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Proofreading Team.
1899
p. IV. For Angelsächsen read Angelsachsen.
p. V. " Fritsche " Fritzsche.
p. IX. " homilest " homilist.
p. 18, 1. 550. " has " hast.
p. 27, 1. 835. " 'Till " Till.
P. 57. " Siever's " Sievers'.
It is always a somewhat hardy undertaking to attempt the translationof poetry, for such a translation will at the best be but a shadow ofthat which it would fain represent. Yet I trust that even an imperfectrendering of one of the best of the Old English poems will in somemeasure contribute towards a wider appreciation of our earliestliterature, for the poem is accessible to the general reader onlyin the baldly literal and somewhat inaccurate translation of Kemble,published in 1843, and now out of print.
I have chosen blank verse as the most suitable metre for thetranslation of a long and dignified narrative poem, as the metre whichcan most nearly reproduce the strength, the nobility, the variety andrapidity of the original. The ballad measure as used by Lumsden in histranslation of Beowulf is monotonous and trivial, while the measureused by Morris and others, and intended as an imitation of the OldEnglish alliterative measure, is wholly impracticable. It is a hybridproduct, neither Old English nor modern, producing both weariness anddisgust; for, while copying the external features of its original, itloses wholly its æsthetic qualities.
In my diction I have sought after simple and idiomatic English,studying the noble archaism of the King James Bible, rather thanaffecting the Wardour Street dialect of William Morris or ProfessorEarle, which is often utterly unintelligible to any but the specialstudent of Middle English. My translation is faithful, but notliteral; I have not hesitated to make a passive construction active,or to translate a compound adjective by a phrase. To quote from KingAlfred's preface to his translation of Boethius, I have "at timestranslated word by word, and at times sense by sense, in whatsoeverway I might most clearly and intelligibly interpret it."
The text followed is that of Grein-Wülker in the Bibliothek derAngelsächsischen Poesie (Leipzig, 1894), and the lines of mytranslation are numbered according to that edition. I have not,however, felt obliged to follow his punctuation. Where it has seemedbest to adopt other readings, I have mentioned the fact in my notes.
I have compared my translation with those of Kemble and Grein(Dichtungen der Angelsächsen), and am occasionally indebted to themfor a word or a phrase.
It gives me great pleasure to acknowledge my indebtedness to Dr. FrankH. Chase, who has very carefully read my translation in manuscript;and to Professor