses, which makes for an incidence of 22.9% of the on-verses. The style seems to be an individual choice of each poet; only Guthlac A makes substantial use of the light onset in the on-verse, and Beowulf and Exodus do not use that pattern at all. The gnomic poems contain this same 12 The verses in question are Maxims I 104a, 112b, 144a, 147b, 183b, and 193a, Solomon and Saturn II 459b, Precepts 17b and 18b, Order of the World 102b, and Maxims II 2b. Maxims I 196b and 198a and Solomon and Saturn II 460a are also unpaired, but these occur at the edge of a hypermetric passage, which appears permissible in the conservative poems. Considering how many hypermetric passages there are in this group of poems, it is surprising that only these three verses, two of which are in the same passage, begin or end a passage at the caesura. Although more passages contain unpaired verses in the middle, fewer do so at the start or end of a passage. 13 Bliss identifies Maxims I 30b, 116b, 149b, 151b, and 164a, Maxims II 47a, and Solomon and Saturn II 490a. In addition to these seven verses, Maxims I 172 and 189, and Solomon and Saturn II 236b, 261a, 289a, 337b, and 400b should also be considered hypermetric. 14 Three normal verses in hypermetric sections, Maxims I 183b, Solomon and Saturn II 459b and 460a, all occur in places in the text where there are contentious emendations, and one hypermetric verse in a normal section, Solomon and Saturn II 490, does not have a verse pair. 15 See specifically Maxims I 104b, 112a and 192b. 16 See specifically Order of the World 102a and Maxims I 144b. 17 See specifically Maxims II 2a and Precepts 18a.

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pattern at an incidence of 18.8%, or a total of twenty-one of the hypermetric onverses. Thus, the light onset does not occur in the on-verse as commonly as in the conservative verses as a group, but it does appear as often as or more often than it does in all the poems apart from Guthlac A. These verses are distributed relatively evenly throughout the poems, though with slightly more in Maxims I and Solomon and Saturn II and none at all in The Rune Poem. While less usual, these patterns seem unexceptional, especially because most of the verses are otherwise regular and even generally maintain the regular form of using postponed double alliteration when a light onset appears in the on-verse Next to this placement of the light onset, the gnomic poems also contain a heavy onset in the off-verse (note that this placement happens only once in the conservative poems); it occurs twenty-nine times, or at an incidence of 25.4% in the hypermetric off-verses. This distribution is not a consistent feature of gnomic poetry overall, but rather a unique feature of the two Maxims poems and Solomon and Saturn II. In the Maxims poems in particular, the pattern is quite common: Maxims I uses it eighteen times, which is far more than the five times it has a light onset in the on-verse and Maxims II uses it six times, a number that is quite significant in light of the fact that it contains a light onset in the off-verse just twice. This expanded use of the heavy onset, therefore, seems much more specialized than the light onset in the on-verse; rather than an atypical but useful pattern that can be adapted for many stylistic and syntactic purposes, this one is used almost exclusively to create adjacent verses with repeating formulaic structures. The two Maxims poems, which most frequently contain long lists of short, condensed gnomes, are the only poems that are particularly apt to have this pattern, so the alternate distribution pattern may have been used as a tool for the poets to construct those lists at particularly heightened moments. Overall, then, the various distribution patterns are quite similar in nature to the structure of the line in terms of how they compare with conservative verse: gnomic poems mostly follow the same principles of composition, but the poets are more likely to use some of the marginal patterns. We shall see that these marginal patterns help the poets to put the emphasis and formality appropriate to gnomic statements into their poems by allowing for the heightened feeling created by extended lines along with the repetitive formulaic diction that marks gnomic speech.

Kuhn’s Laws in Gnomic Verse The gnomic poems in general are not quite as regular regarding Kuhn’s laws as a particularly strict poem such as Beowulf, yet they still adhere to the laws

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relatively well.18 The hypermetric lines do the same, maintaining a degree of continuity between the metrico-syntactic patterns of normal and hypermetric verse just as the traditional poems do. As discussed in chapter 1, the most likely problematic place is those lines that do not have a clause break over the caesura. These poems have one such line: Wineleas, wonsǣlig mon (HE: ͜ ́͜××–́–̀×–́) | genimeð him wulfas to gefēran (hA1: ××××–́×××–́×) “The friendless, unhappy person takes for himself wolves as a companion” (Maxims I 146).19 Because there is no clause break between the verses, genimeð and him are both unstressed particles that stand outside the first drop of the verse clause. In addition to this one clear violation, six possible violations occur, all of Kuhn’s first law, though these are somewhat ambiguous. Three of these violations are due to anacrusis, as in oftigen biþ him torhtre gesihþe (aHA1: × ͜ ×́͜ ××–́××–́×) “clear sight is withheld from him” (Maxims I 40a).20 In this case, the particles biþ and him stand outside of the first drop. However, as discussed in chapter 1, anacrusis is a problematic position that interferes with Kuhn’s laws often enough that some scholars believe it does not count as a separate unstressed position. Two more verses mirror a type of possible violation found in the conservative poems. They contain the second and third infinitive to depend upon a single auxiliary verb: and him ðonne on healfum sittan, (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) / tȳdran him mid ðȳ tēoðan dǣle (HA1: –́××××–́×–́×) “and then reside in his own part, propagate for himself with the tenth part” (Solomon and Saturn II 455b–56a). Technically, these

18 The most common problematic verses are those that have an unstressed particle after the first stress when the verse has anacrusis and the first stress falls on an alliterating finite verb (which Kuhn does not consider a violation). In the first hundred normal verses of Maxims I, Maxims II, and The Fortunes of Men, there are no other violations. Solomon and Saturn II, The Order of the World, and The Rune Poem are slightly less strict and have one or two other violations each in the first hundred verses: one each of the first two laws in Solomon and Saturn II (9b and 39a), two of the first law in The Order of the World (4a and 16a), and one of the first law in The Rune Poem (2b). 19 There are two other verses without a clause break, Maxims I 3b and Solomon and Saturn II 459b, but they do not violate Kuhn’s first law because they do not contain any particles. Chapter 1 argues that the poets’ tendency to eliminate particles from the light onset that occurs in the middle of a clause in contrast to elsewhere, where there is almost always one or more particles in this position, suggests that the poets may have been aware of the problem and attempted to compensate for it. These poems do not have enough relevant verses to confirm a pattern, but given that no light onsets other than these two and one irregular verse from Solomon and Saturn II that lacks a verse pair (Solomon and Saturn II 490) lack particles, the poet might well have been aware of this problem. However, similarly to the Daniel poet, the Maxim I poet fails to account for this problem in one instance. 20 The other two violations are in Maxims I 113a and 188a.

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verses are all part of a single clause that began in a previous verse, so all particles in these verses create a violation of Kuhn’s first law. But, explained in the introduction, clause boundaries in Old English might not have been perceived the same way as in modern English; since each verse is talking about a new action and the auxiliary must be supplied in order to make sense of the sentence, the poet may have considered them all separate clauses. The final verse is ambiguous because it is not clear whether the word in question ought to be considered a particle. In Maxims I 58a: cēne men gecynde rīce “the bold one [holds] his natural kingdom,” the word men is an unstressed word outside of the first drop of the clause, which starts in the previous verse. As a noun, men should in fact receive stress, but if it does the verse would have four stressed positions. Several verses exist in Maxims I containing a form of man that could potentially create a fourth stress. Though grammatically nouns, these words semantically resemble the pronoun mon and should perhaps likewise be unstressed.21 It is not entirely clear how a word that is syntactically a noun but acting metrically as a particle ought to be treated under a metrico-syntactic rule. The relatively small number and generally understandable nature of the violations suggest that the gnomic poets were just as interested as the conservative poets in maintaining the metrico-syntactic principles of the tradition throughout the hypermetric sections. The gnomic poems as a group have more violations of Kuhn’s laws in the hypermetric sections than the conservative poems do, but they do in the normal sections as well. The diction of gnomic poetry requires a greater use of particles, and the gnomic poets position the particles in different locations in the line than the conservative poets, so it is hardly surprising that the gnomic poets occasionally have trouble fitting all the unstressed particles into the first drop of the clause. The exceptional verses in the hypermetric sections, then, do not differentiate the hypermetric sections from the normal sections, but instead show a degree of continuity. Such continuity reinforces the idea that the gnomic poets were pushing the flexibility of the hypermetric form without necessarily abandoning the principles of traditional versecraft.

21 The other verses are Maxims I 4a, 36a, and 66a. Bliss puts stress on man/men in all of these cases, creating verses with four stressed positions. Given the general characteristic of the statement, it would seem more logical to treat man as a generic pronoun and not stress it, thereby making these verses more regular. Although doing so for this one verse would arguably cause a violation of Kuhn’s first law, not doing so would create a violation in verses 4a and 66a.

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Placement of the Finite Verb The largest structural difference between the conservative poems and the gnomic poems is which types of verbs appear in which positions. This is not to say that the two show no similarities; for the most part, verbs in the gnomic poems occur or do not occur in the same position as they do in conservative poems, as Table 2.2 illustrates.

Table 2.2: Finite verb placement in gnomic hypermetric lines. Position ana st lift

Heavy nd nd onset drop lift drop

rd lift

rd Light drop onset

th lift

th Final th drop lift drop

Auxiliary

























Copula

























Lexical

























Total

























In terms of where the verbs are placed, only four verbs occur in a place where they do not in the conservative verses. The two verbs that appear in the third drop, however, are perfectly logical for verb placement, in that they occur in the final stressed position of the verse: Mūþa gehwylc mete þearf (irregular: –́××–́ ͜ ́͜×–̀) “Each of mouths needs food” (Maxims I 124a) and þæt ēce nīð ǣldum scōd (aHD4: ×–́×–́–×́ –̀) “that eternal hatred injured men” (Maxims I 198a). Because type A1 dominates the cadence, few verses end in a half-stressed position, but when they do, there is no reason why they would not contain a verb just as the fifth position of each verse often contains a verb. The more unusual instances are the one verb that appears in the first lift of the off-verse, gif hī his hlȳstaþ ǣror (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “if they attend to it on time” (The Rune Poem 28b), which would normally be considered too strong a position to contain a verb, and the one that appears in anacrusis, Wearð fǣþo fȳra cynne (aHA1: ×–́×–́×–́×) “Hostility occurred for the race of men” (Maxims I 192a), which is normally too weak. Aside from these two anomalous instances, the verbs show the same preference for the more moderately stressed positions

22 Note that while I have listed the drop of the heavy onset and the light onset where they would normally appear in a hypermetric line, I have counted for these positions heavy onsets in the off-verse and light onsets in the on-verse.

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and heavier unstressed positions, avoiding the two lifts that establish the alliteration and the most weakly stressed drops. However, while the overall positioning of the verbs follows the same trends as that in the conservative poems, the gnomic poems show more variants in terms of which verbs occur where. This is not to say that these poems ignore the logical trends for verb placement altogether: the first lift still has only lexical verbs, the light onset still has the most variety, and the final lift also varies, but with a preference for lexical verbs. The third lift does not maintain the standard absolutely, because it does have one auxiliary and one copula, but these two verbs can be taken as exceptions rather than a new trend, especially because the two verbs are both found in the unusual Maxims I. A new trend does seem to have been established with the types of verbs that appear in the drop of the heavy onset. The conservative poems have only copulas, whereas in the gnomic poems all three kinds of verbs appear. Lexical verbs are rarer, but there are almost as many auxiliary verbs as copulas. This change goes along with the changes apparent in the heavy onset in terms of syllable length and syntactic complexity discussed above. The drop in the heavy onset appears to have been expanded in these poems to almost the weight of the light onset. Because more copulas and auxiliaries are used, and the poems have fewer light onsets in which to put them, the expanded drop of the heavy onset provides a useful alternative for the poets. In addition to the types of verbs, the number of verbs that appear in the various positions shifts dramatically. In the conservative poems, the final lift of the line is the dominant one, and the next most frequent place for verbs to appear, the light onset of the off-verse, has notably fewer. All the rest of the positions have less than half the number. In the gnomic poems, the three most heavily used positions are used to almost the same extent, meaning that instead of relying predominantly on the final stressed position of the line, which is the most common place to find a verb in normal verse, the gnomic poets also rely heavily on two onsets for the finite verbs. Unlike some of the differences noted with the structure of the lines, the differences in verb placement occur in all the poems; there is still variation from poem to poem, but it is less drastic. The increase in the number of verbs in the drop of the heavy onset is the most unusual feature and appears predominantly in the two Maxims poems. In this case, Maxims II has the most examples; Maxims I distributes the verbs more evenly, though there are slightly more verbs in the final lift of the line in this poem. Solomon and Saturn II and The Rune Poem both have several examples of finite verbs in the heavy onset, proportionally more than the conservative poems, but the verbs are all copulas. Apart from the Maxims poems, the rest of the poems display a slightly different change from the conservative

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poems: they have more verbs in the light opening than the final lift. What all the poems have in common, though, is that verbs appear more often in the unstressed than the stressed positions and, not surprisingly, the majority of these verbs are auxiliaries and copulas. We shall see in the next section that the shift in the placement of verbs results from a particular type of formulaic diction employed in the gnomic poems. Because these weaker verbs are an integral part of gnomic diction, all the gnomic poems use them more often, and in order to do so, the poets compose the poetry in a way that can accommodate the frequent use of these verbs.

Oral Formulaic Diction and Syntax Though bound by the same general principles, gnomic poetry and conservative poetry, as the above analysis has shown, differ quite a bit. The major reason for this is the traditional language that in many ways defines the gnomic poems and that also sets them apart from narrative poems. Narrative poems use formulaic diction, but the construction and use of formulas in gnomic poetry contrast with the typical use in narrative poems. Where narrative poems contain verses made up of many different formulaic systems that are spaced out across the poem, poets of gnomic poems often use a small number of systems repeatedly, recasting them with each new piece of wisdom. In addition to increasing the degree of repetition, this method of composition can also highlight some of the peculiarities of gnomic diction: because the poems use these formulas so much, the unusual diction that characterizes gnomic formulas creates some large shifts in the overall metrical patterns as well as the specific hypermetric lines. This section will review the scholarship on oral theory in order to demonstrate some of the methodological considerations necessary to employ it fruitfully and demonstrate some of the atypical features of gnomic formulaic diction. It will then analyze how these unusual features influence the structure that was detailed above as well as the syntactic patterns of the poems. The frequent repetition of these formulaic systems, which highlights the gnomic diction while also creating the more unusual metrical patterns, may have given these poems an identifiable tone and sound that would have been associated specifically with this genre, which, it turn, evokes the overall cultural significance of wisdom in Anglo-Saxon society.23

23 Scholars such as Katherine O’Brien O’Keefe, Mark C. Amodio, and John Miles Foley have argued that many, if not all, of the extant poems in Old English were composed by, as Amodio

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Oral Formulaic Theory and Gnomic Formulae In his famous article first published in 1953, Francis P. Magoun introduces to Old English scholarship the idea of oral-formulaic composition, which had been developed by Milman Parry and Albert Lord to describe and understand the composition of Homeric verse. Parry and Lord show that in Homeric verse, certain phrases are repeated, often verbatim, in particular metrical situations, and they argue that these phrases come from a set of stock phrases that the poets memorized to be used in particular narrative situations in order to satisfy the metrical requirements of the line (Magoun 1991: 47). Magoun applies this theory to Old English poetry, arguing that Beowulf must have been similarly composed, and that if we had a larger surviving corpus, every line in the poem could probably be found elsewhere and therefore be confirmed as formulaic in nature (48–53). Since then, Oral Theory has been refined substantially in many directions, one of which has been to tailor the theories used to analyze Old English poetry to the specifics of Old English meter that distinguish it from Homeric and SerboCroatian verse. In the 1960s and afterwards, Old English scholars focused on refining the theory to match the greater flexibility of the Old English form.24 Donald K. Fry, Jr., in particular, worked on the idea of the formulaic system, which Parry was also developing for his analysis of Homeric verse, defining it as a group of half-lines, usually loosely related metrically and semantically, which are related in form by the identical relative placement of two elements, one a variable word or element of a compound usually supplying the alliteration, and the other a constant word or element of a compound, with approximately the same distribution of non-stressed elements. (1967: 203)

puts it, “a literate poet who composes pen-in-hand” (2005: 184). It is certainly possible that some or all of the gnomic poems were literate works. However, Amodio also argues that “[a]lthough poetry is composed outside of the performance arena in Anglo-Saxon England, the performative features of the register remain crucial to it because throughout the Anglo-Saxon period (and the Middle English period as well), poetry is received chiefly through the ear and not the eye” (185). According to this argument, the sound patterning and oral reception of the poems would be relevant to the composition whether or not the poems were originally composed orally. 24 The Greek dactylic hexameter is a relatively rigid system; even though each dactyl (–‿‿) can be replaced by a spondee (– –), the arrangement of long and short syllables in the line is relatively fixed. For this reason, many of the formulae are also relatively fixed. The variety of verse types, together with the flexibility of the unstressed position in Old English, creates a metrical system that can include more variants. For an overview of the scholarship that dealt with these revisions, see Foley 1988: 69–74.

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Fry formulates this particular definition to emphasize the variability of formulaic diction in Old English. He quotes Lord’s explanation of formulaic speech as a type of language in which singers do not memorize a large number of specific formulas, but instead, through listening, pick up a “basic mold” which they can then adjust for each situation (see Lord 1960: 36–37). In light of this explanation, Fry argues that many formulaic systems can be related and overlapping, and that a good poet would be able to substitute variably and thereby build new systems on the basis of existing ones. A formula, therefore, is not a rigid unit that stands independently of a system, but it is rather “a group of words, one half-line in length, which shows evidence of being the direct product of a formulaic system” (1967: 204).25 As Foley shows, the importance of understanding this style of composition rests not simply in knowing how the poets constructed the line but in understanding how the lines create meaning. Foley states that “[t]raditional referentiality, then, entails the invoking of a context that is enormously larger and more echoic than the text or work itself, that brings the lifeblood of generations of poems and performances to the individual performance or text” (1991: 7). In other words, when the poet uses traditional language, he brings to mind all the other contexts in which that language has been used, creating an explicit meaning that is unique to the story as well as an immanent meaning that the audience can recognize and use to understand the story more fully. In this way, Foley says, “the networks of inherent meaning enrich the momentary with the timeless, the situational with the all-pervasive, and story-specific with the traditional” and create a poem that has meaning beyond its individual parts (1991: 10). Unsurprisingly, the gnomic poems are steeped in this type of traditional language, though the formulaic systems are formed and employed in different ways that are significant to the structure and style of the poems. The syntax and metrical patterning, therefore, become connected to the cultural meaning evoked by the formulaic language. One difference results from the type of words that characterize gnomic diction. The verbs most typically used in gnomic speech are beon and sculan, since these are the verbs that can specify how

25 This basic idea still characterizes the formula and system in Old English literature, though scholars such as John D. Niles have tried to tighten the system somewhat to make it more specific and exacting. Niles (1983: 121–29) defines a system as a “rhythmic-syntactic-semantic complex one half-line in length” (126). By this he means that for two groups of words to belong to a single system they need to be metrically similar to each other, preferably the same verse type; the variable words should have the same syntactic relation to the constant word in both cases; and there should be some semantic similarities between the variable words.

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things fundamentally are or what they should be. Similarly, when the wisdom is social in nature, it often applies to people in general; therefore, the subject can often be sum or mon. All of these words are unstressed. According to most conventional analysis of formulaic composition, a system ought to be formed by one stress word that remains the same and a second that is variable and usually (though not always) changes for the sake of alliteration (see O’Neil 1960: 598, Fry 1967: 202, and Niles 1983: 123). The unstressed words are unimportant; so long as the relative placement of the drops remains stable, the unstressed words can vary quite a bit. Yet in the gnomic formulas the unstressed words— namely, weakly stressed verbs and indefinite pronouns—are the ones that remain the same, which makes the formulaic systems rather unconventional.26 Another way in which gnomic formulaic composition is different is the degree of repetition used. In narrative poetry, poets combine a range of different systems in each passage, bringing in a variety of details, associations, and metrical patterns. A poet might use a particular formulaic system multiple times in a single poem, but the usage tends to be spread out over the entire poem.27 In contrast, gnomic poets often take one formulaic system and use it again and again, filling in the variable positions with different words to create a number of different statements with the same structures that occur one after the other. This format creates a notably large amount of repetition in sound patterns, syntactic structures, and verse types, making for a very different listening experience.

Formulaic Diction and the Structure of Gnomic Hypermetrics We have already seen that gnomic hypermetric structure is distinct from hypermetric structure in conservative narrative poems. The differences can largely be explained by the unique formulaic language that is used and repeated throughout the poems. In this way, the differences do not simply accommodate alternate language, but might also characterize the poetry as gnomic and formal, since the structure creates a repetitive rhythm that is distinctly tied to the gnomic diction.

26 Fry (1967: 202) argues that unstressed words can occasionally make up an integral part of a formula, but that such cases are rare, not governed by rules, and should be treated on a case-by-case basis. 27 For example, Foley points out the system þæt/þa wæs/is X cyning, which appears in Beowulf at lines 11, 863, 1885, 2209, and 2390.

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The major structural differences in gnomic hypermetrics come in the heavy onset, particularly the drop of the heavy onset. These differences can clearly be illustrated by the opening section of Maxims II: Cyning sceal rīce healdan. Ceastra beoð feorran gesȳne, (HA1: ͜ ́͜××–́×–́×) (HA1: –́××–́××–́×) orðanc enta gewearc, þā þe on þysse eorðan syndon, (D*4: –́×–́××–̀) (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) wrǣtlic weallstāna geweorc. Wind byð on lyfte swiftust, (HE: –́×–́–̀××–́) (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) þunar byð þrāgum hlūdast. Þrymmas syndan Crīstes myccle, (HA1: ͜ ́͜××–́×–́×) (HA1: –́×××–́×–́×) wyrd byð swīðost (Maxims II 1–4a) (A1: –́×–́×) “A king shall hold a kingdom. Cities are seen from far, skillful work of giants, those which are on this earth, the artistic work of building stones. Wind is in the air the swiftest, thunder is at times the loudest. The powers of Christ are great, fate is strongest.”

This passage starts out with two typical gnomic statements, one using beon and the other using sculan. From there, the poet elaborates on the second verse for a time, using language that is not quintessentially gnomic. In verse 3b, he returns to his gnomic diction and makes four more statements (three in hypermetric verse) on the fundamental nature of things. All of the more unusual features of gnomic structure can be found in this passage and explained by the formulaic diction the poet employs to compose it. The length of the drop in the heavy onset is not extraordinarily long here, but it does have more than one syllable over half the time, which is more often than the conservative poems tend to. This is because the drop is rarely filled with just the final, often inflectional, syllable of a stressed word. Instead it has a finite verb, a form of either beon or sculan in that position. As a copula and a modal auxiliary, neither of these verbs would likely receive stress, so it is natural that they would fall in an unstressed position, in this case directly after the subject. When, as is often the case, the formula also calls for a preposition to explain where the typical nature of a thing is, the drop is expanded further still. These verbs are also what make the drops in general heavier. A finite verb is a particle, so all of the verses that use this gnomic system have a particle in the drop of the heavy onset. In a related way, this structure also shows why the verb distribution is so different for hypermetric verse and why this meter tends to have more verbs in the onsets than in the final stressed position of the line. Because the verbs are often words of little prosodic stress, they are unlikely to fill a stressed position. Furthermore, they are more naturally placed at the beginning of the clause. Not

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only does Kuhn’s law suggest that they ought to fall in the first drop of the verse clause, but the material itself makes that position more likely. Syntactically, a copula is more likely to follow the subject and an auxiliary is more likely to appear early on in the sentence, since the main verb must follow after it. Typical word order can, of course, be voided in poetry, but that would not make sense here. The unstressed word is what makes the formula and what marks the clause as an aphoristic statement, so it is logical that it comes early to alert the audience to the nature of the statement that follows. With these verbs occupying such an important space in the gnomic diction, it is no surprise that poets shift the metrical tendencies to accommodate them, thereby emphasizing the poem’s genre and its cultural significance. In addition to its effect on the drop, the diction also dictates the structure of the line, in this case the use of the heavy onset in the off-verse. As stated above, gnomic poets often take one formulaic system and repeat it again and again. While these gnomic statements vary more than a typical formula would, the ones with beon are certainly related in that they state a subject followed by beon and then give a quality about that subject, usually with an adverbial modifier. When the poet starts listing these gnomes verse by verse, he abandons the opposing structure of the on- and off-verse and instead allows his formulaic system to dictate the structure of the line. This structure is found almost exclusively in gnomic poetry. A more extreme version of the same features can be found in a particular formula that was first identified by Haruko Momma, which she named “the gnomic formula.” Momma finds eight instances of the formula in hypermetric verses, three of which are in the gnomic poems on which this chapter focuses (1989: 424):28 Ēadig bið sē þe in his ēþle geþīhð (HA1: –́××××××–́××–́×) (Maxims I 37a)29 “Blessed is he who grows in his native land” Gīfre biþ sē þām golde onfēhð (HA1: –́××××–́××–́×) (Maxims I 69a) “Greedy is he who takes the gold” Earm bið sē þe sceal āna lifgan (HA1: –́××××–́×–́×) (Maxims I 172)30 “Wretched is he who lives alone”

28 The other five examples are Daniel 232a, The Seafarer 106a and 107a, and The Wanderer 112a and 114b. 29 Bliss is likely correct to scan this verse, as well as Maxims I 69a below, with a type-A cadence even though they lack a final syllable because the verb ending is a West Saxon form and he substitutes the Anglian equivalent, -eð. 30 This verse does not have a verse pair according to the line divisions in ASPR, though Cavill suggests that it could be split into two normal verses: Earm bið sē þe sceal | āna lifgan. In this case, the first verse would be an instance of the normal-verse version of the gnomic formula.

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In addition to these three, the poem contains five more examples that could also be considered part of the formulaic system, even though many of them have slight differences in the unstressed material: Dol biþ sē þe his dryhten nāt (HB1: –́××××–́×–́) (Maxims I 35a) “Foolish is he who does not know his lord” earm sē him his frȳnd geswīcað (HA1: –́×××–́×–́×) (Maxims I 37b) “wretched is he who deceives his friends” lāð sē þe londes monað (HB1: –́××–́× ͜ × ́͜ ) (Maxims I 59a) “hateful is he who demands land” lēof sē þe māre bēodeð (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) (Maxims I 59b) “dear is he who offers more” Sēoc sē biþ þe tō seldan ieteð (HB1: –́××××–́× ͜ × ́͜ ) (Maxims I 111a) “Sick is he who eats too seldom”

Similarly to the verses from Maxims I 1–4a, these verses generally have a verb in the drop of the heavy onset (the exceptions, Maxims I 37b, 59a, and 59b, all have the verb elided). Therefore, the verb of the clause comes in this position rather than the final lift of the line, and the drop is heavier since it contains a particle. In addition to the verb, these verses also contain clause breaks, which add more complications still. To mark the clause break, the poet includes the relative pronoun and subject pair se þe (or its inflected equivalent), creating two more syllables, both of which are pronouns. In the case of Maxims I 69a, that is all the poet includes, but that still makes for a four-syllable drop. Other verses can have an additional auxiliary, a preposition, an article, or a combination, making for a drop of up to six syllables. Finally, the formula takes this form whether it is in the on-verse or the off-verse, creating three examples of a heavy onset in the off-verse. Once again, it is the specific nature of the gnomic diction that causes these unusual features. The formulaic system itself is ADJ/INTERJ + biþ + se + particle + (. . .) + verb (where the ellipsis is optional extra material that fills out the hypermetric verse). As in many of the other gnomic systems, the stable position is the unstressed one. As a result, the unstressed words appear together and in a prominent place, even though putting them there creates unusual metrical patterns. Furthermore, the desire to fit this entire saying, which is two clauses long, into one verse also naturally makes for a longer pattern. Thus, it is clear that the gnomic poets had certain formulaic systems in mind that they used to invoke wisdom and that these patterns in some ways dictate the structure of the line. Hypermetric lines in particular are flexible enough to support such accommodation without too much trouble, although doing so augments the length of these already long lines and therefore alters the rhythms. The length, though, would not be entirely problematic, since it would serve to further

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emphasize these important statements and to raise the formality of the passage. These structures might therefore signal gnomic composition to an audience that is attuned to the rhythmical variants in a poet’s performances, reinforcing the authority inherent in formulaic language and helping to evoke the immanent tradition in which gnomic poetry participates.

Syntax in Gnomic Hypermetrics Together with the structure of the line, the gnomic focus of the poem also has a profound effect on the syntax. Gnomic hypermetrics display a shift in syntax similar to that of the hypermetric lines in the conservative poems when both are compared to the syntactic patterns of the respective normal verse: both show an increase in syntactic breaks and a decrease in variation. Yet the reasons for the shifts do not entirely match. As chapter 1 shows, the conservative poets have a variety of reasons to shift into hypermetric meter, but the syntactic changes seem to result from a desire to increase the clarity and narrative progress of the section. While this may be partially the case for gnomic poems, an alternative motivation for the syntactic change is to increase the number of short, pithy gnomes that fill only one verse, or perhaps two. Rather than create a noticeable break between hypermetric and normal composition, then, the syntactic shift can in fact link the two, for the hypermetric lines present exaggerated examples of the type of syntax that characterizes the normal lines. Syntax is another aspect of gnomic poetry that can differ from conservative poems even in normal verse. As a group, the gnomic poems tend to have more syntactic breaks per verse than the more conservative poems, though all of the poems can vary in this regard.31 Unsurprisingly, the two gnomic poems that have the most syntactic breaks are the two that are most focused on listing gnomes: Maxims I has a syntactic break in 56% of the verses, Maxims II in 58%. The large number of breaks comes from the listing quality that dominates both poems. Because the most effective gnomes tend to be pithy, any list of them will create a syntactic style heavy in clause breaks (especially when compared to some of the drawn-out clauses with variation common in narrative poetry). The rest of the gnomic poems do not have syntactic breaks as often, but they do all have more syntactic breaks per verse than Beowulf, since they all list short gnomes to some degree.

31 In the conservative poems, for example, Guthlac A, which has the most syntactic breaks of the group, has a syntactic break in 46% of the first hundred normal verses, while Beowulf has one in 39%.

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Often when the poets switch into hypermetric meter, this trait can be exaggerated. One common pattern that gnomic poets use in hypermetrics passages is the following: Nieht bið wedera ðīestrost, nēd bið wyrda heardost, (HA1: –́× ͜ ́͜×–́×) (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) sorg bið swārost byrðen, slǣp bið dēaðe gelīcost. (Solomon and Saturn II 312–13) (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) (HA1: –́×–́××–́×) “Night is the darkest of weathers, oppression is the hardest of fates, sorrow is the heaviest burden, sleep is the most like to death.”

In these passages, the hypermetric meter allows the poet to include a large amount of detail in each gnomic statement while still keeping each gnome to a single verse. Because this patterning seems preferred and because hypermetric composition makes it easier, syntactic breaks are more common when a poet is composing in hypermetric meter. A more extreme example of this can be found in Momma’s “gnomic formula,” quoted above, since it includes two complete clauses in a single verse. It is not surprising that variation is rare in both normal and hypermetric verses in these poems, since variation is primarily a narrative feature. When telling a story, poets often use variation to set up the alliteration for an element that is dictated by the narrative. In gnomic poetry, where no outside force necessarily dictates the order of the gnomes, a poet needs only remember two sayings with the same alliterative stave to construct a line. Thus, as long as the list does not go on for too long, variation is not required by the form. While the poems do use some variation in the more narrative moments, the strictly gnomic moments, as in the example from Solomon and Saturn II above, often move from one gnome to the next without it. The exception to this rule is in Maxims II, which sometimes builds variation into the formulaic systems. This poem contains a number of two-verse formulae that may contain variation in the second verse, which falls in the onverse. This innovation is probably due to the consistently gnomic nature of the poem. Unlike Maxims I, Maxims II is almost exclusively a list of gnomic statements. At times, the poet uses one gnome per verse or two per line. However, it would be difficult to maintain that pairing consistently while still meeting the alliterative requirements of the poem for the length of the entire poem. Therefore, the poet switches in the middle of the poem to a two-verse system that is realized as such: wulf sceal on bearowe, (A1: –́×× ͜ × ́͜ ×) earm ānhaga, eofor sceal on holte, (D2: –́–́ ͜ ̀ ×) (A1: ͜ ́͜×××–́×) tōðmægenes trum. (Maxims II 18–20a) (E: –́ ͜ × ̀͜ ×–́)

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“the wolf shall [be] in the grove, the miserable solitary one, the boar shall [be] in the forest, strong of tusk-strength.”

In these verses, the main part of the gnomic statement comes first, followed by an augmentation: variation in the first case and a description in the second. This structure allows the poet to give the gnomic statement in the off-verse where only one alliterative stave is expected and then use the subsequent onverse to create alliteration for the next gnome. A similar pattern can be seen in the hypermetric sections: þyrs sceal on fenne gewunian (HA1: –́××–́××–́×) āna innan lande. Ides sceal dyrne cræfte, (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) (HA1: ͜ × ́͜ ×–́×–́×) fǣmne hire frēond gesēcean (Maxims II 42b–44a) (HA1: –́×××–́×–́×) “The giant shall dwell in the fen, alone in the land. The woman shall with secret craft, the virgin, seek her friend”

In these hypermetric lines, the on-verse is not necessarily entirely variation, but the passage still shows a similar pattern. In this way, then, the variation also illustrates the same trend about gnomic verse: the syntax of the hypermetric verses largely echoes the normal verses, though the longer lines of the hypermetric meter allow the poets to follow the concise patterns all the more closely. In pointing out these trends, I do not mean to argue that such features are universal to all gnomic poems. Although formulaic diction dictates both the structure and the syntax of gnomic sections of the poems, not every single verse or every hypermetric passage shares these formulaic features. The following partially hypermetric passage from Precepts illustrates a different trend: Ne freme firene, ne nǣfre frēonde þīnum, (C2: × ͜ × ́͜ ͜ ́͜××) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) mǣge man ne geþafa, þȳ lǣs þec meotud oncunne, (D*4: –́×–́×× ͜ ̀͜×) (hA1: ××× ͜ ́͜××–́×) þæt þū sȳ wommes gewīta. Hē þē mid wīte gieldeð (Precepts 17–19) (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “Do not perform sin, and do not ever in your friend or kinsman condone sin, lest the lord accuse you, that you are guilty of sin. He will reward you with punishment”

In this passage, none of the drops are particularly long, only one onset has a verb (a copula), and none of the off-verses has a heavy onset. That is because these lines are primarily descriptive rather than gnomic; the speaker is explaining his

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wisdom instead of sharing it in short proverbs. Thus, using formulaic diction is a choice that only some poets make, or that poets make in only certain situations (Solomon and Saturn II is a good example of a poem that frequently switches). However, when the poet composes the hypermetric verses using gnomic formulaic diction, it affects most every aspect of the verse in ways that create a distinctive quality of sound for these gnomic passages. The poets who use hypermetric verse for some of the practical reasons discussed in chapter 1 could use hypermetric patterns that look similar to those of the traditional poems. Those poets who want to bring the immanent tradition to bear on their poems, though, have a ready tool to do so with not only the diction but the metrical structure, especially of the hypermetric verses.

The Rhetorical Functions of Gnomic Hypermetrics The main reasons conservative poets use hypermetric meter—for emphasis; for a heightened tone; to create a transition, beginning, or ending; or for clarity, especially in direct speech—all occur in the gnomic poems to some degree. When the poets seem focused on some of these specific purposes, the poetry can look relatively conservative itself: Forþon scyle mon gehycgan þæt hē meotude hȳre; (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×× ͜ ́͜ ××–́×) ǣghwylc ælda bearna forlǣte īdle lustas, (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) lǣne līfes wynne, fundige him to lissa blisse, (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) forlǣte hetenīþa gehwone sīgan (aD*1: ×–́× ͜ ́͜×–̀×) (C2: × ͜ ́͜×–́×) mid synna fyrnum, fere him tō þām sellan rīce. (The Order of the World 98–102) (aA1: ×–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) “Therefore shall man resolve that he obey the creator, each of the children of men abandon useless desires, the transitory joy of life, strive after the bliss of grace for himself, allow each of hostilities to fall with the crimes of sins, set out, for his part, to the better kingdom.”

Apart from the intervening normal line and a half, this hypermetric passage looks quite conservative: it mostly uses the heavy onset in the on-verse and the light onset in the off-verse, and the only exception is one instance of a light onset in the on-verse; the drops are not particularly long; and the material in the drops is typical, with only the final syllables of disyllabic words in the drop of the heavy onset and particles in the drop of the light onset.

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The possible reasons the poet might have shifted into hypermetric verse are equally traditional. These are the last five lines of The Order of the World, so the poet may have wanted to use longer lines both to mark and to put special emphasis on this ending. Other poems, such as The Wanderer and, as we shall see in chapter 5, Judith, do likewise or, in the case of The Seafarer and The Rhyming Poem, include a hypermetric passage very close to the end. In all cases, these hypermetric passages serve in some way to praise the glory of God or encourage obedience to him, which is also quite common as a final note of Old English poems in general.32 Such an ending is particularly important to The Order of the World because the concept is the culmination of the entire poem. The initial forþon “therefore” refers not to a single idea, but to the poem as a whole; this sentence is the conclusion drawn from the nearly hundred lines of poetry before this point. The hypermetric mode might also add formality to this moment. As the ultimate lesson of the poem, it must certainly have been a formal moment. The language reinforces the possible hypermetric formality. The passage includes an instance of variation, lǣne līfes wynne, which likewise adds formality, especially in hypermetric composition where variation is rare. The rest of the passage enumerates the many ways that a person should forlǣte īdle lustas, and the many different commands that all build on each other serve to maintain the formal tone of the passage as a whole. In all likelihood, the poet had some or all of these purposes in mind when he switched to hypermetric meter at the end of his poem, and the lines would likely have a correspondingly profound effect on a listening audience. Other poems likewise use hypermetric meter for reasons that echo those of the traditional poets. The Rune Poem, for example, has four consecutive hypermetric lines that allow the poet to add detail to two descriptions of runes more easily. The Solomon and Saturn II poet often uses hypermetrics for the very pointed and significant moments of Solomon’s speech. Direct speech makes up the whole of the poem, so hypermetrics cannot emphasize that particular mode of narration above any other. Nevertheless, two speeches, both in the mouth of Solomon, correspond exactly to a passage of hypermetric lines. These speeches, which both provide a warning to any who would question the strength of God in favor of his own, therefore seem especially powerful and important in the context of the rest of the poem. Hypermetric verse in gnomic poetry, however, may have one added purpose that the traditional poems do not: to emphasize the solemnity particular

32 See The Wife’s Lament, The Husband’s Message, The Gifts of Men, The Fortunes of Men, and Maxims II, among others.

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to gnomic wisdom by foregrounding the gnomic diction that characterizes these poems. Not all of the poems do this, and not all of them do it all of the time, but when the poets choose, the hypermetric passages can be a powerful way to showcase the wisdom of a particular moment or to accentuate the wise purpose of the poem as a whole. The poets most clearly highlight the gnomic material when there is a degree of continuity between the normal and hypermetric verses. As discussed above, the syntactic relationship between normal and hypermetric verse in traditional poems is quite different from that in gnomic poems. While traditional hypermetrics often creates distinctive patterns, gnomic hypermetrics look very similar to normal verse in gnomic style: both modes of composition can focus on presenting gnomic material that is succinct and bound by the verse. In fact, as I will show below, gnomic hypermetric systems are often adaptations of normal systems that can include more information. These lines therefore give the gnomic statement as a contained unit while also adding detail that might augment the solemnity or import of the statement. In addition, the emphasis created by the length of the line draws further attention to these gnomic moments. For the rest of this chapter, I will analyze specific examples of how poets can use hypermetrics to augment the gnomic aspects of the poem. To do so, I will look at three poems that all adapt normal lines into hypermetric meter in different ways. The two Maxims poems, which are most narrowly focused on disseminating all manner of wisdom, adapt systems this way most frequently, but a similar pattern can also be found in The Fortunes of Men. In all cases, the adaptations allow the poets to put the traditional gnomic language into the longer, more elevated patterns of hypermetrics. In this way, the poets can emphasize the immanent elements that they invoke by using the traditional diction and sound patterning that draw the audience’s attention to the overall gnomic tradition. Though very different, all three examples show the artistry with which the poets adapt gnomic systems and how they use the traditional elements to create their own unique version of wisdom verse.

