helmet yet found in England has a boar-crest[[737]]; and this is, I believe, the only actual boar-helmet yet found. How then can the boar-helmets of Beowulf show Scandinavian rather than Anglo-Saxon origin?
"The prevalence of ring-corslets." It is true that only one trace of a byrnie, and that apparently not of ring-mail, has so far been found in an Anglo-Saxon grave. (We have somewhat more abundant remains from the period prior to the migration to England: a peculiarly fine corslet of ring-mail, with remains of some nine others, was found in the moss at Thorsbjerg[[738]] in the midst of the ancient Anglian continental home; and other ring-corslets have been found in the neighbourhood of Angel, at Vimose[[739]] in Fünen.) But, for the period when Beowulf must have been composed, the ring-corslet is almost as rare in Scandinavia as in England[[740]]; the artist, however, seems to be indicating a byrnie upon many of the warriors depicted on the Vendel helm (Grave 14: seventh century). Equally, in England, warriors are represented on the Franks Casket as wearing the byrnie: also the laws of Ine (688-95) make it clear that the byrnie was by no means unknown[[741]]. Other Old English poems, certainly not Scandinavian, mention the ring-byrnie. How then can the mention of it in Beowulf be a proof of Scandinavian origin?
"The prevalence of ring-money." Before minted money became current, rings were used everywhere among the Teutonic peoples. Gold rings, intertwined so as to form a chain, have been found throughout Scandinavia, presumably for use as a medium of exchange. The term locenra bēaga (gen. plu.) occurs in Beowulf, and this is interpreted by Stjerna as "rings intertwined or locked together[[742]]." But locen in Beowulf need not have the meaning of "intertwined"; it occurs elsewhere in Old English of a single jewel, sincgim locen[[743]]. Further, even if locen does mean
"intertwined," such intertwined rings are not limited to Scandinavia proper. They have been found in Schleswig[[744]]. And almost the very phrase in Beowulf, londes ne locenra bēaga[[745]], recurs in the Andreas. The phrase there may be imitated from Beowulf, but, equally, the phrase in Beowulf may be imitated from some earlier poem. In fact, it is part of the traditional poetic diction: but its occurrence in the Andreas shows that it cannot be used as an argument of Scandinavian origin.
Whilst, therefore, accepting with gratitude the numerous illustrations which Stjerna has drawn from Scandinavian grave-finds, we must be careful not to read a Scandinavian colouring into features of Beowulf which are at least as much English as Scandinavian, such as the ring-sword or the boar-helmet or the ring-corslet.
There is, as is noted above, a certain atmosphere of profusion and wealth about some Scandinavian grave-finds, which corresponds much more nearly with the wealthy life depicted in Beowulf than does the comparatively meagre tomb-furniture of England. But we must remember that, after the spread of Christianity in the first half of the seventh century, the custom of burying articles with the bodies of the dead naturally ceased, or almost ceased, in England. Scandinavia continued heathen for another four hundred years, and it was during these years that the most magnificent deposits were made. As Stjerna himself points out, "a steadily increasing luxury in the appointment of graves" is to be found in Scandinavia in these centuries before the introduction of Christianity there. When we find in Scandinavia things (complete ships, for example) which we do not find in England, we owe this, partly to the nature of the soil in which they were embedded, but also to the continuance of such burial customs after they had died out in England.
Helm and byrnie were not necessarily unknown, or even very rare in England, simply because it was not the custom to bury them with the dead. On the other hand, the frequent mention of them in Beowulf does not imply that they were common: for
Beowulf deals only with the aristocratic adherents of a court, and even in Beowulf fine specimens of the helm and byrnie are spoken of as things which a king seeks far and wide to procure for his retainers[[746]]. We cannot, therefore, argue that there is any discrepancy. However, if we do so argue, it would merely prove, not that Beowulf is Scandinavian as opposed to English, but that it is comparatively late in date. Tacitus emphasizes the fact that spear and shield were the Teutonic weapons, that helmet and corslet were hardly known[[747]]. Pagan graves show that at any rate they were hardly known as tomb-furniture in England in the fifth, sixth, and early seventh centuries. The introduction of Christianity, and the intercourse with the South which it involved, certainly led to the growth of pomp and wealth in England, till the early eighth century became "the golden age of Anglo-Saxon England."
It might therefore conceivably be argued that Beowulf reflects the comparative abundance of early Christian England, as opposed to the more primitive heathen simplicity; but to argue a Scandinavian origin from the profusion of Beowulf admits of an easy reductio ad absurdum. For the same arguments would prove a heathen, Scandinavian origin for the Andreas, the Elene, the Exodus, or even for the Franks Casket, despite its Anglo-Saxon inscription and Christian carvings.
However, though the absence of helm and byrnie from Anglo-Saxon graves does not prove that these arms were not used by the living in heathen times, one thing it assuredly does prove: that the Anglo-Saxons in heathen times did not sacrifice helm and byrnie recklessly in funeral pomp. And this brings us to the second argument as to the origin of Beowulf which has been based on archæology.