CONNECTING BEOWULF AND THE GUTA SAGA
In 2017 Clan Carruthers CCIS started part 2 of the Carruthers DNA projects. For almost 15 years people have been contributing their DNA samples to make connections. We took that data, and other data people had, to see where it took us. At this point we found Forensic DNA would give us what we need, with a price of $800.00 – $1500.00 per test.
We were interested in the Scottish line, but the Genetic Genealogist told us we were connected to the Beowulf Vikings. Here we are 4 years later working on the Norse DNA project.
There is something called the Beowulf epos, from the beginning of the 500s, which is the oldest known Germanic epos, by some regarded as the Germa-nic-speaking peoples counterpart to the Greek Iliad and Odyssey.
Historians and linguists have tried in various ways to interpret and t the epic
into the Swedish history without much success. However, it is now proven that it has its home in the Gotlandic history. Together with the Gotlandic picture stones and Guta Saga the Beowulf epos
constitutes Gotland’s nest historical records.
The Gotlandic picture stones indicate intensive contacts with the literary world of the time. From these sources you can also read the historical relationship between the Gotlanders and they in the beginning of the 500s immigrating Heruls (Svear). The Beowulf epos is the ancient Germanic world’s great epic poem.
According to professor Björn Collinder: “The Beowulf Epos argues well its place among epics in world literature. And it contains lyrical passages of great beauty”. ”A fastidious reader discovers in the Beowulf epos some contradicto-ry details. But the contradictions are not worse than those found in the Gospels and the Acts.”
“The Beowulf epos contains much that is difficult for contemporary people to
understand. The Epos writer could make do with hints when it came to events and inherited legends which were renowned for his audience. ”“To understand and appreciate the Beowulf epos we must put ourselves in the ancient Germanic view on life and death, danger and glory, and it should not be entirely impracticable.”
Since several people, who figure in Beowulf, are also mentioned in other independent tales, we must assume that they are historical, and if so should the rest of the characters also be historical. From Gregory of Tours reference in Historia Francorum, we know that Hygelak died in battle in Friesland about the year 521. Although we have no other source that says that Beowulf has lived, it should still have been so. His name was probably not Beowulf but, according to Collinder, rather Älf-here (Alvar, Avair). He is the prototype of a Scandinavian hero, stronger and braver than any of the fighters of his time and wiser than most, and he is a good king, with all that it implies.
The Sagas refer briefly to the wars between Gotlanders and Danes, and Gotlanders and Frisians, between Skilngs (Svear) and Danes, the Danes and Frisians and Danes and Heathobards. The only conflict told in detail is between Gotlanders and Skilngs (Svear),
which is described in a story inside another story. Interestingly, in the verses 2472- 2473 it says: “There was hostility and strife
between Skilfings (Svear) and Gotlanders, discord and violence across wide
waters.”
We can now connect Beowulf with the Guta Saga
“Many kings fought against Gutland while it was thought to be heathen; the Gotlanders, however, always held the victory and constantly protected their rights. Later the Gotlanders sent a large number of messengers to the Svear, but none
of them could make peace before Avair Strabain from Alva. He made the first
peace with the king of the Svear. When the Gotlanders begged him to go he answered: “you know that I am now most doomed and ill-fated. Grant me then, if you wish me to expose myself to such peril, three wergilds ( “Mansbotwergild’, fines according to the old Nordic law was paid by a murderer or his kin to the slain family, which then declined to exact blood vengeance”), one for myself, a second for my begotten son and a third for my wife.’ Because he was wise and skilled in many things, just as the tales go about him. ”Beowulf has historically been dated to the beginning of the 500s.
The battles between the Svear and Gotlanders should have been in the first
half of the 500s. Procopius information that the Heruls (Svear) would have
immigrated to the Lake Mälar area about the year 512 .
By comparing the various testimonies I have dated Avair Strabain to mid 500s.
In the Beowulf epos the geographical framing is Denmark and the land of the
Geats (older source Geta) Gotland. The main characters are Beowulf and to some extent, his uncle Hygelak, Rex Getarum.
The story begins by describing
the monster Grendel who haunts the Danish king. Then it tells how Beowulf decides to help the Danish king and makes his way on a two-day voyage across
the open sea, after which he kills Grendel. The story continues to talk about the wars between the Geats and the Svear, who are still at that time not known
as Svear but Skilfings, and ends with a description of the death of Beowulf
when he tried to rob a grave.
In the story it is presupposed that the audienceis familiar with contemporary history. Many people and events mentioned in
This by wide waters has been difcult for previous researchers to explain as
they have not been aware that this was with the Gotlanders. However, if we talk about Svear and Gotlanders it falls completely natural. In addition, it says in verse 2954, when the Svear talk about the Gotlanders: “toresist the men from the sea.”
