The Sword in Beowulf: 3 Representational Examples

Swords play a crucial role in the story of Beowulf, not only as weapons of war, but also as symbols of status. Each of the swords named in the poem plays an important narrative function. However, how would these swords actually look? Through looking at ancient sources and filling in the blanks, one can infer the type, quality, and even patterning.

Hrunting

Unferth’s role in the epic Beowulf is more or less as an example of a weak dissenting voice to contrast Beowulf’s strength and bravery. However, he possesses the apparently legendary sword Hrunting which had already “been called on / to perform a great work” (The Grinnell Beowulf, 1466-7) It fails against Grendel’s mother, a POSSIBLE reflection of Unferth’s cowardice.

As a sword described as having already been used many times in battle, and the story taking place around 500 CE, one can assume the sword to have been created somewhere around 300-400 CE, as the Vikings greatly valued old, battle tested swords (Sayer, Sebo, E., & Hughes, K. 2019.) However, because information on swords from before 700 CE is few and far between, we are choosing a hilt type that would have been sufficiently old to those telling the story of Beowulf, so around ~800 CE.

The hilt we chose is a type O hilt, similar to those pictured below:

Image sourced from De Norske Vikingsverd (1919) by Jan Peterson

Hrunting’s hilt could be cast in bronze and coated in gold, a show of status, with carvings similar to O 104 in the picture. However, the gilded nature of the hilt may symbolize that Unferth is, despite the image his sword gives off, cowardly.

The blade would be similar to other contemporaneous blades, where there doesn’t seem to be much variation over time. The blade would be about 80-90 cm long, probably on the upper end if intended to be used by a “great hero” (Petri, 2019.) As with most swords, it would be about 5.5 cm thick and tapering off towards the point (Petri, 2019.) The blade would, if it was of particularly high quality, which it would have been in the story, it would have been pattern-welded, an incredibly high-quality and difficult to reproduce technique. The pattern would look similar to this:

Niels Provos, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

Again, in evidence to the above, Hrunting is even described as being wave-patterned:

The wave-patterned sword, ornamented

and steel-edged, lay lifeless on the ground.

(The Grinnell Beowulf, ll. 1540-41)

Finally, there is a question as to whether or not the sword would be inlaid with symbols: We don’t think so. There is little to no evidence of inlaid designs prior to about 900 CE, and if this sword was created around 800 CE, it would not be realistic to design any blade inlays.

Naegling

Næġling is a named sword that Beowulf uses specifically in his fight against the dragon: despite its ill-fated end, it is described up until its death as “sharp”, “gleaming”, “bright”, “mighty”, “strong”, an “excellent ancient sword”, and an “ancient heirloom” (Culbert, 1960.) The sword fails due to his own strength:

Naegling snapped. 

Beowulf’s sword, ancient and gray, 

Failed him. It was not granted by fate

That iron swords would help him in battle;

His hand was too strong. I have heard

That he overstressed each blade

With his sword-stroke.

(The Grinnell Beowulf, ll. 2732-2738)

Though the sword is referred to as ancient multiple times, just as with Hrunting, the age of a sword was highly valued among the Vikings (Sayer, Sebo, E., & Hughes, K. 2019.) As well, the ability of a sword to retain its edge, brightness, and sheen over this long span of time would compound its value. Before Beowulf wielded Naegling, it very may well have been used in many battles before him, and Beowulf himself having happened upon it in some fashion. To contrast with Hrunting, which we imagine to have been passed down through time to end up in Unferth’s hands, we speculate that Beowulf happened upon Naegling by way of treasure. Perhaps it was left at the site of a long ago battle, supernaturally preserved from the harm of the elements. Perhaps it was somehow separated from the burial hoard of a great hero in just the right fashion for Beowulf to happen upon it. In any case, Beowulf, as a young hero, seems fitting for a sword that is young to his lineage but old to the world he inhabits. 

Due to the old age of the sword, I am choosing a hilt that would be similarly ancient to the Anglo-Saxons, and even older than Hrunting. The hilt I chose for Næġling is a type A hilt, similar to the following:

Image sourced from De Norske Vikingsverd (1919) by Jan Peterson

The wide hilt and pommel would serve Beowulf, renowned for his great size and strength, well. Similarly, we would extend the blades length to the longest attested length, 90cm, or even potentially further if one were to slightly disregard the archaeological record (Petri, 2019.)

