Exeter Book Riddle 45

Exeter Book Riddle 45 (according to the numbering of the Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records)^[1] is one of the Old English riddles found in the later tenth-century Exeter Book. Its solution is accepted to be 'dough'. However, the description evokes a penis becoming erect; as such, Riddle 45 is noted as one of a small group of Old English riddles that engage in sexual double entendre, and thus provides rare evidence for Anglo-Saxon attitudes to sexuality, and specifically for women taking the initiative in heterosexual sex.^[2]

Text and translation

As edited by Krapp and Dobbie, the riddle reads:^[3]

Ic on wincle gefrægn weaxan nathwæt,
þindan ond þunian, þecene hebban;
on þæt banlease bryd grapode,
hygewlonc hondum, hrægle þeahte
þrindende þing þeodnes dohtor.

I have heard of something that grows in a corner,
swelling and standing up, lifting up its covering.
Upon that boneless thing a proud-minded woman
gripped with her hands; with her garment a lord's daughter
covered the swollen thing.^[4]

Editions

Krapp, George Philip and Elliott Van Kirk Dobbie (eds), The Exeter Book, The Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records, 3 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936), p. 205, https://web.archive.org/web/20181206091232/http://ota.ox.ac.uk/desc/3009.
Williamson, Craig (ed.), The Old English Riddles of the Exeter Book (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1977), pp. 96-97 [no. 43].
Muir, Bernard J. (ed.), The Exeter Anthology of Old English Poetry: An Edition of Exeter Dean and Chapter MS 3501, 2nd edn, 2 vols (Exeter: Exeter University Press, 2000).
Foys, Martin et al. (eds.) Old English Poetry in Facsimile Project, (Madison, WI: Center for the History of Print and Digital Culture, 2019-). Online edition annotated and linked to digital facsimile, with a modern translation.

Recordings

Michael D. C. Drout, 'Riddle 45', performed from the Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records edition (29 October 2007).

References

^ George Philip Krapp and Elliott Van Kirk Dobbie (eds), The Exeter Book, The Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records, 3 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936), http://ota.ox.ac.uk/desc/3009 Archived 2018-12-06 at the Wayback Machine.
^ Hugh Magennis, “No Sex Please, We’re Anglo-Saxons”? Attitudes to Sexuality in Old English Prose and Poetry, Leeds Studies in English, n. s., 26 (1995), 1–27 (pp. 16-18).
^ George Philip Krapp and Elliott Van Kirk Dobbie (eds), The Exeter Book, The Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records, 3 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936), p. 205; http://ota.ox.ac.uk/desc/3009 Archived 2018-12-06 at the Wayback Machine.
^ Old and Middle English c. 890-c. 1400: An Anthology, ed. by Elaine Treharne, 2nd edn (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004), p. 73.

External links

Megan Cavell, 'Commentary for Riddle 45', The Riddle Ages (7 October 2015).

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[1] George Philip Krapp and Elliott Van Kirk Dobbie (eds), The Exeter Book, The Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records, 3 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936), http://ota.ox.ac.uk/desc/3009 Archived 2018-12-06 at the Wayback Machine.

[2] Hugh Magennis, “No Sex Please, We’re Anglo-Saxons”? Attitudes to Sexuality in Old English Prose and Poetry, Leeds Studies in English, n. s., 26 (1995), 1–27 (pp. 16-18).

[3] George Philip Krapp and Elliott Van Kirk Dobbie (eds), The Exeter Book, The Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records, 3 (New York: Columbia University Press, 1936), p. 205; http://ota.ox.ac.uk/desc/3009 Archived 2018-12-06 at the Wayback Machine.

[4] Old and Middle English c. 890-c. 1400: An Anthology, ed. by Elaine Treharne, 2nd edn (Oxford: Blackwell, 2004), p. 73.

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