Hypermetrics in The Fortunes of Men The Fortunes of Men has only one small hypermetric section, but the poet uses it to great rhetorical effect. Although scholars such as Derek Pearsal (1977: 51) have argued that the poem lacks structure or poetic value, and others such as Isaacs (1975) and Swensen (1991) have argued that it lacks unity, the rhetorical use of hypermetrics, among other features, shows that the poet did, in fact,

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have an organizing principle.33 Apart from an introduction, conclusion, and brief interlude, the poem is basically a list of all of the fates that sum sceal go through in his or her life. Most of the fates are described in detail, but they all start with some variant on sum sceal to mark both the gnomic nature of the poem and the start of a new wise saying. The poem begins with an introductory explanation of the power of God and how he controls the fate of everyone who is born. After saying that only God knows what will happen, the poet moves on to the idea that some unlucky people die early and gives his first example of how a wolf can eat a person, emphasizing again the lack of control humans have over such things. This example starts with sumne, and the sceal comes later on, so it is not quite the formulaic example of an introduction of a fate, but it clearly establishes the idea. Once he gives the context for the poem through both explanation and example, the poet then turns to the four hypermetric verses, all of which expand the typical sum sceal formula that becomes the defining marker of the poem into a larger, hypermetric verse: Sumne sceal hungor āhīþan, sumne sceal hrēoh fordrīfan, (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) sumne sceal gār āgētan, sumne gūð ābrēotan. (The Fortunes of Men 15–16) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) (hA1: ××–́×–́×) “Hunger shall destroy a certain one, stormy weather shall drive a certain one away, a spear shall destroy a certain one, war kill a certain one.”

The placement, content, and structure of these four verses is important because they create a turning point in the poem. Until this point, the poem has been talking about the power of God and the lack of control humans have in their own lives. The poet has explained a single fate, but he used it to exemplify his initial point. By putting all these new fates together one after the other in the formulaic language that will define the rest of the poem, the poet brings the focus of the poem to the second important idea: the large variety of fates in people’s lives. The concise list that juxtaposes multiple fates in a short space illustrates this idea better than any explanation could. The form of the hypermetric line is ideal for a number of reasons. It allows a single fate to appear per verse; without the extra space, two stressed words could not occur in the same line with such a long introductory drop. The verse-fate correspondence gives the list its rhetorical impact. It allows the poet to stack the fates on top of each other in close proximity with the continual repetition of the

33 For a fuller discussion of the structure of the poem as a whole, see Dammers 1976 and Hartman 2016.

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sumne sceal in the same position in every verse, thereby emphasizing the repetitiveness of the types of fates men face together with the variety of realizations those fates can take. At the same time, the ability to include the entire clause in each verse allows the poet to end each verse in an infinitive, which results in the additional feature of slant rhyme. The rhyme further joins the ideas together, while at the same time giving the lines extra emphasis with the added stylistic flourish. Hence, the theme that many fates, most of them bad, can come to man is illustrated by moving efficiently from one complete fate to the next within the space of four rhetorically elevated, purposefully repetitive verses. After these four verses, the theme of the poem is solidly established, and the poet turns to the more expansive list of fates. Even as the form of the hypermetric line allows the poet to illustrate the theme more clearly, it also puts added emphasis on these particular lines. The length of the line slows the poem down, drawing out each verse a little more than the normal verses. Elsewhere in the poem, each new fate is introduced by a type-A3 verse, which is one of the lightest Old English verses. The difference between that and the hypermetric line is not as absolute as it could be, since these hypermetric lines have no heavy onset, and so all open with an extended unstressed position, similarly to a type A3. However, the cadence has two stressed positions, so it draws the line out further than a normal type A3, making these lines related to the normal formulae, but more expansive. Because each fate stands in a verse by itself, and that verse is longer than others in the poem, each individual fate seems particularly significant. The group of them together, which creates not just a slow line but a slow section, shows how each unique fate is important and also forces the reader to linger over the variety of disasters that the list of different fates represents. Therefore, by adapting the normal-verse system into a hypermetric version, the poet is able to condense each clause into a single verse that is thematically significant while at the same time changing the tenor of the poem in a way that emphasizes the important theme.

Hypermetrics in Maxims II The Maxims II poet composes his poem differently from the other gnomic poets, which consist of a large number of verses that reuse a few formulaic systems, but also include explanatory verses with different metrical patterns. In Maxims II, almost every verse in the poem is either formed from or closely related to one of the characterizing formulaic systems. For this reason, the hypermetric lines do not seem to have a single, directed purpose, but rather serve to augment the wisdom of the poem as a whole. The poem has two hypermetric sections. The first, which

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is four lines long, opens the poem. The first verse is a simple directive: cyning sceal rīce healdan (HA1: ͜ ×́͜ ×–́×–́×) “the king shall hold the kingdom” (Maxims II 1a). Larrington (1993: 130) and Stanley (2015: 192) both argue that the poem has a strong political focus, a focus that moves from earthly to the divine according to Larrington, and that this opening highlights this focus. The subsequent gnome, a longer description of ancient cities reminiscent of The Ruin, continues with this theme of earthly and political power. The poet then expands his focus when he returns to single-verse gnomes: Wind byð on lyfte swiftust, (HA1: –́×××–́×–́×) / þunar byð þrāgum hlūdast. (HA1: ͜ ×́͜ ×–́×–́×) Þrymmas syndan Crīstes myccle (HA1: –́×××–́×–́×) “Wind is in the air the swiftest, thunder is at times loudest. The powers of Christ are great” (Maxims II 3b–4). By broadening his focus, the poet draws attention to the power of several single, concise, and contained pieces of wisdom. Since each of these verses opens with a heavy onset, the hypermetric lines here slow down the pace of the poem, even more so than the hypermetric lines in The Fortunes of Men with their light onsets, forcing the audience to linger over each piece of wisdom. The extra qualifier in each line makes each gnome appear to be more profound, in that it is more precise, while the longer lines add a sense of weight to each individual gnome. By opening his poem this way, the poet introduces his focus on individual pieces of wisdom for the rest of the poem while at the same time suggesting that sharing such kernels of wisdom is an important task indeed. The next hypermetric passage is an augmentation of the main wisdom of the poem. Starting at line 16b, Maxims II takes on the pattern NOUN + sceal + on + NOUN in the off-verse, followed in the on-verse by an infinitive phrase that goes with the auxiliary sceal, an adjective phrase that describes the initial noun, or a noun phrase in variation with the initial noun. With a few variants, the poet maintains this pattern until line 42, when he switches into the hypermetric mode: Þēof sceal gangan þȳstrum wederum. Þyrs sceal on fenne gewunian (HA1: –́×××–́× ͜ × ́͜ ×) (HA1: –́××–́××–́×) āna innan lande. Ides sceal dyrne cræfte, (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) (HA1: ͜ ́͜××–́×–́×) fǣmne hire frēond gesēcean gif hēo nelle on folce geþec on (HA1: –́×××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××××–́××–́×) þæt hī man bēagum gebicge. Brim sceal sealte weallan, (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) lyfthelm and laguflod ymb ealra landa gehwylc, (A2ab: –́–̀× ͜ ́͜×–̀) (B2: ×××–́××–́) flōwan firgenstrēamas. (Maxims II 42–47a) (HA1: –́×–́×–́×)

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“A thief shall dwell in dark weather, a giant shall dwell in the fen, alone in the land. A woman shall with secret craft, a maiden, seek her friend, if she does not wish to bring about among the people that someone buy her with rings. The sea shall surge with salt, the air and waves about each of all lands, the mountain streams flow.”

This passage starts with a single-verse gnome, followed by a two-verse gnome, followed by two more that are expanded beyond two verses. Each of them, though, is somehow related to the two-verse system described above. The first verse is a realization of the system with an infinitive that takes up only one verse. The second realization uses two verses and, since the hypermetric verse affords more space, includes both an infinitive and an adjectival modifier. The next is similar, only this time the author uses variation instead of the adjectival, and then appends a second dependent clause to further expand on the idea. Finally, the fourth gnome is far more expansive after the initial statement.34 This short passage very much follows the pattern of the poem as a whole and allows the poet to expand upon the wisdom he has been sharing. When he first begins the section of the poem defined by this system, the poet starts with a single-verse formula, just as he does here, and then expands it into something more. Because the hypermetric line can fit more material, the single-verse realization of the system in the hypermetric form includes an infinitive, just as some of the realizations of the two-verse, normal system do. Thus, the poet gives a gnomic statement that contains the same amount of material, but fits into a single verse. From there, he expands his wisdom into two verses, allowing him to include both the infinitive and the extra description, either as a modifier in the first instance or variation in the second. The poet uses this particular formula twice more after the hypermetric section, but then switches to a new one. The hypermetric section therefore serves as a kind of culmination of the wisdom, which the poet gets to by expanding as far as he can the pattern he has been using, before he allows the subject to close, ending with a three-verse gnome that describes the nature of a star, specifying that it is swā him bebēad meotud (C3: ×××–́ ͜ ×́ ) “as the ruler ordered it” (Maxims II 49b). The subject matter for this expansive section is interesting. It has a far more dire feel than the rest of the poem, especially the section of the poem leading up to it, which speaks of the proper place of a shield’s boss, a bird, a fish, and a rain shower. From there, the poet switches to the proper place of thieves and giants. Although Stanley argues that the þēof and þyrs have nothing in common but the 34 Though this final gnome is not entirely in the hypermetric mode, the intervening line is very heavy—with two half-stressed positions in the on-verse and a verse with a trisyllabic opening drop in the off-verse—so it is clearly related to the heavy composition of the hypermetric passage around it.

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alliterative þ (2015: 195), they are, in a sense, both outcasts. The subsequent reference to the woman could be part of this same sequence, as Goldsmith (1970: 97), Greenfield and Evert (1975: 350), and Larrington (1993: 132–33) suggest. There is some debate as to whether the description of the woman’s actions should be considered deceitful (for example, Meaney 1979 and Dane 1984) or positive (for example, Fell 1984: 69 and Stanley 2015: 194). The context of the maxim gives credence to the more negative interpretation: it could be advice to help prevent young women from becoming outcasts as well. The poet might have switched into the hypermetric mode to emphasize the importance of this passage over the rest: he has been describing the state of things, but he finds this description of those who fall outside of society especially important. Perhaps he is including it as something of a warning. In this context, the final gnome about the storm could therefore have a metaphorical bent to it in order to fit in with the first three statements. Certainly, the weather, particularly storms on the sea, is something important to Anglo-Saxon culture and therefore worth emphasizing. At the same time, these storms might also reference how life in general can be turbulent, thereby ending the hypermetric section by characterizing the turbulent nature of society and the way a person could be outcast from it. After all the proper places described in the poem, this one hypermetric place comes across as the clearest and the most urgent of them all.

Hypermetrics in Maxims I Maxims I has many more hypermetric verses than The Fortunes of Men and Maxims II, so I will focus on one group of them in particular: the hypermetric versions of Momma’s gnomic formula. These hypermetric adaptations are quite different from those in the other two poems because the poet does not adapt his own normal-verse system but rather a system that is used to create wise sayings across the Old English corpus. Cavill (1999: 82–105) has expanded on Momma’s analysis of the gnomic formula to provide more context for the system. Focusing on the various headwords to put them in subcategories, he finds forty-five verses, most of them normal verses, that he considers part of the system.35 He concludes

35 The headwords he finds in frequent use are wā “woe,” wel “wel,” ēadig(e) “blessed,” earm “wretched,” and dol “foolish,” though he also includes a miscellaneous category for verses that clearly fit the formula but have a headword that is only used the once. Some of the verses that he lists, particularly those beginning with ēadig(e) that can be found in the Metrical Psalms, vary somewhat in the syntax, but they still have the same headword followed by a relative clause that presents the generalized meaning.

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that the system “was most often used to convey Christian, and specifically eschatological doctrine” (105). With such a strong association, formulae from the system would necessarily evoke the immanent tradition as explained by Foley, bringing to mind ideas of Christian doctrine and salvation when they are heard. Significantly, though, the formulae in this poem do not all discuss that particular doctrine, so the poet uses it both to promote the message of salvation and to tie that message to a more earthly concern with the salvation of society. Of the verses that Cavill discusses, ten are hypermetric, six of which are in Maxims I. Each formula occurs in a hypermetric passage, so it would not receive emphasis simply for being hypermetric. Nevertheless, since the verses are both expansions of a common formulaic system and long even for hypermetric verses, they could still stand out to the audience. Cavill also suggests (1999: 105), and Deskis echoes this idea (2013: 685–86), that such clearly recognizable wisdom can serve a transitional function in the poem, particularly as introductory or concluding material. This is another function of hypermetric verse, and as longer hypermetric patterns, verses of the gnomic formula could even perform this function within a hypermetric passage. Thus, these verses seem to have the dual purpose of providing structural elements of the poem and evoking the immanent tradition in a way that brings gravity to the subjects they present. Three instances of the gnomic formula, namely 35a, 111a, and 172 stand by themselves to introduce bigger ideas that the poet discusses further. The formula’s first appearance in the poem, line 35a, seems to be the quintessential version: Dol biþ sē þe his dryhten nāt, (HB1: –́××××–́×–́) Snotre men sāwlum beorgað, (HA1: –́××–́×–́×)

to þæs oft cymeð dēað unþinged. (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) healdað hyra sōð mid ryhte. (Maxims I 35–36) (hA1: ××××–́×–́×)

“Foolish is he who does not know his lord; to him often comes death unexpected. Wise men guard their souls, hold their truth rightly.”

This piece of wisdom starts with the gnomic formula, which contains a complete thought when it is in its hypermetric form. As many scholars have noted, the first line is almost identical to The Seafarer 106.36 The statement has a clear religious bent, dealing specifically with the subject of death. As the poet expands out from the unexpected death to advice on what a wise man should do to avoid it, the

36 Deskis notes that the two verses contain three common elements: “1) a foolish man; 2) who knows not his Lord; and 3) an unexpected death.” She finds these same elements in a number of other Old English and Latin texts, though only these two have all three together (2013: 675–77).

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audience would no doubt have in mind not only how the wisdom would help them to avoid physical death but also how it could save their immortal soul in the broader, eschatological context that the gnomic statement evokes. The other two instances of the formula are structured similarly, but with very different material: 111a introduces a practical discussion of the importance of nourishment and how a sick person might need a friend to help him gain it, while 172 discusses the wretched state of the exile, specifically when faced with the danger of hunting a boar alone. While not religious, both of these discuss life-and-death situations, and they also mention the importance of having a friend. The poet could be extrapolating from the original eschatological context, then, to give these new statements especial gravity as he discusses another topic that he considers of vital importance: the value of community in Anglo-Saxon society. Four other instances of the gnomic formula are particularly interesting because they appear paired together, making two opposite statements that constitute a single piece of wisdom. The first Ēadig bið sē þe in his ēþle geþīhð (HA1: –́××××××–́××–́×) | earm sē him his frȳnd geswīcað (HA1: –́×××–́×–́×) “Blessed is he who grows in his native land, wretched is he who deceives his friends” (Maxims I 37), does not introduce a longer discussion but instead stands by itself in the middle of a list of hypermetric gnomes. These verses do not bring the eschatological context to the system, but Deskis shows that the statement is still very traditional. Though the first half of the line does not seem to have a specific analogue, the second half has a number of analogous verses in Latin, Old English, and Old Norse that condemn treacherous companions. Furthermore, the pairing of earm/ēadig to create contrast is quite common and often contrasts a wretched life on earth with a blessed life in heaven (2013: 677–81). It is interesting that the secular gnome in Maxims I elicits a religious context from two different features: the metrical formula and the lexical collocation. Again, though, this gnome turns to an individual’s place within society and the importance of having a home and fostering friendship. By repeatedly casting this concept in patterns that otherwise illustrate a greater cosmological order, the poet implicitly juxtaposes the order of society and the order of the world, suggesting that listeners should take equal care in ordering both. The second paired example, lāð sē þe londes monað (HB1: –́××–́× ͜ ́͜×) | lēof sē þe māre bēodeð (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) “Hateful is he who demands land, dear is he who offers more” (Maxims I 59), reinforces this trend further. Neither Momma nor Cavill note these lines as part of the system, yet the metrical and syntactic patterns are the same, albeit with different headwords and an elided copula. This line ends a five-line section that focuses on power dynamics and the importance of a lawful kingdom. Even more, then, the poet seems to have used

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very traditional diction, taking a common system together with a tendency to pair contrasting ideas, to foreground a secular concept that is important to his poem. By structurally positioning the prominent hypermetric line as a conclusion, the poet emphasizes the short passage and highlights its meaning by providing such a powerful culminating statement. The frequent use of the gnomic formula in Maxims I as a whole allows the poet to further elevate key passages with statements that are characteristically wise. This is important for this poem because the poet already uses quite a few hypermetric passages, so he needs another way to emphasize the important moments. As he does so, the poet does not limit himself to the most common context for this system; the first realization of the formula addresses Christian doctrine, but the rest turn to ideas of companionship, exile, and ways of ordering society. The audience might still have recognized the immanent context of the system, though, even as the poet moved progressively further from it through the course of the poem, allowing attentive listeners to connect the divine order with an earthly one. The poet is thereby able to use the composition of the poem to discuss the order of things on multiple levels simultaneously, making his explanation of the essential nature of the world all the more effective.

Conclusion Though they vary to a large degree, gnomic poems in general tend to make large use of hypermetric meter, and when they do, the meter often serves to showcase the immanent tradition by foregrounding the features of gnomic diction. Hypermetric meter is especially useful for this purpose for two reasons. First, the length and formality of the lines allow the poets to emphasize the diction when they compose in hypermetric meter while also increasing the formality of the moment. Second, the flexibility of the hypermetric form allows the poets to place the diction into prominent positions in each verse while still fitting a full gnomic statement in a single verse (or sometimes pair of verses). The gnomic style may seem unusual, since it appears so much more haphazard than a more conservative style, yet close inspection shows that it is driven by the diction associated with gnomic statements. The style is, therefore, able to invoke the tradition as surely as the subject matter must. While highlighting the gnomic language, the hypermetric form would also have created a distinctive sound that results from lines that are longer and heavier than even other hypermetric lines. Rather than finding this form off-putting, listeners well versed in the

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Old English tradition would have recognized this form as characteristically gnomic and associated the poem with other gnomic materials that they had heard in the past. In this way, each wisdom poem invokes the entire tradition and appears all the wiser due to the associations that the audience would bring to bear and use to interpret the individual gnomes being shared.

Chapter 3: Old Norse Ljóðaháttr and Málaháttr: Dividing Hypermetrics Introduction Old Norse has a vibrant poetic tradition with quite a bit of variability. In fact, one salient difference between the Old Norse and Old English traditions is the number of meters used: where Old English has just the one, Old Norse includes a number of variant meters, from the less formal eddic meters to the highly stylized skaldic meters. A number of factors affected the development of these meters, such as the linguistic context, which creates shorter, more contained lines; the stanzaic form, which creates sparser syntax; and the intricate metrical patterning, which can require more verbal gymnastics, depending on the complexity of the meter. This chapter will focus on the meters of the eddic tradition, which are primarily found in the Codex Regius of the Poetic Edda. This manuscript was written ca. 1270, but the poems were composed earlier and, as with most oral poetry, are very difficult to date.1 Though often taken in a group, the poems are quite diverse. Carolyne Larrington describes eddic poetry as “anonymous, stanzaic, relatively straightforward in form, and, like its relatives in other Germanic languages, . . . capable of mediating all kinds of content: swift-moving narrative, pithy dialogue, grand monologue, and lyric description” (2016: 3). The poems are composed mainly in three different meters, which can be divided into two generic categories that are in turn reflected in their titles. Poems that end in –kviða are often legendary poems told in a narrative form in fornyrðislag “old story meter.” Poems that end in –mál are often mythological poems told through performative dialogue in ljóðaháttr “song meter” or its variant galdralag “spell-meter” (see Schorn 2016a: 239–40 and Gunnel 2016: 97). Málaháttr “speech meter” is similar to fornyrðislag and is typically used for narrative, though the main poem in málaháttr, Átlamál, has the –mál suffix. Fornyrðislag is the closest meter to the alliterative long-line of the other Germanic languages and is often considered the oldest meter, from which the other meters are derived (see Russom 2009: 73, Suzuki 2014: 797–98, and Fulk 2016: 263–64). Although quite different from each other, the other two meters both have an 1 It has been suggested that the poems can be distributed into three periods: old (850–1030), middle (1030–1150), and late (1150–1300), though there is not universal agreement on which poems should be in which group. For more on the transmission and dating of eddic poetry, see Harris 1985: 93–106, Clunies Ross 2016, and Thorvaldsen 2016. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501513688-004

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element of hypermetric composition and shall thus be the focus of this chapter. My corpus for the statistical data consists of Átlamál in its entirety to illustrate málaháttr, since it is the one poem in Old Norse that is consistently composed in málaháttr, and a variety of poems for ljóðaháttr: the first seventy-six stanzas of Hávamál together with twenty stanzas each of Fáfnismál, Sigrdrífumál, and Skírnismál. In addition, I also use the three eddic praise poems, Eiríksmál, Hákonarmál, and Haraldskvæði, for a stylistic analysis. The chapter consists of three main sections. The first considers the differences between the Old English and Old Norse traditions and how those differences have influenced Old Norse composition. This allows me to then explain how the more constrained metrical form is realized and adapted into hypermetric patterns. The second section turns to the syntactic patterning and stylistic elements that result from the linguistic and metrical constraints illustrated in the first section to discuss how poets typically make use of the two meters and what sorts of rhetorical strategies are possible. In this case, the meters differ not only in verse patterns but also in stanzaic structure, which has a number of effects on narrative possibilities. A more directed stylistic analysis is presented in the third section, which examines how poets shift between the two meters in the eddic praise poems and analyzes how those shifts aid in interpreting the poems. My analysis indicates that málaháttr and ljóðaháttr are by no means equivalent to Old English hypermetric composition: the verses are not expanded as much as the Old English hypermetric line, and they are independent meters rather than variant meters that occur in isolated passages. Nevertheless, there are some fundamental similarities between hypermetrics in the two languages, even beyond the fact that they are all expanded past the normal four positions: both traditions show increased metrical flexibility in the hypermetric lines and employ them for narrative progress and increased formality. The difference between Old English and Old Norse is that the typical uses for hypermetrics are split so that málaháttr becomes a less formal meter that can accommodate numerous syntactic breaks and ljóðaháttr elevates the tone for formal situations, but also has a greater degree of flexibility for how it can be used. This split makes the choice of meter, and especially changes between meters, a significant interpretive tool that scholars can use to analyze the poems, especially when it comes to the different syntactic options that each meter affords and the ways in which the poets exploit those options.

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Linguistic and Metrical Differences in Old Norse As a North Germanic language, Old Norse developed quite differently from Old English, and the resulting metrical tradition reflects many of those differences. As specified above, the Old Norse meter closest to the Old English long-line is fornyrðislag “old story meter,” which is illustrated in the following typical stanzas from Þrymskviða: Gengu þeir fagra (A3: ×××–́×) Freyju túna, (A1: –́×–́×) ok hann þat orða (A3: ×××–́×) alls fyrst um kvað: (D4: –́–́×–̀) “Muntu mér, Freyja, (A3: ×××–́×) fjaðrhams ljá (F: –́–̀–)́ ef ek minn hamar (C3: ××–́ ͜ ́×) mættak hitta?” (A1: –́×–́×) “They [Þorr and Loki] went to the fair courts of Freya, and they these words spoke right at first: ‘Will you lend me your feather-coat, Freya, if I can find my hammer?’” ... Fló þá Loki, (A2k: –́–̀ ͜ ́×) fjaðrhamr dunði, (A2l: –́–̀–́×) unz fyr útan kom (B1: ××–́×–́) ása garða (A1: –́×–́×) ok fyr innan kom (B1: ××–́×–́) jǫtna heima. (A1: –́×–́×) (Þrymsqviða sts. 3 and 5)2 “Loki then flew, the feather-coat made a rushing noise, until he came beyond the enclosure of the gods and came into the region of the giants.”

The most striking feature of these verses when compared to Old English is their length; the verses are shorter on average than Old English verse. The metrical difference is probably a result of linguistic differences between the two languages. Linguistically, Old Norse has a stronger root stress than Old English. The strength of the root syllable leads to more syncope (the loss of an unstressed vowel word-medially) and apocope (the loss of an unstressed vowel word-finally) than found in Old English. For example, in the passage above, Old Norse has jǫtna as the genitive plural form for jǫtunn (cf. Old English eotena); when the inflectional ending is added, the medial syllable is lost. This process is also responsible for the reduction and ultimate loss of prefixes in Old Norse.3 The strong root stress in Old Norse also causes more function words to

2 For the most part, I use the notation for Sievers’s five types to scan the Old Norse poetry, with all of the relevant subtypes. When scanning málaháttr, however, since the subtypes for type A are formed differently than they are in Old English meter, I do not mark the subtypes except where they are relevant to that meter. I also employ Sievers’s notation of a type F for a catalectic verse with only three positions, which can take the form of either –́–́×, –́×–́, or ×–́–́. The rare two-position verse, –́–́, is a type G. I also use the notation B3, in analogy with A3, for the pattern ××–́. 3 Other common examples of syncope in Old Norse are first class weak verbs, for which the vowel between the stem and the preterit ending is lost in Old Norse, as in Old Norse framði

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be cliticized, that is, attached to the end of the previous word, as in the passage above, where muntu comes from munt þú.4 With these shorter word forms, poets can more easily compose lines of the minimal four syllables. A second difference that is evident in the passage above is the stanzaic form of the poetry. Each line is split into verses (usually called the odd verse and the even verse in Old Norse, since verses are frequently written out in separate lines), but then the lines in fornyrðislag are arranged into stanzas. These stanzas are of variable length, but they are most commonly four lines long and can be divided into two half-stanzas or helmingar (sg. helmingr). The above stanzas show this clear division because each stanza describes a discrete moment, the first, the moment in which Þorr and Loki request Freya’s cloak and, the second, Loki’s flight once he has donned the cloak. The second of the two stanzas is short, so it does not have a helmingr division, but the first shows the typical arrangement of two discrete syntactic units, Þorr and Loki’s approach followed by their request. These linguistic and stylistic differences change the prosody of the language and the syntactic arrangement of the line, which has a necessary effect on the meter. In the following two sections, I will first summarize what scholars have said about how the changes affected fornyrðislag, and then demonstrate how the changes are integrated into the hypermetric systems.5

Effect of Linguistic Differences in Old Norse Meter The syncope, apocope, and cliticization all result from and reinforce a strong root stress in Old Norse, which affects the meter in many ways. The direct result of these shortening processes, as mentioned above, is that the lines are relatively short. Because there are fewer and shorter polysyllabic words and some of the unstressed words can be elided as they are cliticized, the verses do not have to be as long and can even occasionally become hypometric, as in verse 3.6 above.6 versus Old English fremede, “I did,” and the common Germanic ge- prefix, which is reduced to a root onset in Old Norse, as in Old Norse glíkr versus Old English gelīc, “like” (see Gade 2002: 857 and 2012: lii, and Russom 1998: 16–17). 4 Other words that are commonly cliticized are definite articles (úlfinn < inn úlfr “the wolf”; konan < in kona “the woman”) or negative markers, frequently together with pronouns (mákat < má ek at, “I cannot”) (see Russom 1998: 17). 5 For fuller discussions of the effect of linguistic change on Old Norse metrical patterning, see in particular Lehmann 1956: 80–88, Russom 1998: 1–135, and Suzuki 2014. 6 For theories on the specific process that occurred to allow hypometric verses, see Sievers 1885, 10–11, 1893: 33–34, Heusler 1956, 282–83, Gordon 1957: §178, Russom 1998, 13–28, and Suzuki 2011: 376–77.

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The loss of prefixes also contributes to the shortening of the lines because with the loss of prefixes comes the loss of anacrusis.7 The Þrymskviða passage illustrates this feature because none of the verses exceed fives syllables and half of them are four or fewer.8 Another result is increased metrical subordination, which in turn leads to less double alliteration and suspension of resolution. The passage above contains no examples of double alliteration; overall, poems in fornyrðislag can contain varying amounts of double alliteration, but it rarely occurs more than half the time in any given poem (see Gering 1924: passim and Russom 1998: 69–95). The passage also contains two examples of suspended resolution. The type of suspension in verse 3.7, in which the second lift falls on an unresolved light syllable directly after a stressed position, is permitted in Old English, but it occurs more often in Old Norse (see Russom 1998: 105–15). However, resolution is suspended almost universally after the first lift in fornyrðislag, even if the lift in question does not follow a stressed position, as verse 5.1 exemplifies (see Gering 1924: passim, Russom 1998: 103–4, and Suzuki 2010 and 2011: 377–78). The use of stanzaic rather than stychic form also has a profound effect on the metrical style, as well as on the metrico-syntactic features of the poem. Fulk (1996: 73–78) shows, first, that the sentences tend to be shorter, with less syntactic subordination, as illustrated in the passage from Þrymskviða, because all of the clauses occupy only one or two verses and only two begin with a subordinating conjunction (ef in verse 3.7 and unz in 5.3). This is, of course, not to say that Old Norse poems are simpler—Old Norse word order can become very convoluted to allow the poets to meet the poetic requirements—but that the two traditions are complex in different ways: Old English employs long sentences that may include numerous subordinated or coordinated clauses, and Old Norse presents simpler sentences with a word order that may be further removed from normal prose order (75). Secondly, Fulk shows that the use of stanzas tends to cut down on such features as variation and other types of repetition (71). Strikingly, the passage above has no instances of variation and only one verse,

7 Russom argues that the two were connected because anacrusis was originally formed on the basis of prefixes (1998: 49–51), but cf. Suzuki, who, while agreeing that the loss of prefixes affected anacrusis, argues that it made anacrusis an independent position which could still be used rarely (2010: 162–69, 2014: 171–81). 8 Sievers (1893: 66) and Gering (1924: passim) both believe that most, if not all, of the longer verses should also be analyzed as four syllables, arguing that many polysyllabic drops should be analyzed as monosyllabic due to neutralization, which combines two short syllables in a drop into a single syllable in the same way that resolution combines syllables in stressed positions, and that other drops with multiple unstressed words can be attributed to scribal intervention.

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fjaðrhamr dunði, that characterizes a previously mentioned action; all other verses provide completely new information. Fulk demonstrates that this different style of verse composition can lead to quicker narrative progress in the heroic lays, since the poets tend to move rapidly from one action to the next within a single stanza, or more obscurity in the non-narrative poems, since bigger ideas can be compacted into enigmatic statements to fit into each helmingr (77–78).

Features of Old Norse Hypermetrics In his article “Why There Are Three Old Norse Meters,” Russom suggests that the two additional eddic meters came about because of the constraints on fornyrðislag. He argues that those constraints vastly limit the available metrical patterns and that málaháttr and ljóðaháttr, which have metrical patterns in near-complementary distribution, developed to fill the gap. Russom’s argument accurately reflects the distribution of the metrical patterns, but it is also important to note the stylistic differences that subsequently came to characterize the different meters. As I will show, the metrical patterns of the málaháttr types lead to lines that are slightly expanded but relatively uniform, allowing for the swift narration mentioned above, while the ljóðaháttr lines are quite flexible, giving poets a range of options. The first of the two hypermetric meters, málaháttr, is relatively rare. The only poem from the Poetic Edda entirely composed in málaháttr is Átlamál, though the meter is also used sporadically in Atlakviða and Hamðismál. The form of a málaháttr verse seems quite simple: it takes a normal fornyrðislag verse and adds a fifth metrical position, which can have either secondary stress or zero stress. Kom þá Kostbera, (D*: –́×–́ ͜ ̀ ×) kvæn var hon Hǫgna, (A*2: –́×–̀–́×) kona kapps gálig, (D: ͜ ́͜×–́–̀×) ok kvaddi þá báða; (aA: ×–́××–́×) glǫd var ok Glaumvǫr, (A*1: –́–̀×–́×) er Gunnarr átti, (aA: ×–́×–́×) fellskat saðr sviðri, (C*: –̀×–́–× ́ ) sýsti um þǫrf gesta (D*: –́××–́–× ̀ ) (Átlamál st. 6) “Then Kostbera came, she was Hogni’s wife, a woman mindful of ardor, and welcomed them both; and Glaumvor was cheerful, whom Gunnar was married to, the wise woman did not abolish faithful care, she busied herself with the needs of the guests.”

Verses that are expanded with an extra drop can take the form of D* (see lines 6.1 and 6.8) or a type A with anacrusis (see 6.4 and 6.6). Though neither type appears regularly in fornyrðislag, they are regular in all the other Germanic languages. For those verses that are expanded with a half-lift, the patterns can be unique to málaháttr. The more common of these verses are those with an extra particle in the medial drop: type A*1 (see 6.5) or the more common type A*2

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(see 6.2).9 Verses that open with a long polysyllabic drop form a type C* (see 6.7). A type B* (–̀×–́×–́) is possible but very rare: it occurs only once in Átlamál (line 16.4).10 Very occasionally, a regular, four-position line will intrude (see 6.3).11 In spite of being hypermetric, the lines in this meter tend to follow the general Old Norse tendency to be relatively short. Over half of the verses contain the minimal five syllables, as is the case for the passage above. The passage also shows the preferred filler for each position. The two stressed positions are typically filled with either two stress words, a stress word and a particle, or the two components of a true compound. A word ending appears most frequently in the drop, though clitics are also common; particles are possible, but rare. The half-stress position is the most variable of the three. It most commonly contains a particle and can frequently contain a medial syllable, but it can have anything from a stress word to a clitic. 9 In his initial work on eddic meter, Sievers calls the two type-A* verses type E* instead (1885). Gering (1926) and Russom (2009) prefer this notation. 10 Suzuki argues that no half-lift should be distinguished in either type-A* or -C* verses. He reasons that the verses are often ambiguous in terms of which position should receive the half-lift; that marking a half-lift based on the prosodic weight of each word can sometimes create six positions, with the patterns –́×–̀×–̀× (A*) or ×–̀×–́–́× (C*); and that the resulting subtypes in a type A are not valid because there is no evidence that the two subtypes have a superordinate type or distinct metrical properties (2014: 435–39, 457–59). Though Suzuki’s arguments are accurate, they do not discount the possibility of secondary stress. While the verses may appear ambiguous to a modern audience, the syllables in the drops do often have distinguishable levels of stress when taken in context, which would be augmented by the oral presentation of the lines. Furthermore, six-position lines exist elsewhere in the system, when anacrusis is used on a line that is already expanded, as in a type aD* (×–̀×–́–× ̀ ). For these reasons, it seems better to mark the half-stress, especially since two consecutive unstressed syllables are generally not otherwise treated as two distinct positions (for a fuller discussion of the structure of the málaháttr drop, see Hartman forthcoming). Nevertheless, marking the scansion can be difficult for verses with two particles in the expanded drop. To be consistent, I have ranked the relative prominence of the different particles, which I determined by the number of times each appears in an unambiguously stressed position: adverbs, lexical verbs, pronouns, auxiliaries, copulas, conjunctions. Unless there is prosodic evidence for a different stress pattern, I use this ranking to determine which word to stress in an expanded drop when there are multiple particles. When this leads to a six-position type A, I simply label it as a type A*. 11 Significantly, 6.3 has resolution in the first position. Sievers notes that many of the fourposition verses in málaháttr contain resolution and argues that it should be suspended for this meter so that such verses are scanned with five positions. Although there is clear evidence that resolution should be suspended after the first lift in Old Norse, the evidence is not as clear that it should be suspended on the first lift as well. For this reason, I mark resolution on the first lift in the málaháttr lines, though Sievers’s observation is telling and could use further investigation. Note that, as Kuhn (1939: 489–93) and Suzuki (2011: 396–97) show, resolution after the first lift was reinstituted for ljóðaháttr, so I always mark it in that meter.

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What is perhaps most noteworthy about the lines is the way in which all of the drops are treated similarly. In the Old English tradition, unusual drops such an anacrusis and the first drop in a D* verse are short and very limited in terms of filler, while, in contrast, the opening drops of a type-B or -C verse can be longer than a standard verse-medial drop. In this meter, though, almost 95% of the drops are one or two syllables long, with about 75% of the drops having one syllable and 20% having two. This proportion is comparable for all of the verse types except for type C, which has more disyllabic drops but still trends more toward a monosyllabic drop with a 61.7%/33.3% split. In terms of filler, the proportion of the different possibilities is necessarily different since certain positions in the verse are more likely to match up with syntactically different parts of the sentence, but each different verse type still contains all of the possible filler in the drop. See for example the type-D* verses above: this type most typically has a word-final syllable in the first drop, but it can also have a clitic, in this case in addition to another syllable (13.8), or even a particle (13.2).12 As a result of the similarities in unstressed positions, the lines in málaháttr are relatively uniform in structure. They certainly differ in the way the stresses are arranged, but all have drops of similar length, which leads to similar overall verse length and overlapping patterns of secondary stress. While these verses bear some similarities to corresponding verses in other meters, the resemblance they bear to each other is more striking. The meter also has a degree of ambiguity in the stress pattern, since the half-stressed position is so variable. The combination gives the lines a more prosaic feeling. They have the regularity of the two strong stresses with drops of minimal length in between; the stylized alternation of metrical patterns that characterizes other meters is gone, and the unstressed positions that have been expanded with a variably distinctive halfstressed position give the line just enough flexibility to fit a natural clause. The structure of ljóðaháttr stands in stark contrast to this more informal meter. In ljóðaháttr, not every verse is hypermetric, but the hypermetric verses appear consistently in the same position of every stanza: Hugr mik hvatti (A1: –́×–́×) hendr mér fulltýðu (D*: –́×–́–̀×) ok minn inn hvassi hjǫrr (A3+1: ×××–́×–́); fár er hvatr, (F: –́×–́) er hrøðask tekr, (B1: ×–́×–́) ef í barnæsku er blauðr. (C1+x1: ××–́–́××–́) (Fáfnismál st. 6)

12 Suzuki also notes this difference in málaháttr particularly for the first drops in types aA and D*, which leads him to argue that anacrusis and the expanded position have become fully realized, independent positions (Suzuki 2014: 126–30, 165–85).

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“The heart hastened me, the hands assisted me, and my sharp sword; few are vigorous when they start to become old if he is weak in childhood.”

