The first thing Beowulf does on returning to his homeland is to sit at a feast with his uncle King Hygelac and narrate the story we have just read. On first glance, it seems like it only reiterates the familiar and can be skipped. However, Beowulf’s tale changes the emphasis and adds details. It also may have functioned as a refresher for a story that was too long to tell in one sitting.
A few of the new details clash with the previous story in ways that we cannot completely justify. Hygelac, in asking for the story, says that he tried hard to dissuade his nephew from going (1992-7), but the early lines had assured us that “wise men did not dissuade him” (202). Was Hygelac not wise? Did the other wise men encourage Beowulf, and Hygelac was the only negative voice?
Similarly, later in 2183-9, the narrator tells us that Beowulf was considered a weakling and a loser when he was young and thus he had to prove himself. This jars with the earlier narrative, where Beowulf was clearly always the young strongman spawning tales of his feats of strength and daring. While there are some athletes who began with physical problems, this does not seem likely in Beowulf’s case. Many scholars believe that at least two authors (and perhaps many more) had a hand in creating the poem, and these two discordant notes may be evidence.
Most of the new details only expand on the original narrative. We learn that the name of Grendel’s Geatish victim was Hondscio, with the ironic literal meaning of “Hand-shoe,” that is, glove. But now we learn also that Grendel wore a victims-collection-bag on his belt, called a “glof” in the original language, and from these details may wonder if the poet intended irony that “Glove” was put into the glove. This bag sounds like a mythical, perhaps even magical, item, as it is made of dragon-skins and has an amazing clasp of some sort.
A very large part of Beowulf’s commentary on Hrothgar’s family centers on his political speculations about what he observed. Freawaru, who was not even named in the early text, is promised in marriage to the King of a neighboring tribe, the Heathobards. The Heathobards appear to live south of the Danes, perhaps in the neck of the Danish peninsula, perhaps on the coast of modern Germany. Beowulf alludes to past history between Danes and Heathobards, and predicts trouble.
Apparently, there was a past feud between Hrothgar and Froda of the Heathobards. At least one hero of the Heathobards, Withergyld, is named as having died in this war. Hrothgar wants to preserve peace on his borders, and so Freawaru is to marry Froda’s son, Ingeld. This common tactic often worked, but at times, as we saw in the story of Finn and Hildeburh, it could also be disastrous.
In this case, Beowulf predicts that the feud is too recent and the need for revenge too sharp. Just coming to Heorot for the bridal feast will be enough to provoke old memories, since Heorot will be decked out in its finest and that will include trophy weapons on the walls. The sight of these old wounds will remind the Heathobards of the deaths of their fathers, and as the mead flows, eventually one of them will stand up and slug a Dane, and then pandemonium will break loose. Beowulf is sure that Ingeld’s infatuation with the bride he has just met will not be as strong as his desire to avenge his father’s feud, and that Freawaru’s bridal feast will end with funeral pyres. From the poem Widsith, we know that Hrothulf and Hrothgar “humbled Ingeld’s battle-array, hacked down at Heorot the pride of the Heathobards.” Beowulf suggests that Ingeld cannot be trusted, that the Heathobards are only laying a trap for the Danes, but in the end, it would clearly have been better for Ingeld to keep his men quiet and take his bride home.
Beowulf does not add new information to his fights, apart from the personal comment that it was a burden for the Danes not to be able to build a funeral pyre for the honored counselor Aeschere, the last victim of Grendel’s mother. He retells the stories in much the way that we heard them already, and with less vividness. One of the oddities of this narration is that the character Beowulf shows much more interest in the way a feud with the Heathobards might reopen than in his own exploits. He expends a good bit of narrative energy on Freawaru, imagining the scene and dialogue at the bridal feast, but waves off his own fight with the comment, “It is too long to tell how I handed back payment to the people’s enemy for all his evils” (2093-4). About Grendel’s mother, he laconically explains, “There for a while, we fought hand to hand…” (2137) While he reiterates the main points (ripping off the arm, finding the “mighty sword”), he does not elaborate.