Grendel's Mother Broods Over Her Feral Son

Editor's Note: Marijane Osborn, Professor of English at the University of California, Davis, has announced her retirement at the end of the 2006-07 academic year. According to Jordanes the Heruli (or Eruli) were the tallest of the tall people of Scandinavia and "fought with the cruelty of wild beasts" (Getica III 23-24). If Grendel's Mother maybe imagined as a member of this dispossessed and decimated tribe, her duty is clear, for among the Scandinavians a man was bound by honor to avenge his slain kinsman, and the woman's role was to urge him to the task, or even to do it herself as a final resort.