However, one aspect we would make “worse” for Næġling than for Hrunting is the quality of the blade’s steel itself. We would have the blade forged from advanced techniques, rather than the top-of-the line reflected in Hrunting’s patterning. This is because 1. I want Næġling to at least seem older than Hrunting, and having older, less advanced techniques would aid in that, and 2. Hrunting is explicitly described as having a patterned blade, whereas Næġling is only described as bright and gleaming. This steel would be bright and smooth, lacking the patterning of the top-level techniques but being obviously separated from low-quality steel, as low-quality steel would be dull and almost ruddy (Martens, Astrup, E. E., Loftsgarden, K., & Vike, V., 2021.)

The blade itself, therefore, would be similar in visual quality to this example:

Philadelphia Museum of Art, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Hrothgar’s Sword

Unlike with Næġling and with Hrunting, Hrothgar’s sword is never mentioned (to my knowledge) in Beowulf. Therefore, we are going to imagine his sword as one truly fit for a king. We believe that, to contrast with the old age of Hrunting and the even older age of Naegling, this sword should be relatively newer than the other two. Owing to this is that it never gets used itself in battle (in Beowulf.) Perhaps they did not trust the un-tested blade like they did with the others?

For the hilt we want to mirror an actual hilt found in the archaeological record, fittingly from Denmark in around the 10th century:

Iron swords with decorative handles from Jutland, Denmark, Viking civilization, 9th-11th century. (2014). In Bridgeman Images: DeAgostini Library.

We want to recreate the hilt on the right. The grip and crossguard are intact, but the pommel seems to have lost much ornamentation. Therefore we want to combine its design with the ornamentation of the pommel on the left. Perhaps a designer could extend the designs to cover the whole of the pommel, then inlaying it with black and gold patterns like on the left pommel.

As for the blade itself, we think it would be of similar quality to Hrunting, with wave-patterns arising from the high quality of the forging:

Niels Provos, CC BY-SA 4.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0>, via Wikimedia Commons

After all, the king would accept only the best for his very own sword.

As for blade inlays, I think it’s time for one of these swords to be allowed to be inlaid. Some incomplete inlay examples for a designer to expand upon are as follows:

Martens, Astrup, E. E., Loftsgarden, K., & Vike, V. (2021). Viking Age Swords from Telemark, Norway: An Integrated Technical and Archaeological Investigation: Vol. XXXIII. Cappelen Damm Akademisk/NOASP (Nordic Open Access Scholarly Publishing). https://doi.org/10.23865/noasp.145

The designer may prefer taking inspiration from chiefly 3 or 5 to reflect the Old English nature of Beowulf.

Citations

Martens, Astrup, E. E., Loftsgarden, K., & Vike, V. (2021). Viking Age Swords from Telemark, Norway: An Integrated Technical and Archaeological Investigation: Vol. XXXIII. Cappelen Damm Akademisk/NOASP (Nordic Open Access Scholarly Publishing). https://doi.org/10.23865/noasp.145

  Iron swords with decorative handles from Jutland, Denmark, Viking civilization, 9th-11th century. (2014). In Bridgeman Images: DeAgostini Library.

  Petri. (2019). Development and use of Viking Age swords. History Compass, 17(10). https://doi.org/10.1111/hic3.12593

 Culbert, Taylor (1960). “The Narrative Functions of Beowulf’s Swords”. Journal of English and Germanic Philology. (1): 13–20. https://www.jstor.org/stable/27707401.

  Short, W. R., & Reynir A. Óskarson. (2021). Men of terror : a comprehensive analysis of Viking combat. Westholme Publishing, LLC.

Sayer, Sebo, E., & Hughes, K. (2019). A Double-edged Sword: Swords, Bodies, and Personhood in Early Medieval Archaeology and Literature. European Journal of Archaeology, 22(4), 542–566. https://doi.org/10.1017/eaa.2019.18

Davidson, H. R. E. (Hilda R. E. (1962). The sword in Anglo-Saxon England. Clarendon Press.