Thus the audience was expected to know how Hama some hundred years earlier and in another part of the world had stolen the Brisinga jewel from the Gothic King Ermanarik. This suggests that the Geats stood in close relation to the Goths. Even the
Goths’ rich culture has given the Gotlanders a lot of new injections, reflected
in the Gotlandic society, when the Goths moved on to the Black Sea.
The archaeological and linguistic testimony suggests that the Goths, the oldest name is Gutans and their kingdom Gutthiuda, had close relationship with the Gotlanders. In addition, we must not forget that the Gotlanders, along with the tribal kinsmen the Ostro-goths were Christians of the Arian faith, and that parts of their bible are now preserved in Uppsala, the Silver Bible. It is therefore very likely that Gotlanders were familiar with Christian doctrine already at this time. Even, according to several archaeologists, some contemporary burial customs on Gotland suggest Christian elements. It is interesting to note that the Bible was translated into Gotlandic by the Goths 1200 years before it was translated into Swedish. Since the Beowulf poem holds quite some Christian expressions
and thoughts, it did not fit into the idealized image of the Swedish pre-Chris
–tian times that among others, Tegnér tried to produce. This should be a cause to the poor circulation of what we then thought was a Swedish epos. The Heruls (Svear) had at their immigration early 500s the Æsir belief and would therefore be promoted as ‘barbaric’. The archaeologist Gad Rausing has attacked the problem with Beowulf and the Geats in a very conscientious way. He has, as probably the only researcher,
actually traveled ‘Beowulf’s way’ and identied the geographic characteristics. He has published his findings in Fornvännen 80 (1985) . Already Grundtvig, Danish cultural personality from 1783 to 1872, guessed at
the time that the Geats in the Beowulf epos could be the same as the Gotland-ers. ( *** We now know that they are DNA matches ) Since he did not elaborate on this assumption and did not come with good reasons for this conclusion, other scholars regarded it as uninteresting. It was at that time the scholars had decided that the Geats ought to be the Götar in Västergötland. However, some scholars protested to this Västgöta position as it clearly says in the Beowulf epos that the battle between Svear and Geats occurred over open water and the Geats also were called the men from the sea. As we know, there are not any open water between the Lake Mälar area and Skara in Västergötland. We have, however, vast waters between Gotland and the Lake Mälar area.
“The lay of Beowulf describes the court of king Hrothgar, who resided in
the largest and most magnicent of halls, who rewarded his warriors with golden rings and with magnificent arms, among which ring-swords are specifically
mentioned (verse 2042), in terms which suggest the Roman Iron Age or the Migration Period.
Apparently the Sköldunga kings had conquered Denmark some generations
earlier and the dynasty appeared well established when an enemy, Grendel, attacked. “So Grendel became ruler”. The war lasted for a long time, twelve years being mentioned. Finally Beowulf, with fourteen companions, came from Geatland to Hrothgar’s aid. The description of his voyage and of his landfall is quite clear: Away she went over the wavy ocean, boat like a bird, breaking seas, wind-wet-ted, white-throated, till the curved prow had ploughed so far – the sun standing right on the second day that they might see land loom on the skyline, then the shimmer of cliffs, sheer fells behind, reaching capes.
Apparently they sailed across the open sea, making their landfall as planned onthe second day out on a coast of high white cliffs with capes reaching far outinto the sea. Modern commentators have always found this description incom-
patible with their ideas of Danish geography and topography, the site of He
–orot usually thought to have been Leire, far inland from a coast conspiciouslylacking in cliffs and headlands.Few commentators, if any, have been sailors familiar with northern waters and
few, if any, appear to be familiar with Danish topography. The passage has been
taken to be a late addition to the saga, since it appears to describe a crossing
of the North Sea and a landing beneath the white cliffs of Dover. Actually, the
passage proves that the waters crossed were not to have been the Channel, andthus strongly suggests that the poem was not composed in Britain.
Either you cross at Dover, where the Channel is narrow and the crossing a
matter of hours, even in an open row-boat, to land beneath the famous cliffs,or you cross elsewhere, either north or south of the narrows, where the passagemight require two days, but where there are no white cliffs.
Can any conclusion be drawn from the actual distribution of the Danish archa
–eological material of the Iron Age, in conjunction with the geographical features described in Beowulf? Obviously, mere map-reading is not good enough.
For any conclusion to be valid the observations must have been made in the
field or at sea. The geographical features being seen as Iron-Age man saw them,
on foot, from horse-back or from a comparatively small, open boat.