Each stanza contains six verses, and the third and sixth verses, also called the full line, are generally the longest. There has been much controversy regarding the structure of these lines. I am following Sievers’s system that the full line consists of a verse plus an additional stressed position (which can sometimes be accompanied by one or even two unstressed positions, as in line 6.6 above, though this is rare). He formulated this system largely to account for the one universally acknowledged feature, which was first pointed out by Bugge (1879), that each full line ends in either ͜ ͜× ́ or –́. The other main controversy about ljóðaháttr is whether each line should have two or three stressed positions. Early scholars mostly argued that it should be one or the other.13 Russom refined Sievers’s system to demonstrate how twoand three-syllable scansions can easily be mixed together. He points out that the on-verse in a ljóðaháttr stanza tends to be relatively short and will commonly take a hypometric form. He then argues that the full line is a verse pattern +1, but rather than a normal fornyrðislag verse, the verse pattern is instead a ljóðaháttr on-verse (2009: 73–79). As a result, the first part of the verse, to which the cadence is added, commonly takes forms such as ××–́× and ××–́, in addition to verse patterns common in the five-type system, such as –́×–́×.14 This explanation accounts for what is perhaps the most important feature of the ljóðaháttr full line: its variability. The lines can be anywhere from three to eight syllables long, though they are more commonly somewhere between four and seven, with an initial drop of up to five syllables. This length makes the full line very similar to the light hypermetric verse in the Old English tradition: the opening drop can be expanded quite a bit and often accommodates a 13 Sievers acknowledges the ambiguity but argues that “da aber 75% aller verse sicher dreihebig sind, wird man im zweifelsfall dreihebiger betonung den vorzug geben müssen” “But when 75% of all verses are certainly three-lift, one will have to give the preference to three-lift stress in doubtful cases” (1887: 83). His argument is based largely on analogy with the lines that contain triple alliteration, which he says indicates three stressed positions. Heusler (1889) argues that, because triple alliteration occurs too seldom to be anything but a coincidence, all the verses have only two lifts. Hollander (1931) provides evidence that some of the triple alliteration should be considered deliberate and, therefore, argues for three stressed positions but also acknowledges the possibility that in some cases the first stressed word might receive a half-stress rather than a full stress. Suzuki reviews these arguments and concludes that “all c-verses comprise three lifts because of their defining form” (2014: 739), but shows that the lifts can be suppressed and the verses realized as containing only two lifts. 14 See also Suzuki 2014, who argues that the full line is formed from a condensed verse pattern plus a cadence.

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number of unstressed words. In my corpus, over 65% of the verses have two or more unstressed words, whereas less than 12% have none. In contrast, verses in fornyrðislag have two or more unstressed words in the drop on average just over a quarter of the time, versus about 35% with none. Clearly, then, though it developed quite differently, the ljóðaháttr full line could have a similar function as the light hypermetric verse. The function is not identical, however, because the variability of the full line goes one step more: it also differs in the number of stressed syllables that it can contain. Where the verses with two stressed positions tend to be similar to light hypermetric verses, the ones with three are more similar to heavy hypermetric verses. Rather than adhering to a consistent, or somewhat consistent, pattern of alternation between the two that is seen in Old English hypermetrics, poets composing in ljóðaháttr can choose freely between the two options as it suits them. Thus, the ljóðaháttr stanza is a relatively tightly structured stanza, but it ends with a verse that contains variable hypermetric properties that allow for more flexibility.15

The Syntactic Style of Old Norse Hypermetrics When describing eddic style, Brittany Schorn notes “the terse quality of Eddic stanzas, which are relatively short and syntactically self-contained” (2016b: 274) and observes that “it is rhythmic and clipped in progression, complimenting a lexicon that is highly allusive and idiomatically distinct from literary prose” (2016b: 274). This argument accords well with Fulk’s earlier observations about how the stanzaic nature of Old Norse poetry limits the syntactic patterns that are possible. Syntactic possibilities become particularly important when we consider why poets might have chosen particular meters of eddic poetry. As explained above, Russom argues that alternate meters were developed so that poets could employ a wider array of metrical patterns. While his evidence clearly shows that the different metrical patterns are divided neatly among the meters, I would argue that realizing the full range of metrical patterns may not have been the primary motivation for developing the different meters. Instead, the significant distinction is the different syntactic options afforded by the different metrical patterns in the context of the confined stanzaic form. While the stanzaic form can limit the degree to which each topic can be developed, the shorter, more stylized helmingr of

15 For a fuller discussion of the unique properties of málaháttr and ljóðaháttr, see Hartman forthcoming.

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ljóðaháttr are more likely to produce formal but enigmatic statements while the looser málaháttr form lends itself to a clearer narrative. To quantify the degree to which the syntax differs and thereby analyze the possibilities that the different meters afford, I examine the number of syntactic breaks per stanza using the terms and methodology first introduced in Neckel 1908 to describe fornyrðislag and later brought to the analysis of ljóðaháttr in Alexander 1929. Neckel defines three possible relationships between verses: feste Bindung “firm connection,” which means that two verses are syntactically joined so that material necessary to a clause that was started in the first verse, such as the direct object of a transitive verb, appears in the second verse; lose Bindung “loose connection,” which means that the two verses make up a single clause, but the material in the second verse is not an integral part of the grammatical structure of the first, such as an extra adverbial modifier or a word in variation; and Bindungslosigkeit “connectionlessness,” which means that the two verses are part of two separate clauses. Using these terms to show the syntactic relationships, I demonstrate that málaháttr uses Bindungslosigkeit far more often than any other Old Norse meter, making it particularly appropriate for narrative verse and action sequences. The ljóðaháttr full line, in contrast, is a great deal more variable and therefore provides the poets with more options. Because the full line comes in the context of the more structured stanza, however, poems in ljóðaháttr still tend to take on a more formal tone than the prosaic málaháttr lines. Thus, the two meters separately fulfill the major functions of hypermetric composition in Old English: poets have hypermetric options that can create a formal tone or speed up the pace of the narrative, but they are separate options that the poets must choose between.

Narrative Convenience in Málaháttr Syntactically, málaháttr operates very similarly to Old English hypermetrics. The verse patterns are expanded from the more common fornyrðislag patterns, just as Old English hypermetric verse has two positions more than the normal verse pattern, with the result that the expanded lines allow for steadier narrative progress. The major reason that málaháttr can so easily facilitate narrative progress is that the additional metrical position in each line can accommodate more grammatical material and allow for more syntactic breaks than the comparatively limited fornyrðislag verses. Fornyrðislag averages two clauses per helmingr. Most commonly (on average, almost 50% of the clauses), the clauses are two verses long. Since the meter is frequently used for narrative, there are still a fair number of syntactic breaks, so individual verses can use Bindungslosigkeit,

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making up their own clause in almost 30% of the clauses. Conversely, the clauses can be sustained, so that 31% of the helmingar contain only one clause. Only very rarely, for less than 5% of the helmingar, does a helmingr consist entirely of verses that make up independent clauses. Málaháttr looks quite different, with Bindungslosigkeit almost the ubiquitous relationship between verses. This difference is facilitated largely through the additional position in each verse: the two stressed positions can take one or more stress words, the drops contain the normal word endings or clitics, and then the half-stress is available for whatever additional words are necessary to finish the clause. Frequently, the half-stress is filled by a particle, but since it can contain anything from a stress word to a clitic, it can accommodate whatever the poet needs. The most important word to fit into the line to create so many independent clauses is the verb. In part, the half-stress is able to accommodate these verbs, since it is an ideal position for particles. As Table 3.1 shows, over a quarter of the verbs in the poem occur there, and the verbs with less stress do so often. Table 3.1: Finite Verb placement in the line in málaháttr. Copula

Auxiliary

Lexical

Total

#

%

#

%

#

%

#

%

st lift



.%



.%



.%



.%

nd lift



.%



.%



.%



.%

rd lift



.%



.%



.%



.%

Final lift



.%



.%



.%



.%

Half stress



.%



.%



.%



.%

Drop



.%



.%



.%



.%

Total



.%



.%



.%



.%

In spite of the convenience of this position, the Átlamál poet does not use it for verbs more often than stressed positions in general. Particularly for lexical verbs, the poet prefers stressed positions, where over half of the verbs can be found. In fact, fully 25% of the stressed positions in this poem contain a verb. It is so common that the poet frequently violates the rules of precedence in order to use verbs in these positions: of the 128 verbs in the first stressed position, thirty-one create a violation to the rule. The table also shows a general flexibility in terms of

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the verb placement. While there is a clear division between the preference of stressed position for lexical verbs and half-stressed or unstressed positions for the auxiliaries and copulas, there is also a relatively even division among all the possible positions except for the second stressed position. It seems, then, that an overall variability in where the verb is placed allows the poet to use frequent clause breaks and generally arrange the syntax to facilitate narrative progress. The first stanza provides an example of the syntactic organization: Frétt hefir ǫld ófu, (C*: –̀××–́–× ́ ) Þá er endr um gørðu (aA: ××–́×–́×) seggir samkundu, (D*: –́×–́–̀×) sú var nýt fæstum, (D*: –́×–́–̀×) œxtu einmæli, (D*: –́×–́–̀×) yggt var þeim síðan (A*2: –́×–̀–́×) ok it sama sonum Gjúka, (aD: ×× ͜ ́͜× ͜ ́͜×–̀×) er váru sannráðnir. (C*: –̀××–́–́×) (st. 1) “Many have news of an old hate, when once men made a feast, it was the least useful; they made a great conference, afterward something dreadful happened to them also together with the sons of Gjuki, who were betrayed in truth.”

Here, the first verse has Bindungslosigkeit, then the second has feste Bindung, with only the verb and an adverb in the original verse, followed by the subject and direct object in the next. The following three verses all begin a new clause, with only the third extending into the subsequent verse, providing a second indirect object. The last verse is closely related to the previous one as a modifier of sonum Gjuka, but the two verses still do show Bindungslosigkeit, since the final verse is a complete clause. Thus, of the eight verses, four stand by themselves as complete clauses and four function in pairs of verses; none of the clauses are more than two verses long. The verbs can be accommodated relatively easily since many of them in this stanza are non-lexical verbs and so can be placed in the drop without disturbing the meter at all. Other typical placements are the half-stressed position (váru) or the final stressed position of a line (gørðu). The result to the narrative overall is that the stanza can present a complete introduction to the poem, starting with the rather formulaic opening, followed by a few statements about the feast itself, and then making the betrayal clear. In terms of the number of clause breaks, stanza one stands in a middle ground; it is not uncommon for the poet to include a clause break in every verse, as in the second stanza of the poem: Skǫp œxtu skjǫldunga, (D*: –́××–́–× ̀ ) skyldu-at feigir, (A*2: –́×–̀–× ́ ) illa rézk Atla, (A*2: –́×–̀–́×) átti hann þó hyggju; (A*2: –́××–̀–́×) felldi stoð stóra, (C*: –́×–́–́×) stríddi sér harðla, (A*2: –́×–̀–́×) af bragði boð sendi, (aD*: ×–́×–́–̀×) at kvæmi brátt mágar. (C*: ×–̀×–́–́×) (st. 2) “The fate of the Skjoldings grew, they should not have been doomed, Atli was ill-advised, although he had intelligence, he felled a great pillar, harmed himself much, sent an offer with cunning intention, that his in-laws come hurriedly.”

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Here, each verse presents a new action, all of which build upon the idea of betrayal that the previous stanza ends on. The stanza starts with a rather ominous statement about Gunnar and his brothers, revealing in broad terms what is to come for them, followed by a second statement that laments that fate. After the foreshadowing and the commentary, the poet switches to a discussion of Atli, still focusing on the tragic nature of the Hunnish king’s action and pointing out several ways in which his plot to kill the Gjukings was ill-advised. The stanza wraps up by shifting to the specific narrative and introducing Atli’s action: that he invites the brothers to a feast. Some of these verses could be considered loosely bound as juxtaposed verb phrases, all of which have the same subject. Since the inflectional ending of the verb makes repeating the subject as a pronoun unnecessary, I have chosen to analyze them as independent clauses with the pronoun implied. This arrangement is one of the most common in the poem. It allows the author to go through a series of actions by a single character, keeping the verses relatively short since no subject is required but still progressing through quite a few actions. The arrangement is especially ideal for the battle scenes that punctuate the poem: Dóttir lét Gjúka (A*2: –́×–̀–́×) drengi tvá hníga, (A*2: –́×–̀–́×) bróður hjó hon Atla, (A*: –̀×–̀×–́×) bera varð þann síþan, (A*1: ͜ ́͜××–̀–́×) skapði hon svá skœru, (A*2: –́××–̀–́×) skelldi fót undan. (D*: –́×–́–̀×) (st. 49) “The daughter of Gjuki caused two bold ones to fall dead, she struck the brother of Atli, afterward he was carried off, she shaped the fray thus: she struck his leg from under.”

The first two verses have a feste Bindung, with an auxiliary verb in the first verse and its complementary infinitive in the second. The rest, though, display Bindungslosigkeit. The stanza therefore has five distinct actions, all relating to a single moment in the fight. It provides vivid detail on what Gudrun was doing and how she was able to successfully defeat a (presumably) strong warrior. The frequent use of single-verse clauses also facilitates the heated conversations that make up much of the second half of the poem. After Atli complains to Gudrun about her supposed wrongdoing, she replies: Getr þú þess, Atli, (A*2: –́×–̀–́×) gerðir svá fyrri: (A*2: –́×–̀–́×) móður tókt mína (A*2: –́×–́–̀×) ok myrðir til hnossa, (aA*2: ×–́×–̀–× ́ ) svinna systrungu (D*: –́×–́–̀×) sveltir þú í helli; (A*: –́×–̀×–́×) hlœgligt mér þat þykkir, (A*2: –́××–̀–́×) er þú þinn harm tínir, (C*: ×–̀×–́–́×) goðum ek þat þakka, (A*2: ͜ ́͜××–̀–́×) er þér gengsk illa. (C*: ×–̀–́–́×) (st. 56) “You speak of this, Atli, you acted thus first: you took my mother and murdered her for treasure, my wise cousin you starved to death; that seems laughable to me when you recount your harm; I thank the gods for that, when things go ill for you.”

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With this reply, Gudrun is able to accuse Atli of multiple things: first of being disingenuous with his own accusations, then of cruelly murdering two different women in her family. Finally, she adds to the insult by explaining her own feelings toward him, telling him not only that she laughs at his injuries but also that she gives thanks for them. Just like the action, then, the dialogue is detailed and combines many independent clauses that can be joined to make a fuller picture. Significantly, this does not necessarily mean that each stanza covers a lot of diverse material. In many cases, the different clauses discuss different aspects of the same point or reiterate closely related ideas. In this way, the stanzas provide a large amount of detail about the different events or speeches in the poem. The style in which it provides the detail, however, differentiates this poem and this meter from other Germanic poems. Where Old English poets used techniques such as variation and enumeration, which expand the length and complexity of individual clauses, the Átlamál poet combines a number of clauses to paint a picture from multiple angles. This technique seems particularly appropriate for a poem such as Átlamál, which centers largely on battle: it provides numerous details to describe the battle while still moving quickly through events in a way that puts the focus on various actions, thereby increasing the excitement of the overall event. Thus, as a meter, málaháttr can be very detailed, even somewhat repetitive, while narrating a number of actions in quick succession with an almost prosaic tone.

The Flexibility of the Ljóðaháttr Full Line In contrast to málaháttr, ljóðaháttr has typically been viewed as an especially formal meter, an assertion reinforced by the translation of the name, “song meter,” which could indicate a formalized setting. In his analysis of eddic genres and performance, Terry Gunnel claims that the poems invoke the mythological world, going so far as to assert that “at some point an accepted association must have existed between the ljóðaháttr and galdralag metres and ‘magical’ (or at least efficacious) ritual of some kind” and that “unlike the performance of most poems in fornyrðislag, living performance of the ljóðaháttr poems would have opened the gates to an active state of between-world or dual-world liminality (especially in the time when people believed in the Old Norse gods)” (2016: 97–98). Judy Quinn agrees about the formality of the meter, particularly with how it can be associated with magic and ritual, but argues that there is a great deal of variability in the reasons for choosing ljóðaháttr and that often there are multiple factors involved. She agrees with the general consensus that many ljóðaháttr poems focus on wisdom verse and that riddle contests, which similarly

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disseminate knowledge, are comparable. She adds that ljóðaháttr is also the meter of choice for poems that consist mainly of conversation, specifically “where utterance constitutes an illocutionary act” (1992: 108), especially when one or more of the interlocutors are mythological beings. According to Quinn, these poems are cast in ljóðaháttr because they are about interpersonal effect: the relationship between the characters is important, and their speech acts have a measurable effect on the events of the poem (1992: 108–9). In this way, she accounts for the wide variety of poems that make use of ljóðaháttr while still showing the relationship these poems have to the formal, even ritualistic properties that can be found in poems such as Hávamál. The formality that Gunnel and Quinn observe is imparted largely from ljóðaháttr’s strict stanzaic pattern. Because each helmingr is carefully structured and the poets only rarely include more than two helmingar per stanza, the pattern is more regulated than the málaháttr stanza. The regulation gives the meter a sense of gravitas that málaháttr lacks. Furthermore, as noted above, the strict patterning has a greater tendency toward brevity, sometimes to the point of obscurity (see for example Fulk 1996: 72–74 and Schorn 2016b: 279–82). This brevity can add to the mythic or ceremonial feel, since each statement requires interpretation and has an air of mystery about it. I will demonstrate that the main feature that allows this strict stanza both to remain tightly structured and to cover such a wide range of material is the form of the full line. Like the Old English hypermetric line, the full line can be characterized primarily by its flexibility. This flexibility results in part from the long opening drop that opens approximately 75% of these lines, which, like the light onset of a hypermetric off-verse, can accommodate multiple unstressed words and easily fit all elements of even a relatively complicated clause into a single verse. However, because the full line commonly ranges anywhere from four to eight syllables, occasionally has only three, and can include a third stressed position instead of a long drop, it also has a much larger range of possible realizations than the hypermetric line. These options allow poets to easily compose a full line that makes up part of a clause in addition to one that stands alone. This flexibility gives poets multiple choices for how to construct the syntax of each stanza. As Lee Hollander has pointed out, as well as others before him (see particularly Alexander 1929), ljóðaháttr is mostly end-stopped, with a particularly strong syntactic break between the helmingar, but many poems show different syntactic patterns (1932: 51–52). Overall, I have found four common syntactic arrangements for a helmingr, which I will discuss in more depth below. It can consist of one long statement, often including one or more subordinate clauses; it can start with a statement in the long-line followed by a related, often either summative or contrasting, statement in the full line that is syntactically

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independent; it can start with a short statement in the on-verse followed by a single clause that extends through the off-verse and into the full line; or all three verses can be independent clauses making related but separate statements.16 Thus, while the stanza as a whole gives ljóðaháttr its formal, even magical tone, it is the structure of the full line and the way that it uses some features of hypermetric composition without being bound to them that allows poets to use the meter in such diverse ways and with varying rhetorical effects. Although ljóðaháttr is used to compose many types of poems, the type most commonly discussed and associated with it is gnomic verse, again creating a similarity between ljóðaháttr and Old English hypermetrics. The two wisdom traditions are similar, with both using the flexible hypermetric forms to fit the complete gnomic statements into short units, but the stanzaic structure of Old Norse poetry puts additional restrictions on the length of each gnome, which in turn requires poets to be more creative in the way they use their most flexible feature. The syntactic organization most often cited for gnomic poems includes two clauses: one in the long-line followed by a second in the full line that clarifies the wisdom being imparted, as in the following helmingr: Óminnishegri heitir (remainder: –́–̀×–́×–́×) Sá er yfir ǫlðrum þrumir (B1: ××××–́× ͜ ́͜×) Hann stelr geði guma (B3+1: ×× ͜ ́͜× ͜ ́͜×) (Hávamál 13.1–3) “He is called the heron of forgetfulness who loiters over a drinking party; he steals men’s minds”

This helmingr starts with a poetic statement that describes the man who drinks too much, and then it makes a more direct statement about the effects of ale. The full line includes a pronoun and a finite verb in the drop, followed by two nouns in the stressed positions. As in Old English, then, the particles are relegated to the drop, where multiple particles can co-occur and alliteration is not required, leaving room for the stress words at the end of the verse. This layout allows the poet to include the entire clause easily in one verse, making for a pithy statement that imparts the most important aspect of the wisdom in a memorable way. Such an arrangement also allows for a second helmingr that can easily respond to or expand upon the first, as is the case for this stanza: Þess fugls fjǫðrum (C1: ×–́–́×) ek fjǫtraðr vark (B1: ×–́×–́) í garði Gunnlaðar (B1+1: ×–́×–́ ͜ ̀͜×) (Hávamál 13.4–6) 16 I use the term “statement” here in addition to “phrase” and “clause,” even though it is less precise, because I am talking about the intersection of syntax and semantics. By “statement,” I mean a single proposition, which frequently includes a relative clause to define a person under discussion or a noun clause as a direct object.

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“With the feathers of this bird I was fettered in the yard of Gunnlog”

In this second helmingr, the poet adds mythological material that provides further context to the initial gnome, placing it in the mouth of Oðinn (since the audience would recognize him as the speaker who won the mead of poetry from Suttung in part by seducing his daughter Gunnlog) and allowing the audience to connect the commonplace wisdom to a known story that can further illustrate the idea. The style is also particularly conducive for a helmingr in galdralag: Nótt verðr feginn (A2k: –́–̀ ͜ × ́͜ ) ́ ) sá er nesti trúir (B1: ××–́× ͜ × skammar ro skips rár, (F+1: –́××–́–́) hverf er haustgríma; (F+1x: –́×–́–́×) (Hávamál 74.1–4) “At night becomes glad he who trusts in his provisions. Short are the berths of a ship; changeable is the autumn night.”

The two full lines at the end of the verse both give a summative statement, this time in medium-length verses that include three stresses. The extra stressed position in each verse allows for a pattern typical in Old English gnomic verse: a modifier in the first stressed position, a copula in the first drop, and a compound or pair of nouns at the end of the verse. More importantly, though, the pair of three-stress verses allows the poet to use this longer pattern twice in a row, augmenting the parallel structure of the verses. By employing such parallel syntax, poets can use galdralag structure to illustrate a thematic relationship necessary to understand the stanza. In this case, the two final statements, which seem at first glance to be unrelated, together illustrate the importance of being prepared for the hardships of the night, which can bring unexpected change in a number of different forms. Although this structure of the defining full line is often discussed, there are multiple other options that are equally common in Hávamál. Another possibility is to have a single gnome that takes up a whole helmingr, as is the case for both helmingar in the following stanza: Elds er þǫrf (F: –́×–́) Þeims inn er kominn (B1: ×–́× ͜ × ́͜ ) ok á kné kalinn; (B3+1: ××–́ ͜ × ́͜ ) matar ok váða (A1: ͜ ́͜××–́×) er manni þǫrf (B1: ×–́×–́) þeim er hefir um fjall farit. (B3+1: ×××××–́ ͜ ́͜×) (Hávamál 3) “Fire is needed for he who comes in and is frozen to the knee; food and clothing are needed for the man who has journeyed over the mountain.”

In this stanza, each helmingr consists of two clauses, a main clause and a relative clause to describe the person in question. These gnomes are both longer than the pithier gnomes of the Old English tradition, which tend to consist of either a verse

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or pair of verses, but are still bounded by a clear metrical unit that makes them memorable. Further, the two occur in the same stanza so that the second elaborates on the first, in this case by adding to the list of needs a traveler has. In this example, though, the two full lines look very different because the helmingar are not structured the same: in the first, the relative clause begins in the off-verse, but in the second it is in only the full line. Presumably, the poet switches the position of the clause from the off-verse to the full line in order to make use of its flexibility, since the off-verse can sometimes be quite long, but tends not to be expanded as much as the full line can be. The poet makes the full line in the first helmingr a moderate five syllables with only two unstressed clitics but uses four unstressed words in the full line of the second helmingr, adding an auxiliary verb and a particle to the structure of the first relative clause. The second version puts more emphasis on the traveler, giving more substance to the journey and allowing the listener to understand his needs more fully as the poet expands upon the initial piece of wisdom. In this way, the related structures of the gnomic statements augment the meaning, though with more subtlety than the traditional and straightforward use of parallel structure in galdralag. In other instances, the poet uses the unity of the entire stanza to provide commentary on a single gnome. Because the stanza is generally limited to six lines, the poet cannot provide the same degree of explanation as the Old English Maxims I poet sometimes does, but he can still offer some additional commentary on a single idea: Inn vari gestr (F: × ͜ ́͜×–́) er til verðar kømr, (B1: ××–́×–́) Þunnu hljóði þegir, (A1+1: –́×–́× ͜ ́͜×) eyrum hlýðir, (A1: –́×–́×) en augum skoðar; (B1: ×–́× ͜ ́͜×) svá nýsisk fróðra hverr fyrir. (A3+x1: ×××–́×× ͜ ́͜×) (Hávamál 7) “The wary guest who comes to the meal keeps a watchful silence. He listens with ears and views with eyes. Thus each of learned ones looks about himself.”

The first helmingr gives a single gnome, using the relatively typical syntactic pattern in the poem of presenting the gnome in two clauses: a main clause plus a relative clause that further defines the person in question. The subsequent helmingr expands upon the first by giving specific strategies for staying alert. In this case, the poet chooses two simple independent clauses for the two verses in the long-line and then gives a summative statement in the full line, creating a longer line that makes use of the opening drop and sums up the stanza as a whole. The poet will sometimes give the contextualizing material first, as well: Gefendr heilir! (F: ͜ ́͜×–́×) Gestr er inn kominn. (D*: –́×–́ ͜ ̀×) Hvar skal sitja sjá? (A3+1: ××–́×–́)

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Mjǫk er bráðr (B3: ××–́) sá er á brǫndum skal (B1: ×××–́×–́) síns um freista frama (A3+1: ××–́× ͜ ́͜×) (Hávamál 2) “Hail the giver! A guest has come in. Where shall he sit? He is very hasty who shall by the burning logs try his luck.”

This stanza sets up the gnome by establishing the situation: a guest has arrived. It creates a celebratory feel to the moment, getting at the excitement of having a guest and the praise that a generous host can garner. Only after establishing that context does the poet go on to make a claim about the haste of the guest and the importance of the hearth. Sometimes the poet even crosses the helmingr boundary to provide further explanation and contextualization of a gnome. Though this is uncommon, it happens often enough to indicate that it is an acceptable option. Vatns er þǫrf (F: –́×–́) þeim er til verðar kømr, (B1: ×××–́×–́) Þerru ok þjóðlaðar (F+1: –́××–́ ͜ ́͜×) góðs um œðis (A1: –́×–́×) ef sér geta mætti (C2: ×× ͜ ́͜×–́×) orðs ok endrþǫgu (F+1: –́×–́ ͜ × ́͜ ) (Hávamál 4) “There is a need for water for he who comes to the meal, for a towel and a hearty welcome, good manners, if he can get them for himself, words and renewed silence.”

The second helmingr consists of additional noun phrases that create a compound with Vatns and þerru ok þjóðlaðar. This is a lose Bindung because the phrases are not integral to the first clause, but they are still a part of it. Both full lines in these helmingar use the extra stressed position to include a compound subject, providing space for the maximum number of nouns, including compound nouns, so that the list of needful objects becomes quite exhaustive. By extending the list across the helmingr boundary, the poet draws attention to the way the needs of a guest go beyond what one might expect, just as the list extends beyond where the audience would expect it to stop. Poets also take advantage of the strict stanzaic pattern in gnomic verse to emphasize and formalize anaphoric formula, which they frequently use when going through a longer list of instruction, often as a way to teach runic material.17 This is another way that poets can combine metrical and syntactic parallels to connect ideas, though in this case the connections span a larger number of ideas across multiple stanzas instead of closely related ideas in one helmingr. Sigrdrífumál includes a section that goes through the runes necessary for a

17 Elizabeth Jackson shows that such “opening devices” are a common feature of lists in eddic poetry and a way to provide structure to lists that sometimes have a very loose stanzaic pattern (1995: 85–91).

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leader. For each item, Sigrdrífa starts with the requirement for Sigurðr to know the rune, as in the following: Sigrúnar þú skalt rísta, (A1: –́–̀×××–́×) ef þú vilt sigr hafa, (C3: ×××–́ ͜ ́×) ok rísta á hjalti hjǫrs (A3: ××××–́×–́) (Sigrdrífumál 7.1–3) “Victory-runes you shall cut if you wish to have victory and cut them on the sword’s guard.”

The initial formula is relatively long for the on-verse of a ljóðaháttr stanza, but it still basically conforms to a type-A pattern, though a type-A verse does not usually contain a half-stress together with multiple unstressed syllables in a drop in ljóðaháttr. Following the formula, the poet has a few options as to how he can arrange the rest of the helmingr. In this case, he completes the first thought in the off-verse with a subordinate clause and then includes a new independent clause, introduced by a coordinating conjunction, that presents an imperative in the full line. The initial drop in the full line therefore must contain both the conjunction and the main verb of the clause, as well as a preposition, leaving space in the final two stressed positions for two nouns. Because the line can easily be expanded in such a way, Sigrdrífa is able to tell Sigurðr what the rune is and what he should do with it. In another version, the poet does not use a syntactic break between the offverse and the full line: Ǫlrúnar skaltu kunna, (A1: –́–× ̀ ××–́×) ef þú vill annars kvæn (B1: ×××–́×–́) vélit þik í tryggð, ef þú trúir (A3+x1: ××××–́×× ͜ ́͜×) (Sigrdrífumál 8.1–3) “Ale-runes you shall know if you wish that another’s wife will not betray you in a sword truce, if you trust her.”

Here, the entire helmingr after the initial formula makes up the adverbial clause that explains why Sigurðr would want to know Ale-runes. Significantly, though, the poet does not use a short full line to complete the verse, but instead expands it quite a bit, including a verb with a negative clitic plus a pronoun and a preposition in the initial drop and then expanding the second drop as well by using a subordinating conjunction and another pronoun for a new subject. This is a very rare arrangement for the full line which, unlike Old English hypermetric verse, does not often include a clause break in the middle of the line. Sigrdrífa is therefore able to include quite a bit of instruction about this ale rune, even within the circumscribed context of the ljóðaháttr helmingr. The degree to which Sigrdrífa emphasizes the topic is perhaps not surprising given the focus in Hávamál on the dangers of getting drunk, together with the potential dangers created by women; the poet clearly wanted to give as much information as possible on this rune and

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its use. In both cases, then, the poet is able to use the formula in the helmingr and still include quite a bit of instruction on its importance and application. Overall, the helmingr creates an interesting context for the gnomic material that makes gnomic diction in Old Norse both similar to and different from Old English gnomic poems. As a single unit, the helmingr can create more space for a gnomic statement than even a hypermetric line in Old English. Furthermore, the clearly delineated positions of the helmingr allow the poet to draw more strongly on parallel structures and use them to imply connections between loosely related ideas without stating them directly. However, because the entire explanation of the gnome is often contained within a single helmingr and rarely goes beyond the boundaries of the stanza, the Old Norse poets do not include the same amount of discursive material that sometimes accompanies gnomic statements in poems such as Maxims I. Like Old English poets, though, the Old Norse poets do include a variety of syntactic structures for the gnomes, from the shortest and pithiest to relatively expansive, and it is the extreme flexibility of the full line that allows them to do so in the context of the strict helmingr. Ljóðaháttr is also used for a range of poems outside of gnomic verse, including narrative poems. As Quinn points out, these narrative poems tend to be told primarily through dialogue, so the focus is still on speech acts, but the poems must nevertheless include narrative elements. For this reason, the syntactic patterns tend to be different from those that are used most often in gnomic verse. The most common is to include a shorter statement in the on-verse followed by a longer statement that fills both the off-verse and the full line. Rístu nú, Skírnir, (A3: ×××–́×) ok gakk at beiða (aA1: ×–́×–́×) Okkarn mála mǫg (A3+1: ××–́×–́) ok þess at fregna (A3: ×××–́×) hveim inn fróði sé (B1: ××–́×–́) ofreiði afi (F+1: –́–́× ͜ ́͜×) (Skírnismál 1) “Get up now, Skirnir, and go quick to ask to speak to our son, and ask this: for whom the wise one is a very angry man.”

Both of these helmingar open with an imperative in the on-verse and then have a clause that starts in the off-verse and has the complement in the full line, making for a feste Bindung. Also, as complements, the material in the full lines are both simple noun phrases, so they are on the short side for the full line, though still well within the common length range. Significantly, the two helmingar are also closely related. Although they denote two different actions, at beiða and at fregna are both infinitives that depend upon the same verb, gakk, and have the same subject. The whole stanza therefore narrates a single request that includes several actions in a way that is rare in non-narrative voice.

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The Skírnismál poet includes additional syntactic patterns that similarly allow for continuity between the verses and allow the poets to develop the narrative action. For example, the poet uses helmingar such as the following, which consist of a single clause, more frequently. Hví um segjak þér, (B1: ××–́×–́) seggr inn ungi, (A1: –́×–́×) mikinn móðtrega? (G+1: ͜ × ́͜ –́ ͜ ́͜×) (Skírnismál 4.1–3) “Why should I speak to you, young man, about my great deep sorrow?”

The on-verse here starts the question, with a vocative noun phrase in the offverse and the direct object in the full line. Again, with just a noun phrase, the full line is quite short, in this case, as short as possible. With the short pattern lacking in drops, this full line can accommodate the necessary syntax to round out the mostly complete clause, which in turn allows for the more contiguous syntax throughout the helmingr that is more appropriate for narrative. This style also includes more close syntactic relationships between the helmingar, as in the following: Mar gefðu mér þá, (A1: –́××–́×) þann er mik um myrkvan beri (B1: ××××–́× ͜ × ́͜ ) vísan vafrloga (F+1: –́×–́ ͜ ́͜×) ok þat sverð (B3: ××–́) er sjálft vegisk (C3: ×–́ ͜ ́×) við jǫtna ætt (A3+1: ×–́×–́) (Skírnismál 8) “Then give me the horse that carries me through the dark, famous flickering flames and the sword that wields itself against the race of giants.”

The direct objects make up the constituent that goes across the helmingr boundary in this case, so that the first on-verse contains the verb and first direct object, followed by a relative clause (creating one very long off-verse), and the second helmingr has the second direct object, including a second relative clause to describe it. That second direct object is particularly important, since this is the sword Freyr loses that he could otherwise have used to defeat Surtr during Ragnarǫk, so it is appropriate that the entire noun phrase has its own helmingr. These patterns with shorter lines and few asides allow for the continuous progress that makes an engaging narrative. While the form of the ljóðaháttr stanza overall is responsible for the contrast, formality, and emphasis available in this meter, it is the extreme flexibility and hypermetric possibilities of the full line that allows for the diversity of syntactic possibilities. Because poets can choose between an expansive line with a long initial drop, a short line of four (or even three, in rare cases) syllables, and anything in between, they can fit the end of each helmingr to the material necessary for the different syntactic situations. Thus, the line can be used for

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gnomic brevity and narrative continuity while maintaining the integrity of the helmingr. More significantly, a skilled poet can exploit the various options, switching between them and mixing patterns for a variety of rhetorical effects.

Style Shifting in the Eddic Praise Poems While málaháttr and ljóðaháttr are often used in isolation, poets can also shift between the meters within the same poem. One place that this shifting can be seen most clearly is the set of three poems known as the eddic praise poems: Haraldskvæði, which was composed by Þorbjǫrn hornklofi ca. 900; Eiríksmál, which was composed anonymously ca. 954 at the behest of Eiríkr blóðøx’s widow Gunhildr; and Hákonarmál, which was composed by Eyvindr skáldaspillir and is often considered derivative of Eiríksmál so is therefore generally thought to have been composed shortly after. These poems are unusual because they share features of eddic and skaldic verse: they are panegyrics and two of them have named poets, but they are composed in eddic meters.18 What I find more interesting about them, however, is the facility with which the poets shift between the meters throughout. While shifting meters is common, it is often done for obvious, practical reasons, such as switching out of ljóðaháttr into fornyrðislag to accommodate a list (see, for example, Hávamál 85–87) or switching between two related meters, such as fornyrðislag and málaháttr or ljóðaháttr and galdralag to expand the line or the stanza (see, for example, Hávamál 156–64).19 In the eddic praise poems, the poets switch back and forth more frequently, possibly with some more subtle stylistic effects in mind. The clearest possible reason for the switches is the nature of the narrative. As Frederick Paasche (1916) and others have observed, málaháttr seems to be used for the battle scenes where ljóðaháttr is used for the rest. This observation makes sense in light of the syntactic observations from the rest of this chapter: the action-oriented, verb-heavy málaháttr would be particularly effective for battle scenes, whereas the more flexible ljóðaháttr could be used elsewhere, giving the panegyrics a formal tone. Judy Quinn has expanded on these earlier observations to argue that there is a more complex combination of factors at work. She notes that in Eiríksmál, the meter shifts according to speaker, so that

18 For more information about these poems, see Fulk’s introductions to the individual poems in Whaley 2012. All quotes from the poems are from this text. 19 Schorn 2016b provides an interesting discussion of the effect of mixing meters on eddic style.

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mortals speak in málaháttr whereas the gods speak in ljóðaháttr; Eiríkr ultimately switches, which indicates his close affinity to Oðinn after he ascends to Valhǫll. Hákonarmál, she argues, is similar, though the meters relate to where the speakers are located (Miðgarðr vs Valhǫll) rather than who they are. She believes that Haraldskvæði is more complicated and that “[t]he more interactive nature of [the Valkyrie and raven’s] exchange is signaled both by the change in diction and in rhythm. The raven’s answers are cast in a mixture of long lines and ljóðaháttr, with lists of items cast in the long-line measure” (1992: 118). The connections that these scholars are able to make indicate that the poets were doing something systematic as they shifted back and forth between the meters. Finding a single factor, or even a combination of factors, might not be able to fully explain the phenomenon, however. Certainly, Paasche and Quinn’s reasoning is sound, and the factors that they explain are a part of what is happening in these compositions. A close analysis of the content of the poems can also reveal the logic behind some of the individual decisions the poets made and illustrate how attention to the meter can help to analyze the poems. In all three cases, the poets carefully control the balance of the more mundane, yet possibly exciting, málaháttr passages with the formalized and elevating ljóðaháttr passages in order to create as effective a panegyric as possible.

