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An illustration of Grendel's mother by J. R. Skelton from Stories of Beowulf (1908) described as a "water-witch" trying to stab Beowulf. Grendel's mother (Old English: Grendles mōdor) is one of three antagonists in the anonymous Old English poem Beowulf (c. 700–1000 AD), the other two being Grendel and the dragon.
Grendel's mother violently kills Æschere, who is Hrothgar's most loyal advisor, and escapes, later putting his head outside her lair. Hrothgar, Beowulf, and their men track Grendel's mother to her lair under a lake. Unferth, a warrior who had earlier challenged him, presents Beowulf with his sword Hrunting. After stipulating a number of ...
On his return from Heorot, where he killed Grendel and Grendel's mother, Beowulf becomes king of the Geats and rules wisely for fifty years until a slave awakens and angers a dragon by stealing a jewelled cup from its lair. When the angry dragon mercilessly burns the Geats' homes (including Beowulf's) and lands, Beowulf decides to fight and ...
Grendel flees but dies in his marsh den. There, Beowulf later engages in a fierce battle with Grendel's mother in a mere, over whom he triumphs with a sword found there. Following her death, Beowulf finds Grendel's corpse and removes his head, which he keeps as a trophy. Beowulf then returns to the surface and to his men at the "ninth hour". [4]
However, when Hrunting fails Beowulf in his battle against Grendel's mother, it possibly reflects its previous owner, Unferth, who failed to defeat the hated Grendel. [4] In addition, Beowulf's defeat of Grendel prompts the Danish king Hrothgar to bestow upon him many gifts consisting of weapons; this further emphasizes the importance of ...
After Beowulf defeats Grendel's mother, Hrothgar rewards him again, and then preaches a sermon in which he warns Beowulf to beware of arrogance and forgetfulness of God. [ 23 ] Beowulf takes his leave of Hrothgar to return home, and Hrothgar embraces him and weeps that they will not meet again (because Hroðgar is a very old man). [ 24 ]
In the poem, Beowulf, a hero of the Geats in Scandinavia, comes to the aid of Hroðgar, the king of the Danes, whose mead hall Heorot has been under attack by a monster known as Grendel. After Beowulf kills him, Grendel's mother attacks the hall and is then also defeated.
The morning after the celebratory feast on the occasion of Beowulf killing Grendel's mother, Beowulf and his people prepare to return to their home. Beowulf returns the sword Hrunting to Unferth, praising the weapon and its owner: he has "no ill word" for the sword (although it had not helped him against Grendel's mother), and he thanks Unferth ...