In Denmark, the richest burials of the early Iron Age are concentrated in the
southern part of Lolland island. This concentration of wealth probably mar-ked the political center of the country or, at least, the territory of the politically and economically dominant families.
In the Later Roman Iron Age, the fourth and fifth centuries, the rich burials
were concentrated in south-east Sjaelland, with Himlingøje as the type locality, with seven ‘royal’ mounds and a great number of rich burials without mounds. There is a number of rich cemeteries in the area, such as Valløby, Varpelev and others. The same district, centering on Stevns, appears to have remained the
richest part of Denmark all through the Migration Period, 500s and 600s. At
least, it has yielded the greatest number of gold objects of this period, inclu-
ding the largest of all gold rings known from Denmark, found at Hellested on
Stevns. The numerous paved roads and fords which cross the valley and thestream almost separating Stevns from the rest of Sjaelland also indicate that thearea was of special importance, nothing similar having been found anywhereelse in Scandinavia. The center of economic and, probably also of political
power shifting from Lolland to east Sjaelland may have been caused by the first appearance of the Danes in the country. According to the sagas, they came
from central Sweden, where they can be traced in many placenames, such as
Dannemora, Danderyd and even Danmark, now a parish in Uppland.
Beowulf is silent on this point, even though Hrothgar only belonged to the
fifth generation of the Sköldunga family, (i.e.the fth generation after the con-quest?) and ve generations cover no more than 100-150years.
However, the riches described do t what we know of economic conditions on Stevns in late
Roman Times or in the early part of the Migration Period. Everything suggests that, at this time, the royal residence had not yet been moved to Leire but was still somewhere in southeast Sjaelland. The description of Beowulf’s landfall and of his subsequent march to Heorot leaves little doubt:… the shimmer of cliffs, sheer fells behind, reaching capes. A coastguard, usually posted on these cliffs, met the hero on the beach and accompanied him and his companions to Heorot. Paved Roman roads being still in use in 700s England, there would have been no particular reason for mentioning them, had the poem been composed in that country.
Denmark was different. There, paved roads of Iron Age date are few indeed,
and there is but one single area in Scandinavia, corresponding to the description: high white cliffs jutting into the sea, a neighbouring beach for landing, a paved road leading to the royal residence of late Roman times or of the early part of the Migration Period: Stevns Klint in Denmark. The white chalk cliffs of Stevns rise straight out of the sea, more than 40 m high, facing east. Behind them stretch down, bordered in the west by a river valley about 500 m wide, running almost the whole way from Køge Bay to Faxe Bay, separating Stevns peninsula from the rest of Sjaelland. This valley and its river is crossed by a number of prehistoric paved roads and fords, those at Varpelev, Elverhøj, Harlevand Kari-se I dating from the end of the Late Roman Iron Age and the beginning of the
Migration Period.
Down one of these marched Beowulf and his companions
on their way to king Hrothgar.“There was stone paving on the path that brought the war band on its way.” This passage also proves that the scene can not have been set on Rügen, the only other place where white chalk cliffs face the Baltic Sea, since it lacks the paved roads and the rich Iron Age of Beowulf’s tale.
The description fits the picture of the Iron Age settlement pattern outlined by
Nylén, a situation where sea-borne attacks might be expected at any moment and where, in consequence, farms and settlements were always at some distance from the shore
But what conclusions can be drawn as to the land of the Geats, Beowulf’s country? As mentioned previously, the account of the voyage has been taken to describe a crossing of the North Sea and a landfall in Britain. The factual evidence of the saga having been thus disposed of, the land of the Geats could be located anywhere in south Sweden or in Denmark and it has even been suggested that the waters separating the land of the Geats from that of the Swedes might have been lake Vänern and the lakes of central Sweden. But if we accept the description of the actual voyage, with the wind directions prevalent in the South Baltic Sea in early summer, and the time stated, a different explanation appears more plausible.
Apparently, Beowulf made his land fallon the second day out from the land of the Geats. It is expressly stated that he used sail. There is no indication as to the size of the ship. However, since the band comprised but fifteen men, the vessel must have been quite small, nothing
to compare with the Nydam boat or with the Sutton Hoo ship. The Nydam vessel, some 25 m between perpendiculars, and close on 18 m on the waterline,
appears to have had fifteen pairs of oars. The minimum crew must then have
been 62 men, two watches of 30 oarsmen and one helmsman each.