Building up Battle in Hákonarmál Hákonarmál adheres closely to Paasche’s claim that the poet uses málaháttr for battle, a claim that Erin Michelle Goeres builds on in her analysis of three early Norse commemorative poems by suggesting that the contrast created by the metrical shifts extends to earthly versus supernatural material as well as excited versus solemn tone (2015: 65–66). She argues that Eyvindr uses these shifts in part to question Oðinn’s decision to allow the superior army to be defeated, a move that shows ambivalence toward placing the Christian King Hákon in a pagan afterlife, and in part to emphasize the tragedy of King Hákon’s death (2015: 65–74). While I agree that the poem is ultimately one of loss and mourning, I believe that the stylistic shifts that accompany the metrical changes have a second effect as well: the poet builds first the excitement and then the admiration in the two major sections of the poem and transitions between them in a way that glorifies Hákon’s battle as much as possible. Eyvindr begins the poem in ljóðaháttr, providing a rather grandiose description of Oðinn sending out Valkyries as choosers of the slain. The ljóðaháttr elevates the poem’s formality, which is appropriate for a panegyric. The section

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also creates an epic feeling from the start of the poem, since it tacitly connects Hákon’s final battle to Ragnarǫk (where the warriors who are chosen will ultimately fight) and immediately gives value to the death it is about to describe. After creating this context, Eyvindr makes his first shift, switching briefly to málaháttr for a mere helmingr, then returning to ljóðaháttr for the second helmingr of the second stanza: Bróður fundu þær Bjarnar (A*: –́×–̀××–́×) í brynju fara, (aA: ×–́× ͜ ́×) konung inn kostsama, (D*: ͜ ́͜××–́ ͜ ̀×) kominn und gunnfana. (D*: ͜ ́͜××–́ ͜ ̀×) Drúpðu dolgráar, (D*2: –́×–́ ͜ ̀×) en darraðr hristisk; (A1: ×–́×–́×) upp vas þá hildr of hafin (A1+1: –́××–́× ͜ × ́͜ ) (st. 2) “They found Bjorn’s brother putting on his mail coat, the admirable king, stationed under his standard. The enmity yardarms [=spears] dropped, and the banner shook; the battle had then begun”

The first helmingr is more mundane as it relates the practicality of battle preparation: Hákon appears impressive as an admirable king under a battle standard, but his actions are still relatively typical. The second helmingr, though, brings the epic quality back to the battle. The beginning is explained in a formulaic way as Eyvindr describes two different aspects of the battle’s opening in the long-line, then makes an independent statement that the battle upp vas in the full line—a statement that both explains the beginning of the battle and alludes to the way that it can be remembered in that it is upp for all to see. From that point, the battle is joined and Eyvindr switches to málaháttr. He describes the battle in formulaic tones that include quite a few kennings and even occasional instances of variation. For that reason, not all the verses make up a single clause. Nevertheless, Eyvindr does take advantage of málaháttr’s tendency to use Bindungslosigkeit several times through the course of his description of the battle, as in the following: Brǫkuðu broddar, (A1: ͜ ́͜××–́×) brotnuðu skildir, (A*1: –́ ͜ ̀×–́×) glumruðu gylfringar (remainder: –́ ͜ × ̀ –́–× ̀ ) í gotna hausum. (aA1: ×–́×–́×) (st. 5.5–8) “Points clanged, shields burst, swords clattered in men’s skulls.”

With three clauses in these four verses, Eyvindr creates an action-filled moment that takes the listeners through all the gruesome details of battle, making for a very exciting scene. Even though not every stanza is quite so action packed, the meter itself might add to the feeling of excitement since it seems to be associated with battle.

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Throughout the battle, the poem builds in formality as Eyvindr begins to include more and more kennings and heiti. Then, after six full stanzas of málaháttr, he switches back to ljóðaháttr in the second helmingr of stanza nine: Blendusk við roðnar (A3: ×××–́×) und randar himni; (aA: ×–́×–́×) Skǫglar veðr léku (D*: –́×–́–̀×) við ský of bauga. (aA: ×–́×–́×) Umðu oddláar (D*: –́×–́ ͜ ̀×) í Óðins veðri; (aA: ×–́×–́×) hné mart manna (C: –̀–́–́×) fyr mækis straumi. (aA: ×–́×–́×) “Reds mixed under the heaven of rims [shields], Skogul’s wind [battle] played with the clouds of the shield-ring [shields]. The point-waves [blood] roared in Oðinn’s tempest [battle], many men sank before the sword’s tide [blood].” Sôtu þá dǫglingar (D*: –́××–́–̀×) með sverð of togin, (aA: ×–́× ͜ ́×) með skarða skjǫldu (aA: ×–́×–́×) ok skotnar brynjur. (aA: ×–́×–́×) Vasa sá herr (B3: ×××–́) í hugum ok átti (aA1: × ͜ ́͜××–́×) til Valhallar vega. (C+1: ×–́–́× ͜ ́͜×) “Then sat the kings with swords drawn, with hacked shields and shot-up byrnies. The army was not happy and possessed the way to Valhǫll.” Gǫndul þat mælti, (A1: –́××–́×) studdisk geirskapti: (D*: –́×–́–̀×) “Vex nú gengi goða, (A3+1: ××–́× ͜ ́͜×) es Hôkuni hafa (aE: ×–́ ͜ ̀× ͜ ́͜×) með her mikinn (C3: ×–́ ͜ ́×) heim bǫnd of boðit.” (F+1: –́–× ́͜ ) (sts. 8–10) ́ ͜× “Gǫndul said that, leaned on a spear-shaft: grows now the retinue of the gods, since the bands of gods have invited Hákon, with a great army, home.”

The first stanza shows the battle coming to a head, with all the references to battle, weapons, and blood given in kennings, two of which contain specific mythological references. After this buildup, the ninth stanza takes on a more mournful tone in the first helmingr, which shows the results of the battle: the kings sitting in their ruined armor. By staying in málaháttr for this helmingr, the poet is keeping his audience focused on the actions that are taking place even as he brings the combat itself to a close. It is after the poet has established this change in tone that he changes meter in the second helmingr even as he changes the focus from the events to the emotional response that they elicit. As Goeres also notes (2015: 65–66), Eyvindr starts that shift by suggesting that the event is a tragedy, as must be the first thought of anyone who thinks about the death of a beloved king. The mournful statement that the army was not in good spirits is given emphasis by the sudden switch to ljóðaháttr mid-stanza, after so long a málaháttr section. Furthermore, the claim that the army was on the way to Valhǫll does not even have the impact that it could to alleviate the mournful tone. Rather than putting the statement by itself in the full line, where it could stand

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apart and show contrast, Eyvindr begins the statement at the end of the long-line, using a feste Bindung and therefore connecting the two statements, that the army was sad and that they were on their way to Valhǫll, into a single thought. The next stanza, though, mitigates the mournful tone through the words of the Valkyrie Gǫndul. She shifts the focus from the deaths in battle to the glorious future that the warriors have earned when she speaks of how the gods’ force has grown: now they are part of something even more celebrated. By using the structure of the ljóðaháttr stanza to isolate the statement Vex nú gengi goða in its own full line, Eyvindr emphasizes this idea, highlighting both the warrior’s new glory and the benefit to the ranks of the einherjar. The use of boðit “invited” is particularly important here since it shows that Hákon was especially desired as an einherji. The subsequent stanzas, all likewise in ljóðaháttr, continue to show the renown that Hákon won and the honors that are bestowed upon him as he goes to Valhǫll. This section also parallels the málaháttr section in the way the material grows more formal throughout, until in the end the poet adapts some famous lines from Hávamál: Deyr fé, (G: –́–́) deyja frændr, (F: –́×–́) eyðisk land ok láð, (A3+1: ××–́×–́) síz Hôkun fór (B1: ×–́×–́) með heiðin goð; (B1: ×–́×–́) mǫrg es þjóð of þéuð (A3+1: ××–́× ͜ ́͜×) (st. 21) “Cattle die, kin die, the land and realm lie deserted, since Hákon went with the heathen gods; many a nation is enslaved.”

This stanza creates an ambivalent end to the poem. Goeres sees the end as particularly mournful, especially in the way it differs from the similar stanzas in Hávamál: where the Hávamál poet offers a consolation in the second helmingr by saying that a man’s reputation can last forever, Eyvindr finishes out the stanza by showing the ruin that was left of Hákon’s kingdom. Goeres argues that the end shows that no comfort is able to be gained from this eulogy (2015: 73). Although this final stanza certainly turns the poem back to a dreary tone, it is nonetheless high praise for King Hákon: such deaths, which are inevitable, were kept at bay by Hákon when he was alive and things on earth have grown dim with his passing, in contrast to life in Valhǫll. In this way, the ending is similar to the end of Beowulf, which mourns the loss of the heroic king and laments the imminent downfall of the Geats. Although sad, the ending still serves as a testament to Beowulf’s greatness, since it shows the destructive forces that he was able to hold back for so long. This mournful note in Hákonarmál similarly offers a reverent praise for a leader who could do so much. The skillful way in which Eyvindr combines the two meters thus creates an impressive panegyric for a warrior king. The opening ljóðaháttr stanza provides

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a formalized and formulaic beginning that sets the tone as serious from the start. The poet quickly moves into the battle and switches to málaháttr to allow for the continuous action that makes the battle feel more exciting. The audience can therefore get caught up in Hákon’s great deeds. Once the king’s warrior prowess has been established, Eyvindr switches back to ljóðaháttr to end more formally and more emotionally, illustrating both the king’s glory and the loss that his death brought the mortal world.

Shifting views of Valhǫll in Eiríksmál The Eiríksmál poet does not divide the meter as clearly between different modes of narrative as Eyvindr does for Hákonarmál. For this (and other) reasons, Clause von See (1963: 115–17) has argued that Hákonarmál is the older poem and that Eiríksmál is a poor imitation of the style by a poet who did not understand the reasons for metrical variation. Von See’s argument has been disputed on other grounds,20 but I would like to argue in particular that the metrical patterning is not inferior. Instead, the focus of the poem is different, since it takes place entirely in Valhǫll instead of reaching Valhǫll from an early battlefield. Nevertheless, the poet uses the shifts in meter to set the tone of the poem in a way that builds in formality to exalt in Eiríkr’s arrival at Valhǫll. This poem starts in málaháttr rather than ljóðaháttr, making the first moment appear more mundane. The poet’s choice to do so may seem unusual, since the action at this point takes place in Valhǫll, but it also appears to be a rather mundane event: Oðinn questions a dream he had and then relates the very utilitarian orders he gave to have the hall prepared: Vakða ek einherja, (C*: –̀××–́–́×) bað ek upp rísa (C*: –̀×–́–́×) bekki at stráa, (A2*: –́×–̀ ͜ × ́ ) borðker at leyðra, (A*2: –́×–̀–× ́ ) valkyrjur vín bera, (remainder: –́–̀×–́ ͜ ̀×) sem vísi komi. (aA: ×–́× ͜ ́×) (st. 1.5–10) “I woke the einherjar, I told them to rise up, cover the benches with straw, rinse the drinking cups, the Valkyries to bring wine, as though a leader comes.”

Málaháttr is more practical than ljóðaháttr for this stanza since it provides a list of actions, each one taking up a single verse. Goeres argues about these lines that “the repetitive structure of Odinn’s commands creates quick, dynamic sentences that emphasize the rhythmic bustle of preparation” (2015: 60). I agree, and I would add that the domestic nature of the actions, together with the less

20 See Wolf 1969, Marold 1972, Heinrichs 1990: 434 n. 8, and Kreutzer 1999: 397.

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formal meter, give the bustling a sense of familiarity that makes this image of Valhǫll feel commonplace to the audience. The meter continues in málaháttr in the next stanza, a short stanza relating that Oðinn expects great warriors to come and is glad for it. The poet only switches to ljóðaháttr in the third stanza, where the speaker also switches and Bragi, god of poetry, hears the sound of Eiríkr and his men approaching and likens it to the return of Baldur, Oðinn’s murdered son who was favored among the gods. Although Oðinn immediately chastises Bragi for his foolishness, the switch into ljóðaháttr along with the reference to Baldur makes Eiríkr’s approach seem very important indeed. To greet these important guests, Oðinn calls upon the famous heroes Sigmundr and his son/nephew Sinfjǫtli. At this point, the next few stanzas take on the pattern identified by Quinn of málaháttr for the speech of the mortal character and ljóðaháttr for the god: “Hví es þér Eireks vôn (B*: –̀××–́×–́) heldr an annarra konunga?” (remainder: ××–́–̀× ͜ ́–̀×) “Því at mǫrgu landi (aA1: ××–́×–́×) hann hefr mæki roðit (B1: ××–́× ͜ ́͜×) ok blóðugt sverð borit.” (B+1: ×–́×–́ ͜ × ́͜ ) “Why is for you the hope for Eiríkr rather than another king?” “Because in many a land he has reddened a blade and born a bloody sword.” “Hví namt þú hann sigri þá, (B*: –̀×××–́×–́) es þér þótti hann snjallr vesa?” (C*: ××–̀××–́ ͜ × ́ ) “Því at óvíst es at vita, (B: ××–́××× ͜ ́͜×) nær ulfr inn hǫsvi (aA: ×–́×–́×) sœkir á sjǫt goða.” (F+1: –́××–́ ͜ ́͜×) (st. 6–7) “Why did you deprive him of victory then, when to you he seemed to be valiant?” “Because it is uncertain to know when the grey wolf attacks the host of gods.”

Goeres compares this discussion of Oðinn’s role in Eiríkr’s death to the equivalent discussion in Hákonarmál and notes that the parallel discussions differ substantially in their tone: where Eyvindr could be seen to question the legitimacy of Oðinn’s choice, the poet here uses the questions to introduce extravagant praise (2015: 68). In terms of the metrical shifts throughout the discussion, Goeres agrees with Quinn that they mark the speakers, but I would argue that they have the more important effect of establishing the tone in a way that further augments Oðinn’s praise. With only the single long-line for each question, the málaháttr lines remain relatively unadorned. This is not to say that the lines are short— each makes full use of the extra málaháttr positions with a number of connective words and pronouns, allowing Sigmundr to be very straightforward and clear. Instead, they take a more prosaic tone that members of the audience could

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imagine themselves taking when asking questions: the language resembles prose and the questions are presented as clearly as possible. As ljóðaháttr lines, Oðinn’s answers come across differently. The addition of the full line, making for a total of three verses instead of two, allows him to be more expansive in what he says. At the same time, he is also more cryptic and poetic. In stanza six, Oðinn praises Eiríkr’s battle prowess by speaking only of the blood he has spilled, leaving the audience with the image of a bloody sword in the full line. In the second stanza, Oðinn speaks of Ragnarǫk, but only synecdochically, allowing the Fenriswolf to stand in for the entire enemy force. The heavily symbolic language that is rife with images of violence is appropriate to Oðinn as a god of both wisdom and war. Additionally, the poet is able to elevate Eiríkr’s status by having Oðinn discuss him, his past, and his presumed future as an asset during the battle of Ragnarǫk in this formalized way. Significantly, the pattern of switching meters with speakers does not continue once Eiríkr arrives in Valhǫll; Sigmundr greets Eiríkr in a full stanza of ljóðaháttr, wishing him good fortune and asking Hins vil ek þik fregna: (A3: ××××–́×) hvat fylgir þér (B1: ×–́×–́) jǫfra frá eggþrimu?’ (F+1: –́××–́ ͜ × ́͜ ) (st. 8.4–6) “One thing I wish to ask you: what monarchs follow you from the edge-thunder [battle]?”

Now Sigmundr is speaking similarly to Oðinn, giving Eiríkr an elaborate welcome and using the kenning eggþrimu for battle. The poem has therefore switched entirely into the more formal tone with Eiríkr’s arrival. Eiríkr, of course, replies in kind, bringing the poem to a close on a lone helmingr of ljóðaháttr:21 Konungar eru fimm; (F: ͜ × ́͜ ×××–́) kenni ek þér nafn allra; (D*1: –́×××–́–× ̀ ) ek em inn sétti sjalfr.’ (A3+1: ×××–́×–́) (st. 9.1–3) “There are five kings, I make known to you the names of all; I am the sixth myself.”

The statement is relatively obscure, but it shows the grand nature of Eiríkr’s company, especially since he arrives not only in royal company but with an auspicious number of kings.22 Thus, the poem ends with a stylized image of a respected king in distinguished company entering a splendid hall that has been prepared for his arrival by equally imposing legendary figures.

21 Some scholars argue that this abrupt ending shows that the poem is fragmentary (Storm 1873: 123 and Kreutzer 1989: 55), but others argue that the arrival at Valhǫll is a sufficient closing point (Hollander 1932–1933: 250, supported by de Vries 1964–1967, and Goeres 2015: 69–70). For a discussion of the different arguments, see Fulk 2012b: 1003. 22 See Seeberg 1979 for a comparison to biblical references to five kings.

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Though very different from Hákonarmál, then, the poem still works effectively as a panegyric, and the poet uses shifts in the meter to build the praise throughout the poem. Goeres argues that the two poems contrast because of the way they both treat their titular character: rather than mourning Eiríkr’s passing, the audience can admire him as he passes from “human monarch” to “mythological hero” (2015: 69–73). I agree about the difference of tone, but I also argue that the structure of the poem elevates the praise further by manipulating the way Valhǫll and the characters within it are depicted. By starting in málaháttr, the poet depicts a Valhǫll that could be easily compared to any other hall before a feast. He then slowly builds up the formality of his tone even as the characters prepare for Eiríkr’s arrival, adding in sections of ljóðaháttr and using more poetic language the more the poem deals directly with Eiríkr himself. By the end of the poem, the hall and the characters within it have transformed into something more than the everyday, and the scene is therefore fit for the arrival of so great a king.

Speech Patterning in Haraldskvæði Haraldskvæði is not as straightforward as the other two eddic praise poems in terms of metrical patterning for two reasons. First, it is definitively fragmentary, and scholars are not even convinced that it is a unified composition,23 so it is impossible to draw conclusions about the overall arc of the poem. Second, the two meters are not split clearly between events or speakers, making the poet’s motivations more obscure. Nevertheless, once the poet begins to switch meters near the end of the poem, some possible patterns emerge, showing that the poet combines the meters to control emphasis on the different aspects of the speakers’ statements. The majority of the poem, starting with the first seventeen stanzas, is written in málaháttr. This includes what looks like a relatively formalized first stanza: Hlýði hringberendr, (D*: –́×–́ ͜ ̀×) meðan ek frá Haraldi segi (aA: ×××× ͜ ́͜×× ͜ ́×) odda íþróttir (D*: –́×–́–̀×) inum afarauðga. (C*: –̀× ͜ ́͜×–́×) Frá môlum mun ek segja, (aA: ×–́×××–́×) þeim es ek mey heyrða (C*: –̀××–́–́×) hvíta haddbjarta, (D*: –́×–́–̀×) es við hrafn dœmði (C*: –̀×–́–× ́ ) (st. 1) “Listen, ring-bearers, while I recite the feats of points about Haraldr the exceedingly wealthy. I will speak about matters which I heard a white, light-haired girl [say], who spoke with a raven”

The poet opens this stanza with the formulaic request to listen, specifically addressing himself to hringberendr, a poetic way of referring to warriors. The stanza 23 For a discussion of the poem’s composition, see Fulk 2012a: 91.

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also differs from many málaháttr stanzas in the syntactic pattern: the first verse forms its own clause, but then the next three verses are all bound together. In fact, the relationship is a feste Bindung since verse 1.3 provides a direct object for the verb in 1.2 and 1.4 is the epithet that accompanies Harald, also in 1.2. The second helmingr has more clauses, three in the four verses, but they are all related hypotactically rather than the paratactic relationship that dominates Átlamál, since the second two clauses are both relative clauses. In contrast to these formal features, the poet also uses language typical of narrative verse, asking the audience to listen and promising to speak words that were previously heard. By choosing málaháttr, then, the poet primes the audience for a narrative tale, though with a particularly formal opening. The next sixteen stanzas give a brief description of the Valkyrie referred to in the first stanza, explain how she found the raven, and then detail the raven’s narrative of Haraldr’s deeds, all in málaháttr. The poet continues to use longer epithets and kennings, as well as long lists of noun phrases, that make for clauses that are longer on average than those in Átlamál, but at other times he takes full advantage of the ease with which clauses can be combined in málaháttr to make lists of the brave and violent actions that Haraldr undertook with his armies. The combination of formalized language and enumeration of deeds makes for a very appropriate panegyric. In stanza 19, the poet begins to use the metrical shifting that characterizes the other eddic praise poems. Similarly to the other two poems, the poet frequently shifts meters within a single stanza, making for stanzas that have one helmingr of málaháttr and one of ljóðaháttr. Where similar shifts mark changes in speakers in Eiríksmál, here the speakers tend to stay the same throughout each stanza, so the shift is marking something else, perhaps the tone or purpose of each statement. The first stanza to shift comes after the raven’s long explanation, when the Valkyrie asks another question: At skalda reiðu vil ek þik spyrja, (aA*: ×–́×–̀××××–́×) alls þykkisk skil vita; (C*: –̀××–́ ͜ × ́ ) greppa ferðir (A1: –́×–́×) þú munt gǫrla kunna, (aA1: ××–́×–́×) þeira es með Haraldi hafask.’ (A3+1: ×××× ͜ ́͜×× ͜ ́͜×) (st. 18) “About the skalds’ treatment I wish to ask you, since you seem to know the information: you must know all about the throngs of poets who reside with Haraldr.”

The Valkyrie continues to speak in málaháttr, just as the raven has been doing, and asks a basic question about skalds. She adds to that a bit of praise for the raven, possibly to make him more willing to answer. By switching into ljóðaháttr, the Valkyrie is able to expand upon the first bare compliment, alls þykkisk skil vita, and extol the raven’s knowledge more fully and formally.

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The raven’s answer is the inverse pattern. Á gerðum sér þeira (aA1: ×–́××–́×) ok á gollbaugum, (C1: ××–́–́×) at þeir eru í kunnleikum við konung: (C1+x1: ×××××–́–́×× ͜ ́͜×) feldum ráða þeir rauðum, (A*: –́×–̀××–́×) fôðum rǫndum, (A1: –́×–́×) sverðum silfrvǫfðum, (D*: –́×–́–̀×) serkjum hringofnum, (D*: –́×–́–̀×) gyltum andfetlum (D*: –́×–́–̀×) ok grǫfnum hjǫlmum, (aA: ×–́×–́×) hringum handbærum, (D*: –́×–́–̀×) es þeim Haraldr valði (C*: –̀× ͜ ́͜×–́×) (st. 19) “In their gear and in their gold rings one sees that they are on intimate terms with the king: they have red cloaks, painted shields, swords wrapped in silver wire, mail coats woven with rings, gilt baldrics, and engraved helms, rings worn on the arm, which for them Haraldr chose.”

It begins in ljóðaháttr, equaling the formal tone that the Valkyrie used to give it praise and making a balanced statement about the accoutrements that distinguish skalds: the alliterative gerðum and gollbaugum name what the skalds have in the long-line, then the full line names their association with the king. From there, though, the raven provides details in the form of a list, which is much easier to compose in málaháttr. The list is used to make the answer complete but lacks the more formal tone of the initial response. The next pair of stanzas confirm this pattern, for they are very similar in character: At berserkja reiðu vil ek þik spyrja, (aA*1: ×–́–̀××××××–́×) bergir hræsævar: (D*: –́×–́–̀×) hversu es fengit, (A3: ×××–́×) þeim es í folk vaða, (C3: ×××–́ ͜ × ́ ) vígdjǫrfum verum? (F+1: –́–́× ͜ ́͜×) “About berserkers’ accoutrements I wish to ask you, taster of the corpse-sea [=blood> raven]: how is it given to those who rush the host, to the battle-daring men?” “Ulfheðnar heita, (A*1: –́–× ̀ –́×) þeir es í orrostu (C1: ×××–́–× ́ ) blóðgar randir bera; (A1+1: –́×–́× ͜ ́͜×) vigrar rjóða, (A1: –́×–́×) es til vígs koma; (C3: ××–́ ͜ ́×) þeim es þar sist saman. (B3+1: ×××–́ ͜ ́͜×) Áræðismǫnnum einum, (A*: –́××–̀×–́×) hygg ek, þar undir felisk (aA: ×××–́× ͜ × ́ ) skyli sá inn skilvísi, (D*: ͜ ́͜×××–́–̀×) þeim es í skjǫld hǫggva. (C*: –̀××–́–́×) (st. 20–21) “Wolf-skins are called those who in combat bear bloody shields; they redden spears when they come to war; they are there seated together. I think that there he, the sovereign wise in understanding, entrusts himself to the men of courage only, to those who hew on a shield.

Again, the first verse provides the basic question, followed by a second verse that relates directly to the raven, this time using a kenning as a direct address. The following ljóðaháttr stanza essentially asks the same question in different terms, this time expanding upon the Valkyrie’s topic rather than her interlocutor and building up the berserkers by referring to them in increasingly exciting ways. The structure of the ljóðaháttr stanza is particularly effective here since it foregrounds the noun

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phrase in variation, vígdjǫrfum verum, putting emphasis on not only the berserkers themselves but also the creative adjective compound used to describe them. The raven’s response gives two helmingar of ljóðaháttr instead of only one, but the idea is very similar. It starts in a formalized way that adds to the praise of the berserkers, calling them ulfheðnar, describing what they do in battle and speaking to their prowess. Only once the context is established and the imagery emphasized does the raven actually answer the question, saying that they are seated together. This answer occurs in the second full line, so it stands as a culmination of all of the descriptions that came before, and the raven’s answer gives not just the information about these men but an image of them, vicious and bloody, seated together at court. Having planted that image in its audience’s mind, the raven then goes on to explain the relationship between the berserkers and the king. The diction and the contrast in these stanzas are not completely identical, and they do not suggest a particular system that the poet was following by rote. What they suggest instead is that the poet composed the conversation with a clear sense of how the meters could shift the tone of the poem or the focus of the audience, and he therefore mixed them throughout the poem to keep the conversation more dynamic. The mixture becomes especially interesting in the next set of stanzas, in which the Valkyrie asks about the jesters and jugglers at Haraldr’s court, asking specifically about the hospitality shown to Andaðr. The raven replies At hundi elskar Andaðr (aA*: ×–́×–̀×–́×) ok heimsku drýgir (aA: ×–́×–́×) eyrnalausum (A1: –́×–́×) ok jǫfur hlœgir. (C2: × ͜ × ́͜ –́×) Hinir eru ok aðrir, (A3: ×××××–́×) es of eld skulu (C3: ××–́ ͜ ́×) brennanda spôn bera; (E+1: –́–̀×–́ ͜ ́͜×) logǫndum húfum (A1: ͜ ́͜××–́×) hafa sér und linda drepit (B1: ××××–́× ͜ ́͜×) hældræpir halir. (F+1: –́–× ́͜ ) (st. 23) ́ ͜× “Andaðr fondles earless hounds and practices silliness and makes the king laugh. There are also others, who shall bear a burning woodchip across a flame; the heel-strikable men have tucked blazing caps under their belts.”

While the poem does not make clear who Andaðr is, it is relatively clear that the raven is not altogether fond of him, and this answer stands in sharp contrast to its previous praise of the berserkers. Perhaps it is for this reason that the raven starts with málaháttr here: it does not want to contextualize the description with the same respect. It does then switch into ljóðaháttr, but only to emphasize the foolish actions of such entertainers. In both cases, the word order differs from normal prose order in a way that drives home the jab. In the first helmingr, the seemingly ridiculous practice of brennanda spôn bera stands by itself in the full line. The second helmingr provides an even stronger invective and uses the same position to name these people hældræpir halir. The switch into ljóðaháttr at this

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moment is therefore not an attempt to increase the formality of the moment, but instead the poet uses the structure of the line to clarify the meaning of his words. Haraldskvæði is the most opaque of the three eddic praise poems in terms of the metrical patterning and how it should be interpreted. Even so, I do not agree with von See’s assessment that the stanzas were the work of an inferior poet imitating Átlamál (1961). Instead, the poem shows that trying to name concrete and discrete reasons to switch between meters in these poems may be a mistake. While it is certainly possible in some cases, the reasons for the switches can also be subtle and context dependent. Therefore, rather than trying to categorize and name all reasons to switch, it might be more interesting to understand the different effects that such shifts can have and analyze each one in context.

Conclusion Where Old English hypermetric lines are one option to expand the line and can therefore be used for a variety of reasons, sometimes all at once, Old Norse poets have more options. Málaháttr seems to be used primarily for narrative progress, with ljóðaháttr filling the other roles related to formality. The system is ideal for the multi-faceted metrical system that developed in Old Norse poetry. The strict stanzaic structure limited the effective syntactic patterns that a poet could use. This is not to say that a skilled poet had only a few options for how to compose in any meter—poets can and did compose varying poems in fornyrðislag—but rather that the stanzaic forms introduced limits that poets composing stichic poems did not face. The two meters with hypermetric elements opened up additional options for fluent syntactic patterning that poets could use to expand their repertoire. In many cases, poets chose the meter most appropriate to the material to compose their poems, such as the Átlamál poet, who chose málaháttr to compose a particularly stirring narrative, or the Hávamál poet, who chose ljóðaháttr, occasionally augmented by galdralag, to formalize and ritualize his list of gnomic wisdom. Some poets, however, demonstrated a particular facility with the meter and used the metrical features to their utmost. For the poets of the three eddic praise poems, that meant switching fluidly back and forth between the meters to integrate and augment the excitement of battle scenes with the formality of the aftermath, the commonality of the mead hall with the nobility of great kings and gods, or whatever else the poet might combine to create just the right bent to his poem. With such accomplished poets, therefore, trying to assign finite purposes for metrical shifts does not suffice. Instead, we must examine how the meter and syntax interact in unique ways in the context of each stanza and what those individual combinations reveal about what the poet might have been trying to show.

Chapter 4: The Old Saxon Heliand: Working through Ambiguity Introduction Like Old Norse, Old Saxon developed differently from Old English, and the linguistic environment created metrical differences between the two traditions. Unlike Old Norse, though, entire new meters did not develop; instead, the stichic alliterative long-line remained the norm, just with new tendencies in line length and drop structure. Where Old Norse has a particularly strong root stress, Old Saxon stands at the opposite end of the spectrum, with Old English in the middle, and is characterized by a particularly weak root stress. As demonstrated by Suzuki (2004: 11–23), the weakening of the stress in Old Saxon is shown by such sound changes as the restoration of syncopated vowels and the addition of vowel epenthesis.1 According to Russom (1998: 137), weak linguistic stress also results in weak metrical subordination. This combination has three important results that affect the shape of the metrical patterns. First and most simply, each word has more syllables in Old Saxon than in Old English. Second, because the weak metrical subordination makes them prominent, drops can be expanded with more of the function words that are used in prose but often omitted in poetry. Third, because the later stressed positions are not as strongly subordinated to initial stressed positions, resolution is frequent on later positions in the verse, even in secondary stress. These changes lead to long lines with multiple unstressed words and loose restrictions on all of the drops. Because of the lengthening of the line, Lehmann (1956) asserts that Old Saxon poetry is a tradition in decline. The Heliand poet may have been trying to cling to traditional Germanic verse form as it is seen in the Old English tradition, he argues, but linguistic changes that increased the length of each

1 Suzuki, following the analysis of Dresher and Lahiri (1991), argues that syncope and apocope occur by the process of “defooting.” In this process, the non-root syllable loses its status as a separate foot, and when it is connected to the previous foot, the unstressed vowel has such low prominence that it is lost. According to Suzuki, the restoration of syncopated vowels in Old Saxon shows that defooting is not in effect, which in turn shows that the primary stress of each word is weaker. Similarly, he argues that only a strong primary stress can be followed by a liquid plus another consonant in the same syllable. Therefore, the insertion of an extra vowel between the liquid and the consonant, as in sorgon > sorogon, indicates a more weakly stressed root syllable (2004: 11–23). https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501513688-005

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drop stretched the line to the limits and caused the traditional verse structure to break down. Suzuki (2004) argues against that hypothesis, claiming that rather than a decline in the alliterative tradition, Old Saxon poetry demonstrates its remaking. He claims that, although the linguistic development of Old Saxon made it all but impossible to adhere to the metrical standard apparent in Old English, the Old Saxon poet developed new standards that nevertheless maintain a metrically cohesive system.2 In this chapter, I investigate the results of the linguistic development on the hypermetric sections of Heliand. To some extent, my observations show that Lehmann may be correct that the system is breaking down: the weakening of restrictions leads to ambiguous verse patterns that create overlap between normal and hypermetric verse, and the poet does not maintain the careful distribution patterns that distinguish the two. Nevertheless, evidence of organization persists. While the hypermetric lines can grow quite long, the cadence remains stable and the onset is the sight of most of the expansion. This combination leads me to argue that the more flexible use of hypermetric composition is part of the reorganization suggested by Suzuki and that this flexibility helps the poet to compose effectively in the alliterative long-line. Because hypermetric meter is not as distinct from normal verse as it is in Old English, the poet can switch into hypermetric meter more readily and for a briefer amount of time. The extra flexibility may have originally come from the increase in unstressed syllables due to linguistic change—the frequent need for more space than standard verse patterns allow created an increase in typical verse length, which occasionally led to a hypermetric verse in a normal section—but once the flexibility arose, the poet used it for more reasons than just that. Given the option, the poet employs the occasional hypermetric verse or line to increase the formality or descriptive ability of a phrase, or to facilitate the translation of a dense biblical clause. He also uses hypermetric composition in distinctive ways, sometimes switching to the long meter for very long passages, sometimes using only brief snippets. The wider range of hypermetric effects available to the poet makes the meter vital to the poet’s task of communicating the biblical story to his Saxon

2 Specifically, Suzuki argues that verses are no longer split into distinct subtypes on the basis of a normal or heavy drop in the first unstressed position (as in type A1: –́×–́× versus type A2a –́–̀–́×). Instead, the drops form a sort of continuum, from monosyllabic drops formed by an inflectional ending to long drops that include several separate words and perhaps even a half-stress. In this system, no verse requires double alliteration, but it becomes more and more common as the verses get heavier (2004: 29–66).

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audience. When the poem was composed, the Saxons were a newly converted people, still chaffing under the rule of their conqueror Charlemagne and his successor Louis the Pious and still resisting the new religion imposed on them.3 The precise composition of the poem’s audience is unclear, but most scholars agree that, whether largely religious, lay, or a combination thereof, the audience needed further instruction in the Christian faith to fully understand it.4 The poet therefore had the difficult task of making this rather foreign narrative of a humble martyr comprehensible and appealing to a people who were unfamiliar with the stories and historically connected to a heroic poetic and religious tradition. He does so by deftly weaving together biblical material with the heroic tradition, using hypermetric meter to juxtapose, explain, and emphasize the points of synthesis that he uses to align the two ideologies in his audience’s minds.

Linguistic Differences and Increased Flexibility in the Old Saxon Tradition The linguistic developments of Old Saxon necessitate greater flexibility in the alliterative long-line. The language material required by the syntax simply makes for lines that are too long to be bound by the same restrictions that seem to have applied to the Old English tradition. The loss of restrictions on verse types and drop filler in turn creates ambiguity in the scansions, especially when it comes to distinguishing normal from hypermetric verse: because normal verses can be so long—with extended drops in unusual places and more

3 Most scholars currently agree that the Saxons were largely converted before the Heliand was composed. While nominally Christian, however, the Saxons may not have been particularly devoted, and the Heliand was therefore commissioned either to reinforce the conversion, which was not necessarily going well (see Woods 1985: 72 and Murphy 1989: 11–31), or to educate the newly converted people on the new religion (see Cathey 1999: 169, Schulman 2003: 16–17, and Rembold 2017: 176–78). 4 Although Mierke claims that “scholarly consensus, supported by paleographic evidence, is that the text was read during monastic ceremonies (such as grace and prayer) and during liturgical celebrations” (2010: 99), others argue that it could have been shared in both monasteries and mead halls (see Green 2003: 254–55 and Matzner 2008: 117), that it was primarily directed at the educated elite among laymen (see Murphy 2010: 37, Rembold 2017) or even that it was meant to be read aloud to the illiterate masses (Schulman 2003: 16). Even if it were a purely monastic text, it was likely part of an effort to promote a German literary tradition in order to facilitate the learning of Christianity (see Rupp 1978: 35–39), and the more it was intended for a lay audience, the more important the goals of instruction and acceptance would have been.

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than two stress words in a line—they overlap with some allowable hypermetric patterns. The situation is complicated further because the poet does not group the hypermetric lines neatly in longer passages but instead includes alternate distribution patterns. In this section, I will examine the linguistic differences that create these ambiguities and explore the specific verse types that overlap. I will also show the distribution patterns that seem to be both allowable and typical. I will then use that combination to determine what verses I believe make up the hypermetric corpus in Heliand.

Flexibility within the Verse Types The restrictions on poetic composition are relaxed in a variety of ways. The first of these is simply the length of the drops. Not only can the drops grow quite long, but drops that have strict limitations in the other Germanic languages, specifically anacrusis and the first drop in a type D*, do not have the same limitations in Old Saxon. These two positions are limited in length in Old English: they can be up to two syllables long but are usually only one. In Old Saxon, though, there does not appear to be an upward limit, with the drops reaching nine or more syllables. Furthermore, those two positions are traditionally restricted in terms of filler. According to Suzuki (1996: 31–35), the filler of the D* drop must be clearly related to the first lift, so it cannot be anything that should be considered proclitic to the following word, and most scholars agree that anacrusis is normally limited to prefixes and the negative particle. Neither of these restrictions hold in Old Saxon, as both positions contain a variety of major and minor function words, including finite verbs. Anacrusis is further limited in Old English in terms of the verses that it can attach to, but Suzuki shows that that limitation does not hold for Old Saxon either (2004: 161–65).5 Though both of these positions are more likely than other drops to be relatively short, they do not seem to have a definite upper limit on length or weight, which is why

5 According to Bliss (1962: 40–43), anacrusis can only fall on those verses in which the first breath group, which ends at the end of the first stressed word, is shorter than the second breath group. In other words, it can occur on the verse geworden in wīcun (aA1: ×–́××–́×) “occurred in dwelling places” (Beowulf 1304a) but not on a type-A verse such as frēonda fēorum (A1: –́×–́×) “for the lives of friends.” Furthermore, in type-D verses, anacrusis is almost never found on verses with tertiary stress in the third position; it almost always appears in verses with secondary stress.

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Suzuki argues that these drops should be considered fully metricalized positions (2004: 335–36). In addition to the drops, the linguistic differences also affect the contour of the lifts, specifically with the more frequent occurrences of heavy verses; that is, verses with three stress words in which one of the positions must be subordinated, as in fulgengun godes lêrun (aD*1: ×–́× ͜ ́͜ ×–̀×) “they followed the teachings of God” (Heliand 696a). Suzuki (2004: 263–68) shows that these heavy verses are not as tightly controlled in Old Saxon as they are in Old English, becoming both more common and subject to fewer restrictions. Firstly, double alliteration is not required but instead alliteration can vary widely on the basis of a system of syntactic arrangement within the line.6 Secondly, the verses commonly include additional unstressed words, unlike in Old English where heavy verses tend to be limited to only the three words that receive stress, as in bǣdde byre geonge (D*1: –́× ͜ ́͜ ×–̀×) “urged on the young boys” (Beowulf 2018a), presumably to limit the complexity of an already complex line. In Old Saxon, a single clitic is the most common addition to these lines, but it is possible to have more than one clitic, sometimes in different unstressed positions, and occasionally even an unstressed particle. Hence, a verse such as quami to them cnôsla gihue (D*4: ͜ ́͜ ×××–́××–̀) “come to each of their clans” (Heliand 347a) is not uncommon. Together with the less restricted use of unstressed positions, these verses show that the additional words and syllables in Old Saxon poetry lead to flexible verse patterns that expand the possibilities for the Germanic alliterative long-line. One major result of this flexibility is that the expanded verse patterns described above can overlap with common hypermetric patterns. Because anacrusis can contain more syllables and heavier words in Old Saxon, all light hypermetric verses overlap with anacrustic verses. Some scholars have argued that length and weight can still help to distinguish the two, pointing out that the light hypermetric onset in Old Saxon must have at least three syllables and normally contains one or more particles, whereas anacrusis is more likely to have fewer than three syllables and contain only clitics (see Hofmann 1991, 2: 170, Russom 1998: 156, and Suzuki 2004: 307–13). Nevertheless, these scholars agree that the difference is not absolute: although the two opening positions tend to employ different numbers of syllables, there is a large overlap between

6 Suzuki argues that the alliterative pattern aax is most common when the second two words make a single syntactic unit, while axa can occur when the first two words make the closest syntactic unit. Single alliteration, always axx, can appear with any syntactic arrangement, but it is most common when no two words are more closely related to each other than to the third (cf. Rieger 1876).

