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Eric Wargo
In: Washington, DC
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Henry Sweet, a philologist and early linguist specializing in Germanic languages, proposed that the name Beowulf literally means in Old English "bee-wolf" and that it is a kenning for "bear". |
I'm new to the forums, so perhaps this has been discussed already elsewhere, or is just obvious ... but isn't it easy to imagine a Tudor-era forger of a new English national epic (one that is both more plausible and less Continental and Catholic than the Arthurian romances) giving his hero, oh-so-cleverly, an almost unrecognizable, Anglo-Saxon version of the name Arthur (i.e., "Bear")?
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Hatty
Site Admin
In: Berkshire
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| isn't it easy to imagine a Tudor-era forger of a new English national epic (one that is both more plausible and less Continental and Catholic than the Arthurian romances) giving his hero, oh-so-cleverly, an almost unrecognizable, Anglo-Saxon version of the name Arthur (i.e., "Bear")? |
Eric (there's a good Scandinavian name), why would a Tudor forger have a Great Dane as an English national hero? Have you come across Francisco Junius (mid seventeenth century antiquarian) in connection with Beowulf? His patron at one point was Queen Christina of Sweden. At this stage Protestant Europe was taking a severe thrashing, Germany and Holland particularly, while England was beheading its Catholic-leaning monarch.
Would anyone equate Arthur with bear/bee-wolf? Come to think of it, people keep insisting he's Ambrosius or son of so perhaps yes.
In what way do you see Arthurian romances as 'Catholic'?
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Eric Wargo
In: Washington, DC
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| Hatty wrote: | | In what way do you see Arthurian romances as 'Catholic'? |
The Grail (whether it is described as a stone or a cup or a plate) is always a relic associated with Christ's saving blood. The stories can be seen as conservative Catholic propagandism, written during a period when the centrality of the Mass and the belief in transubstantiation were being challenged by various heretical groups (like the Cathars).
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| Eric Wargo wrote: | | Hatty wrote: | | In what way do you see Arthurian romances as 'Catholic'? |
The Grail (whether it is described as a stone or a cup or a plate) is always a relic associated with Christ's saving blood. The stories can be seen as conservative Catholic propagandism, written during a period when the centrality of the Mass and the belief in transubstantiation were being challenged by various heretical groups (like the Cathars). |
I've read a lot of the Arthurian stuff. (Well actually, the condensed Reader's Digest kind of version.) But, at any rate, I don't recall there being any Pope-like figure in these stories. Wouldn't you need a Pope for these stories to be Catholic? Isn't the Pope the real difference between Catholics and non-Catholics?
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TelMiles
In: London
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I would say that the Arthurian romances, whilst they have obvious Christianity in them, are not Catholic propaganda, as the Pagan element is quite high too. They are quite clearly a gathering together of paganism, christianity and plain fiction.
_________________
Against all Gods.
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Eric Wargo
In: Washington, DC
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| TelMiles wrote: | | They are quite clearly a gathering together of paganism, christianity and plain fiction. |
I don't disagree about the plain fiction part, although isn't the paganism stuff a product of modern rereadings? What would you say is actually pagan in the Grail romances?
"Catholic propagandism" may have been too strong a word for me to use ... But the Grail stories do create a huge mystique around what seems to be essentially a symbol of the Eucharist. It's the central element (and was the central element and ritual for the faithful, provoking awe and wonder on the rare occasions when they witnessed it--they didn't see it every Sunday, I don't think). Is it a coincidence that Arthurian romances went out of fashion with the Reformation?
My original suggestion was merely that, if a 16th-century forger were going to create his own proto-English hero, might he not invent an "Arthur" without all the Holy Grail baggage (and maybe set his story in the old country to make the connection less obvious and thus more plausible as an "original source")?
There are a lot of possible "anti-Arthurian" elements in Beowulf once you start reading it as possibly a product of this time. Significantly, the climactic dragon episode in Beowulf begins with the finding of a jewel-encrusted cup (the poet however goes to weirdly great lengths--read it, it's actually quite odd--to emphasize that the finder was "nobody important"). There's an anti-lady-in-the-lake (Grendel's mother). Instead of saving blood, there's acid blood. Twelve men go off to fight the dragon at the end (many of the Arthur stories numbered the Knights of the Round Table at 12, although I think Mallory was an exception). And so on. Of course, this might just be "reading too much in..."
