Compelling evidence that the legend of Beowulf and Grendel was based on historical events. It reveals the existence of an ancient English fertility rite that involved the ritual taking of a sacred intoxicant and the sacrificial drowning of human victims in secluded lakes . . .
John Grigsby reveals that the English had a mythology and a vibrant pagan religion as rich and complex as that of the early Celts, of which only a few precious fragments remain. One such fragment is a Dark-Age poem that tells of the deeds of the monster-slaying hero Beowulf, who frees the feasting hall of a Danish King from the twelve year tyranny of a creature named Grendel and its hideous, lake-dwelling mother.
Grigsby's conclusions will revolutionise the way we think about the ancestors of the English. He explains how they came to England from Denmark and Northern Germany and how human sacrifice was central to their religion. He discovered that it was the memory of the forceful suppression of this sacrificial cult in the 5th century AD that lies behind the seemingly-fantastic deeds of Beowulf. His discovery helps to answer where, when and why the poem was written ,and to restore the poem to its rightful place as a national epic.