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the longer cases of anacrusis and the shorter off-verses in hypermetric sections (inasmuch as the two can be distinguished), and there are a few particularly long anacrustic outliers, especially in the off-verse, where longer unstressed openings seem to be preferred (Suzuki 2004: 319–20). Therefore, while it may be possible to distinguish verses that cannot be hypermetric based on length and particle use, it is not possible to determine which verses cannot be anacrustic except possibly through context (see Hofmann 1991, 2: 169, Russom 1998: 155–56, and Suzuki 2004: 319–23). The second normal verse type that tends to overlap with hypermetric verse patterns is a type D*, particularly when it is formed from three stress words and has a long first drop. Thus, in a verse such as frâhon is friunda gehuuane “[shall] love each of his friends” (Heliand 1451a), each stress word can be given a full stress, making for a type-HB verse (–́××–́×× ͜ ́͜ ×)7 or the stress on the final word can be subordinated, making a type D*4 (–́××–́×× ͜ ̀͜ ×).8 A word ending and a clitic in the first drop and a disyllabic second drop are reasonable for both possibilities, so it is difficult to tell which scansion is preferable. Perhaps the normal scansion is better in this case, given that Old English has shown that hypermetric B verses tend to be avoided. Verses such as fan themu hêroston, the thes hûses giuueld (aHB: ×××–́–̀×××–́××–́ or aD*4: ×××–́–̀×××–́××–̀) “from the most noble one, who controlled the house” (Heliand 3344a) complicate the matter. Here, the first drop would be quite heavy for a D* verse, but since more syllables are permitted and secondary stress does appear in normal drops, it is not outside the realm of possibility. Such overlapping patterns make distinguishing between normal and hypermetric verse, and thereby establishing a corpus for analysis, more difficult.

Flexibility of Distribution Patterns One easy way to distinguish between normal and hypermetric verse in the ambiguous cases would be simply to look at the second verse in the verse pair: verses in hypermetric lines or grouping should be considered hypermetric, while those outside of such groupings should not. However, Old Saxon creates some difficulties in that regard as well, for the poet seems to use a larger variety of distribution patterns. Although he tends to prefer complete hypermetric lines, usually grouped together in long passages, other distribution patterns

7 Hofmann prefers this analysis, calling the verse a type A5B52.x2.x1 in his notation. 8 Suzuki prefers this analysis, calling the verse a type D*2b in his notation.

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appear more frequently in the manuscript. Perhaps because the overlapping metrical patterns obscure the distinction between the two meters, the poet may have been more willing to switch back and forth between normal and hypermetric meters, creating mixed lines in both normal and hypermetric sections. In the hypermetric sections, there are thirty-two verses that can be scanned as normal, twenty of which do not have a possible hypermetric scansion. These verses are distributed throughout the poem, especially in the longer hypermetric passages. Of the fourteen hypermetric passages that are five lines or longer, seven of them have at least one normal verse, and five have more than one. Sometimes such normal verses are isolated within the hypermetric passages, while other times they are grouped together in short breaks. In many cases, these switches occur near the beginning or end of the passages, suggesting a sort of gradual transition between the two meters. Other times, though, the normal verse can come in the middle of the section. The different options illustrate another way the Old Saxon tradition seems to be more flexible than the Old English tradition. Hypermetric verses can also intervene in the middle of normal passages, though these are even more difficult to identify because of the ambiguity of some verse patterns. Hofmann (1991, 2: 173–74) presents a set of four criteria that he uses to determine whether or not a potentially hypermetric verse in a normal section should in fact be considered hypermetric. For a syntactic criterion, he argues that the major break in a hypermetric verse usually comes between the second and third positions, so that ambiguous verses in which the break comes later should be considered normal. In terms of structure, he states that any ambiguous verse that ends in a stressed followed by an unstressed position, whether the word break appears as –́|×–́× or –́×|–́×, must be hypermetric because there are no possible examples of a normal verse with subordinated stress in such a cadence. Lexically, he argues that ambiguous verses that open with an alliterating verb plus a particle must be hypermetric because there is no comparable pattern among unambiguously normal verses. Finally, focusing on context, he argues that all ambiguous verses in hypermetric sections should be considered hypermetric and that any other verse with the same structure should, by analogy, be analyzed the same way. According to these criteria, he is left with only eleven verses that he would consider ambiguous, and these, he argues, should also be classified as hypermetric because they would present very unusual patterns if classified as D* types. While these criteria are useful in distinguishing hypermetric verse, some of them could be reconsidered. In particular, the syntactic and analogical criteria produce a group of verses that would be unusual as hypermetric: these verses frequently end in a type B or E, often with a relatively short drop in the heavy

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onset. While no one verse stands out as completely irregular as a hypermetric verse, many of them have features more common to normal type-D* verses, such as a monosyllable in the first drop or a compound at the end of the verse. Most of these verses are the ones described above that can also be scanned as type D*, which is how Suzuki argues they should be scanned; because the group of verses seems out of the ordinary as a whole when scanned as hypermetric, and because another valid way to scan them exists, it is preferable to use the normal scansion. Nevertheless, while this explanation can reclassify several of Hofmann’s lone hypermetric verses as normal, not all of them can be explained away as such. None of the verses that he identifies as hypermetric on the basis of his second criterion—that they end in the pattern –́× following a drop—can fit into a type-D* pattern.9 In a verse such as bôtta, them thar blinde uuârun “a remedy to those who there were blind” (Heliand 2358a), even if the final stress were subordinated to eliminate the third stressed position (–́×××–́×–́×) the final drop would remain, creating a sixth position in the verse. As a group, these verses do not differ from the hypermetric norms as dramatically as the verses which Suzuki classifies as a type D*: none end in a compound and the average length of the first drop in this group is similar to the average of unambiguous hypermetric verses, with only one verse that contains a monosyllabic drop. This makes for twenty-five lone hypermetric verses, a number that does not preclude the possibility of scribal error, but still raises the possibility that the pattern might be authorial. Manuscript and comparative evidence reinforces the possibility that these additional distribution patterns are authorial. Firstly, there is less reason to suppose that scribal error caused the irregular distribution patterns because the time between the probable composition of Heliand and the extant manuscripts is much shorter than the corresponding time for most Old English poems. While the text cannot be dated exactly, it was likely composed in the

9 The verses in question are 954a, 1096a, 1110a, 1271a, 1512a, 1561a, 1667a, 1796a, 2290a, 2358a, 3125a, 3127a, 3241a, 3298a, 3971a, 4211a, 4251a, 4265a, 4986a, 5354a, 5551a, 5663a, 5892a, and 5975a. Similar are 4568a, 5379a, 5609a, and 5590a, which Suzuki also categorizes as hypermetric. These seem to fall in the same category because they end in uuunderquâla which looks like a type-A pattern. However, it is possible that uunder retained the monosyllabic value it had before the application of vowel epenthesis in Old Saxon, and so I have chosen to analyze these verses as a type D*, as does Hofmann. In addition, although it does not end in –́×, the verse that ic feldi thero forasagono uuord (aHE: ××–́××× ͜ ́͜ × ͜ ̀͜ ××–́) (1429a) should likewise be hypermetric because, as a compound, forasagono must contain secondary stress, and therefore subordinating stress on uuord would be unmetrical.

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first half of the ninth century.10 The text survives in two incomplete manuscripts and three fragments. Four of the five extant versions, the M manuscript and all three fragments, were written in the mid to late ninth century. The second manuscript, C, is the furthest removed; it was probably copied in the tenth century in England and shows some dialect variation (see Behaghel 1996: xviii and Cathey 2002: 22–24). But even this later manuscript was copied closer in time to the original than were, in all probability, the surviving copies of early Old English poems. Secondly, in addition to having a shorter period of transmission, Heliand also survives in two nearly complete manuscripts, allowing for comparison to supply more reliable evidence for authorial patterns. Although both manuscripts have some gaps, starting at line 85, where M starts, we have at least two versions of most of the text (see Behaghel 1996: xix–xxiv and Cathey 2002: 23–24). A comparison in the manuscripts of both the lone and unpaired hypermetric verses shows very little variation. Aside from one problematic section around line 5920, which has provided an unresolved editorial crux, in all the places in which the two manuscripts differ at all, the deviation tends to pertain to small orthographic or dialectal differences that do not affect the meter.11 If the distribution patterns for hypermetric verses in question resulted from scribal errors, we would expect to see a larger difference between the two

10 Traditionally, the poem has been dated on the basis of the Latin Praefatio. The terminus post quem can be set at 822 because the Praefatio B seems to have been influenced by Hrabanus’s commentary on Matthew, which was completed that year. The terminus ante quem can be set at the death of Louis the Pious in 840 because the Praefatio A claims that the Ludouuicus pijssimus Augustus, whom most scholars take to be Louis the Pious, commissioned the text to be written in his lifetime (see Doane 1991: 46 and Cathey 2002: 21–22). Some objections can be raised to these dates. Doane points out that the terminus post quem of 822 cannot be regarded as certain because the text makes no definitive reference to Hrabanus’s commentary and similar ideas were circulating through other sources at the time. He also argues, though, that “the poems [Heliand and Genesis] could not have been written much earlier than 819, that is, into the reign of Charlemagne, because they have lost touch with the real oral, popular style” (1991: 46). Cathey likewise points out that the terminus ante quem could be pushed forward on the basis of an argument proposed by Drögereit (1978), who says that some of the orthographical features, namely and a certain form of the large, were used only between 850 and 900 (according to this argument, the Augustus in the Praefatio A is Louis the German, who was referred to as Augustus in the year of his birth). While the dating is not definitive, none of the counterarguments take the poem far from the proposed date of the first half of the ninth century. 11 For example, at 3125a, the M manuscript uses the form berhte, where the C manuscript includes vowel epenthesis to make berahto, but because of resolution, the two words have the same scansion.

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manuscripts, with one of the scribes keeping to a more regular metrical pattern or at least with the two scribes presenting different errors. Finally, there is evidence of these same alternate distribution patterns in other Old Saxon poems. A comparison with the Genesis fragment provides minimal corroboration, since it has only eleven hypermetric lines, but two of those lines are clearly lone hypermetric verses in normal passages.12 More evidence can be found in the Old English translation, Genesis B, particularly of the mixed lines in hypermetric passages.13 Three out of the four larger hypermetric sections of this poem are broken up by normal lines, so that 7.6% of the hypermetric verses in groups are paired with a normal line (as compared to 5.7% of the hypermetric verses in Heliand). The combination of a larger number of verses in these unusual distribution patterns, together with the additional evidence that makes the possibility of scribal error less likely, leads me to conclude that the Old Saxon poet made use of these patterns in the original composition.

Determining the Corpus The increased ambiguity creates the question of what verses should be counted in the complete corpus of hypermetric lines in Heliand. In terms of heavy hypermetric verses, Hofmann counts all of the verses that could be considered hypermetric according to his four criteria. Suzuki counts only those verses that cannot possibly be scanned as normal. Both scholars count light hypermetric verses that appear in longer groups or are paired with a hypermetric on-verse. I believe that both of these methods are problematic because, in terms of the heavy hypermetric patterns of the on-verses, they do not take context into account. Of course, with the addition of the two mixed-line distribution patterns, context is no longer an absolute criterion, but it should still be considered. For ambiguous lines that could be scanned as either hypermetric or D*, I scan those in hypermetric sections or paired with a hypermetric verse as hypermetric and those in normal sections as D*. If a verse presents a particularly unusual

12 The verses in question are 20a and 56a; although 56a does contain a biblical name, Kain, the name is monosyllabic and so does not present a difficulty to the scansion. 13 While Genesis B should not be considered a precise record of the Old Saxon Genesis—indeed, comparison of the small overlap shows that the Old English poet made a considerable effort to shorten the lengthy drops wherever possible—the poem is a relatively close translation and generally uses the same verse types, even in those lines in which the poet omits some words.

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hypermetric pattern, I will consider the normal pattern, especially if the hypermetric passage in question has additional mixed verses. So for instance, the verse arme thurh ôdmôdi “humble through humility” (1302a) seems unusual as a hypermetric verse because it uses the generally avoided C cadence, it ends in a compound, and the first drop is relatively short. While none of these unusual features are enough to discount it as hypermetric, the combination makes it highly unusual and it is in a broken hypermetric passage, so I scan the verse as a type D*1. In those cases where no other regular scansion is possible, I do scan lines as mixed in either hypermetric or normal passages. This analysis creates one major imbalance, as Suzuki points out: it leaves open the possibility for unpaired hypermetric verses in the on-verse but not in the off-verse, creating a structural imbalance that seems counterintuitive (2004: 322). However, that inequality is not entirely without justification since, as Russom shows (1998: 145), complexity is kept to a minimum in the off-verse, and unpaired hypermetric verses are quite complex. Hofmann further notes that calling all instances of the long opening drops on type-A and -D verses outside of hypermetric sections anacrusis makes for more verses with long anacrusis containing multiple separate words in the off-verse (where we might expect a hypermetric verse with a light onset to occur) than in the on-verse. Yet, he also states that the uneven distribution of anacrustic verses is not wholly unexpected, because clauses in Old Saxon very often begin in the off-verse, and they also often start with a string of unstressed particles. Therefore, the syntactic structure of the line would call for the uneven distribution among the verses (1991, 2: 170). Because no set of more certain criteria exists, it seems safest to argue that verses with an unstressed onset should be considered hypermetric only when they appear with other hypermetric verses. These criteria make for a total of 312 hypermetric verses in Heliand, 159 of which have a heavy onset (all but four or which are in the on-verse) and 153 of which have a light onset (all but two in the off-verse). Of these, twenty-five are lone hypermetric verses in a normal passage, twenty are in mixed lines in or near hypermetric passages, fourteen are part of a lone hypermetric line, and all the rest are in regular passages.

The Composition of Old Saxon Hypermetrics Structurally, the Old Saxon hypermetric line has all the same properties as the Old English line, including similar methods of lengthening the lines by adding extra syllables to the onsets but nowhere else. Because of the general lengthening of the Old Saxon lines, hypermetric composition tends toward very long drops, often

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with multiple heavy words. Furthermore, some of the metrico-syntactic properties, such as the adherence to Kuhn’s laws, are slightly less strict. However, as the verses get more complex with the addition of these syllables, they also get simpler in that more of the verses have a type-A1 cadence, fewer extra syllables appear in the cadence, and the standard distribution of a heavy onset in the on-verse and a light onset in the off-verse occurs more regularly. Thus, the complexity that arises from the extended drops and the additional distribution patterns is in part mitigated by the limits put on the individual lines.

The Structure of the Old Saxon Line As with traditional and gnomic hypermetrics in Old English, Old Saxon hypermetrics manages complexity by expanding the onsets of the line. In terms of the light onset, the shortest onset in Old Saxon is three syllables long, and these are rare, with only eight occurrences. The most common number of syllables in the Old Saxon light onset is five, with thirty-two examples, but it is common to find four to seven syllables, with over twenty examples each. Even an eight-syllable drop is not unheard of, with fourteen examples. Only patterns with more than eight syllables are rare, yet these verses still exist, with one onset that has as many as fourteen syllables. The verses are also heavier than Old English verses: every onset has at least one particle and all but two have more than one. This difference likely developed from the larger number of particles in general that are used in Old Saxon literature, but the preference for particles seems to have been codified so that the light onsets have a particularly high prominence as a drop and what might look standard in Old English would be marked as weak in Old Saxon. The heavy onset of the on-verse provides a starker contrast to Old English. Again, the heavy onset is longer and heavier. While monosyllabic drops are common, with eighteen examples, the preferred length is two to four syllables; in fact, the four-syllable drop is the best-attested variety, at thirty instances. Longer drops are also frequent: eight instances with five syllables, five with six, four with seven, one with eight, and even one with eleven. These drops are also more likely to contain particles than the heavy onsets in traditional Old English poems, though they are similar to gnomic poems in this regard. Of the heavy onsets, fifty-seven, or 35.8%, contain particles, and many of these have more than one or have heavier particles such as finite verbs. Furthermore, the onset is heavier in other ways. As in normal verse in Old Saxon, the drop in the heavy onset is more likely to have secondary stress in addition to multiple unstressed syllables, with an incidence at 8.8%. These

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onsets are also more likely to take anacrusis, which occurs at even a higher rate than anacrusis does in Old Saxon overall.14 The difference suggests that, even more than in Old English, the Old Saxon poet uses hypermetric verse in situations where extra length and unstressed positions might be useful for ease of narration or translation, maximizing the extra space through the use of anacrusis and heavy syllables in addition to the extra positions built into the line. The cadence stands in contrast to the onset, looking even more tightly structured than in Old English. Two-word patterns are by far the norm, with only six examples (1.9%) of a cadence with a single word and one example (0.3%) with three stressed words. The cadence is further simplified by the relative paucity of unstressed words: only twelve (3.8%) have one or more extra words, all of which are clitics. Of these, five have only the negative clitic ne while just one has two words. Such simple patterns are particularly noteworthy in the context of Old Saxon, where unstressed words abound and verses with three stresses are far more common than they are in Old English verse. The poet also maintains this simplicity when it comes to the verse types he uses in the hypermetric cadence. He uses type A 92.6% of the time, as compared to just 3.2% and 2.9% for types D and E, respectively. Type-B cadences are possible, as Hofmann identifies thirteen,15 but many of these are lone verses that can be reanalyzed as a type D* and the rest can also be reanalyzed as type HE. There are only four possible type-C cadences; they all appear in hypermetric sections,16 but two of those could be scanned as normal type-D verses intervening in the hypermetric sections. The overall combination of length, filler, and verse type make the Old Saxon cadence very simple.17 Thus, the structure of the verse shows an extreme version of the contrast that can be found in Old English: the onset is very flexible and presents opportunities for the poet to fit in quite a range of syntactic material, while the cadence is very simple and creates clear verse patterns for the audience.

14 Suzuki calculates that about 13.1% (1453 verses) of the normal verses take anacrusis (2004: 170), whereas 21.5% (67 verses) of the hypermetric verses have it. 15 The verses in question are 347a, 1107a, 1144a, 1429a, 1451a, 1730a, 3344a, 3545a, 5420a, 5552a, 5654a, 5690a, and 5755b. 16 The verses in question are 604a, 1687a, 2821a, and 2826a. 17 Hofmann and Suzuki allow for one more possibility, a verse with four stressed positions. While such a verse type does seem to exist in the Old English gnomic poems, they were common only in Maxims I, where hypermetric verses made up a large percentage of the poem and the four-stress verses therefore create a way to add extra emphasis in an already rhetorically heightened situation. No such context exists in Heliand, and many of the four-position verses can be reanalyzed as regular hypermetric verses (such as 1687a) or come in places in the manuscript that are contentious for other reasons (such as 5690a and 5920a).

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Verse Grammar in Old Saxon In terms of verse grammar, Old Saxon hypermetrics is similar to Old English hypermetrics, except that some of the features that make Old Saxon poetry in general looser and more similar to prose—namely a slightly higher incidence of violations to Kuhn’s laws and a heavier use of particles in various positions— get carried over and even exaggerated in the hypermetric lines. Kuhn’s laws show this trend quite clearly. Kuhn (1969: 15–16) argues that the laws are quite difficult to analyze in Old Saxon, claiming that the large number of words in each line makes it difficult to determine clause boundaries, verse boundaries, and where the first stress falls in each verse. In addition, the manuscripts vary in terms of when and where particles are used. In spite of these difficulties, he argues that the number of violations in normal verse is relatively low: he finds 112 possible violations—although because the violations cannot be analyzed with absolute certainly, he argues that only fifty-two of these verses should be considered certain exceptions—which is less than 1% of the verses in the poem. The hypermetric verses have a slightly higher incidence of violations than the poem overall: sixteen verses, or 5.1% of the hypermetric verses.18 Notably, all of the verses with violations are in the on-verse; with the light onset, all of the off-verse can neatly arrange the particles at the start of the clause, where they do not cause any problems. In all but two cases, the violations result from anacrusis. Each of these verses opens a new clause and so can present two problems, both of which can be seen in thiu helpe quam te heƀencuninge (aHD3: ×–́××× ͜ ́͜ × ͜ ́ –̀×) “the help came to the heaven-king” (4415a). The verse opens with a drop that, because it also opens the clause, constitutes a clause upbeat. The only word in this clause upbeat is thiu, a clitic, so the verse violates Kuhn’s second law. In addition, the second drop of the verse has an unstressed particle, quam, and so it violates Kuhn’s first law. Some of the fourteen verses likewise violate both of the laws, but they all violate at least one. Significantly, some of these violations may be a result of stylistic changes in Old Saxon. Kuhn (1969: 19–21) argues that many common violations result from shifts in poetic style evident in Heliand. Perhaps the most common of these shifts involve the addition of function words such as articles and possessives, which would not have been required in earlier poetry and which often cause violations when poets add them to older formulae (1969: 18–19). Such could explain the violation in verse 4415a above. If the definite article thiu

18 The verses in question are 954a, 1561a, 1685a, 1973a, 2214a, 2822a, 2989a, 2990a, 3068a, 3494a, 3495a, 3496a, 3502a, 4415a, 5918a, and 5919a.

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were removed, the verse would no longer have a clause upbeat and quam would stand in the first drop of the verse clause, making the verse perfectly acceptable.19 The last two exceptional verses, 1973a and 2214a, do not have anacrusis but instead have unstressed particles even though they are in the second verse of the clause. Kuhn argues that this arrangement, too, is the result of a stylistic change. He argues that, traditionally, the onset of a clause corresponded with the beginning of the line, causing poets to group particles together at the start of the on-verse. Heliand adopts the so-called bow style or hooked style, in which the clauses generally start in the middle of the line at the caesura, meaning that the extended drops ought to occur at the start of the off-verse. While the Heliand poet mostly shifts his particle placement accordingly, Kuhn finds several examples in which the verse starts on the off-verse but the following on-verse also has unstressed particles in the first drop. While a number of verses have violations that are understandable, these explanations are valid for violations in normal verse as well, and it is noteworthy that so many more violations exist in hypermetric verse. The increase in violations relate to two features of the hypermetric on-verse that distinguish hypermetric from normal composition: the weight of the drop in the heavy onset and the increased use of anacrusis. As explained above, the drop of the heavy onset is filled by a particle more commonly than verse-medial drops elsewhere. This means that the on-verses are more likely to cause problems with Kuhn’s laws when they do not open the clause. Furthermore, anacrusis is more common on hypermetric verses, and it creates a further complication because it adds an extra drop to the start of the verse. Therefore, even if the on-verse begins a clause, anacrusis can constitute the first drop, and if any particles occur in the subsequent drop, those particles will stand in violation of Kuhn’s first law as well. In addition, since anacrusis frequently does not have a particle, it will often create a violation of Kuhn’s second law when it opens a clause. Even though the violations have a clear structural motivation, the shift toward more violations might represent a less strict attitude toward the poetic features of hypermetric lines in some cases. In normal verse, most of the particles appear in long strings in the first drop of a type A3, B, or C, or sometimes even in extended anacrusis. When these verses begin a clause, they both employ particles in the clause upbeat and provide a place for most, if not all, of the particles of the entire clause. The rest of the drops can therefore be devoid

19 Verses 2290a and 5918a likewise have violations created by articles, and 3495a and 3496a have similar problems with possessives.

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of particles and thereby have no opportunity to violate Kuhn’s laws. Yet the common distribution of particles in normal verse cannot be accounted for by meter alone, for these verse types frequently occur in the middle of the clause, in which case the drops lack particles and instead consist of only clitics. The two distinct methods of composition suggest that the poet was quite conscious of where he was placing particles: he fills the drop with particles where the meter calls for it but avoids them elsewhere. He could have done something similar with the hypermetric verses, where there is the perfect position for particles: the light onset of the off-verse. He could even have put particles in the first lift of the on-verse when it opens a clause only, but not in other instances. Such a method of composition would be similar to the method he uses to compose type-B and -C verses. By not doing so, the poet seems to be adhering to a different, more informal standard of composition. Because attention to that intersection is one way in which poets add a degree of artificiality and archaism to the diction of the poems that can create a high style, this shift gives a more informal tone to the hypermetric passage, or at least the ones that have a higher incidence of violations. Passages that present narrative or indirect speech, such as the indirect explanation of the parable of the vineyard, have more violations of Kuhn’s laws. In moments of particular formality, such as the Sermon on the Mount, the poet avoids any violations in the twenty-two hypermetric lines, making for a more formal tone. The use and placement of verbs in the hypermetric lines reinforces the informality of the hypermetric passages, though only in part. Table 4.1 shows the placement of finite verbs in the hypermetric verse of Heliand.

Table 4.1: Finite verb placement in Old Saxon hypermetrics. Position ana st lift

Heavy nd nd onset drop lift drop

rd lift

rd drop

Light onset

th lift

th drop

Final th lift drop

Auxiliary

























Copula

























Lexical

























Total

























This table shows two significant differences from the conservative Old English poems. First, instead of limiting the types of verbs that can appear in each position, the Old Saxon poet uses every type of verb in almost every position in

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which a verb can appear; the only exception is anacrusis, and it has only two instances of verbs. This is not to say that the preference for certain verbs in certain positions has been entirely lost: the lifts have a strong preference for lexical verbs, whereas nearly half the finite verbs that appear in the light onset are copulas or auxiliaries. Hence, the tendency to prefer lexical verbs in these stronger positions remains, but no longer to the exclusion of the other types of verbs. In this way, Old Saxon is more similar to the Old English gnomic poems, which also stretches what is allowable, but it has a greater degree of flexibility. The other major difference in Old Saxon is the use of the onsets, particularly the light onset. In both cases, heavier verbs are allowed. Whereas copulas dominate the drop of the heavy onset in both the conservative and gnomic poems in Old English, with lexical verbs present but rare, auxiliaries dominate in Old Saxon and lexical verbs are more common than copulas. In the light onsets, the three types of verbs are relatively comparable in Old English, whereas in Old Saxon lexical verbs dominate. This difference probably results from the overall greater prominence of the drops in Old Saxon verse. Because the drops are not distinguished as sharply from the lifts as they are in the Old English tradition, the poet is able to include even heavier material in the light onset and take full advantage of the extended drop. This expanded use of the light onset also leads to perhaps the most salient difference in verb placement from conservative Old English: the prominent use of the light onset overall for finite verbs, with over three times as many verbs as the final lift, almost half of which are lexical verbs. The gnomic poems show a similar shift in verb placement toward the light onset, but the new position is far more dominant in Old Saxon. While this trend shows a break with conservative Old English composition, it does not necessarily show a break from normal composition in Old Saxon. With the proliferation of unstressed words in Old Saxon comes the need for a place to put them all. Therefore, as noted above, the Old Saxon poet oftentimes fills the opening of a type B or a type C, and sometimes even anacrusis, with far more syllables than the corresponding position tends to contain in Old English, frequently including all the particles for the entire clause and leaving the rest of the verses relatively short and simple. While finite verbs do not always join the less strongly stressed particles in these positions and can come in later stressed positions, they appear in the opening drop of the clause often, especially if they are auxiliary verbs. Hypermetric lines create an even more convenient clause-initial drop for these verbs, since the drop is particularly heavy and always corresponds with the opening of the clause. The poet therefore seems to have taken advantage of this drop to benefit from the convenient practice of grouping all the particles at the start of the clause already in use in the sections of normal verse in the poem. The greater

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flexibility of verb placement in Old Saxon hypermetrics, then, does not distinguish them from normal hypermetric composition but instead shows how the poet expands upon the normal trends in hypermetric verse. A similar trend can be seen in relative verb frequency. One interesting feature of Old Saxon is that it contains more finite verbs in normal meter, on average in around 50% of the verses, than in the Old English. Therefore, when the number of finite verbs per verse increases in the hypermetric sections, which occurs in Old Saxon just as it does in Old English, the sections contain a very high number of syntactic breaks. As a whole, the Old Saxon hypermetric verses have a finite verb in 70.8% of the verses overall. Lone verses and lines are less likely to have verbs than hypermetric lines in longer passages, however; in the passages, 84.7% of the verses have a verb. While the overall average is comparable to the average for conservative Old English poems, the passage average exceeds the Old English average and is in fact greater than any of the conservative poems except Guthlac A. This suggests that, in combination with other flexible features, the poet uses verb placement in hypermetric passages to create a more prosaic feel that can increase clarity and narrative progress. It also shows a distinction between the longer passages, in which the poets include quite a large number of syntactic breaks, and the individual hypermetric verses in lines, which the poet could use to create added formality without a syntactic motivation.

Two Modes of Hypermetric Composition As discussed above, more distribution patterns appear to be allowable in Old Saxon poetry than in Old English. These patterns can ultimately be broken down into two categories: large passages and small passages. The large passages comprise five or more complete lines, or ten verses. Sometimes these passages are hypermetric throughout, but often they are broken up by normal verse. The small passages, in contrast, are mostly made up of one to four verses, which usually appear contiguously though are occasionally broken up. There are two exceptions: one consistent group of five verses and one broken group that has six hypermetric verses,20 but the short passages generally do not exceed two full hypermetric lines. The idiosyncratic lack of hypermetric passages with five to nine verses suggests that these two patterns are discrete and therefore, perhaps, employed in different situations for different rhetorical purposes.

20 The passages in question are 3036b–3038 and 1553b–1556.

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The large passages are quite similar to Old English composition and tend to be employed for a combination of rhetorical heightening and practical purposes. As the Old English poets did, the Heliand poet frequently employs this combination in speeches: three long hypermetric passages include some direct speech sections, and eight are entirely spoken. These speeches tend to be important moments delivered by significant figures. The first is given by Caesar (557–561), the next by the three wise men (599b–605), the third by John the Baptist (897b–903a), and the rest by Jesus himself, including a section of the Sermon on the Mount (1300–1321a; this passage does include some indirect speech as well as direct speech), the end of his explanation of the Lord’s Prayer (1681–1689), the moment he charges Peter to be the rock upon which to build the church (3062–3072), and a description of doomsday (which has two longer hypermetric sections, 4392–4396 and 4411–4418, with an extended normal section in the middle). Possibly, the poet switches to hypermetric lines in these moments to give the added weight of the longer lines, even as the hypermetric features such as more syntactic breaks and finite verbs allows the poet to use more natural speech patterns that are easier to understand. This combination can be seen clearly in John the Baptist’s introductory speech at lines 897b–903a. In the corresponding section in Matthew, John only tells people to prepare themselves and quotes Isaiah in order to explain that he is preparing for the coming of Christ. His speech in Heliand starts similarly, with John saying that he can baptize the people but is only clearing the way for one who can wipe away their sins. As the speech builds, it switches into hypermetric mode at the end when John claims that he shall lêrean thesa liudi, huuô sea sculin iro gilôƀon haldan (A1: –́×××–́×) (hA1: ×××××××–́×–́×) thurh hluttran hugi, endi that sie an hellea ni thurƀin, (B1: ×–́× ͜ ́͜ ×) (hA1: ×××××–́××–́×) faran an fern that hêta. Thes uuirðid sô fagan an is môde (HA1: ͜ ́͜ ××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××× ͜ ́͜ ×××–́×) man te sô managaro stundu, sô huue sô that mên forlâtid, (HA1: –́×× ͜ ́͜ ×××–́×) (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) gerno thes gramon anbusni, — sô mag im thes gôdon giuuirkean, (HD1: –́×× ͜ ́͜ ×–́–× (hA1: ××××–́××–́×) ̀ ) huldi heƀencuninges, — sô huue sô haƀad hluttra treuua (HD3: –́× ͜ ́͜ × ͜ ́ –̀×) (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) up te them alomahtigon gode. (Heliand 897b–903a) (HE: –́×× ͜ ́͜ ×–̀×× ͜ ́͜ ×) “teach the people how they shall hold their belief through a pure heart. And that they do not need to go into hell, in that hot hell. For this one becomes very glad in his mind for

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many an hour, whoever eagerly forsakes that sin, the law of the devil, so can work for himself this grace of the good heaven-king, everyone who has pure loyalty up to the almighty God.”

This last section is added to the Bible and provides directions on what a new convert should do. As such, it is particularly relevant to the Saxon audience.21 The poet uses the longer passage at the end of the speech to conclude it on a rhetorical high-note, drawing emphasis to the moment and bringing the audience’s attention to the import of what is being said. The additional flourish of variation—an fern that hêta for hellea and later these gramon anbusni for mên— adds to the rhetorical heightening of the moment. At the same time, the author also uses the hypermetric ending of the speech to make these important words particularly straightforward. In the six hypermetric lines, the poet includes a clause break at every caesura, making the sentences relatively simple. While they do include variation, each instance of variation is limited to a single phrase that is near the antecedent, so the syntax is not difficult to parse. Furthermore, the light onsets often have connections, with conjunctions (endi), adverbs (huue, sô), and pronouns (Thes, sô huue sô) all serving connective roles. These features make the message easy to follow and understand. Thus, the longer passages with the combined roles of heightening the tone and simplifying the syntax that are common in Old English are useful for the message of the Heliand. The short passages do not have the same association with narrative progress because they often do not extend beyond one or possibly two clauses. Instead, they seem to be more closely associated with formality and emphasis: the poet can expand a single verse or line, occasionally a few verses, at key moments in which he wishes a phrase or idea to stand out. Frequently, this emphasis is created not just by the length but also by extra description that draws attention to the subject of the verse. In particular, the cadence is often filled with a noun plus a modifier, either an adjective or another noun in the genitive, so that a verse can contain a particularly descriptive noun phrase in addition to the material in the onset, as in thar uppe far them alouualdan fader (aHE: ×–́××× ͜ ́͜ ×–̀× ͜ ́͜ ×) “there up before the all-ruling father” (1973a), the first verse in a lone hypermetric line. Without an extra stressed position, this verse would only be able to fit either alouualdan or fader; because it is hypermetric, the poet

21 G. Ronald Murphy in fact argues in his translation that this section “may contain the clearest statement of the author’s intent in composing the Heliand, putting the gospel in Northern terms: so that the Saxons will be able to have a clear-minded grasp of their new faith” (1992: 32).

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can use the much more exalted term for God. The descriptive feature is particularly prevalent in the lone verses or lines, which rarely contain finite verbs but are heavier on nouns and adjectives, especially because the lone verses are always in the on-verse where they have an additional stressed position. Thus, these short passages most frequently add to the weight and expansiveness of the noun phrases. These short groupings suggest an expanded conception of hypermetric composition overall. Certainly, the long passages appear similar to what we would expect from Old English: though they contain slightly more irregularity in the verse grammar and are not always consistently hypermetric, they still seem to be motivated by the same combination of rhetorical and syntactic concerns as the Old English passages. The short groupings, though, seem almost to be an additional option that has been added to the traditional five types. Perhaps because of the increased ambiguity between normal and hypermetric composition, the poet did not consider the two options as clearly distinctive. Hypermetric verses can, therefore, be a sixth type of verse that the poet could choose when the need arose. Though he uses the hypermetric option only rarely, the poet can still do so in a normal section when his syntactic or descriptive needs require him to expand the line beyond the typical boundaries of the five types.

Converting the Bible through Hypermetrics These divergent forms of hypermetric passages can be connected through one important concern of the poet: his need to instruct his newly converted Saxon fellows in Christianity in a way that they would find appealing. Many scholars have pointed out the myriad ways in which the Heliand poet shifts or adds details to give the poem a more Germanic and heroic coloring. In particular, the poet adds details to scenes that would have resonated with his audience, such as those involving feasts and seafaring, to make them resemble traditional scenes that can be found in other Germanic poems (see Magennis 1985, Murphy 1989: 57–73, Matzner 2008: 118–19, and Moynihan 2012); he uses poetic and heroic terms that characterize poetry and distinguish it from prose (see Woods 1985, Murphy 1989: passim, Cathey 1999, and Augustyn 2002: 57–145); and he focuses on heroic issues such as the role of fate, bravery in the face of opposition, and personal loyalty to one’s lord (see Swisher 1991, Augustyn 2002, Schulman 2003, and Murphy 2010). Some contention remains over whether such changes were a deliberate choice on the part of the poet (for example, Woods 1985, Murphy 1989, and Augustyn 2002) or a necessary result of composing in the epic style (for example, Green 2003 and Matzner 2008). This in turn leads to the question of whether or not

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the poem is the poet’s attempt at “Germanicization” of Christianity. In terms of the way the arguments are articulated, they range from Murphy’s assertion that the Christ figure in the poem could be deemed the “Saxon Savior” (1989) to Green’s argument that the poem avoids syncretism altogether and instead engages in subordination of the Germanic concepts under the Christian ones (2003), with most scholars falling somewhere in the middle (see Augustyn 2002 and 2004, Haferland 2010, Rembold 2017). While they prefer different terminology and emphasis, however, most of these scholars make largely the same points: that when the poet refers to pagan concepts such as fate, he creates a relationship where fate falls under God’s power (see Woods 1985: 72, Augustyn 2002: 62–110, Green 2003: 255–58, Matzner 2008: 139–40, and Murphy 2010: 47–50); that although the poet emphasizes the places where Christianity and the Germanic religions overlap, he also illustrates those aspects of Christianity that oppose the Germanic tradition (see Rupp 1978: 39 and Woods 1985: 72); and that the parallels used to show that Jesus is similar to Germanic lords or gods also show that Jesus ultimately supersedes them in power and in the gifts he can give to mankind (Woods 1985: 73–74, Schulman 2003: 19, and Haferland 2010: 230–33). Thus, while not all of these scholars would go so far as to agree with Green’s assertion that “What starts by looking like a Christian concession (pagan temples are maintained) conceals a radical break (altars in place of idols) and is meant to lead to the victory of the new (acknowledgement of the Christian God)” (2003: 251), they would appreciate his comparison with the strategy of accommodation that Pope Gregory suggested to convert England. In describing how these methods of accommodation were enacted, Moynihan asserts that “[i]n contrast to the older and largely discredited notion that the Heliand-poet simply ‘germanicized’ his biblical material, what actually took place is a far more complex and artistically creative strategy or religio-cultural re-contextualization, accommodation, and amalgamation” (2012: 158). He says this to emphasize his claim that the added Germanic material is neither superficial nor haphazard but rather a subtle and sophisticated attempt at accommodation that beneficially melds the two traditions. Though he argues specifically in reference to the scenes that bring in elements of the Germanic mead hall, the argument holds true at all levels of the poem, and often the detail and clarity required for this effort can be aided by hypermetric composition. The combination of added emphasis and precise diction allows these passages to illustrate connections to salient Germanic concepts such as loyalty to one’s lord or the importance of traditional wisdom in a way that highlights the ideas that the Saxons need to learn and accept. Hypermetrics, therefore, are central to the poet’s effort to convert the Saxons by converting the Bible into a text they can appreciate.

