Heorot

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The first page of the Beowulf manuscript

As Heorot or Herot is Met - or Festhalle of King Hrothgar in the Anglo-Saxon epic poem about Beowulf called. Hrothgar was a legendary Danish king who, according to tradition, lived in the 6th century.

Background and description

Heorot as the name for the hall means "Hall of the deer" (English: "Hall of Hart"), this designation can still be found in many place names in Great Britain . This is described by the unknown author in the Beowulf as "the first hall under the sky" and served Hrothgar as a royal seat and assembly hall. This hall is defended in the epic by Beowulf against the demonic monster Grendel .

In the alliterative poetry of Beowulf the hall in the translation as described follows:

English German

Then, as I have heard, the work of constructing a building
Was proclaimed to many a tribe throughout this middle earth.
In time - quickly, as such things happen among men -
It was all ready, the biggest of halls.
He whose word was law
Far and wide gave it the name 'Heorot'.

Then, as I heard, a work was
proclaimed to be the erection of a building for many a tribe in this Middle-earth.
At a time - faster than such things happen among men -
everything was erected, the largest of the halls.
He, whose word law was
far and wide, gave her the name 'Heorot'

The men did not dally; they strode inland in a group
Until they were able to discern the timbered hall,
Splendid and ornamented with gold.
The building in which that powerful man held court
Was the foremost of halls under heaven;
Its radiance shone over many lands.

The men did not dawdle, they strode inland in a group
Until they could see the wooden hall,
splendid and decorated with gold.
The building in which the mighty man held court
was the foremost (first) of all the halls under heaven;
Its shine shone over many countries.

The magnificent Heorot Mead Hall of King Hrothgar has been haunted at night for years by the malicious monster Grendel, who devours his warriors and ravages the hall. Then the young man Beowulf unexpectedly comes to Hrothgar with a few loyal followers and offers to free him from Grendel. Hrothgar welcomes Beowulf with a party in his hall. During the night Grendel comes out of the moor, pulls open the heavy doors and devours one of the sleeping Goths. Beowulf seizes Grendel, who can only free himself from this grip by tearing off his arm and fleeing fatally wounded. This victory is duly celebrated in the Heorot . But the following night, Grendel's mother appears to avenge her son. Beowulf kills them too and is then rewarded by Hrothgar in the hall with eight horses adorned with gilded headgear. The Heorot functioned both as the king's seat of government and as the residence of his thanes (warriors, followers). It symbolizes human civilization and culture as well as the power of the Danish king - essentially all the good things in the world of Beowulf . Their brightness, warmth and joy contrast with the darkness and the marshy water that Grendel inhabits.

Localization of "Heorot"

Reconstruction of a longhouse from the Viking Age (28.5 m) in Fyrkat

Modern research sees the village of Lejre near Roskilde as the place where the Heorot hall stood. In Scandinavian sources, Heorot is regarded as the equivalent of Hleiðargarðr , the hall of King Hroðulfs ( Hrólfr Kraki ), which is reported in the Hrólfs saga kraka , which was located in Lejre. Even the medieval chroniclers Saxo Grammaticus and Sven Aggesen suspected that Lejre was the main residence of King Hrothgar's clan, the Skjöldungen (called "Scyldinge" in the poem). The remains of a Viking hall complex were uncovered from 1986 to 1988 southwest of Lejre by Tom Christensen, an employee of the Roskilde Museum . The wooden foundations were dated to the year 880 by means of the C14 dating . In the course of the excavations, it was found that this building was built over an older hall, which was dated to the year 680. Between 2004 and 2005, Christensen exposed a third hall to the north of the others. This was built in the middle of the 6th century. All three halls were around 50 meters long.

Fred C. Robinson agrees: "Hrothgar (later Hrothulf) ruled from a royal settlement, the location of which can most likely be identified as the actual location of Halle Heorot in the modern Danish village of Lejre ." 2007 is one Another publication related to the village of Lejre and its role in Beowulf by Marijane Osborn and John Niles, entitled Beowulf and Lejre .

reception

The hall or the name Heorot is used:

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ AD Mills: A Dictionary of British Place-Names. on books.google.de
  2. ↑ Own translation of the English text, with minor corrections for the sake of beauty
  3. ↑ a b c Beowulf.
  4. ↑ Beowulf. on britannica.com, accessed March 25, 2013.
  5. ↑ John Halverson: The World of Beowulf. in: English Literary History. Issue 36, No. 4. The Johns Hopkins University Press, December 1969, pp. 593-608. ISSN  0013-8304 , doi: 10.2307 / 2872097 .
  6. ^ A b John D. Niles: Beowulf's Great Hall. in: History Today. October 2006, Volume 56, No. 10. pp. 40-44.
  7. ↑ Michael Lapidge, Malcolm Godden: The Cambridge companion to Old English literature. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1991, ISBN 0-521-37794-3 , p. 144 ( books.google.com )
  8. ^ Fred C. Robinson: Teaching the Backgrounds: History, Religion, Culture. In: Jess B. Bessinger, Jr. and Robert F. Yeager (Eds.): Approaches to Teaching Beowulf. MLA, New York 1984, p. 109.
  9. ^ Marijane Osborn, John Niles: Beowulf and Lejre (= Medieval & Renaissance Texts & Studies. Volume 323.) Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Tempe, Ariz. 2007, ISBN 978-0-86698-368-6 .
  10. ↑ Chi Heorot. ( Memento of the original from November 27, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. on dartmouth.edu, accessed March 25, 2013.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.dartmouth.edu