Lawrence continues: "The lines tell us that it was regarded as disgraceful for the Danes to have to follow him." But surely this is saying too much. That the Frisians are not to taunt the Danes with following the slayer of their lord is only one of two possible interpretations of the ll. 1101-3. And even if we accept this interpretation, it does not follow that the Danes are regarded as having done anything with which they can be justly taunted. It is part of the settlement between Gunnar and Njal, that Njal's sons are not to be taunted: if a man repeats the taunts he shall fall unavenged[[488]]. Surely a man may be touchy about being taunted, without being regarded as having done anything disgraceful. Indeed, in our case, the poet implies that taunts would not be just, þā him swā geþearfod wæs. But, as I try to show below, no þearf could have excused the submission of retainers to a foe who had just slain their lord by deliberate treachery.

"The revenge at the end falls heavily upon Finn." It does; as so often happens where the feud is temporarily patched up, it breaks out again, as in the stories of Alboin, Ingeld or Bolli. But this does not prove that the person upon whom the revenge ultimately falls heavily had been a guest-slayer. The possibility of even temporary reconciliation rather implies the reverse.

"The insult and hurt to Danish pride would be very little lessened by the assumption that someone else [than Finn] started the quarrel; and for this assumption, too, the lines give no warrant." But they do: for they tell us that it was due to the bad faith of the Eotens. Commentators may argue, if they will, that "Eotens" means Finn. But the weight of proof lies on them, and they have not met it, or seriously attempted to meet it.

Section VIII. The Weight of Proof: The Eotens

Finn is surely entitled to be held innocent till he can be proved guilty. And the argument for his guilt comes to this: the trouble was due to the bad faith of the Eotens: "Eotens" means "Jutes": "Jutes" means "Frisians": "Frisians" means "Finn": therefore the trouble was due to the treachery of Finn.

Now I agree that it is probable that Eotenas means Jutes; and, as I have said, there is nothing improbable in a Frisian king having had a clan of Jutes, or a body of Jutish mercenaries, subject to him. But that the Frisians as a whole should be called Jutes is, per se, exceedingly improbable, and we have no shadow of evidence for it. Lawrence tries to justify it by the authority of Siebs:

"Siebs, perhaps the foremost authority on Frisian conditions, conjectures that ... the occupation by the Frisians of Jutish territory after the conquest of Britain assisted the confusion between the two names."

But did the Frisians occupy Jutish territory? When we ask what is Siebs' authority for the hypothesis that Frisians occupied Jutish territory, we find it to be this: that because in Beowulf "Jute" means "Frisian," some such event must have taken place to account for this nomenclature[[489]]. So it comes to this: the Frisians must have been called Jutes, because they occupied