Max Ashton (Stanford, English)

The Old English Exeter Book Badger Revisited

The abstract for the talk: 

In the Old English Exeter Book (copied in the 10th century), there is a short, heroic poem about an animal defending her burrow and children from a deadly invader—this is among the oldest original animal poems recorded in English. This poem is a riddle, and its solution is still debated. In this presentation, I make a new case for the earliest—but now disfavored—accepted solution, “badger.” I revisit and reconsider philological and biological evidence that has been used against this solution and contextualize it with previously unconsidered badger lore.

What’s at stake? Of all the Exeter Book Riddles whose solutions are probably animals, this is the longest and the most sympathetic. The animal’s psychology is richly developed through her heroism during a violent crisis; if she’s a badger, this poem is a unique entry in the medieval badger canon, where it is often considered a dirty and ridiculous creature. It furthermore represents English literature’s first engagement with a charismatic animal whose grip on popular culture and world mythologies should not be underestimated.