Exeter Riddle 47
MEGANCAVELL
Date: Mon 28 Sep 2015Matching Commentaries: Commentary for Exeter Riddle 47
Original text:
Moððe word fræt. Me þæt þuhte
wrætlicu wyrd, þa ic þæt wundor gefrægn,
þæt se wyrm forswealg wera gied sumes,
þeof in þystro, þrymfæstne cwide
5 ond þæs strangan staþol. Stælgiest ne wæs
wihte þy gleawra, þe he þam wordum swealg.Translation:
A moth ate words. That seemed to me
a curious happening, when I heard about that wonder,
that the worm, a thief in the darkness, swallowed
a certain man’s song, a glory-fast speech
5 and its strong foundation. The stealing guest was not
at all the wiser for that, for those words which he swallowed.Book-worm, Book-moth, Maggot and psalter
Notes:
This riddle appears on folios 112v-113r of The Exeter Book.
The above Old English text is based on this edition: Elliott van Kirk Dobbie and George Philip Krapp, eds, The Exeter Book, Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records 3 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936), page 205.
Note that this edition numbers the text Riddle 45: Craig Williamson, ed., The Old English Riddles of the Exeter Book (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1977), page 97.
Tags: anglo saxon exeter book riddles old english solutions riddle 47
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