beowulf burial (week 4)

Blog 9/22/17  R.I.P Beowulf

How does one equate glory and a legacy of a King into a proper burial? By burying him in conquered treasure with a dash of gavel, obviously. The burial of Beowulf is interesting because he was alive enough to say his final wishes which were dedicated to his funeral rather than some wisdom-filled monolog. Two, as stated “[h]e had many requests. He wanted me to greet you, and order the building of a barrow that would crown the site of his pyre, serve as his memorial, in a commanding position, since of all men to have lived and thrived and lorded it on earth, his worth and due as a warrior were the greatest” (3095-3100). With no wife or heir, the only wish Beowulf wanted a warrior’s honor and legacy to be his lasting effect (and again, not his ruling). While this can point out to Beowulf again needing to live up to all factors of masculinity, his choices in burial are more interesting, and the lack of mention for the afterlife.
While Beowulf was a Geat (now Sweden) before ruling over the Danes (now Denmark), death was a very important milestone that came with many rituals and superstitions for both nations. It was common to leave gifts with the deceased, even if the corpse was on a pyre. The amount of goods depended on the social group where the person came from. This makes sense as to why the treasure from the Dragon was buried with Beowulf because not only is treasure fit for the pyre of a king, but also the treasure was won over from the Dragon by Beowulf. The goods were given to the deceased so that they were not homeless in the afterlife. It is assumed that Beowulf goes to heaven as “haven swallowed the smoke” of the pyre (3155).
Beowulf’s wishes were not out of the ordinary, and the Geats mourned him properly, built a memorial and continued to keep his legacy alive (3150-3180).  


Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norse_funeral 

Comments

  1. Leah EricksonSeptember 22, 2017 at 6:46 PM

    Susmitha, your blog posts always crack me up because your use of figurative language is always so descriptive!!! Anyway, I truly loved reading your post and I think that you made a great point of talking about Beowulf's obsession with wealth. How could you be dying from a venomous bite and think at THAT moment that you need to have an extravagant funeral?! That just does not seem like something I would be even be close to thinking about when I am on my deathbed. I also really liked your touch of adding in the historical context of a Norse funeral! So thoughtful!

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