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These developments belie the fact that the Norse Skjo˛ldung-analogues contain enough detail for a plausible outline of the Beowulf-poet’s ‘Danish’ material to be drawn on the basis of whatever narrative they have in common. Unravelling their relationships is complex, but it is still obvious that these analogues descend from one tradition. Perhaps, as was once accepted without challenge, this is what we could call ‘North Sea Germanic’, a body of legends that came to England in the Age of Migrations; perhaps, as many now believe, these legends reached the poet directly from Danes of the Viking Age.

890, speaks of the monasteries all burned, before he enlarges on the decay of monastic learning that had set in earlier. 125 Consequently no books survive from middle, eastern, or northern England in OVa’s time through which his reign (757–96) will ever be understood to the same degree as Charlemagne’s. In the light of these upheavals, Beowulf would have to be read as anti-clerical if it was written near Mercia in the Viking Age. Today, notwithstanding, Beowulf ’s tales of Scandinavia are thought to show an acquaintance with Danes living in England; suggested dates bring the poem into the tenth century.

I. 43 What Milton does in each case is to recast an episode from the Aeneid. It may be presumed that Vergil in his own day did likewise, for many scenes which Milton found in the Aeneid themselves appear to be borrowed from the Iliad or Odyssey. 44 Why Vergil should borrow in this way from ‘Homer’, or Milton from Vergil, among many others, is best explained in terms of the opportunities which each poet found in the work of his great predecessor. 45 This is particularly a light in which to see the poet of Beowulf.