The following two Exeter Book elegies are among the most baffling poems in the Old English corpus. The speakers of both poems describe events and relationships in their lives, but the details are just hints—they don’t add up to a coherent story. Each elegy, in short, is a bit like a riddle. Indeed, the speaker of Elegy D calls their poem as giedd, which can mean riddle, poem, or song in Old English.

Elegy C

Translated by Dr. Aaron K. Hostetter

Possibly whoever had given a gift to my tribe—

they would chew him up if he came with a company.

It is not like that with us.

Wulf is on one island, I am on another.

It’s strong there, surrounded by swamps.

Slaughter-fierce men crowd there—

they would chew him up if he came with a company.

It is not like that with us.

I wondered with hope on my Wulf’s wide wanderings

when there was rainy weather and I sat weeping,

when the battle-bold wrapped me up in his arms,

it was my delight — but it was hateful as well.

Wulf, my Wulf! My hopes for you

have sickened, your seldom visits—

a mourning mind—I’m not hungry—

Do you hear me, Eadwacer? Wulf bears

our wretched whelp into the woods.

One may easily sever

what was never bound fast,

our mutual riddling…

Elegy D

Translated by Dr. Aaron K. Hostetter

I wrack this riddle about myself

full miserable, my very own experience.

I can speak it—

what I endured in misery,

after I was grown, both new and old,

none greater than now. Always I suffered

the torment of my wracked ways. (ll. 1-5)

My lord departed at first, from his tribe here

over the tossing of waves—

I watched a sorrow at dawn

wondering where in these lands

my chieftain might be.

Then I departed myself to venture,

seeking his followers, a friendless wayfarer

out of woeful need. (ll. 6-10)

They insinuated, the kinsmen of that man,

by secret thought, to separate us two

so that we two, widest apart in the worldly realm,

should live most hatefully—and it harrowed me. (ll. 11-14)

My lord ordered me to take this grove

for a home — very few dear to me

in this land, almost no loyal friends. (ll. 15-17a)

Therefore my mind so miserable —

[then] I met a well-suited man for myself

so misfortunate and mind-sorrowing,

thought kept close, plotting a crime. (17b-20)

Keeping cheery, we vowed quite often

that none but death could separate us. (21-23a)

That soon changed…

it’s now as if it had never been —

our friendship. I must, far and near,

endure the feuding of my dearly beloved. (ll. 23b-26)

[Someone]^[1] ordered me anchored

in a woody grove, under an oak-tree

within this earthen cave.

Ancient is the earth-hall:

I am entirely longing— (27-29)

Dark are the valleys, the mountains so lofty,

bitter these hovels, overgrown with thorns.

Shelters without joy. So many times here

the disappearance of my lord^[2]

seizes me with a stewing. (ll. 30-33a)

All my friends dwell in the dirt,

I loved them while they lived,

now guarding their graves,

when I go forth alone

in the darkness of daybreak

under the oak-tree

outside this hollowed earth. (ll. 33b-36)

There I may sit a summer-long day,

where I can weep for my exiled path,

my many miseries—therefore I can never

rest from these my mind’s sorrowings,

not from all these longings

that seize me in my living. (ll. 37-41)

A young man must always be sad at heart,

hard in the thoughts inside,

also he must keep a happy bearing —

but also breast-cares, suffering never-ending grief— (ll. 42-45a)

May he depend only upon himself

for all his worldly pleasures.

May he be stained with guilt far and wide,

throughout the lands of distant folk,

so that my once-friend should sit under the stony cliffs,

rimed by storms, my weary-minded ally,

flowed around by waters in his dreary hall. (ll. 42-50a)

My former companion may know a great mind-sorrow—

remembering too often his joyful home. (ll. 50b-52a)

Woe be to that one who must

wait for their beloved with longing. (ll. 52b-53)