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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Look, the Catholic bit is critical. Because it is absent. Arthur only becomes of any significance in the twelfth century and onwards when the whole Arthurian industry is clearly part of the Cistercian/ Templar/ Gothic/ Green Man/ Troubadour/ Cathar/ Mary Magdalen axis. All these dudes were fighting the Church for intellectual (and whatever else) mastery. They are of course all ex-Druids and have no interest in Christianity except as local colouring -- whether for literary or self-preservation purposes.
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Eric Wargo
In: Washington, DC
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | ... the whole Arthurian industry is clearly part of the Cistercian/ Templar/ Gothic/ Green Man/ Troubadour/ Cathar/ Mary Magdalen axis. |
I'd love to believe you -- Holy Blood, Holy Grail is what got me reading the romances to begin with (that, and a dose of Carl Jung) -- but isn't such a chain of associations sort of the modern orthodoxy? Is there real evidence the authors or readers of the romances were actually part of an intellectual counterculture (as opposed to members of the elite that opposed it)?
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Hatty
Site Admin
In: Berkshire
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| There are a lot of possible "anti-Arthurian" elements in Beowulf once you start reading it as possibly a product of this time. |
I hadn't thought of Beowulf in this regard but you're right, it's the antithesis of courtly love which rather depressed me as it would seem to throw Spenser and his ilk right out of the frame. Except that Elizabethan courtiers were also warriors, or would-be warriors, the favourites seemed to be constantly chafing to get away.
It isn't altogether improbable that the same person who penned the Faerie Queen could also produce a heroic, "anti-Arthurian" epic (in the FQ the Queen is of Arthur's kin). Hmm, maybe Spenser was Elizabeth's dead sheep in which case he'd do well to remain anonymous. He was after all a leading light of the Rosicrucians, renowned for their 'invisibility'.
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| I'd love to believe you -- Holy Blood, Holy Grail is what got me reading the romances to begin with (that, and a dose of Carl Jung) -- but isn't such a chain of associations sort of the modern orthodoxy? |
Yes, which is why I would never write a book about it. Mainly, I am just interested in all this for the same reasons you are. And it has the same spin-off -- a painless way of acquiring vast gobbets of data without having to hoover it up the orthodox way by attending university. However, my thesis that links the Holy Grail stuff with Megalithia is not (I think it fair to say) a modern orthodoxy so I cautiously push into this general area on my own.
| Is there real evidence the authors or readers of the romances were actually part of an intellectual counterculture (as opposed to members of the elite that opposed it)? |
It is important not to start making the very human error of seeing one's own pet 'discoveries' as being the heroes of the story (except that it does help while in 'discovery mode' as opposed to 'analytic mode'). My entire thesis of human development requires that there be an intellectual counterculture, otherwise imperial stasis sets in. This is why you get no development during the Roman Empire, and none in the subsequent Catholic Empire but everything takes off when the quasi-national states in Europe are strong enough to confront the Church in c 1000 AD.
I am even now putting together the idea that in Megalithic times there was a separation between the Religious Classes and the Intellectual Classes. This is why it is important we see Skara Brae, Stonehenge and Avebury as universities rather than mausoleums.
The Big Question is whether this all happens at the sociological level (boring but probable) or the conspiratorial level (exciting but far-fetched).
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Eric Wargo
In: Washington, DC
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| Hatty wrote: | | Have you come across Francisco Junius (mid seventeenth century antiquarian) in connection with Beowulf? |
Not until this site and this thread ...
| Mick Harper wrote: | Oh well, it seems I have to kiss goodbye to authorship of yet another theory
... One third of the words in Beowulf do not appear in any other document, they might simply have been invented.Who was able to invent this language? It could have only been Franciscus Junius (1589-1677) who was the first to publish a grammar and dictionary of the Old English language, and it was he too, who in 1665 gave his authority to the authenticity of the Wulfilas-Bible, which is a fake as well (see Topper 1998). Moreover, twice in his life Junius had access to the codex Vitellinus A. XV in which Beowulf was found after Junius' death. It had not been in it when its contents were listed earlier. ...
