The Translations of Beowulf: A Critical Bibliography

by Chauncey Brewster Tinker

[ CONYBEARE’S EXTRACTS]

Illustrations of Anglo-Saxon Poetry. By John Josias Conybeare, M.A., &c. Edited, together with additional notes, introductory notices, &c., by his brother, William Daniel Conybeare, M.A., &c. London: printed for Harding and Lepard, Pall Mall East, 1826. 8^o, pp. (viii), xcvi, 287.

Anglo-Saxon Poem concerning the Exploits of Beowulf the Dane, pp. 30–167.

Translation of extracts into English blank verse, with the original text of the extracts, and a literal translation of them into Latin prose.

Circumstances of Publication.

The volume had its origin in the Terminal Lectures which the author gave as Professor of Anglo-Saxon and Poetry at Oxford from 1809 to 1812[1]. We know from an autobiographical note printed in the Introduction[2] that the Beowulf was finished in October, 1820. But the book did not appear until two years after the author’s death, and the material which it contains is of a slightly earlier date than the title-page would seem to indicate—e.g. the volume really antedates the third edition of Turner’s History discussed above[3].

Conybeare, and the Progress of the Interpretation of the Poem.

Conybeare did not edit the entire poem, and apparently never had any intention of so doing. The selections which he translates are based on Thorkelin’s text. He revises this text, however, in making his translations, and even incorporates a collation of Thorkelin’s text with the MS. (pp. 137–55). This collation, though not complete or accurate, was serviceable, and kept Conybeare from falling into some of the errors that the Icelander had made. He distinguished by an asterisk the MS. readings which were of material importance in giving the sense of a passage, and, in fact, constructed for himself a text that was practically new.

‘The text has been throughout carefully collated with the original Manuscript, and the translation of Thorkelin revised with all the diligence of which the editor is capable.’ —Page 32.

‘Any attempt to restore the metre, and to correct the version throughout, would have exceeded the bounds, and involved much discussion foreign to the purpose of the present work. This must be left to the labours of the Saxon scholar. It is evident, however, that without a more correct text than that of Thorkelin, those labours must be hopeless. The wish of supplying that deficiency, may perhaps apologize for the occupying, by this Collation, so large a space of a work strictly dedicated to other purposes.’ —Page 137, footnote.