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The Sermon on the Mount Murphy argues that the poet makes the Sermon on the Mount one of the central moments for his conversion of the biblical story, giving it a disproportionate amount of space in the text (1989: 81). In making it a key moment for his teaching, the poet must insure that the Sermon can both appeal to and be relevant for the Saxon audience, even as it remains true to the central teaching of Christianity. The poet begins this adaptation by giving the sermon a heroic frame, using traditional vocabulary to characterize the listeners as a heroic band of warriors (see Murphy 1989: 81 and Haferland 2010: 216). Furthermore, the poet shifts the emphasis of the speech itself to better engage and instruct the heroic warriors of his own audience. Murphy argues that the poet carefully constructs each beatitude to place the less palatable part in indirect speech while the reward is in direct speech, so that while both parts are clear, the reward receives more emphasis. Rembold adds that, while making the directives more active, the poet also focuses them on topics such as the need for charity and justice and the problems of riches and blood feuds (2017: 184), thereby making the topics apply directly to the changes in behavior that the Saxon nobility might be expected to make. While making these changes, according to Murphy, the poet emphasizes Jesus’s role as a dispenser of secret wisdom, giving him some similarities to traditional figures such as Oðinn, who likewise has access to secret knowledge and shares it with his chosen followers. By emphasizing Jesus’s wisdom, the poet is able to highlight an aspect of him that the Saxon warriors would respect, even if he does not have the same martial prowess that is present in the more traditional heroic figures (1989: 81–90). None of these changes are particularly substantive, but they shift the focus just enough to make the sermon palatable to a Saxon audience that remains attached to older ways of thinking while still addressing behaviors they would have to change. Hypermetric composition helps to facilitate the way the poet controls emphasis and draws attention to this important part of the poem. The largest hypermetric passage in the poem, lines 1300–1321, is in the middle of the sermon. In part, this is probably an instance of rhetorical heightening, with an extended passage of the long lines meant to highlight the vital passage. Other features add to the formality. While Kuhn’s laws are violated more in hypermetric passages than normal verse, none of the violations appear in this passage. The standardized placement of unstressed particles suggests that the poet here maintains a higher degree of formality than he does in other hypermetric passages. Furthermore, the passage has seven instances of variation, a feature that is normally minimized in hypermetric passages. By bringing

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together the most formal compositional features while reducing the more prosaic ones, the poet maximizes the formality and impact of the passage. As a second strategy to draw attention to this passage and foreground the material, the poet expands the onsets in a way that allows him to translate the prose of the Bible more closely at this moment. Fitting the prose into the alliterative meter is difficult in many places, but it is especially difficult in this section, where the Latin is simple and specific. Translating the terse clauses into Old Saxon creates difficulties because the Germanic poem requires both more grammatical words and more expansive speech that can assist with alliteration. The hypermetric lines provide the necessary space for the poet to at least closely approximate the original Latin, which perhaps gives the passage an even more formal tone than the hypermetrics alone, especially in the eyes of the initiated, who could recognize the similarity to the biblical language. For example, one sentence in the Latin reads Beati qui esuriunt et sitiunt iustitiam: quoniam ipsi saturabuntur “Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for justice: because they themselves will be satisfied” (Matthew 5:6). This sentence is typical of the statements in this section: it starts by describing a category of people who are blessed—usually through the use of beati followed by the relative pronoun with the appropriate form of the verb “to be” omitted— and ends by describing what their fate will be in the future. Whereas the Latin form is short, the Old Saxon form needs to be longer since it includes the omitted form of the verb “to be” as well as the auxiliary verbs necessary to create the future tense. Together with all of these function words are only a few words that would typically receive stress. By using hypermetric verses, the poet is able to translate the Latin relatively closely in only four verses: Salige sind ôc, the sie hîr frumono gilustid, (hA1: ×××××××× ͜ ́͜ ×××–́×) / rincos, that sie rehto adômien. (HA1: –́×××–́××–́×) | Thes môtun sie uuerðan an them rîkia drohtines (hD*2: ××××××××–́×–́ ͜ ̀ ×) / gifullit thurh iro ferhton dâdi (aHA1: ×–́××××–́×–́×) “Blessed are also those who long for good here, men, so that they judge rightly. For this, they can become fulfilled in the kingdom of the lord through their wise deeds” (1308b–1310a). Through the light onset, the hypermetric lines fit the necessary parts of the original without creating irregular lines or extending the length over a large number of verses.22 In the first verse of the translation, the poet includes the predicate nominative, copula, and relative pronoun in the onset that opens the first clause, along with a few other

22 As one reviewer kindly noted, matching of syntactic structures to verses resembles the sententious matching of parallel clauses to parallel meanings in the Bible, not only in the beatitudes but in the poetic psalms and as a rhetorical device in biblical prose.

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unstressed words. The light onset that opens the second clause includes several pronouns, the auxiliary verb, and the infinitive uuerðan.23 The two light onsets can therefore take care of most of the function words, including the particles that would need to be stressed if they appeared later in the clause. Because the drop of the heavy onset is longer than a normal drop, it provides ample room for any other necessary unstressed words. The translation is not exactly word for word. In order to provide for alliteration, the poet also includes variation, adding rincos, that sie rehto adômien to sie hîr frumono gilustid. The poet likewise adds thurh iro ferhton dâdi, a detail that is not in the original, to the second clause, probably to create alliteration again. While accounting for the poetic requirements, these additions also add a bit of Germanic flavor to the passage. The variation is, of course, the most recognizable stylistic flourish in the alliterative long-line. At the same time, the prepositional phrase adds reference to important deeds, a significant aspect of the Germanic heroic code. In this case, though, the deeds are wise rather than brave. Thus, the poet is able to take this focus on wisdom over martial prowess and elevate it further by linking it with a heroic concept, thereby creating an additional connection between the Germanic and Christian ideals.24 Though significant, these additions are nevertheless relatively small. The poet needs a minimum of four verses to translate the two clauses from the Bible, since he needs the light onset to fit the function words of each clause, and he does not go beyond the four-verse minimum. The translation can also be loose—as in gilustid “long for” translating esuriunt et sitiunt “hunger and thirst for”—but the phrasing is generally quite close. This gives the passage the pacing and diction of the Bible, even as the poet adds just enough Germanic flavor to make it feel familiar. Much of the rest of the hypermetric passage looks similar: the poet makes some changes to fulfill metrical requirements and provide the occasional added detail that he presumably thought would help his Germanic audience understand the message, but the translation of the sermon is relatively close in this 23 Although infinitives normally receive stress, they occasionally do not, and an auxiliary verb such as uuerðan is naturally less stressed than lexical verbs. 24 Connecting a Christian ideal to a Germanic one is a common tactic throughout the poem. Analyzing the two scenes where Jesus performs miracles at sea, Swisher argues that the poet is trying to “establish a relationship between two aspects of heroic Christian behaviour: bravery and faith” so that “physical strength and inner fortitude are praised as worthy qualities, but within the Christian context they are meaningless unless underpinned by an unflagging faith in Christ” (1991: 237). Likewise, Murphy argues that faith in God is recast as personal loyalty to one’s lord, creating clear parallels between Jesus’s relationship to his various disciples and the typical lord–thegn relationship (2010: 39–46).

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section, where the poet translates as close to word for word as possible rather than merely conveying the general sense. This technique allows the poet to introduce the audience to not just the story but even, to a degree, the diction of this important part of the Bible. The formalized diction adds to the emphasis that the Sermon receives overall, making the message of who can get into heaven very clear while still incorporating Germanic features and ideas. The hypermetric lines, therefore, reinforce the overall message of the Sermon and allow the poet to present that message in a concentrated way that would be particularly effective for his audience.

Mary Magdalena Another of the particularly large hypermetric passages occurs when the poet describes the moment that Mary Magdalene comes to the tomb of Jesus and finds him missing. This moment illustrates the poet’s accommodation because he uses the scene to expand upon a familiar trope in the narrative: mourning the loss of one’s lord. Even as this concept is emphasized, the poet further uses the longer lines to add clarity to any moments that might be confusing, making the comparison complete. In this way, the scene serves to further connect Jesus to the traditional figure of the Germanic lord and help the audience forge an emotional tie to him through the mourning figure of Mary. In this scene, the poet expands quite a bit on the pain that Mary feels at the loss of her lord. Her mourning creates a clear connection to the Germanic heroic tradition, which idealizes the connection between a lord and his thegns. The narrators in poems such as The Wanderer, The Seafarer, and The Wife’s Lament in Old English express the devastating effects of losing one’s lord, and The Battle of Maldon shows the lengths a good thegn will undertake to avoid leaving a battlefield without his lord. In Heliand, the poet expands upon Mary’s reaction to amplify the connection. The Bible provides a simple statement of Mary’s grief, stating only, “Maria autem stabat ad monumentum foris plorans dum ergo fleret inclinavit se et prospexit in monumentum” “Mary, however, stood at the monument outside, lamenting. While therefore she wept, she bent and looked forward into the monument” (John 20:11). The biblical verse twice states that she was weeping but says nothing beyond that. The Old Saxon, by contrast, gives an extended description that spans nine verses to explain Mary’s state of mind: Maria uuas that Magdalena —, uuas iro muodgithâht, (HA1: –́××××–́×–́×) (B1: ×××–́×–́)

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seƀo mit sorogon giblandan, ne uuissa huarod siu sôkian scolda (HA1: ͜ ́͜ ×× ͜ ́͜ ×××–́×) (hA1: ××××××–́×–́×) thena hêrron, thar iro uuârun at thia helpa gilanga. Siu ni mohta thuo hofnu auuîsan, (aHA1: ××–́××××××××–́××–́×) (hA1: ×××××–́××–́×) that uuîf ni mahta uuôp forlâtan: ne uuissa huarod siu sia uuendian scolda; (aHA1: ×–́×××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××××××–́×–́×) gimerrid uuârun iro thes muodgithâhti. (Heliand 5915–19a) (aHA1: ×–́××××××–́×–́×) “That was Mary Magdalene—her thought, her heart was mixed with sorrow, she did not know where she should seek the master, where for her was help prepared. She could not then contain lamentation, that woman could not cease her lament: she did not know where she should turn for her part; her thoughts were tormented because of that.”

The poet starts by saying that Mary is sorrowful and includes a much more detailed version of what her sorrow is like, relating both to her state of mind and to the outward manifestation of her sorrow. The poet includes variation, saying that Mary could not hofnu auuîsan and uuôp forlâtan. The variation again aids in the alliteration, but it also increases the description in the already descriptive passage. In addition, it again allows the poet to add extra formality to his description, since variation stands out more in the hypermetric passage where it is less common. Furthermore, the poet twice states why Mary is so upset, whereas the Bible never gives a specific explanation. This addition reminds readers of Mary’s dedication to her lord while creating more of the repetition that emphasizes the idea. This particularly descriptive version of weeping not only echoes the general concern with the loss of one’s lord but also specifically evokes the image of the mourning woman, which is likewise prominent in Germanic literature. It can be found, for example, multiple times in Beowulf as well as in Old Norse eddic poems such as Gudrúnarkviða I & II and Oddrúnargrátr. A typical example is as follows: swylce giōmorgyd Gēatisc meowle (B1: ××–́×–́) (A1: –́×–́×) æfter Bīowulfe bundenheorde (C1: ××–́–́×) (A1: –́×–́×) sang sorgcearig, sæide geneahhe (D2: –́–́ ͜ ̀ ×) (A1: –́××–́×) þæt hīo hyre heregeongas hearde ondrēde (C2: ×××× ͜ ́͜ ×–́×) (A1: –́××–́×) wælfylla worn werudes egesan (E: –́–× (A1: ͜ ́͜ ×× ͜ ́͜ ××) ̀ –́) hȳnðo ond hæftnȳd. (Beowulf 3150–55a) (A2b: –́××–́–̀)

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“Likewise, sad of mind, the Geatish woman with bound hair, sang about Beowulf, sorrowful, said earnestly that she for herself sorely feared invasions, a large number of slaughters, the terror of the company, humiliation and captivity.”

In this case, the lamenting woman shows practical concerns rather than the more general lamentation, since she fully believes that her tribe will be destroyed. Still, the language of the two passages is similar with the repeated references to the woman’s state of mind and intense sorrow. Furthermore, both are very vocal in their sorrow, with Mary actively weeping and the old Geatish woman singing a song of lamentation. When presenting the image of Mary weeping, the Heliand poet also takes care to make the material particularly clear. He does this, as his Old English counterparts do, in part by taking advantage of the syntactic simplification made available by the particularly long drops at the start of each verse. At times, he goes so far as to divorce the syntactic breaks from the metrical ones, as in Siu quađ, that siu umbi iro hêrron ni uuissi (hA1: ××××××××–́××–́×) / te uuâren, huarod hie uuerðan scoldi (aHA1: ××× ͜ ́͜ ××–́×–́×) “she said that she did not know about her master for truth where he should be” (5922b–23a). Here, the off-verse includes a syntactic break in the middle of the verse. Though this arrangement—a verse with a finite verb that introduces indirect speech together with the complementizer and finite verb for the subordinate clause in the first drop—is not unheard of even outside of hypermetric verse, it is not common and requires a particularly long clause upbeat. More unusual, though, is the subsequent enjambment at the end of the line, which is then followed by a second clause break in the middle of the onset of the on-verse. Enjambment is common enough in Germanic alliterative poetry, but the subsequent clause break tends ultimately to correspond with the end of a verse. Here, the clause break occurs after the opening lift, with a new clause taking up the drop of the heavy onset together with the cadence. Such a construction magnifies the extent to which the poet can use a free style across these long lines, which in turn enables him to write without extensive circumlocution and clearly present Mary’s distress and desire to find her lord. The use of variation in this passage is similar. As he does in other hypermetric passages, the poet cuts down on variation here to add to the simplicity of the syntax. As stated above, he does not do away with it completely; he uses some to maintain a degree of formality in the passage. When he uses it, though, he often keeps it simple and sometimes includes new information in the same line, as in Thuo gruotta sie thie hêlago drohtin, (hA1: ×××××–́××–́×) / bi namen neriendero best (aHE: × ͜ ́͜ × ͜ ́͜ ×–̀××–́) “Then the holy lord addressed her, the best of saviors, by name” (5928b–29a). In this case, neriendero best stands in variation

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to hêlago drohtin, but the poet first says that Jesus addresses Mary, bi namen. Thus, the poet finishes this thought, providing a detail that shows the close connection between Mary and her lord, and then adds the variation that completes the line and provides a second alliterative stave. In this way, the poet is able to provide an additional formal feature that also gives further praise to Jesus without creating a long aside that would significantly increase the syntactic complexity. With this straightforward syntax, the poet can also add explanations for any aspects of the passage that might be unclear. For example, where the Bible simply reports the confused conversation in which Mary does not know that she is talking to Jesus, the Heliand poet adds Sia ni uuissa, that sia thie suno drohtines (hD2: ××××××× ͜ ́͜ ×–́ ͜ ̀ ×) / gruotta mid gôdaro sprâcun: (HA1: –́××–́××–́×) | siu uuânda that it thie gardari uuâri, (hA1: ××××××–́××–́×) hofuuard hêrren sînes (HA1: –́–– ̀ ×́ –́×) “She did not know that the son of the lord addressed her with good speech: she thought that it was the gardener, the yard-guardian of his lord” (5926b–28a). It appears that the poet was concerned his audience might wonder why Mary was reacting to Jesus so strangely and wanted to clarify.25 By explaining both what Mary did not know and what she had falsely assumed, the poet eliminates any possibility of confusion and allows the audience to focus more on the reason for her distress. Thus, while generally adhering relatively closely to his source in this passage, the Heliand poet seems to have taken advantage of a moment to connect with his Germanic audience by expanding on a familiar trope, simultaneously clarifying any obscurities to make sure that the connection is apparent. Significantly, the passage also presents a different outcome to this oft-revisited situation of the dead lord. In all the other poems, the main characters dwell upon their loss to show the transitory nature of their lives and their earthly lords. In Heliand, however, Mary’s lord does not remain dead: he reveals his newly arisen presence to her and alleviates her sorrow. This strategy parallels with other similar moments in the poem, where Jesus is shown to be stronger than powers such as fate or death, which held sway in the Germanic religions.26 The poet may therefore have emphasized this particular mourning scene not

25 Such clarifications are common in the text; one particularly common place to see added clarification is with an explanation of a parable, as Haferland notes about the Parable of the Sower (2010: 220). 26 For further analysis of the specific ways in which the poet integrates the idea of fate into the poem and subordinates it to God, see Augustyn (2002: 62–122 and 2004: 43–49). She emphasizes the way in which fate is made to control death and birth but argues that God remains above this force and is able to direct it. Green similarly argues that fate is either left to appear negative or else subordinated to God in an attempt to show the superiority of the new religion (2003: 255–58).

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only to connect to his Old Saxon audience but also to show the power of his lord, who can overcome even his own death, a death which would otherwise create so much grief.

Short Hypermetric Passages Although the long passages might seem more conducive for connecting to the Saxon audience, the short passages can have a similar function—the only difference is where the long passages provide the poet with a number of options that he can shift between and intertwine in important moments of the story, each shorter passage appears to have been used as a precise tool, crafted to serve a specific purpose in a precise moment. They can be particularly effective when placed strategically within a sentence and a speech. Even a single hypermetric verse can be used for great effect, especially when the poet employs it strategically for a well-placed close translation. Although the poet does not often translate an extended passage roughly word for word as he does with some of the beatitudes, he sometimes does so with key phrases or clauses that might have a particular import. For instance, at another point in the Sermon on the Mount, when he explains why he has come, Jesus says in the Bible Nolite putare quoniam veni solvere legem aut prophetas non veni solvere sed adimplere “Do not believe that I have come to break down the law or the prophets: I have not come to break down but to fulfill” (Matthew 5:17). The Heliand poet translates this with Ni quam ic an thesa uuerold te thiu, (B1: ×××××× ͜ ́͜ ××–́) / that ic feldi thero forasagono uuord, (aHE: ××–́××× ͜ ́͜ × ͜ ̀͜ ××–́) | ac ic siu fullien scal (B1: ×××–́×–́) “I did not come into this world for that, that I make fall the prophets’ words, but I shall fulfill them” (1428b–29a). Murphy singles this statement out as particularly important because it suggests a practice of accommodation, a desire “to proclaim a new religion’s law without destroying the old” (1989: 93).27 The form of the translation is as important as the wording because the lone hypermetric verse is able to emphasize that particular idea. Simply putting the concept into a hypermetric verse creates emphasis because the longer verse stands out amid the shorter ones. Furthermore, the additional space allows the poet to include the entire concept of doing away with the words of the prophets— which is not exactly the same as the original, but nevertheless echoes the pairing 27 Murphy focuses particularly on the term feallan, which he translates as “chop down,” arguing that the poet is evoking the earlier policy of Saint Boniface to efface any references to the Old Norse gods, particularly his decision to chop down Thor’s sacred oak at Geismar, and showing a different method of conversion.

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of the prophets and their statements as the two concepts to be preserved—in a single verse, which in turn allows him to make the contrast between what he will and will not do in a single pair of verses. The form therefore reinforces the contrast, and while the opposition is not as succinct as the final non veni solvere sed adimplere, putting the two sides in a single line brings it close. Thus, the poet is able not only to present the idea of accommodation but also to show the importance of that accommodation as opposed to the other option. Not all cases of hypermetric verse are purely about accommodation, however. Near the end of the poem, the poet uses three verses to draw attention to the new mindset he hopes his audience will adopt. As the crucifixion approaches, after Jesus had been taken into custody, he explains who he is and why he and his followers do not fight back. Many scholars have pointed out that this would have been a very difficult idea for the heroically inclined Saxons to accept, and the poet therefore makes a strong effort at various types of justifications and apologia.28 In the final section of his speech, Jesus gives the ultimate reason, shifting the paradigm in a blunt but clear way that his audience would have to notice: That mugun antkennien uuel (B1: ××××–́×–́) / the uueros, the sind fan uuâre kumane: (aHA1: × ͜ ́͜ ××××–́× ͜ ́͜ ××) | the mugun mîn uuord farstanden, (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) / gilôƀien mînun lêrun (aA1: ×–́×××–́×) “That will recognize well the men who have come for truth, who wish to understand my word, to believe my teachings” (5227b–29a). This sentence begins in the offverse with a verb but no subject, leaving the audience anticipating that subject. When the subject comes, it is a noun followed by a relative clause, a construction that can only fit comfortably in a hypermetric verse. The placement itself puts emphasis on the subject, and the drawn-out length of the verse allows the poet to linger over the description the sind fan uuâre kumane. The length of the following off-verse retains the slower pace and allows the audience to ponder on the importance of the second relative clause, the mugun mîn uuord farstanden, before the poet switches back to normal verse and the speech ends with a second infinitive phrase in variation. Thus, the poet is switching into hypermetric verse in a rhetorically heightened moment and using that lengthened meter

28 Some scholars argue that the poet is trying to characterize Jesus as the ultimate Germanic lord by making him the greatest gift-giver, who gives his life to save all of humanity (see, for example, Woods 1985: 73–74). Murphy (2010: 49–50) and Haferland (2010: 230–33) further argue that the poet indicates that if Jesus had fought back against the Jews and shown his true strength, he would have frightened them away and so would not have been able to give the gift of his self-sacrifice, making his lack of fighting one more generous act on his part, as well as an act that reflects the heroic sacrifice made by characters such as Beowulf and Byrtnoth who become heroes through their sacrifice.

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effectively to drive home his point and explain the purpose of non-violence in the face of opposition: it is about understanding truth and gaining wisdom. In some ways, this is another attempt at accommodation, since ideas of truth and wisdom are vital to Germanic culture, as the various types of wisdom poetry illustrate. At the same time, though, abandoning violence to seek this truth undercuts other beliefs that the early Saxons would have held and presents a new worldview. After all of his attempts at accommodation, the poet ultimately needs to get this new idea across, and he uses hypermetrics to make sure his audience notices and understand the ultimate shift that the new religion necessitates. These examples show that the poet’s innovation has created a new hypermetric tool, and they illustrate an effort to compose key passages effectively within the confines of the meter, not just random hypermetric verses used sloppily due to an inability to maintain normal verse. The strategies employed in both the short and long passages show that the Heliand poet has a facility for metrical alternation and uses it quite adeptly. The long passages might not have quite the regularity of passages in conservative Old English poems such as Beowulf or Exodus, but the poet does appear to have similar reasons for changing into hypermetric meter and adroitly combines the extended drops with other poetic features to create passages that are simultaneously more straightforward and more formal. This acuity with hypermetric composition translates into the brief hypermetric passages as well, which seem to be something of an innovation in the face of the increasingly analytic syntax and weak root stress. Their use therefore reveals those moments that the poet thought most important for his audience to understand in terms of what Jesus stood for, how his Christianity could, in general, be considered closely related to the Saxon’s system of beliefs, and what new ideas would ultimately need to be accepted to reconcile Germanic culture with the new religion.

Conclusion Though Old Saxon poetry may well have been a tradition in decline, as Lehman claims, the poet’s choice to employ the hypermetric meter to aid in his composition suggests that he was still operating with a functional metrical system and was, in fact, innovating in creative ways to keep the system alive. Indeed, the Heliand poet seems to be writing in a tradition that developed a different metrical style with different standards of composition, but within which he has formed alternate strategies to maintain clear and consistent metrical patterns throughout the poem. In addition to using longer verse patterns that can accommodate more finite verbs and are marked by a greater use of particles, the

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poet also employs hypermetric lines in a larger variety of situations than Old English poets do to maintain an organized metrical structure while still accommodating more syllables and words in each verse. Such changes reinforce the idea that the poetic tradition is a fluid one and that poets can adapt their style to accommodate linguistic and stylistic change in a way that allows them to maintain the most important features of the Germanic alliterative long-line. Some of these changes are what we might have expected given the linguistic features of Old Saxon. The language itself contains a much larger number of extra syllables, so the line length must be longer than the lines of the other Germanic traditions. The Heliand poet also includes more of the function words that are used in prose but rarer in poetry, making the line longer still. Even though he uses longer lines than either the Old English or the Old Norse poets, however, the Heliand poet keeps the verse patterns relatively straightforward. For the most part, the additional length of each verse can be found in the onset, which allows the cadence to remain simple—simpler, as a whole, than the cadences found in Old English. Even the increased use of particles in the light onset could be considered an organizational feature, since it could help to distinguish hypermetric onsets from other long drops, particularly anacrusis. Such regularity is especially important since there is more overlap between normal and hypermetric patterns, so the poet seems to have tried to limit any additional complexity as much as possible. While in some ways the differences between Old Saxon and Old English hypermetrics are expected, in other ways the reworking found in Old Saxon can be surprising. In particular, the distribution patterns would not have been expected. Nevertheless, the choice of different distribution patterns, particularly the use of distinctive short and long hypermetric passages, seems very deliberate. This practice suggests that not only did the Heliand poet adapt hypermetric form to fit more unstressed syllables in each hypermetric verse, but he also developed a method of composition in which he can use hypermetric meter as a flexible tool in more locations than just long passages. Long passages occur largely at moments in the narrative such as the Sermon on the Mount, in which the poet may wish to take advantage of the longer drops that open each hypermetric verse to include the function words that will allow him to translate closely, explain clearly, or expound on a particularly important idea, making these passages rhetorically heightened in some way. Short groupings, which can occur more frequently, are mostly used to expand on a description or idea in a very precise way, which can more easily be done in the metrically looser confines of the longer hypermetric verses. In that sense, hypermetric lines become a way to accommodate syntactic or rhetorical requirements of individual sections of the poem, while simultaneously accommodating the longer metrical

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patterns used throughout the poem in normal verse, by giving the poet the still longer option of a hypermetric verse that he can employ amidst the normal sections. Clearly the poet has many options for how to use this newfound flexibility, and hypermetric verses occur in many different places throughout the long poem. One place where they come up again and again is when the poet brings in language or ideology meant to specifically relate to his Saxon audience and lead them to a more willing conversion. In this way, the poet takes just one more feature that his audience would have been familiar with, the hypermetric interval in a poem that creates emphasis or heightened emotion, and uses it to connect to his audience. Through these connections, he attempts to show the benefits of the new faith and make his poem not just a retelling of the gospel but also a type of sermon that will attract new members to his faith. His deliberate composition therefore shows the degree to which he was truly in control of his craft as well as his personal goal for translating the gospel into the Germanic tradition.

Chapter 5: Late Old English Hypermetrics: Linguistic Change and Stylistic Adaptation in the Old English Judith Introduction Because the language of poetry is traditional to the point of being artificial, Old English poetry was slow to change in the face of linguistic innovations: the language maintains many archaisms that promote stability so that poems presumably composed after the conservative verse discussed in chapter 1 have only minimal differences. Nevertheless, the incipient change from a synthetic to an analytic language caused enough of a linguistic shift by the tenth century that its effects made inroads into the poetic tradition. These changes should logically reflect those made in the Old Saxon tradition, since both relate to a greater use of function words. To a degree, this supposition is realized, and Old English poetry shows the same loosening of the drop that is evident in Heliand. Where hypermetrics is concerned, however, things look quite different. It would seem natural for poets to turn to hypermetric patterns more frequently, as the Heliand poet did, in order to fit some of the more unwieldy metrical patterns into individual verses. Instead, only two late Old English poems use hypermetric composition: Judith and The Meters of Boethius. Meters creates a difficult poem to analyze for a number of reasons. Firstly, the poem may have been composed by King Alfred the Great rather than a professional poet.1 Secondly, the subject material that is being adapted is particularly complex and abstract, not at all ideal to fit into the constraints of the alliterative long-line. Any poet would have struggled to transform the content into fluid poetry, and if the amateur poet King Alfred did indeed compose the verses, he may have struggled rather more than others. As a result, the meter is characterized more by the unusual treatment of particles than by other features typical of late poetry.2 The hypermetric patterns in the poem are one way the

1 Scholarly consensus singles out this poem together with the translations of Cura Pastoralis and Augustine’s Soliloquies as the work of Alfred himself, though Godden has recently called this authorship into question (2007: 4–13). 2 For details on the poet’s style, and particularly his unusual use of particles and other unstressed words, see Myrvaagnes 1970 and Fulk 1992: 251–52. https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501513688-006

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poet compensates for the large use of particles. The poet uses hypermetrics in very short groupings of one or two lines, sometimes with the traditional pairing of a heavy hypermetric pattern in the on-verse with a light pattern in the offverse, sometimes with two light hypermetric patterns. The lines generally contain a close translation, transition, or important conclusion, and the hypermetric form therefore allows the poet to adapt the prose text in the poem more cleanly, without the awkward use of particles in unusual positions. In this way, the short hypermetric sections appear to be a utilitarian shift on the part of the poet, and the poet does not use hypermetrics beyond that purpose. In contrast, Judith has a much more innovative use of hypermetric composition. In fact, the poem seems to be quite metrically innovative overall. Howell Chickering believes it is characterized by a “poetic exuberance” that is created by “features such as its half-line rhymes at emphatic times and its purple patches of pulsing polysyndeton” (2009: 122). Other scholars have similarly noted extrametrical features such as cluster alliteration (beyond sp-, st-, and sc-), cross alliteration, and alliterative enjambment (see in particular Griffith 1997: 28 and Bredehoft 2005: 63–66). In addition, the poet uses a particularly nounheavy diction in some interesting ways: he employs traditional diction, often ironically (see Heinemann 1970: 83–96, Tyler 1992: 16–18, and Chickering 2009: 126–27); he uses a large number of compounds, often using a participle as one element to make his nouns more active (see Griffith 1997: 40) or using elements with opposite means to draw out the contradictory characteristics of some characters, particularly Holofernes (see Tyler 1992: 17); he amasses the nouns with features such as inflectional rhyme and repeated metrical patterns in a way that creates a feeling of movement rather than stasis (see Stanley 1994: 152–53 and Griffith 1997: 84–85) and he constructs verbal echoes in complex envelope patterns that create connections across the poem (see Hieatt 1980: 253–57 and Griffith 1997: 87–93). The hypermetric sections are an integral part of the metrical innovations that help the poet to structure his adaptation of Judith’s story. Unlike the Old Saxon Heliand, Judith does not include a larger number of syllables in the drops of hypermetric verses than the conservative Old English poems, it does not use the unusual distribution patterns of mixed hypermetric verses in normal or hypermetric sections more freely, and it does not use the simplest possible metrical patterns in the cadence. In short, all of the metrical modifications in Old Saxon that seem to have been influenced by a linguistic environment that includes numerous function words are absent from Judith. Instead, the stress patterns in the hypermetric verses closely resemble those of the conservative poems of the Old English tradition. This difference suggests that the poet did not compose the lines in the way most convenient for fitting in numerous

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unstressed words while still maintaining a recognizable metrical pattern, but instead attempted to employ more traditional verse patterns in the face of linguistic change. Although the length of the drops in Judith looks quite conservative, the poem’s hypermetric verses depart from the conservative poems’ method of composition regarding the style and possible use of the hypermetric lines. Stanley B. Greenfield rightly argues that the hypermetric meter in Judith seems to be used for slow, descriptive moments in the text, as opposed to the normal verse, which is used for quick, narrative moments (1965: 165–66). This distinction reverses the trends found in the conservative poems, in which the hypermetric verses are frequently used for narrative moments, since they allow for swift narrative progress. Burton Raffel agrees with Greenfield, although he says that Greenfield draws too stark a distinction between description and narrative progress, for he finds descriptive moments in normal sections. In spite of the lack of clear opposition between the content of the normal and hypermetric lines, he nevertheless argues that the hypermetric sections seem quite repetitive and slow the pace of the poem considerably, perhaps even excessively so (1975: 125–28). In response to Raffel, Constance Hieatt defends the poet’s use of hypermetric verse, arguing that it has a distinct rhetorical purpose: namely, to allow the repetitions that emphasize the characterization of God and Judith versus Holofernes and the contrast therein (1980: 251–57). While their views differ on the fine points, these scholars agree that the hypermetric sections of Judith, whether they emphasize description, major themes, or something else, demonstrate primarily an increase in repetition that creates a (possibly ineffective) rhetorical heightening of the tone. The repetition that these critics focus on is surprising because it is so different from hypermetric composition in the conservative poems, both in terms of the style and the ways in which the poet employs these lines on account of the style. The shift suggests that while the stress patterns in Judith look similar to the ones in the conservative poems, Judith was in fact composed differently. Since the use of hypermetric meter in Meters is limited and the composition of the poem is affected by its status as a difficult translation undertaken by an amateur poet, I do not study it in depth here. Instead, I focus on the more innovative composition of Judith. To contextualize the poem, I begin the chapter by analyzing normal verse in other late Old English poems—namely The Battle of Maldon, The Battle of Brunanburh, Judgment Day II, The Death of Edward, and The Death of Edgar—to illustrate what effects linguistic changes were having on verse. From there, I turn specifically to Judith. First, I examine in depth both the structure and the other compositional features of the hypermetric passages of the poem to ascertain the degree to which the poet both adheres to and varies

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from the standards set down in the more conservative Old English poems. Second, I turn to the way the poet employs hypermetrics. The poet composes with a combination of increased syntactic breaks and increased repetition. This style creates a syntax that looks similar to that of conservative hypermetrics but content that appears less so. The style may therefore have been influenced by the increasingly analytic properties of the language that led to more function words, even if the result is quite different from the Old Saxon model. Whereas the Old Saxon poet expands the drops of the onset to accommodate any number of function words, using hypermetric meter wherever it is convenient, the Judith poet keeps the lines almost entirely in groups and consistently maintains short hypermetric patterns. As he does so, the Judith poet varies from the largely practical and multi-purpose hypermetric composition employed by the Heliand poet and uses hypermetrics with a pointedly noun-heavy diction that expands upon the overall noun-heavy trend elsewhere in the poem. By doing so, he creates a slow pace that puts emphasis on the hypermetric sections and the characters and actions described therein. Thus, the poet may have consciously adopted a hypermetric style that takes advantage of the lifts as much as the drops, using the drops to contain the minimal number of function words while the lifts stand out with nouns and other stress words that are repeated and emphasized through variation and a large number of synonyms that are rare elsewhere in hypermetric composition. This style allows the poet to develop and highlight the major themes of the poem: the contrast between Judith and Holofernes, the reversal that inevitably comes, and the power of God to control it all.

Developments in Late Old English While Old English verse is generally stable throughout the Old English period, by the tenth century, linguistic change was putting enough pressure on the language that the poets needed to change the way they composed their verse. Specifically, the incipient shift from a synthetic to an analytic language was beginning to have an effect on the structure of the language. Two aspects of these changes had a significant influence on Old English poetry: the reduction of stress and the increase in function words. The reduction of stress, particularly on trisyllabic words, can be seen largely though manuscript spellings. Fulk argues that weak verbs in particular show this change because the medial syllable of the preterit ending, -ode or -ade, is often spelled -ede; the change in spelling shows that the syllable does not maintain a high enough degree of stress for the vowel sound to be distinguished. Likewise, the vowel sounds in the second elements of compounds are

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not as clearly maintained. For example, in the Peterborough Chronicle, the word headeor is used to rhyme with fæder, making the pronunciation of deor, the second element of a compound word, in this context equivalent to the non-root syllable of a simplex (Fulk 1992: 252–53). Campbell likewise shows that geminate consonants are lost in late texts such as the Meters after a medial syllable; so for instance -ōþera is used instead of ōþerra, creating a short medial syllable (1983: 183). In these cases, the reduction of stress causes the syllable to go from being a long to a short syllable. This reduction of stress is responsible, in part, for the other change in Old English: the increase in function words. As stress is reduced on the final syllables, inflectional endings become more difficult to distinguish, making synthetic syntax difficult to maintain.3 Elizabeth Traugott shows that two features of analytic syntax had therefore begun to work their way into the language at this point. First, the incidence of function words increased; specifically, prepositions and auxiliary verbs became more prominent. Secondly, the subject position in impersonal statements began to be filled more frequently, making pronouns more common (1992: 285–86). These linguistic changes have a demonstrable effect on metrical patterning. As Fulk illustrates (1992: 254–55), the decrease of metrical stress leads to a decrease of poetic compounds. He argues that poets use poetic compounds less frequently because stress reduction makes differentiating the final element of a poetic compound from the second syllable of the more everyday, lexicalized compounds more difficult. Poetic compounds, such as swanrād “swanroad,” which can be coined by individual poets, must have a relatively high degree of stress on the second element because understanding the term as a whole requires understanding all of its elements. Lexicalized compounds, such as hlaford “lord,” were once made up of two elements, but the independent meanings of the two morphemes became obscured over time as the word itself developed a meaning of its own, and therefore the second element does not need to receive the same degree of stress. The distinction between the two types of compounds is important to Old English composition, which seems to distinguish between secondary stress and tertiary stress.4 Thus, compounding as a feature of Old English meter can

3 For more on the precise process of syntactic change, see Vennamann 1974 and Traugott 1972. 4 Bliss shows that for type-D verses, a verse that ends with tertiary stress can frequently appear in the off-verse, whereas verses with secondary stress are much more frequent in the onverse. Furthermore, when in the on-verse, verses with tertiary stress show double alliteration about half the time, whereas double alliteration seems to be mandatory for those with secondary stress (1962: 55–59).

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only play a central role when the distinction between the two types of compounds is maintained, and the gradual reduction of compounds used in poetry suggests that many conventional poetic compounds lost secondary stress and became lexicalized. Because secondary stress is intrinsically tied to compounding and the verse types that are capable of employing compounds, the metrical result of this loss of secondary stress is a general decrease in types D and E—which are frequently constructed with compounds, poetic or otherwise—next to an increase in alternating stress patterns. Table 5.1 shows the frequency of the different verse types in the five late poems as compared to Beowulf, as an example of a conservative poem.5

Table 5.1: Percentage of normal verse types in late poems as compared to Beowulf. Maldon

JD II

Brunanburh

Death of Edward

Death of Edgar

Late verse total

Beowulf

A

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

B

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

C

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

D

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

E

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

The increase in alternating stress patterns is clear overall, as the incidence of such verses increased from 62.31% in Beowulf to 72.23% in the late poems taken together. Type E, with secondary stress, and type C, with clashing stress, decreased. The only verse type that occurs with a comparable incidence is type D. Interestingly, though, the numbers are far from uniform across the board. The incidence of type D decreased in Maldon and Judgement Day II, with correspondingly higher numbers of type-A and -B verses, while it stayed the same in The Death of Edgar and actually increased in Brunanburh and The Death of Edward. A comparison of the distribution of verse types therefore illustrates

5 The percentages of each verse type in Beowulf are calculated from the complete list of verse distribution compiled by Bliss. Bliss’s system varies from Sievers’s in that he introduces the idea of a type-d set of verses with only one full stress in analogy with Sievers’s type A3 (which he calls a type a). In Sievers’s system, these verses would be scanned as types B or C, so I have counted them as such when calculating the total percentages of each verse.

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two important points: first, that alternating stress is becoming more of a norm, and second, that not all poets adapted their compositional style to the loss of secondary stress in the same way, with some making a more concerted effort to maintain the variety of verse patterns that typifies Old English poetry, mainly through the use of the falling stress in a type D. Next to the decreasing metrical stress, the increasing number of function words naturally resulted in a loosening of the restrictions on the drop. As the introduction explains, the ideal verse in Old English has two words and four syllables. While some verses must necessarily exceed these restrictions, poets try to limit the number of syllables and independent words in each drop to be as close to the ideal version as possible. With an increased number of function words in the language, the drops must have more function words as well, as Table 5.2 shows. Table 5.2: Percentage of verses with independent words in the drop. Maldon

JD II

Brunanburh

Death of Edward

Death of Edgar

Late verse total

Beowulf

 word

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

 words

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

 words

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

 words

.%

.%

.%



.%

.%

.%

 words

.%

.%







.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

Total

.%

.%

.%

On average, the total number of verses with independent words in the drop is higher in the late poems than in Beowulf, particularly with verses that have just one or two independent words. Thus, while the Beowulf poet was not averse to composing a long verse with multiple independent words, he tended to keep the verses short and did not include one or two function words on as regular a basis as the late poets. Again, though, the late poets are by no means consistent. Where Maldon, Judgment Day II, and The Death of Edgar stand in sharp contrast to Beowulf in terms of the overall number of verses with unstressed words, The Death of Edward is relatively comparable, and Brunanburh actually has fewer unstressed words.