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Well, maybe only kiss goodbye to part of the theory. Wasn't it you who offhandedly suggested Milton in an earlier post? Milton not only studied Anglo-Saxon but was also the greatest acknowledged word-inventor in the history of the English language, correct? And lo and behold, just the briefest scratching also turns up that scholars have, evidently, gone round and round on the question of Junius's possible influence on or contact with Milton. The second abstract on this page, for example, says the matter should be revisited: http://www.ucs.louisiana.edu/~cxr1086/coglit/MLA2008-LL.html
Most compelling, to my mind, however, are the numerous story, imagery, and theme parallels between Beowulf and Paradise Lost, which my ignorance of Milton kept me from being aware of until I found them laid out nicely in a university paper here: http://www.csulb.edu/~jsmith10/miltbeow.htm. The similarities are striking (is this common knowledge to English scholars?), and this author suggests that the numerous parallel scenes and shared theme of evil in a fallen world must be based on shared sources (such as the Book of Enoch) because, of course, Milton can't possibly have known of the Beowulf manuscript, as it only turned up later...
Does anybody know anything more about the Junius-Milton connection? Seems suspicious.
(Incidentally, Milton had an interest in Arthur, and was planning an Arthurian work. And he also had an interest in Shakespeare--subject of his first published poem--which perhaps inspired him to set his forged Anglo-Saxon epic among the "Spear-Danes" of yore?)
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Ishmael
In: Toronto
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| Eric Wargo wrote: | | Most compelling, to my mind, however, are the numerous story, imagery, and theme parallels between Beowulf and Paradise Lost, which my ignorance of Milton kept me from being aware of until I found them laid out nicely in a university paper here: http://www.csulb.edu/~jsmith10/miltbeow.htm. The similarities are striking (is this common knowledge to English scholars?), and this author suggests that the numerous parallel scenes and shared theme of evil in a fallen world must be based on shared sources (such as the Book of Enoch) because, of course, Milton can't possibly have known of the Beowulf manuscript, as it only turned up later... |
Now who is prepared to give the Illiad similar treatment?
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Mick Harper
Site Admin
In: London
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| It could have only been Franciscus Junius (1589-1677) who was the first to publish a grammar and dictionary of the Old English language, and it was he too, who in 1665 gave his authority to the authenticity of the Wulfilas-Bible, which is a fake as well (see Topper 1998). |
This is still what really sticks in my craw. Everything screams this is a fake but I cannot bring myself to believe the (modern) Swedish government would be party to carbon-dating fraud. Is there no other way out? Especially as one day we will have to listen to the British government tell us that the Beowulf manuscript (or at any rate the smidgeon that 'survived' all the various fires and whatnot) carbon-dates to the eleventh century.
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | In case you missed it on another thread, I have to report complete failure in our quest to expose Gothic as a sixteenth century artifact. The status of Gothic is pretty much tied into the authenticity of the Ulfilas Bible and the Swedes (unlike the Brits with their founding dox) actually took the trouble to carbon date a page. |
Where did you find this out? I can't find the reference (here or on the web).
The only thing I could find was that: | A carbon 14 analysis, made of some binding-threads from the Silver Bible last spring, shows that the manuscript has been bound at least once during the sixteenth century. | |
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| Mick Harper wrote: | | The central character in all this looks as though it's going to be a bloke called Jan van Vliet. But he has another claim to fame -- he is the source of a very important document called The Ormulum, which is an eleventh century Anglo-Saxon version of the Bible (or something...). |
Van Vliet and Junius were good friends.
| The only contemporary manuscript annotated by Van Vliet is a rudimentary Gothic-Greek glossary by Francis Junius which has been preserved among Van Vliet's notes in London, Lambeth Palace MS 783 (henceforth LA). It contains words from the Codex Argenteus with Greek translations, and is probably one of Junius's early attempts to master the Gothic language. Van Vliet's marginal annotations consist almost exclusively of cognate words. The majority are Dutch, the rest are Modern English, Old and Early Middle English, Old High German, Frisian, German, French, and Scots. Apart from the cognates, there are twelve additional Gothic words and some translations into Latin and Greek. The purpose of the Dutch cognates was not to provide translations of the Gothic entries, which are all explained in Greek, but solely to compare them with Gothic. |
"The origins of Old Germanic studies in the Low Countries", by Cornelis Dekker - page 114.
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