The Sutton Hoo vessel appears to have had 20 pairs of oars, and consequently a minimum crew of 82.Beowulfs vessel must have been very much smaller, presumably a square-rigged boat with 3 pairs of oars, with an overall length in the order of 10 m. Such a boat would have had a waterline of about 7-7.5 m. The distance from Cape Hoburgen, the southern tip of Gotland, around the southern tip of Öland and Utklippan island, between the Hammers of Scaniaand of Bornholm, the latter a high cape visible from a great distance, and onwards, along the Scanian coast but largely out of sight of it, to the cliffs at Stevns, is 229 nautical miles. For this distance to be covered in 48 hours, an average speed of no more than 4.8 knots is required, well within the capability of a Gotlandic sixern (tremänning) of today in the prevailing fresh easter lies of early summer ,
However, when returning home, Beowulf is reported first to have sighted the
“cliffs of the Geats”, probably cape Hoburgen and the ”raukar” at its foot. If Beowulf calculated his landfall as do modern sailors, i. e. from the moment
the 36 m high Hoburgen sank into the sea to the moment he raised 40 m high
cape Stevns and his eye-level, in an open boat, was about 2 m above the water-line, his sailed distance was no more than 198 nautical miles and the required average speed no more than 4.1 knots. It thus appears likely that the island of Gotland was the land of the Geats. Today, the natives of Gotland, in high Swedish the ‘Gotlänningar’, call them-selves ‘Gutar’.
In the early Middle Ages, the spelling of Guta lagh, the Gotland Law, proves the pronunciation to have been “Gutar”, without “au” diphtong. This has been taken to prove that the name “Geats” can not have referred to the Gutar but only to old norse ‘gautar’, modern high swedish ‘götar’, the peo-ple by the ‘Gautelfr’ in modern Västergötland. This may be true – but we do not know how Beowulf himself pronounced the word written ‘geat’. This spelling, which indicates a diphtong, is recorded from the Beowulf manuscript, whereas the Liber Monstrorum, also from an Anglo-Saxon scriptorium but older by 200 years, has ‘Getae’, without a diphtong. The scribes spelled the names as they, themselves, pronounced them, in their own local dialect. We can not draw any conclusion as to how the Geats of the early sixth centu-ry pronounced their name or that of their country from the way west-Saxonscribes of the eighth and tenth centuries spelled them.In Scandinavia, summer nights are very short and never quite dark. Even so, in
the days before light-houses, any prudent sailor would schedule his passage soas to pass cape Öland, Utklippan and the Hammers in daylight.
This means setting out from cape Hoburgen in the late afternoon, spending the rst night at
sea between Gotland and Öland, passing cape Öland and Utklippan in daylight, with a second night between Utklippan and the Hammers, passing the latter in the early morning hours and making a landfall at Stevns in the afternoon of the second day, at the expected time, “the sun standing right on the second day”. There are numerous large mounds and cairns on Gotland, mostly dating from
the Bronze Age. However, Ugglehaug in Stenkyrka parish dates from the Migration period and so probably also do the mounds at Havor in Hablingbo and
a few others, all of a size to compare favourably with the contemporary royal
mounds of Sweden, those of the Ynglinga kings, thus testifying to the power and wealth of the families who built them. There are but three kinds of men: the living, the dead and those who sail the
sea. After his final battle, lying mortally wounded on Earnanes, the cape of the
eagles, the childless Beowulf felt no ties to the living. He chose to rest where his monument could be seen from afar and where he would be remembered by his equals, those who sailed the sea, rather than being buried inland, close to the settlements, as was the usual custom. He ordered young Wiglaf.
Bid men of battle build me a tomb fair after fire, on the foreland by the sea
that shall stand as a reminder of me to my people, towering high above Hronesnes so that ocean travellers shall afterwards name it Beowulf’s barrow ,bending in the distance their masted ships through the mists upon the sea. Today, one of the southern parishes on Gotland is named Rone. Beowulf’s‘Hronesnes’ has been taken to be derived from Anglo-Saxon ‘hron’, whale. This word is not known from any other Germanic language. Although whalingis usually associated with the Atlantic, until recent times it played a very import-ant part in the economy of south Scania, of Öland and of Gotland. The dolphins, (Phocaena phocaena, L.) who enter the Baltic Sea in spring and leave in the autumn, were netted by the thousands. Their meat, fat, bone and hides were all utilized.
The derivation of the name ‘Rone’ is not known. It appears as ‘Ronum’ and‘Rone’ in the fourteenth century (Karl Inge Sandred, pers. comm. 10.2.1984).It may be no more than a coincidence, there being no linguistic evidence either way: can possibly ‘Rone’ be derived from ‘hron’ as ‘the place where dolphinsare caught?’ It is suggestive that a hill on the next headland to the north, now called cape Nabbu, called Arnkull, Eagle Hill.
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Tore Gannholm
Reviewed by Tammy Wise CHS- Indiana USA
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CLAN CARRUTHERS INT SOCIETY CCIS HISTORIAN AND GENEALOGIST
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