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The resulting length of the drops looks much the same (Table 5.3).

Table 5.3: Percentage of verses with a polysyllabic drop. Maldon

JD II

Brunanburh

Death of Edward

Death of Edgar

Late verse average

Beowulf

 syllables

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

 syllables

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

 syllables

.%

.%

.%

%

%

.%

.%

 syllables

.%

.%

.%

%

.%

.%

.%

 syllables

.%

.%

%

%

%

.%

.%

 syllables

.%

%

%

%

%

.%

%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

.%

Total

The Beowulf poet was just as willing as the late poets as a group to use long drops, but he did not include at least one extra syllable as often and therefore did not use as many polysyllabic drops overall. The late poets show a contrasting pattern, but they were willing to expand their verses to different degrees. Brunanburh stands on one end of the extreme, with verses even shorter than those in Beowulf, and Judgement Day II stands at the other, with a polysyllabic drop in close to 70% of the verses. These poems therefore illustrate that many poets integrated the contemporary linguistic changes into the poems very directly, stretching out the drops to fit the function words that were becoming more common and switching to verse types that highlighted alternating stress over secondary stress. In this way, the adaptations were similar to the ones that define Old Saxon poetry. However, since the linguistic changes occurred after the Old English tradition was already fully developed, they were not integrated into the tradition the same way by all poets. As I showed in Hartman 2012, the Brunanburh poet in particular made some specific stylistic adaptations and used variation strategically to maintain a more traditional sound with shorter verses and a wider variety of verse types, and the other two Chronicle poems follow suit to varying degrees.6 The difference shows that poets must have been aware that linguistic changes necessitated a change in the structure of the line but reacted to the

6 For more on the rhetorical results of this stylistic choice, see also Hartman 2015.

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changes in different ways. These differences show opposing values towards poetic composition. Some poets seemed to value the natural language and variety of diction and so adapted the traditional structure of the verse accordingly, while others preferred to maintain the traditional compactness of form and manipulated the style of the diction and variation to adhere to those standards. Hypermetric composition provides another way to manipulate compositional style, and as a particularly flexible tool, it is perhaps an ideal way for poets to implement their own stylistic adaptations.

Hypermetric composition in Judith Hypermetric composition in Judith defies the expectations set up by analysis of Heliand that a poem in a linguistic environment with more function words will take full advantage of the onset and use long drops in various distribution patterns to accommodate for the features of analytic syntax. Instead, it shows the extent to which poets in the late Old English period could manipulate their style in different ways depending on their goals. In this poem, hypermetric composition becomes a tool to augment the noun-heavy diction that the poet maintains in spite of the language change. As such, the metrical structure of the hypermetric sections is quite constrained, in some ways even more so than in the conservative poems, and the verse grammar is tightly structured.

Hypermetric Structure in Judith All of the metrical features of the hypermetric verse that this study has analyzed thus far appear relatively conservative in Judith. For instance, the verses are distributed throughout the poem almost entirely in large groups. Of the 133 hypermetric verses, 127 of them appear in a hypermetric passage paired with another hypermetric verse. This percentage is higher than that found in the conservative poems overall. Judith has only a single lone line: Iūdith gingran sīnre. (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) | Ēodon ðā gegnum þanonne (hA1: ×××–́× ͜ ͜× ́ ×) “Judith with her handmaiden. They went directly thence” (Judith 132). Two mixed lines occur in hypermetric sections: hērbūendra (D1: –́–́–̀×) | þe hyne him tō helpe sēceð (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) “of the dwellers of earth who seek him for his help” (Judith 96) and ond swegles drēamas, (aA: ×–́×–́×) | ðurh his sylfes miltse (hA1: ××–́×–́×) “and the joy of heaven through his own mercy” (Judith 349), though in the case of line 349, the normal verse also contains irregular anacrusis and

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could well be the result of scribal error.7 The poem does not have any potential examples of lone hypermetric verses in normal sections. Even the distribution of light and heavy onsets across the verses is quite regular; one light hypermetric verse appears in the on-verse, gehēawan þysne morðres bryttan (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) “to kill this bestower of crime” (Judith 90a), but otherwise the off-verse has verses with light onsets and the on-verse has verses with heavy onsets.8 In terms of distribution patterns, then, Judith is as strict as the strictest of conservative poems. Regarding the structure of the onset, Judith is again similar to the conservative poems, and in some ways the verses are more compact. All of the heavy hypermetric onsets in Judith have between one and three syllables in the drop: 44.6% have one, 41.5% have two, and 13.8% have three. These numbers put Judith in stark contrast with Heliand, since the Old Saxon poem increases the number of syllables quite a bit to provide a place for the extra unstressed words. Judith is not as consistently short as the conservative poems, which have a slightly stronger preference for a monosyllabic drop, with 50.5% of the drops monosyllabic and only 28.4% of them disyllabic. Judith, however, is slightly more consistent than the conservative poems because it has no examples of verses with four syllables in the onset or with no syllables between the first two stresses. The heavy onset also appears more constrained because the types of words in the drop are closer to those in the first drop of a type-A verse than they are in the conservative poems. As explained in the introduction, the drop in a heavy onset differs from the drop of a type-A verse because they have more examples of drops such as the first in engel hine elne trymede (HA1: –́×××–́× ͜ ́͜×) “the angel strengthened him with courage” (Guthlac A 190a), which is three syllables long with a separate word that is a particle. In Judith, the drop in the heavy onset still differs from the drop of a type A, but not to the same extent. Whereas the conservative poems have a single clitic (rather than a word-final syllable) filling

7 Bliss observes that anacrusis does not tend to fall on a verse that has only two disyllabic words with stress on the first syllable after the initial drop (1962: 40–41). Fulk, Bjork, and Niles note that only one exception exists in Beowulf (in Cāines cynne [aA1: ×–́×–́×] 107a), and that even that verse is not an unambiguous exception because it contains a biblical name (2008: 333). 8 Griffith points out two other possible examples. The first, 349a, I discussed above as one of the two possible normal verses in a hypermetric section: it opens with an unstressed syllable, so could be considered a light hypermetric verse, but the light onset normally has two or more syllables. The second, 345a, reads tō ðam ælmihtigan (hD2: ××–́–́ ͜ ̀ ×) “to the almighty” in the manuscript, but, as Griffith points out, it is often amended to ā tō ðam ælmihtigan (HD2: –́××–́–́ ͜ ̀ ×) “always to the almighty” (1997: 35–36).

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the drop in 24% of the monosyllabic drops, Judith uses a separate word in only 10.3% of the monosyllabic drops. And when the verse features a disyllabic first drop, verses in Judith still contain no separate word in the drop 17.4% of the time, whereas those in conservative poems do so at an incidence of only 3.7%. In terms of simpler verses, 58.5% of the verses in Judith fill the drop with only the non-root syllables of a word, as opposed to only 40% in the conservative poems. Hence, while the drop in the heavy onset in Judith is not identical to the typical drop in type-A verses, it is closer than those in the conservative poems. The light onset is similarly compact, though in this case the material used to fill the position looks relatively average while the syllable count stands out as shorter. Similarly to the light openings of all the hypermetric verses that have been examined thus far, the light onset in Judith has a preference for particles. The vast majority of the off-verses, 82.4%, have at least two particles in the onset, either by themselves or with one or more additional clitics. Only one verse (1.5%) has no particle at all. While this feature makes the Judith poet consistent with other poets who compose in hypermetric meter, the length of the light onset distinguishes his work. In Judith, the position can have from two to five syllables, whereas the conservative poems can have up to seven and Heliand up to fourteen. The majority of the light onsets in Judith, 41.2%, have relatively small trisyllabic drops. The light onset in Judith is therefore still strong for an unstressed position, but it does not grow particularly long. In contrast to these very regular onsets, the cadence appears slightly less conservative, though only in some ways. As regards the verse types that are used in the cadence, Judith still appears quite regular: type-A verses are by far the norm, with an incidence of 87.2%. The other verse types all occur less than 10% of the time each, with only one type-C verse and none of type B at all. Where the cadence becomes less conservative is in the filler. In other poems, two stress words are the norm, a restriction which does not become lax in less strict poetry. In contrast to the other metrical differences, Old Saxon follows the regulation just as strictly, perhaps because the opening of the verse is so complex that the poet wished to simplify the end. A two-word cadence remains the norm in Judith, but not to the same extent as in Heliand or the conservative Old English poems. The poet uses two stress words at an incidence of 75.9%. The next most common option is a single stress word filling the entire cadence, which occurs about three times as often in Judith as in the conservative poems, at 15.1% of the time. The third option, two stress words plus one or more additional clitics, is not as common, but still appears 9.0% of the time, almost twice as often as it does in the conservative poems. The increased incidence of these other two options calls into question whether simplicity was the Judith poet’s goal with these particularly short verses.

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He does compose simple patterns in at least one important way. The simplest combination of words that can form a hypermetric verse is three stressed words: two words in the cadence plus one more to form the onset, as in fēran, folces rǣswan (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) “to go to the leader of the people” (Judith 12a). Hypermetric verses do not tend towards this simplest of patterns nearly as often as normal verses use the simplest two-word pattern, but such verses still occur: they are used 12.7% of the time in the conservative poems, and 14.3% of the time in Judith. The numbers are comparable, but the fact that Judith uses slightly more of these verses is particularly noteworthy given that it was written when function words were more prevalent in the language. Other verses are shorter still, however, in a way that creates slightly more complex verse patterns. A two-word pattern in a hypermetric verse is perhaps less conservative because it adds complexity to the line: for the verse to contain exactly two words, the cadence must consist of only a compound, which in turn means that the second stress of the compound must be promoted to primary stress, as in ræfndon rondwiggende (HD1: –́×–́–́–×) ̀ “The shield-bearing warriors carried [that] out” (Judith 11a). Because they create extra complexity, these long compounds are generally avoided in the cadence of hypermetric lines. In Judith, while still not the norm, two-word verses are more common than in other poems. Whereas the conservative poems have two-word verses only 2% of the time, Judith has them in 5.3% of cases. In addition to these shortest of word patterns, Judith has more verses that are still quite compact because they have just three words, but rather than the simplest pattern of three stressed words, those verses fill the cadence with a compound and have a longer onset: either one stressed simplex and one unstressed clitic, as in wlance tō wīngedrince (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) “the proud ones to wine-drinking” (Judith 16a) or two unstressed clitics, as in ealle his wēagesīðas (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “all his companions in evil” (Judith 16b). These verses make up 6.0% of the hypermetric verses in Judith, whereas they make up only 0.8% of the verses in the conservative poems. While these percentages are not exceptionally large, the number of shorter verses in Judith occurs more than twice as often in both cases. As a group, the percentages show that the Judith poet worked even harder than the conservative poets to keep the verses as short as possible. The numbers also suggest a different motive on the part of the Judith poet. The conservative poets were more likely to keep the verse short when the word pattern is the simplest, showing a preference for hypermetric patterns that are easily understood. The Judith poet made more of an effort to keep the verses short regardless, suggesting that his major motive was to keep each verse short, with emphasis on the nouns and compounds that then make up the bulk of the verse.

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Verse Grammar in Judith As regards other compositional features of the line, Judith is likewise relatively traditional. Poetic diction is used frequently in the poem and remains equally frequent in the hypermetric lines. The hypermetric passages have a poetic simplex in 23.3% of the verses, a poetic compound in 13.5%, and a non-poetic compound in 6.8%, whereas the normal passages have a simplex in 19% of the verses, a compound in 16%, and a non-poetic compound in 8%. The hypermetric passages use simplexes more often and compounds less, but this preference is not surprising since most of the cadences are formed with a type A, often with two stressed words; compounds, while more common in the hypermetric verses of Judith than those of other poems, appear more disruptive in hypermetric meter than in normal meter. Overall, the poem contains approximately the same number of poetic words in hypermetric lines as in normal lines, which makes it quite similar to conservative composition. Judith has five verses that violate Kuhn’s laws, but the violations are few and seem to have a logical motivation.9 One example is with eal: ond eal þæt se rinca baldor (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) “and all that the lord of warriors [owned]” (Judith 338b). In this verse, the clause from the previous verse continues through the caesura and a new clause begins at þæt, so eal is outside the first drop of the verse clause and should receive stress, according to Kuhn’s first law. However, the verse is unusual because it has a clause that starts in the middle of the onset, so eal is still grouped with another particle, a relative pronoun, that should be unstressed. Furthermore, even though eal should receive stress in this case according to the law of sentence particles, the word might not do so simply because it is unstressed so often.10 Hence, this case presents a certain violation of Kuhn’s law, but also a readily understandable one. All of the rest of the examples violate Kuhn’s first law with the phrase swylce ēac, which consists of two particles. Because this phrase is frequently used to join two clauses, it tends to appear in that first drop and not receive stress. In four cases, however, it falls outside of the first drop: swylce ēac būnan ond orcas (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) ( Judith 18b) “likewise also goblets and flagons” swylce ēac sīde byrnan (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) ( Judith 337b) 9 In comparison, Judith has eight violations in normal verse, six of Kuhn’s first law and two of Kuhn’s second law (see Griffith 1997: 41–42). 10 Not only can eal be unstressed when it appears at the beginning of a clause, it can also occur as a determiner in attributive position, wherein it is a clitic and should be unstressed, even outside of the first drop in the verse clause, as in ealle his wēagesīðas (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “all his companions in evil” (Judith 16b).

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“likewise also a large coat of mail” swylce ēac mēde on heofonum (hA1: ×××–́×× ͜ ́ ͜××) ( Judith 343b) “likewise also reward in heaven” swylce ēac rēðe strēamas (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) ( Judith 348b) “likewise also fierce streams”

In each case, the verse is part of a long list of items that all make up one clause. Yet these verses could be treated similarly to verses that contain the second of two infinitives that depend on a single auxiliary verb. In each case, the listener must mentally supply the underlying verb to understand the meaning. For instance, to swylce ēac būnan ond orcas must be added wǣron boren, creating the clause “likewise also goblets and flagons were brought.” If the verses are regarded as complete clauses with the implied but unstated verb, none of them are exceptional. Interestingly, all of these violations take place in the same position in the line: the light onset after an on-verse that does not end a clause. Similarly to hypermetric lines in other poems, most of the off-verses open a new clause. Judith has only one other example that does not: swīðmōd sinces āhte (HA1: –́–̀–́×–́×) | oððe sundoryrfes (hA1: ××–́×–́×) “[all that] the arrogant one owned of treasure or of personal wealth” (Judith 339). Here, the light onset is filled with only a conjunction, so it does not violate Kuhn’s first law. However, this verse contains the only instance of an onset with no particles; all of the others have at least one, if not several. Therefore, every time but one that the caesura does not coincide with a syntactic break, the verse incurs a violation of Kuhn’s first law. The same combination of conditions likewise produces violations in the other poems. Therefore, as far as Kuhn’s laws are concerned, the number of violations is small, and all the violations bear some resemblance to those in conservative composition because they seem readily understandable, rather than instances of the poet blatantly disregarding the restrictions. In terms of syntax and the placement of finite verbs, Judith looks similar to the conservative poems, but not identical. The general trend found in the hypermetric sections of all poetry that has been discussed thus far is that the number of syntactic breaks increases from that found in normal verse. The number does so here as well. In the normal sections, the poem averages a finite verb in 35.0% of the verses, whereas the hypermetric sections have one in 55.6% of the verses. This shift makes the poem specifically comparable to Beowulf and Genesis A. Some of the other conservative poems, and even more so the gnomic poems and Heliand, have more syntactic breaks in the normal sections and, in some cases, a greater increase in the number of syntactic breaks from the normal to the hypermetric sections. The incidence of syntactic

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breaks therefore makes Judith similar to the most conservative of the conservative poems. The placement of the verbs, however, presents a slight difference. The possible positions in which verbs appear in this poem remain the same as in the conservative poems, but the most prominent position of the verbs has shifted. The distribution of finite verbs can be seen in Table 5.4. Table 5.4: Finite verb placement in the hypermetric lines of Judith. Position

st Heavy onset lift drop

nd nd lift drop

rd rd lift drop

Light onset

th lift

th Final drop lift

th drop

Auxiliary























Copula























Lexical























Total























As in both Old English and Old Saxon hypermetric verse, the most weakly stressed positions (all of the drops except the light onset, in this case including the drop of the heavy onset, which can receive verbs in other poems) and the most strongly stressed positions (the second and fourth lifts, which define the alliteration) never contain a verb. All other positions may, although the more strongly stressed positions receive more lexical verbs. Where Old Saxon verse relaxes some of the restrictions on verb placement, creating lines that generally follow the trends but allow for a few more weakly stressed verbs in stronger positions, verb placement in Judith seems even more restricted than in the conservative poems. The drop of the heavy onset does not receive any verbs, and the final lift of the off-verse has a minimal percentage of auxiliary verbs and no copulas at all. As the poet restricts finite verbs in most of the positions of the line, he makes much greater use of the light onset than other Old English poets. The conservative Old English poems contain verbs in the light onset frequently, but they still have the most verbs in the final lift. The Old English gnomic poems shift more verbs into light onsets, placing about as many verbs there as in the heavy onset and the final lift, the other two most common positions. In Judith, the light onset receives the verbs more often than even in the gnomic poems, with over three times the number of verbs there as in any other position. Furthermore, the more weakly stressed verbs, auxiliaries and copulas, no longer

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constitute the majority of the verbs in the onset, as they do in both the gnomic poems and the conservative poems; the onset contains mostly lexical verbs, over half of the lexical verbs that appear in the hypermetric passages. In this one way, the poem looks similar to Heliand, which also has just over three times the number of verbs in the light onset, most of which are lexical. However, the placement of verbs in the onset distinguishes Judith from Heliand as well, because unlike the Heliand poet, who places more weakly stressed verbs in any position that may contain a verb, the Judith poet shifts almost all of the verbs into the light onset. While it contains mostly lexical verbs, it nevertheless includes all of the copulas in the hypermetric sections and all but one of the auxiliaries, as well. These verbs have the most potential to get in the poet’s way, for they are not as strongly stressed as lexical verbs, and they do not have synonyms to assist in alliteration. By keeping such verbs in the light onset, the poet does not have to worry about these complications, and by placing the other verbs with them, he can leave stressed positions open for stress words. Of all the compositional elements, the placement of finite verbs is the only one that differentiates Judith substantially from the conservative poems. The use of poetic diction and adherence to Kuhn’s laws show patterns similar to those found in most of the other Old English poems, suggesting that all of the poems maintain these prevalent features that distinguish poetry from prose. The verb placement seems to work in conjunction with the short metrical patterns to create restricted patterns that have prominent nouns and stress words. By relying more heavily on the light onset, the poet is able to fit the verbs in where they will not disturb the meter and will also not take up a stressed position. The other drops can therefore be used for the rest of the unstressed words and remain relatively short, and more stress words can occur in the lifts, making for especially noun-heavy diction.

The Style and Possible Uses of Judith’s Hypermetric Passages The Judith poet’s clear effort to maintain, or even supersede, the conservative norm for hypermetric poetry is an innovation in itself, and it points to a different type of hypermetric composition in this poem.11 As earlier scholars observe,

11 Parts of this section were published in an earlier version in The Journal of English and Germanic Philology as “A Drawn-Out Beheading: Style, Theme, and Hypermetrics in the Old English Judith” (2011).

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the poem becomes slower and more repetitive in the hypermetric sections, whereas the other poems analyzed thus far, including poems in Old Saxon and Old Norse, tend toward greater narrative progress and simple syntax in hypermetric sections. In contrast, the normal sections in Judith most commonly provide the medium for narrative progress. Although the clauses in normal sections take up more verses on average—sometimes because of the addition of variation and sometimes simply because the clause is particularly long— each subsequent clause turns to a new idea, rather than reiterating or reforming thoughts continually, as the hypermetric sections of this poem tend to do. The stylistic shift is reinforced by a dense concentration of nouns and other stress words in the hypermetric sections, which serves to give more weight to these sections and suggests that the poet used the hypermetric sections for a more directed, singular purpose. Rather than the variety of interacting uses that combine speed of narration, clarity, and formality, these weighty passages seem to be entirely for emphasis and serve to highlight the themes of the poem.

Repetition and Variation in Judith As a poem that contains feasting, speeches, introspection, and battle, Judith varies widely in the pacing of the different scenes. Surprisingly, the most active and fast-paced scene in the poem, the culminating battle that sees the Assyrians’ defeat at the hands of the Bethulians after a prolonged siege, is composed in normal meter. Griffith notes that in this section the poet “favours long sequences of short clauses” and uses so many verbs that he frequently violates the rules of precedence (1997: 40–41). In contrast, the poet seems to actively slow the pace of the hypermetric sections, an effect largely achieved through various modes of repetition that permeate the hypermetric sections. One type of repetition that the poet uses, again creating a contrast with hypermetric sections in other poems, is variation. While a characteristic feature of alliterative style overall, variation is less common in hypermetric sections: even those conservative poems that use variation in hypermetric sections tend to use much less of it than they do in normal sections. In contrast, the variation in Judith’s hypermetric verses changes slightly in form, but it does not decrease. In many of the late poems, such as The Battle of Brunanburh and The Death of Edward, the poets tend to use relatively simple phrases in variation, unlike the rather intricate examples from Beowulf, and the variation in Judith is similar. Thus, in the normal passages, the Judith poet frequently uses a single verse to repeat a single noun when he employs variation, as when the poet inserts the verse lāðne lēodhatan (D*2: –́×–́ ͜ ̀ ×) “hostile tyrant” (Judith 72a) in variation

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with ðone wǣrlogan “the scoundrel” from the previous verse, and tends not to employ adverbial phrases or clauses in variation. This same arrangement is most common in the hypermetric sections as well, but the verse in variation can be more expansive and detailed: the poet can either use a compound word with a modifier, as in bealde byrnwiggende (HD1: –́×–́–́–×) ̀ “bold mail-clad war12 riors” (Judith 17a), or a longer noun phrase, as in þearlmōd ðēoden gumena (HA1: –́–̀–́× ͜ ́͜××) “fierce prince of men” (Judith 66a).13 The hypermetric sections can also use longer phrases. For instance, when the poet uses sigorlēan in swegles wuldre (HA1: ͜ ͜× ́ –̀×–́×–́×) “reward for victory in the glory of heaven” (Judith 344a) in variation with swylce ēac mēde on heofonum (hA1: ×××–́×× ͜ ́͜××) “likewise also reward in heaven” (Judith 343b), he repeats a noun plus the modifying prepositional phrase.14 Thus, the variation remains an important element of the poem throughout the hypermetric passages, and the particularly drawnout, descriptive instances of variation serve to slow down the narrative flow and draw the audience’s attention to the nouns in question even more than the simpler variation in the normal sections does. In other cases, the poet uses variation without filling an entire verse, yet he still manages to slow the pace of the section down somewhat. For instance, the poet writes þæt hē hīe wið þæs hēhstan brōgan (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) / gefriðode, frymða waldend (aHA1: × ͜ ́͜××–́×–́×) “so that he protected her against the highest danger, the lord of creatures” (Judith 4b–5a). The second verse has the noun phrase frymða waldend, which stands in variation with hē from the previous verse, but also the finite verb for the whole clause. This particular structure of composition—the clause opening in the off-verse, a verb filling the onset of the on-verse, and variation filling the cadence—recurs several times and seems to be a specific technique the poet uses to slow down the narrative.15 This particular metrico-syntactic arrangement may even have been developed by the Judith poet, for it never occurs in the conservative poems. In part, the poet probably constructs verses this way to assist with the alliteration. He needs an f to alliterate with the verb as well as the main stave of the

12 Other verses similar to this one are 17a and 20a. 13 Other verses similar to this one are 16b, 21a, 61a, 66a, and 93a. 14 Similarly long instances of variation also occur in 31a, 32a, 94a, 273a, 343a, and 344a. 15 In the example cited above, the verb is a finite verb. Verses 11b–12a and 59b–60a exhibit the same structure with an infinitive as the verb in the first lift of the second clause. An alternate version of the structure appears in þā wearð se brēma on mōde (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) / blīðe, burga ealdor (HA1: –́×–́×–́×) “then the famous one became in heart cheerful, the leader of the strongholds” (Judith 57b–58a), where the first word in the second verse is not a verb but a stress word, in this case an adjective.

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following verse, and he can more easily provide it with a noun in variation than by starting the next clause in the middle of a verse. Yet alliteration cannot explain this structure fully, for if the poet wanted to avoid the variation and advance the narrative progress, he could have put the verb in the light onset where it does not need to alliterate, leaving the whole next verse free to add a related phrase or start a whole new clause. This is the technique frequently employed by the Old Saxon poet. In the instance of Judith 4b–5a, putting the verb in the light onset would make the off-verse very long (which is part of the reason why Old Saxon lines tend to be so long). However, the verses are not always as long every time the poet employs this structure. In hīe ðæt ofstum miclum (hA1: ××–́×–́×) / ræfndon, rondwiggende (HD1: –́×–́–́–̀×) “They carried that out with great haste, the shield-bearing warriors” (Judith 10b–11a), the offverse is not as long, so the light onset could accommodate the verb and remain within the accepted syllable range for the poem. Because the poet chooses the variation over placing the verb in the onset in both of these cases, the variation seems to serve three purposes: it avoids particularly long drops, since it allows the poet to provide alliteration for verbs and keep them out of the light onset (where they could lengthen that position to the extreme); it extends the length of the clause, thereby creating long clauses that cause the audience to linger over the descriptive noun phrase in the same way that the full-verse variation does; and it adds to the noun-heavy diction of the passage in a way that increases the formality of the tone. In addition to variation, the poet keeps the pace slow through other forms of repetition. Often consecutive sentences will not say exactly the same thing but be very close in meaning. In one example, the poet describes how Holofernes and his men drink oðþæt hīe on swīman lāgon, (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) / oferdrencte his duguðe ealle (aHA1: ××–́×× ͜ ́͜ ××–́×) | swylce hīe wǣron dēaðe geslegene (hA1: ×××××–́×× ͜ ́͜××) / āgotene gōda gehwylces (aHA1: × ͜ ́͜××–́××–́×) “until they lay in a swoon, he made all his seasoned troop drunk as if they were struck by death, drained of each of good things” (Judith 30b–32a). The entire passage simply states and then repeats the idea that the men are drunk and unconscious. Technically, the phrases are not in variation because they add details; the poet first states that the men are literally drunk, and the second gives a simile that likens them to dead men. But the verb in the first clause, lāgon, can often mean “lay dead” rather than just “lay,” so the simile merely invokes an image that was, implicitly, already there. The passage therefore repeatedly reworks the same concept, emphasizing just how drunk and incapacitated the men are, causing the audience to dwell on these details.

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The poet further increases the amount of repetition by repeating smaller words or phrases, as well. In one specific example, Judith’s prayer before she kills Holofernes, she constantly repeats the direct address to God. Forgif mē, swegles ealdor, (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) sigor ond sōðne gelēafan, þæt ic mid þȳs sweorde mōte (HA1: ͜ ́͜××–́××–́×) (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) gehēawan þysne morðres bryttan; geunne mē mīnra gesynta, (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) (hA1: ××××–́××–́×) þearlmōd þēoden gumena. Nāhte ic þīnre nǣfre (HA1: –́–̀–́× ͜ ́͜××) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) miltse þon māran þearfe. Gewrec nū, mihtig dryhten, (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) torhtmōd tīres brytta, þæt mē ys þus torne on mōde, (HA1: –́–̀–́×–́×) (hA1: ××××–́××–́×) hāte on hreðre mīnum. (Judith 88b–94a) (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) “Give me, heaven’s prince, victory and true belief, so that I with this sword can kill this bestower of murder; grant me my success, stern prince of men. I have never had a greater need for your mercy. Avenge now, mighty God, noble bestower of glory, that which for me is thus grievously in my mind, hotly in my heart.”

For each new entreaty she makes, she calls him something new: swegles ealdor, þearlmōd þēoden gumena, mihtig dryhten, and torhtmōd tīres brytta. Except for the last two examples, each phrase is a separate instance of Judith calling directly upon God in separate clauses. The syntactic distinction means that the vocatives do not create variation, but they still produce a significant amount of repetition, especially since two of the examples are particularly long and take up an entire hypermetric verse. Repetitive references to God in prayers or praise poems are by no means unique to Judith. The short, nine-line Cædmon’s Hymn includes seven synonyms for God. Requests in general tend to breed similar repetition. When Beowulf entreats Hrothgar to accept his aid at Beowulf 426–32, he addresses Hrothgar directly four times with four different epithets, suggesting that continually calling on the person being spoken to may be a convention of formal entreaties.16 In all three cases, while probably partially aiding the alliteration, the repetitions add to the weighty tone of the passage and lend formality to the request by persistently referring back to the beseeched party with especially formal terms. What is unique about Judith is that the poem has such protracted formality in a hypermetric section. These repetitions show that the sort of drawnout, stately diction that can slow down the narrative progress in normal verse in 16 I am grateful to Murray McGillivray for pointing out these two parallels.

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poems such as Beowulf occurs in hypermetric verse in Judith, and it is even adapted here to fill out the longer lines. In addition to this extended example, the poet creates repetition throughout the hypermetric sections through coordination of nouns. Many scholars have noted the proliferation of polysyndeton throughout the poem (see, for example, Griffith 1997: 85 and Chickering 2009: 132–33). Chickering believes that the resultant repetition of sounds and rhythms adds to the energy of the poem. In addition, the constructions add to the lexical repetition. Sometimes these compound constructions are similar but related things, such as mid rǣde and mid rihte gelēafan (aHA1: ×–́×××–́××–́×) “with advice and with true faith” (Judith 97a) or bēaga ond beorhtra māðma (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) “of rings and of bright treasure” (Judith 340a). In these cases, the poet is adding more details to the poem because he creates a list of relevant ideas or objects. The hypermetric structure allows him to do so with extra details since the onset can fit the first noun in the compound and then the cadence can include a modifier for the second noun. At the same time, the two individual nouns are so clearly related to each other that the poet is hardly adding anything new to the description. Instead, the additional noun phrase fleshes out the description in a way that draws attention to its importance more than it adds new information. Sometimes the poet does this in the extreme, as with mid wīdle ond mid womme besmītan (aHA1: ×–́×××–́××–́×) “to soil with defilement and with sin” (Judith 59a). Not only do the two nouns have synonymous definitions, but according to Bosworth and Toller’s Old English dictionary (1972), they can also both mean “filth.”17 The two words are therefore almost exact synonyms, and the repetition serves to add not content but gravity to the line. Furthermore, such repetition stretches out the discussion of the individual idea, making the concept of sin seem particularly important because the poet forces the audience to linger on it. Together, these various repetitive techniques show that the poet’s style of hypermetric composition does not add to the narrative progress but instead slows that progress down, which in turn emphasizes the subject by giving it further weight. The slow pacing of these sections adds to the heightened tone created by the hypermetric meter. It creates a stark contrast between these sections and the rest of the narrative, especially in the second half of the poem, where the pacing through the inspirational speech and the battle scenes is relatively fast. It also allows the audience to linger on and mull over the central themes as the 17 The dictionary lists the definitions of widl as “filth, pollution.” According to entry IIc of wamm, which is the entry that cites Judith 59a, the word means “moral stain, impurity, uncleanness, defilement.” However, in entry Ib, the definition “filth” is listed, along with “impurity, corruption.” The two words therefore have a different range of meanings, but with a clear overlap.

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poet rewords and rethinks those ideas in repetitive language. Thus, both the time it takes the poet to recite the long lines and the lingering style that draws out the length of each individual concept slows the narrative down in a way that differentiates these passages from the rest of the poem and gives them more attention so as to highlight their importance. The formality of these sections is further increased by the noun-heavy diction created by the repetitions. Hypermetric sections in general often have an additional noun in each line because the additional stressed position in the heavy hypermetric verse is frequently filled with a noun. In Judith, though, both the variation and the other types of repetition increase the number of noun phrases used overall, so that over 50% of the stressed words in the hypermetric sections are nouns. The effect is further reinforced by an overall increase in the number of stress words in stressed positions. The larger number of noun phrases also results in more lexical adjectives, which adds another lexical word. Furthermore, the shift of the verbs to the light onset creates one additional position that is not frequently filled by a particle. In the conservative poems, hypermetric sections have fewer stress words in stressed positions, on average, than normal verse: only 65.1% of the lifts in the hypermetric passages contain a stress word, as compared to 75.7% of the lifts in normal verse. In contrast, with 65% of the verbs in Judith occurring in the light onset, the percentage of stress words in the lift rises from 78.8% in the normal passages to 84.4% in the hypermetric passages, which in turn causes the number of particles to decrease from 18.8% to 13.4%.18 As the introduction suggests, the more the poet is able to maintain a noun-heavy diction, filling the stressed positions primarily with stress words and relegating particles to only heavier drops, the more stylized and therefore formal the poem appears. If the Judith poet’s primary goal is indeed to create a heightened tone in these sections, it makes sense that, in spite of the linguistic shift in the late Old English period, the verses lack the lengthened drops that can be found in Old Saxon and the Old English gnomic poems. Those other poems use the hypermetric sections for several different reasons, and one prominent reason is frequently to create greater syntactic simplicity.19 To do so, their poets need to fill

18 The remaining stressed positions are filled with displaced clitics, which appear in stress positions at about the same rate in normal and hypermetric verse. 19 As previous chapters suggest, the Old English gnomic poems require clauses that are simple enough to be memorable while still fitting into as few verses as possible, and Heliand frequently uses hypermetrics in important passages of explanation, speeches, and sometimes even close translations that would benefit from syntactic simplicity so that the emerging Christian audience could learn more about their faith.

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the drops with the function words such as auxiliary verbs, adverbs, and occasionally pronouns that hold each sentence together. In some ways, Judith is likewise syntactically simpler in the hypermetric sections than in the normal sections, since the hypermetric sections do have more frequent clause breaks. In other ways, though, such as the frequency of variation, the syntax remains comparable to the normal sections, so the possibility for syntactic simplicity does not seem to have been a major concern for the poet in the hypermetric passages. With the goal of adding solemnity to the lines, the poet would have wanted to keep each drop as short as possible so that the emphasis remains on the nouns rather than on a long string of unstressed words. He does not minimize the length of the extra drops, because those are what allow him to use a diction heavier in nouns: with a few extra unstressed syllables in each line, most of the weakly stressed words can remain out of the stressed positions. However, he also does not let these positions become too long, keeping the emphasis firmly on the stress words. This may further be why the poet mostly maintains a strict distribution of heavy hypermetric onsets in the on-verse and light onsets in the off-verse. Although he does use the light onset consistently (unlike the Maxims poets) to fit the necessary function words into the line, he does not make frequent use of the light onset in the on-verse, as the Guthlac A and Heliand poet frequently do. This distribution pattern allows him to maintain a more formal tone than the other poets and add additional stress words to each line. As a result of these stylistic and syntactic choices, the poet is able to compose particularly formal hypermetric passages that place emphasis on the major characters of the poem and their important characteristics. The combination of pacing and diction, in conjunction with the hypermetric length, make these lines stand out even more than a hypermetric verse normally would. This particular hypermetric style may even be why these hypermetric lines are more compact than those in the most conservative poems: the poet keeps the drop length as small as he can and more frequently adds complex features such as compounds to coin descriptive terms for the characters while also making a particularly noun-heavy verse that draws attention to these ideas.

Thematic Expansion in Hypermetric Passages The stylistic features described above allow the poet to use the hypermetric sections in Judith primarily to emphasize moments or ideas vital to the major themes of the poem. When interpreting Judith, scholars often look beyond the confines of the poem to explain why an Old English poet would depict a woman in an act of violent revenge that is usually reserved for men. Of course,

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the act of beheading Holofernes is a central moment in the source material, but the questions of why the poet would adapt this particular poem and why do so in the way that he did remain. One of the main features that scholars note when discussing the adaptation is the simplification of the poem. The large cast of characters from the biblical source are reduced to only two named figures plus a few anonymous supporters, and their characteristics can accurately be described as black and white. Judith in particular is made much more innocent, with all evidence of her role as seductress and conniver obfuscated, replaced with emphasis on her wisdom and chastity (see Orchard 1995: 7–12 and Griffith 1997: 55–58). Many scholars have used this simplification to support an allegorical reading of the poem, arguing that Judith is a type of the Church, fighting against the devil figure of Holofernes.20 Her wisdom and purity show the proper characteristics that serve as armament against evil. A second interpretation, suggested by a comment in Ælfric’s Letter to Sigeweard, characterizes Judith tropologically: according to this reading, the poem is a call for the English people both to behave more morally so that they will have the support of God and to fight bravely in defense of the women under their protections, all so that they can win their current battles against Danes.21 Some scholars have also shown that these two interpretations can be reconciled, with Judith as a chaste figure who, when read allegorically, can provide inspiration for both the moral and the brave behavior that would have been needed to fight the Danes.22 These scholars look primarily at contexts beyond the confines of the poem to support their interpretation. Other scholars, however, have observed Judith’s distinctive stylistic properties and focused instead on those. Chickering notes the variety of poetic innovations that the poet employs, which he believes creates a noteworthy “exuberance” throughout the poem, and argues that they exert “such strong tonal and ideation control that it thoroughly stabilizes the text when we read it on its own, rather than against other texts” (2009: 122). Other scholars focus on the specific Germanic-heroic stylistic features, particularly the way that the poet integrates traditional heroic diction and type-scenes, bringing

20 See, for example, Huppé 1970: 186, Campbell 1971: 155, Chance Nitzsche 1980 and Chance 1986: 38–40, Hermann 1989: 178, and Bourquin 1994: 10. 21 See, for example, Pringle 1975, Chamberlain 1975, and Olsen 1982. De Lacy 1996 likewise argues for a tropological reading, though with a general focus on promoting good Christian and Germanic attributes rather than a specific focus on the Danish invaders. 22 See, for example, Astell 1989 and Cooper 2010.

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the poem in line with the Germanic heroic tradition even as he emphasizes the power of faith in this particular battle.23 The extended and highly stylized use of hypermetric meter is surely another stylistic choice that is central to understanding the poem. Because they slow the narrative and force the audience to linger on particular ideas, the hypermetric sections provide emphasis, and the poet uses that emphasis to bring out the major themes of the poem. The first is the idea of contrast, in this case the contrast between the two extremes represented by Judith and Holofernes. The Old English poet seems to be especially interested in the contrast since, as noted above, he adapts his source, which casts Judith as a noble but scheming character, to characterize Judith as wholly innocent and without design. Because the poet further connects Judith directly to God, and Holofernes is frequently equated with the devil, the contrast is absolute. Connected to this theme is the idea of a reversal of fortunes. The whole poem ultimately relates the story of the complete reversal of the Hebrews from an oppressed people to victorious conquerors, together with the reversal of the Assyrians from a ruling army to defeated corpses. Most importantly, the poem illustrates how God plays the governing role over these events and the tale as a whole, and that all of the events in the poem occur through his will. By emphasizing these particular themes with the hypermetric composition, the poet is able to echo a technique that we saw in Heliand, which is also common in Old English religious poems, of melding the Germanic heroic tradition and Christian ideology. The clear heroic language that the poet adds to his source to describe the characters and depict the important scenes shows his interest in the Germanic tradition overall. The contrast between the two characters allows him to focus on the idea of reversal, making Judith similar to heroic poems such as Beowulf and Deor. By depicting this reversal as wholly under the control of God, the poet makes Christianity the governing force of the heroic action of the poem. The subject material of Judith adds an extra layer to this adaptation since, as a woman, Judith would normally not serve the function of heroic avenger. Because she yields her agency to God, her role as a warrior becomes acceptable—she is acting as an instrument of God and so her actions are part of his larger plan. This reading of the poem does not discount either the allegorical or tropological readings; both of those underlying ideas can certainly be read in the poem. It does suggest, however, that making Judith a symbolic figure

23 See in particular Fry 1967, 1971, and 1987, Tyler 1992, Lucas 1992, Garner 2001, and Momma 2003; though cf. Herbison 2010, which argues that the comic elements of the poem serve to subvert rather than uphold the heroic tradition.

