“Wulf and Eadwacer” is an Old English poem in alliterative verse of difficult interpretation. It has been variously characterized, (modernly) as an elegy, (historically) as a riddle, and (in speculation on the poem’s pre-history) as a song or ballad with refrain. The poem is narrated in the first person, most likely with a woman’s voice. The poem’s only extant text is found at folios 100v-101r in the tenth-century Exeter Book, alongside other texts to which it possesses qualitative similarities.
WULF AND EADWACER
unknown author
translated by Michael Alexander
The men of my tribe would treat him as game:
if he comes to the camp they will kill him outright.
Our fate is forked.
Wulf is on one island, I on another.
Mine is a fastness: the fens girdle it
and it is defended by the fiercest men.
If he comes to the camp they will kill him for sure.
Our fate is forked.
It was rainy weather, and I wept by the hearth,
thinking of my Wulf’s far wanderings;
one of the captains caught me in his arms.
It gladdened me then; but it grieved me too.
Wulf, my Wulf, it was wanting you
that made me sick, your seldom coming,
the hollowness at heart; not the hunger I spoke of.
Do you hear, Eadwacer? Our whelp
Wulf shall take to the wood.
What was never bound is broken easily,
our song together.
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original Anglo-Saxon text:
Leodum is minum swylce him mon lac gife;
willað hy hine aþecgan, gif he on þreat cymeð.
Ungelic is us.
Wulf is on iege, ic on oþerre.
Fæst is þæt eglond, fenne biworpen.
Sindon wælreowe weras þær on ige;
willað hy hine aþecgan, gif he on þreat cymeð.
Ungelice is us.
Wulfes ic mines widlastum wenum dogode.
þonne hit wæs renig weder ond ic reotugu sæt,
þonne mec se beaducafa bogum bilegde;
wæs me wyn to þon, wæs me hwæþre eac lað.
Wulf, min Wulf, wena me þine
seoce gedydon, þine seldcymas,
murnende mod, nales meteliste.
Gehyrest þu, Eadwacer? Uncerne earmne hwelp
bireð wulf to wuda.
þæt mon eaþe tosliteð þætte næfre gesomnad wæs,
uncer giedd geador.