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was not necessarily the poet’s main goal. Instead, the stylistic choices that the poet makes show a concern with taking an interesting poem that was clearly an object of fascination, as evidenced by contemporary adaptations of and commentaries on the poem, and successfully integrating it into the Old English poetic tradition. The hypermetric lines are one tool he used to craft this adaptation, providing the emphasis needed to foreground the themes that solidify this integration. The poem as we have it begins with a hypermetric section, and the first full sentence illustrates what might be considered the governing theme of the entire poem, the power of God over all that occurs: Hēo ðār ðā gearwe funde (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) mundbyrd æt ðām mǣran þēodne, þā hēo āhte mǣste þearfe, (HA1: –́–×× ̀ –́×–́×) (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) hyldo þæs hēhstan dēman, þæt hē hīe wið þæs hēhstan brōgan (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××××–́×–́×) gefriðode, frymða waldend. (Judith 2b–5a) (aHA1: × ͜ ͜× ́ ×–́×–́×) “She there then readily found protection from the illustrious lord, when she had the greatest need, grace of the high judge, so that he, the lord of creatures, protected her against the highest danger.”

As with many of the hypermetric passages in Judith, this passage has a slow pace, with two adjacent clauses that both speak of God’s protection of Judith and three different names for God himself. The diction is also particularly heavy, with two or three stress words per verse, many of which are nouns. Therefore, the idea receives quite a bit of emphasis. Although this is not the beginning of the poem itself, and it is impossible to tell just how much originally came before this section,24 it certainly serves to introduce the banquet scene. Thus, the idea of God’s power, introduced as it is in these stately hypermetric lines, serves to contextualize this central episode.

24 The poem is certainly fragmentary because it contains numbered sections and starts in the middle of section nine. Timmer has argued that the first eight sections recount the missing parts of the Book of Judith, making for a poem of “about 1,344 lines” (1952: 2). Using a comparison with the Junius Manuscript, where sections in adjacent poems are numbered contiguously, Rosemary Woolf argues that no further sections exist, and the poem is virtually complete as is (1986: 121–24). While subsequent scholars have mostly agreed with Woolf that the poet probably did not recount Judith’s entire story, many argue that the missing section is probably longer, somewhere between 100 and 200 lines (see Lucas 1990, de Lacy 1996, and Griffith 1997).

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As the poem moves on, the poet shifts his attention to the idea of contrast, which he emphasizes through particularly descriptive hypermetric passages. In the first seventy lines of the poem, the poet repeatedly switches into the hypermetric mode when he describes Judith herself and the perfect protection she has from God. For instance, he describes Judith’s faith and the reward she receives for it with Hyre ðæs fæder on roderum (hA1: ××× ͜ ́͜×× ͜ ́͜××) / torhtmōd tīðe gefremede (HA1: –́–̀–́×× ͜ ́͜××) | þe hēo āhte trumne gelēafan (hA1: ××××–́××–́×) / ā tō ðām ælmihtigan (HD2: –́××–́–́–̀×) “for that the father in the sky provided a glorious boon to her, she who possessed strong belief always in the almighty” (Judith 5b–7a). Conversely, the poet also uses the meter when he describes Holofernes and his men when they are the most drunk, the most lustful, or just generally demonstrating the greatest excess in their celebration. When the poet says of Holofernes that Gefēol ðā wīne swā druncen (hA1: ×××–́××–́×) / se rīca on his reste middan (aHA1: ×–́×××–́×–́×) | swā hē nyste rǣda nānne (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) “Then thus drunk with wine, the powerful one fell onto the middle of his bed, so he did not know any sense” (Judith 67b–68), he shows just how low Holofernes’s vices have brought him at this point. Ciaran Arthur argues that this moment depicts a particularly depraved Holofernes because not only is the audience seeing him in a constant state of repose, but he is also inspiring his men to act in the same way, making him both an anti-hero and an anti-leader (2013: 874–75).25 In both cases, the descriptions tend towards extremes. As such, they create a stark contrast between the holiness of Judith and the debauchery of Holofernes. By continually highlighting these opposites through the hypermetric meter, the poet emphasizes the contrast. In addition to descriptive passages, the poet also uses hypermetric meter in two key speeches. Given that speeches commonly appear in the hypermetric mode, as seen, for instance, in Guthlac A, Genesis A, and Heliand, it should not be surprising that they do here. These speeches are particularly important because they both illustrate the major reversal in fortune of the poem, and they therefore integrate the major themes and highlight the core concepts of the poem. The speeches are carefully constructed to provide emphasis on the themes and explore how the characters illustrate these themes in multiple ways. The first is perhaps the most important moment in the poem: Judith’s prayer to God before she kills Holofernes (Judith 83–94a). The speech starts in normal verse, 25 See also Lucas 1992, who also finds evidence that Holofernes is depicted specifically as an anti-heroic figure (22–23) and the polar opposite of Judith (23–24), and Astell (1989: 123–24) and Cooper (2010: 177–78), who show that the poet alters the source-text to emphasize the drunkenness of Holofernes and his men.

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as Judith addresses God in the form of the trinity and speaks about her troubled mind: Ic ðē, frymða god (B1: ××–́×–́) | ond frōfre gǣst (B1: ×–́×–́) / bearn alwaldan (D1: –́–́–̀×) | biddan wylle (A1: –́×–́×) / miltse þīnre (A1: –́×–́×) “I you, God of creatures and spirit of consolation, child of the lord, wish to ask your mercy” (Judith 83–85a). Already the poet slows the pace of the narrative because Judith opens her speech with an address to each aspect of the trinity, giving an entire verse to each form of address. Some scholars have noted additional extrametrical features here—namely cross alliteration, cluster alliteration, alliterative enjambment, and inflectional rhyme—that bring more attention to these lines, therefore slowing the pace further still.26 Still, the pace is not as slow as it could be, for each of these verses is quite short; only 83a has more than the minimal four syllables. When Judith makes the actual request for God’s aid, she switches into the hypermetric mode. At this point, the pace of the poem is slowed even more because of the extra foot in each line. Thus, the section contains both repetitions, which slow the pace of the narrative, and extra stress words, which slow the pace of the recitation. The hypermetric section can combine these two features in the extreme with phrases such as Gewrec nū, mihtig dryhten (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) / torhtmōd tīres brytta (HA1: –́–̀–́×–́×) “Avenge now, mighty God, glorious bestower of glory” (Judith 92a–93b), in which the noun comes with a modifier and is subsequently repeated, inviting the audience to dwell on every image. By starting to slow the pace of the poem at the beginning of the speech and then adding the hypermetric lines to do so even more, the poet makes this passage stand out more than any other. This speech reinforces the control God has over these events in part through simple repetition. As stated above, almost every clause includes a reference to God as a direct address, and one clause even has a second reference in variation. While the poet could have done this in normal verse, the form of the hypermetric line allows these references to God to be more expansive. For example, in Forgif mē, swegles ealdor (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) “give me, prince of the sky” (Judith 88b), the poet states Judith’s request in an imperative statement while also including a noun phrase that has both noun and adjective to give a full description of God. When the epithet referring to God stands alone in a verse, it can be even more descriptive, as in þearlmōd þēoden gumena (HA1: –́–– ̀ ×́ ͜ ×́͜ ×) “stern prince of men” (Judith 91a). In some ways, Judith’s evoking God at this pivotal moment looks very similar to the actions of other heroes. Beowulf, for example, mentions God before his major battles, saying that God will determine which combatant will be

26 See in particular Griffith 1997: 28–29 and Bredehoft 2005: 63–66.

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victorious. After the fight with Grendel’s mother, Beowulf even claims that he would have lost the battle, nymðe mec God scylde (C1: ×××–́–́×) “if God had not protected me” (Beowulf 1657b). While similarly depending on the power of God, Judith is not identical because she does not merely give God credit for her victory but uses the prayer to gain the agency needed to act in the first place.27 A few words that receive stress in this passage emphasize the importance of God’s agency in Judith’s endeavor. She says: geunne mē mīnre gesynta (hA1: ××××–́××–́×) / þearlmōd þēoden gumena. (HA1: –́–̀–× ͜ ́͜××) | Nāhte ic þīnre nǣfre (HA1: ×××–́×–́×) / miltse þon māran þearfe (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) “Grant to me my success, stern prince of men. I never had the greater need of your mercy” (Judith 90b–92a). In this passage, the poet stresses two clitics, mīnre and þīnre when they appear before the noun they modify; normally clitics can receive stress only when they have been displaced and appear after the noun. The use of these two clitics in stressed positions is particularly unusual in light of the general tendency of the Judith poet to make the hypermetric sections especially noun heavy. Furthermore, they stand in the first stress of the off-verse, one of the two positions that dictate the alliteration and are the most strongly stressed in the line. By filling this position in the weighty hypermetric lines, the clitics must have stood out considerably and have been much more strongly stressed than they normally would be. Therefore, the poet emphasizes the contrasting possessives. Judith acknowledges that she needs help with her success, but that it is God’s mercy that will achieve that success.28 Throughout the passage, then, the poet

27 Thijs likewise sees a contrast between Beowulf and Judith, arguing that the stylistic features of the poem illustrate a humility that Beowulf lacks because the first few lines of the poem juxtapose Judith and God a number of times, consistently placing God in the on-verse and Judith in the off-verse (2006: 53–54). 28 In addition to these metrical features, some parametrical features serve to reinforce the contrast between God and Judith and the importance of calling upon his help. The contrast is brought out by the parallel syntax between verses 90b and 91b: the two verses both open with a finite verb and a pronoun in the drop, followed by a stressed possessive adjective in the first lift, but the words that fill these parallel positions oppose each other in various ways. The two finite verbs, a second-person imperative versus a first-person singular indicative, contrast the difference in God and Judith’s agency. The subsequent pronouns add to the contrast since, while both first person, one is nominative and the other dative, changing Judith’s role in the clause. The possessives solidify the link because not only are they stressed, but they also rhyme, reinforcing the connection between the two concepts. Interestingly, the parallel breaks down at the end of the verse. While the possessive pronoun is immediately followed by the modified noun in verse 90b, the noun is delayed in 91b and occurs at the start of the next verse. This tmesis may signify Judith’s lack of God’s grace, since miltse is not immediately there for the audience to hear, and therefore emphasizes her need of it. (I should like to thank an anonymous JEGP reviewer for pointing out the importance of the parametrical features in this passage.)

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uses the features of the hypermetric line to drive home the point that Judith is relying entirely on God in this endeavor, though it is she who physically performs the action of beheading Holofernes. Judith’s extreme faith in God’s power as well as with the way she acts through it is especially important in this poem because it shows the central role God plays in Judith’s deed. As a woman in an Anglo-Saxon poem, Judith would not normally take such an aggressive role, wielding a sword and killing a man herself. Instead, idealized women are depicted mostly in the role of mother or reproducer and admired primarily for being wise, for weaving peace between communities and within the community, and for supporting their husband and sons.29 These women can become quite powerful within their societies, but it is normally through advising, inspiring, or inciting men to perform suitable acts of violence, not through performing the violence themselves.30 Judith is able to avenge her people herself because she gives God the agency, beseeching him with the imperatives forgif mē “give me” (Judith 88b), and gewrec nū “avenge now” (Judith 92b), when she seeks to gain the power to be avenged on Holofernes. This is not to say that Judith’s actions are not heroic; as several scholars have noted, Judith’s actions are quite brave and make her comparable to a man in some ways.31 Indeed, as mentioned above, men in heroic poems also credit their victory to God when facing a particularly formidable foe. Instead, it means that she avoids defying gender expectations by taking

29 See Chance 1986: 1–5, Sklute 1990: 208, Lees and Overing 2001: 15, and Klein 2006: 4–15; but cf. Damico 1984: 82–85. Juliana provides one other example of a woman in Old English literature who fights directly as she grapples with the devil, but she is often interpreted as an allegorical symbol of the Church instead of a martial woman (see Chance 1986: 40–46). Furthermore, once she finishes this spiritual battle, she returns to being relatively passive in the face of worldly persecution; she does not waver from her devout stance, but she maintains it by enduring her suffering and allowing herself to become a martyr, rather than physically taking up a sword against her persecutor. 30 Women in Old Norse literature are particularly well known for aggressively inciting the men in their lives to action (for a discussion of these women, see, for example, Clover 2002 and Scott 2002). Some scholars have pointed out that Wealhtheow (see Murphy 1985: 111–12 and Olsen 1997) and Hildeburh (see Hill 1995, Olsen 1997, and Neidorf 2017) similarly, though more subtlety, serve as inciters in Beowulf. 31 Most of the scholars who argue for her status as a hero also remark on her fluid characteristics: they argue that she is transformed, perhaps only temporarily, to take on a masculine role (see, for examples Kaske 1982, Litton 1993, and Belanoff 1993) or that she moves into masculine spheres while still being tempered by female characteristics (see, for example, Mullally 2005 and Thijs 2006). Olsen (1982: 289–93) argues more firmly that Judith performs heroic deeds as a woman, but she also argues that the poet depicts her doing so in order to shame his contemporaries who have fallen prey to the Danes.

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the heroic trope to an extreme and acting not just with the help of God, as a man might do, but through God. The poet reinforces this idea when, as the speech ends, he does not yet switch out of hypermetric mode. He explains that Hī ðā se hēhsta dēma (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) / ǣdre mid elne onbryrde (HA1: –́××–́××–́×) “Then the highest judge immediately inspired her with courage” (Judith 94b–95a). He makes clear that God answers Judith’s prayer and indeed gives her the power to perform this deed, showing that his inspiration allowed her the courage to take up the sword and strike Holofernes, creating the reversal that brings Holofernes low and returns the Hebrews to power. Only once this idea is apparent, and Judith has begun to act, does the poet switch back into normal meter to describe the deed itself. The hypermetric lines here seem to draw out the important speech that Judith delivers, but only in part. Even more so, the lines call attention to the whole section, which explains one of the major themes of the poem, namely, the way in which God can act through those who have faith in him, whoever they might be, and bring about a reversal of fortunes that favors the faithful. The second speech that contains hypermetric verse uses the same structure as the first. The speech begins in normal verse, switches into hypermetrics for the most important moment, and is followed by a few subsequent lines still in the hypermetric mode to show the results of the speech. This speech occurs just after the Assyrians have found Holofernes beheaded in his bed, and one of his warriors declares that they are defeated and will all soon lie dead as well. While not as important as Judith’s speech, this speech is also central to the poem because it shows the key reversal in the fortunes of the two armies. After Judith’s act, the attitude of the soldiers in the Assyrian army changes from complete overconfidence in their ability to defeat the Hebrews to utter despair about their imminent death at the hands of the Hebrew army. The warrior illustrates that despair when he declares that it is the time þe wē sculon nȳde losian, (hA1: ××××–́× ͜ ́͜××) / somod æt sæcce forweorðan (HA1: ͜ ́͜××–́××–́×) “when we shall by need be lost, at the same time perish at battle” (Judith 287b–88a). The speech shows a complete lack of hope because it speaks not of a fear of death, but rather a necessity; the speaker is resigned that death has become his fate. The repetition of the idea underscores both the fact of the reversal and the speaker’s acceptance of it. Once again, the hypermetric meter does not end with the speech but instead goes on afterwards to show the result of the speech: Hī ðā hrēowigmōde (hA1: ××–́×–́×) / wurpon hyra wǣpen of dūne (HA1: –́×××–́××–́×) | gewitan him wērigferhðe (hA1: ××××–́×–́×) / on flēam sceacan (C3: ×–́ ͜ ́ ×) “They then sad at heart threw their weapons down, for their part, the weary-hearted ones departed to hasten away in flight” (Judith 289b–91a).

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At this point, the valor of the Assyrians has fallen so far that they do not even fall in battle but flee before they get a chance to fight. The hypermetric section emphasizes this central reversal through the speech and then drives the point home with the following description of the actual result that the speech predicts. Between the two speeches, the poem contains very few hypermetric verses. Only a pair of lines, which comes very near to the second speech and likewise points out the reversal of fortune of the Assyrians and the lone line at 132 are hypermetric. Apart from these, the poem remains in normal verse for over 200 lines after Judith begins her attack on Holofernes. While not particularly odd for most poems, this is a long section considering how much of the early section of the poem is in hypermetric verse and how frequently the poet there shifts between the two modes of composition. The reason the poet avoids hypermetric verses in this part seems to be that it provides mostly narrative rather than description or reflection. After Judith kills Holofernes and leaves the Assyrian camp, the action becomes quite hectic. Judith has to flee, then she inspires her people to fight, which in turn leads them into a fierce battle while the Assyrians scramble to figure out what is happening. Because the poet limits the amount of repetition in the normal lines, normal meter can more effectively illustrate the excited tone. Even the two speeches that Judith delivers in this section have more in common with the narrative moments than the other speeches. She first tells the Hebrews that God has granted them an end to their suffering and later inspires them to go out of Bethulia and fight with utterances such as: Fȳnd syndon ēowere (A1: –́××–́×) gedēmed to dēaðe, ond gē dōm āgon, (aA1: ×–́××–́×) (C1: ××–́–́×) tīr æt tohtan, swā ēow getācnod hafað (A1: –́×–́×) (B1: ×××–́× ͜ ͜× ́ ) mihtig dryhten þurh mīne hand. (Judith 195b–98) (A1: –́×–́×) (B1: ×–́×–́) “Your enemies are judged to death, and you possess glory, fame in battle, as [the] mighty lord has indicated to you though my hand.”

Here, as with most of the material in the two speeches composed in normal verse, Judith moves swiftly through what she wants to say. Variation does occur, as in tīr æt tohtan appearing in variation for dōm, but the poet uses it sparingly. Otherwise the verses are short, generally at or close to the foursyllable minimum, and the speech itself builds quickly, allowing Judith to push her people into battle. Thus, the two speeches seem to be a part of the rapid

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action mixed up with the battle, and so the poet stays with the style that allows for narrative progress. The whole 200-line section has no moment or event that illustrates the major themes of the poem. Therefore, rather than slow down the narrative pace with the repetitions that characterize the hypermetrics in this poem, the poet maintains normal verse composition. At the end of the poem, after the bulk of the narrative is over, the poet returns to hypermetrics with the last eleven lines. At this point, the battle sequence is finished, and the poet describes the distribution of treasure after the battle, gives responsibility for the victory to God, and ends with overall praise of God. The repetition appears appropriate here because no action is taking place, and the poet can end the poem by reiterating and lingering over the major themes, ending the poem by clearly bringing all three together. In this case, the passage starts with the theme of reversal that emphasizes the contrast between Judith and Holofernes. The poet describes the excess of treasure that the swīðmōd “arrogant” Holofernes had (Judith 339a), and also shows that he has lost this treasure and it is now in the more deserving hands of the beorhtan “bright” and gearoþoncolre “ready-witted” Judith (Judith 340b, 341a). But perhaps more important is the praise for God, both as the architect of the Hebrew victory and as the powerful ruler of the earth overall. The poet quite explicitly gives credit for the victory to God, and then moves past that topic to end the poem, still in the hypermetric mode, with a general praise of his might: Ðæs sȳ ðām lēofan drihtne (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) wuldor tō wīdan aldre, þe gesceōp wind ond lyfte, (HA1: –́××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) roderas ond rūme grundas, swylce ēac rēðe strēamas (HA1: ͜ ́͜×××–́×–́×) (hA1: ×××–́×–́×) ond swegles drēamas ðurh his sylfes miltse. (Judith 346b–49) (aA1: ×–́×–́×) (hA1: ××–́×–́×) “Therefore, glory is forever for the beloved lord, who created wind and air, sky and spacious ground, moreover furious streams and the delights of the heaven through the mercy of himself.”

Stylistically, the Judith poet is quite conventional in his choice to end the poem in hypermetric meter. As noted in chapter 2 in reference to The Order of the World, poets frequently choose to end their poems with a hypermetric passage, praise of God’s glory together with those who show obedience to him, or both. The Judith poet therefore finishes his poem in a way that is consistent with other poems in terms of meter and content. Where he differs is in the unique style of his hypermetric composition: while the other poets use the typical

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rapid syntax of most hypermetric sections, the Judith poet maintains his slow, stately pace. These last few lines essentially praise God for his creation, and the poet draws out that praise by listing the various aspects of the earth that God created, frequently stating concepts that overlap or are outright repetitions. Thus, the hypermetric ending serves to bring all the themes of the poem together at the end, and most emphatically to underscore the power of God and his control of the heroic actions and triumphs of the poem.

Conclusion Even though the hypermetric composition in Judith looks similar to that in the conservative poems, the poet’s style and the specific places he employs the meter suggest that he was using it quite innovatively. As part of his innovation, he eschews the various and multifaceted use of hypermetric meter found in many other poems and instead uses hypermetrics consistently to slow the narrative down in the hypermetric sections and to provide emphasis, composing with the same deliberate repetition in each hypermetric passage. He uses the emphasis to bring together the heroic and religious aspects of the poem in a way that highlights the major themes: the contrast between Judith and Holofernes, the reversal of fortunes of the two groups, and the way the power of God brings about that reversal. The hypermetric line in general is especially suited for such emphasis, since the high number of stress words in the stressed positions gives extra weight to the line. By increasing the variation and other forms of repetition, the poet augments the already emphatic features to create a particularly slow and stately pace for these important moments. This style of composition is particularly notable in the context of late verse, where it represents a more drastic shift than the same pattern would show in conservative verse, since the poet is coping with a larger number of function words that might otherwise increase the length of the line. Hypermetric verses are convenient for contending with multiple unstressed words, since the extra unstressed positions provide an easy place for them, and so using them would seem quite logical in this context. Still, hypermetric meter in Judith represents an innovation on the poet’s part for a number of reasons. First, hypermetric composition is even rarer in late poetry than it is in earlier poetry. Secondly, the poet shifts the verb placement primarily into the light onset, rather than placing verbs mostly in the final lift or distributing them evenly among the final lift and the two onsets, to maximize the number of stressed words in stressed positions. And third, in spite of the increased number of function words and additional verbs in the drops, the poet composes lines that, on average, are as short as, if

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not slightly shorter than, those of the conservative poems. This compositional technique allows the poem to sound traditionally structured in the face of language change, and it could be a way for the poet to maintain the conventional noun-heavy diction that recalls earlier heroic verse in the particularly important moments of the poem. In using such innovations to add emphasis to the poem, the poet is not completely breaking from earlier compositional technique, since other poets commonly use hypermetrics to provide emphasis. Furthermore, the Judith poet does so in typical moments such as speeches and the end of the poem, where hypermetric meter is quite common elsewhere. Nevertheless, the deliberate style that the poet uses together with the near-exclusive focus on emphasis suggests that the Judith poet took his awareness of hypermetric composition and the style it creates and adapted it to fit late Old English diction into a traditional sound that stood out enough to create the thematic core of his poem.

Conclusion The study of metrical style through hypermetrics is the study of fluidity, adaptation, and the individual poets’ choices. The form itself demonstrates these characteristics. As chapter 1 shows, hypermetric form is all about options. While there are definite standards that the poets tend to adhere to, such as using hypermetric verses in groups and placing the heavy verse in the on-verse and the light verse in the off-verse, the lines still have more flexibility than most normal lines through the structure of the onset: the drop length and filler are flexible enough that poets can choose to accommodate quite a lot of material in them. Furthermore, even what standards exist are more tendencies than rules, and poets frequently take options such as including a lone hypermetric line or using a light onset in both verses when they find it aids them in their goals. These options can be found in the most conservative of Old English poems. Other contexts produce still greater varieties. The Old Norse and Old Saxon traditions reveal how different languages adapted hypermetric principles in various ways. In a tradition very similar to that of Old English that was adapted to allow for a greater number of unstressed syllables, the Heliand poet uses hypermetric meter more readily throughout his poem, expanding the most flexible parts of the line to their limits. Conversely, the Old Norse poets did not have hypermetric meter in the same way, but still used similar principles to construct meters that had differing degrees of flexibility. Even within Old English, a wide range of options can be seen. The group of gnomic poems and Judith show how poets can take advantage of the fluidity of hypermetric composition to serve the needs of a unique genre or even an individual poem. Because hypermetric composition is so versatile, paying attention to the how of the composition can show the why, which makes such inquiry an invaluable tool for analysis. There are many reasons for poets to switch to hypermetric meter, which can best be seen when looking at the intersection of metrical form, syntactic patterns, and a variety of metrico-syntactic and extrametrical features. First and foremost, the long lines increase the emphasis on the passages composed in hypermetric meter. Sometimes this is done through the sheer length of the line, but it can also be reinforced by changes in the pacing and the syntax. Often hypermetric syntax is simpler, allowing for straightforward diction that is useful for clear explanations, with multiple connections and explicit subjects; for natural speech that has some features of prose; and for quick narrative progress, often in the form of exciting action scenes. Another contrast, though, can be the level of detail included. Hypermetric form allows for a greater number of details, which can function together with https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501513688-007

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the extended length of the line to slow the pacing down. In the more specific context of gnomic diction, the form can also be used to accommodate the formulaic language of gnomic statements, allowing simple aphorisms to fit into a single verse, making them pithy and memorable. Some of these uses have been pointed out by earlier scholars such as Sievers and Timmer, but this fuller analysis has allowed me to add to the list and show the various interactions between the different uses. When considering the numerous uses for hypermetric meter, as well as the interactions between them, it is important to keep in mind that there is not necessarily a one-to-one correspondence between hypermetric composition and particular functions. It can exist in individual instances, as in Judith, where the poet seems focused on using hypermetrics for emphasis. More often, though, a single hypermetric passage can perform multiple functions at once, using a simpler syntax for a clear explanation while also providing extra details that add to the formality of the moment, or using natural speech patterns that also create emphasis because of the contrast it creates. Poets do not even have to be consistent about their use of hypermetrics within a single poem: in Haraldskvæði, the poet switches from málaháttr to ljóðaháttr twice in near proximity—the first time to give a sense of dignity to the berserkers who were honored in King Haraldr’s court, the second time to draw attention to the shame the jesters and jugglers bring on themselves with their ridiculous actions. Hypermetric meter is a versatile tool and, as such, the poets can employ it as needs be throughout their poems. The multifaceted aspect of hypermetric composition is why it is so important to look at all the features together in order to analyze each passage and its larger significance to the rest of the poem. For example, the extended length of the lines can signify variously. In general, longer lines in a poem show a rhetorical heightening that points to a greater degree of formality, a tendency that clearly applies to early Germanic poetry as well. Yet in the alliterative long-line, the line is often lengthened with additional unstressed syllables, many of which are formed with function words, which suggests a more prosaic syntax. Since line length is especially variable in hypermetric meter, it can be difficult to immediately know what such expansion might signify. However, often the more prosaic syntax will also lead to more violations of Kuhn’s laws, so examining that additional feature in conjunction with the length can indicate whether the poet was taking care to keep a passage more formal. Similarly, a poet might switch to a more straightforward syntax in hypermetric verse, increasing the number of verbs, connectives, and clause breaks per line. Again, this syntax might be considered less formal and perhaps at odds with the longer hypermetric lines. In some cases, especially in poems such as Guthlac A where the poet uses two light hypermetric onsets per line so that

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the speech can sound more natural, the poet probably is going against the tendency to be more formal and employing hypermetric meter more for its practical uses. However, when the poet maintains a particularly formalized diction in these moments, using a large number of nouns and compounds and perhaps even including some instances of variation, he clearly wishes to maintain or even increase the formality of the moment in spite of the extra clarity. This type of analysis that uses additional contextual tools to ascertain what the meter might signify in any given moment is particularly rewarding because it can be used to glean more than can be uncovered by just looking at the words alone. This study of hypermetric form and function is a starting-off point, and there is much more work to do in the same vein. First, there are many more poems with hypermetric sections. For instance, The Wanderer and The Seafarer both switch to hypermetric meter in significant parts of the poem, and The Dream of the Rood has a substantial number of hypermetric verses. These poems were not included in my analysis because they did not fit into any of the specific categories that I was investigating, but they could provide fascinating additional case studies when viewed through this lens. Significantly, with The Wanderer and The Seafarer in particular, scholars such as T. A. Shippey have suggested a connection to wisdom poetry. Analysis of the hypermetric style could reinforce such a connection. This mode of research could also be extrapolated to normal meter. Hypermetric meter is perhaps an easier place to start with this kind of stylistic analysis since it marks a clear break in the style and is fluid enough that current scholars can distinguish between different trends that mark different goals. The shifts in normal meter are subtler but also more ubiquitous: with stricter rules governing the normal lines, shifts in features such as line length are minimal, and because variety is prized in the alliterative long-line, changes in verse type are not necessarily significant. Such analysis on the basis of meter has probably not been pursued in depth for these very reasons, and looking at the metrical patterns alone would not be particularly effective. However, looking at the full range of features examined in this study could contextualize any shifts in the meter so that more meaning could be drawn from the poets’ styles. Such stylistic analysis that considers why the poets do what they do would enhance our understanding of oral theory, of compositional techniques, of poetic analysis, and of literary analysis for the entirety of our enigmatic but fascinating corpus. The intersection of these various metrical and extra-metrical properties can create a clearer picture of how the poet was composing than looking at any one of them could do, and such analysis is vital for understanding the meaning that the poet was trying to create. Poetic style is one aspect of

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the poet’s craft, and, as such, it plays a heavy role in the audience’s understanding of what is heard. My readings of the poems throughout this study show how paying attention to this craft can enhance our modern interpretations of the poems by creating a multi-faceted view of each line. My hope is that in addition to considering these readings, more scholars will consider taking up this methodology and advance the discussion of metrical patterning within literary analysis.

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Index alliteration 7, 26–27, 62, 66, 68, 70, 75–76, 93, 97, 105, 126, 129, 148–49, 151, 160, 163, 173–74, 176–78, 186–87 anacrusis 18–19, 26, 29, 61, 63, 65, 93–96, 128–30, 135, 137–39, 141, 157, 167–68 Átlamál 9, 12, 89–90, 94–95, 100, 103, 121, 124 Battle of Brunanburh, The 161, 175 Battle of Maldon, The 150, 161 Beowulf 6, 9, 15, 18, 21–26, 28, 31, 33, 37, 39–40, 44, 47–51, 61–62, 68, 74, 116, 128–29, 151–52, 156, 164–66, 178–79, 187 Bible, The 21–22, 126–27, 144, 146–56 Bindungslosigkeit 99–102, 114 Bliss, A.J. 1, 3, 8–9, 11, 15, 21–22, 24–25, 53, 56, 64, 72, 128, 163–64, 168 Cable, Thomas 4, 6, 18 cadence 9, 17–18, 20–24, 32, 49, 56–59, 97, 126, 131, 137, 144, 157–60, 169–71, 176, 179 – four-position 20, 90 – irregular 21–22, 24, 65, 132, 148 – type-A 17, 19–22, 26, 38, 56, 58–59, 65, 72, 81, 91, 94–95, 109, 126, 135–37, 139, 164, 168, 171 – type-B 20–22, 24, 58, 61, 95–96, 131, 137, 140–41, 164 – type-C 20–21, 58, 95–96, 135, 137, 141, 164, 169 – type-D 20, 24, 58–59, 61, 96, 128, 130, 132, 135, 137, 163–65 – type-E 20, 95, 164 Chickering, Howell 160, 179, 182 Christianity 127, x145–47, 156, 183 clitics 5–6, 17, 19, 29, 31, 95, 100, 107, 129, 137, 140, 169–70, 187 conjunction 5, 34–35, 43–44, 95, 109, 144 conservative 4, 8, 10, 15–32, 53, 55–67, 70–71, 74, 77, 140–42, 159–62, 164, 167–76, 180–81, 192–93

https://doi.org/10.1515/9781501513688-009

Daniel 15, 17–19, 21–22, 24–28, 30–31, 36–37, 40, 43, 46, 51, 61, 72 Deskis, Susan 54, 85–86 eddic 89, 94–95, 98, 103, 151 – praise poems 12, 90, 112, 120–21, 124 – verse 112 Eiríksmál 9, 90, 112, 117, 121 Eyvindr 112–17 Exodus 15, 18, 26, 28, 40, 42–44, 51, 61, 156 extra-metrical 4, 8, 10, 197 Fáfnismál 9, 90, 96 feste Bindung 99, 101–2, 110, 116, 121 Foley, John Miles 55, 67–70, 85 fornyrðislag 5, 11, 89, 91–94, 97–99, 112 Fortunes of Men, The 54–55, 63, 78–80, 82, 84 Fulk, R.D. 1, 4, 8–9, 15, 31, 39, 89, 93–94, 98, 104, 112, 162–63, 168 full line 97–99, 104–11, 114–16, 119, 122–23 function words 10, 12, 19–20, 39, 58, 91, 125, 128, 138, 148–49, 157, 159–60, 162–63, 165–67, 170, 181, 192, 196 formulaic system 67–70, 72–73, 75, 81, 85 galdralag 89, 103, 106–7, 112, 125 Genesis (Old Saxon) 8, 133–34 Genesis A 15, 17–19, 21–22, 24, 26, 28–30, 33, 37, 39–40, 43, 51, 172, 185 Gifts of Men, The 54–55, 78 gnomic 11, 53–58, 60–83, 87–88, 105–8, 110, 112, 124, 136, 196 – formula 70, 72, 75, 77, 84–87 – poetry 5, 11, 25, 40, 53–58, 60–69, 72, 74–79, 87, 105, 110, 136–37, 141, 172–74, 180, 195 Goeres, Michelle 113, 115–20 Greenfield, Stanley B. 53, 84, 161 Green, Dennis H. 127, 145–46, 153 Gunnel, Terry 1, 89, 103–4 Guthlac A 10, 13, 15, 18–19, 21, 24, 26–29, 33, 37, 39–41, 43, 45–47, 51, 60–62, 74, 142, 168, 181, 185, 196

212

Index

Hákonarmál 9, 90, 112–13, 116–18, 120 Haraldskvæði 9, 90, 112–13, 120, 124, 196 Hávamál 9, 12, 90, 104–9, 112, 116, 124 Heliand 8, 12, 125–58, 159–60, 162, 167–69, 172–74, 180–81, 183, 185, 195 helmingr 92, 94, 98–100, 104–12, 114–16, 119, 121, 123 Hofmann, H. 3, 129–32, 134–35, 137 Hutcheson, B.R. 1, 5, 8, 21, 25 hypometric 92, 97 Judith 12–13, 159–62, 167–93, 195–96 Kaluza, Max 15, 21–22 kennings 3, 8, 114–15, 121 Kuhn’s laws 5–6, 10, 27, 29–31, 51, 62–64, 72, 136, 138–40, 147, 171–72, 174, 196 – Kuhn’s first law 5–6, 22, 29, 31, 63–64, 138–39, 171–72 – Kuhn’s second law 6, 29, 138–39 Larrington, Carolyne 54, 82, 84, 89 late poems 4, 164–65, 175 ljóðaháttr 9, 11–12, 89–90, 94–99, 103–105, 109–24, 196 lone line 41, 47, 51, 167, 190 lone verse 24–25, 137, 142, 145 long-line 1–2, 51, 89, 91, 104–5, 107, 113–14, 116, 118, 122, 125–27, 129, 149, 157, 159, 196–97 málaháttr 9, 11–12, 89–91, 94–96, 99–100, 103–4, 112–18, 120–24, 196 Mary Magdalena 150–53 Maxims I 11, 53–66, 71–74, 84–87, 137 Maxims II 53–55, 60–63, 66, 71, 74–76, 81–82 Meters of Boethius, The 159, 161, 163 metrical – pattern 1–2, 5, 8, 10–11, 15–16, 55–56, 60, 67, 69–70, 73, 89, 94, 98, 117, 120, 124–25, 156, 159–61, 163, 197–98 – style 1, 51, 93, 156, 162, 181, 195, 197 metrico-syntactic 5, 7–8, 16, 27, 31, 63–64, 93, 136, 176, 195 mixed lines 24, 51, 131, 134–35, 167 Murphy, G Ronald 127, 144–47, 149, 154–55

narrative 3, 10–13, 25, 35, 37–38, 42, 54–55, 60, 75, 89–90, 99, 110–12, 121, 140, 161, 176, 186, 190–91 – poems 5, 46, 53–54, 67, 70, 74, 110 – progress 11, 28, 35, 42–43, 46, 74, 90, 94, 99, 101, 124, 142, 144, 161, 175, 177–80, 191, 194 Neidorf, Leonard 1, 4, 9, 15, 188 onset – heavy 9, 17–18, 22–23, 26–27, 29, 32, 39, 53, 57–58, 61–62, 65–66, 71–73, 76–77, 81–82, 135–36, 139–41, 149, 152, 168–69, 173 – hypermetric 10, 17, 56, 129, 157, 168, 181, 196 – light 9, 17, 19–20, 23, 26–27, 29–30, 32, 37–39, 41, 45–46, 51, 57–58, 61–63, 65–66, 77, 82, 104, 135–36, 138, 140–41, 144, 148–49, 157, 168–69, 172–74, 177, 180–81, 193, 195 Oral Formulaic Theory 11, 67–68 Order of the World, The 54–55, 61, 63, 77–78, 191 Paasche, Frederick 112–13 Particles 5–6, 10, 17–20, 26–27, 29, 31, 33, 45–46, 57, 63–64, 77, 95, 100, 105, 129, 136, 138–41, 147, 149, 156–57, 159–60, 169, 171–72, 180 Pope, John C. 1, 16, 18, 24–25, 39 Precepts 54–55, 61, 76 Quinn, Judy 103–04, 110, 112–13, 118 Rune Poem, The 54–55, 62–63, 65–66, 78 Russom, Geoffry 1, 3–4, 9–10, 15, 19–20, 25, 29, 41, 89, 92–95, 97–98, 125, 129–30 scribal error 8, 24–25, 27, 61, 132, 134 Sermon on the Mount 12, 140, 143, 147–150, 154, 157 Sievers, Eduard 9–10, 16, 18, 23, 25, 38–40, 91–93, 95, 97, 164, 196 Sigrdrífumál 9, 90, 108–9

Index

Simms, Douglass 22, 60 Skírnismál 9, 90, 110–11 Solomon and Saturn II 53–54, 57, 60–63, 66, 75, 77–78 speech, direct 12, 40, 45–46, 77–78, 140, 143, 147 stanzaic 12, 89–90, 92–93, 98, 104–5, 108, 124 stress words 5–7, 10, 19, 22, 27, 31, 37–38, 41, 44, 58, 61, 70, 95, 100, 105, 128–30, 162, 169, 174–76, 180–81, 184, 186, 191 Suzuki, Seiichi 1, 3, 8–9, 18–19, 89, 92–93, 95–97, 125–26, 128–30, 132, 134–35, 137

213

Timmer, B.J. 3, 16, 39, 46, 50, 184, 196 Trilling, Renée 35, 44 variation 3, 7–8, 13, 23, 28, 35–37, 42, 45–46, 74–76, 78, 83, 93, 103, 114, 144, 147, 149, 151–53, 162, 166–67, 175–78, 180–81, 190, 192, 197 verbs, placement of 7, 65–67, 140, 172–74 wisdom poetry 11, 54–56, 197 Þrymskviða 91, 93