SAGA-BOOK - Viking Society Web Publications

The end of the Geats 271
two powers. They engage in a series of battles, with
victories on either side. Quite naturally, once they have
lost a strong ruler, the Geats fear incursions from without
- but there is no mention of tribal destruction in Beowulf,
and none in history.
X Beowulf and Sutton Hoo
In interpreting the many problems of Geatish and
Swedish relations in Beowulf, one might expect aid from
the splendid treasure-trove at Sutton Hoo. Indeed, in his
supplementary chapter to Ritchie Girvan's Beowulf and
the Seventh Century, Dr Bruce-Mitford speaks of 'the clue
that the ship-burial as a whole may provide to the poem's
place of composition and to the transmission of its
Scandinavian themes to the Anglo-Saxon milieu - two
of the major problems to do with the poem still unsolved'.88
Both in this publicatiorr'" and in the British Museum
Handbook of 1968, Dr Bruce-Mitford states that there is
a direct connection between Swedish Uppland and Sutton
Hoo. His statement in the Handbook is intended for a
general audience, but the major points are presented:
The most plausible explanation of the hard fact of the
Swedish connection seen at Sutton Hoo is that it is dynastic.
The evident antiquity of some of the Swedish pieces at Sutton
Hoo, especially the shield, suggests that the connection goes
back into a period earlier than the burial. The most likely
explanation seems to be that the dynasty of the Wulfingas was
Swedish in its origin, and that probably Wehha, said to be the
first of the family to rule over the Angles in Britain, was a
Swede.
However, the names in the genealogy of the Wulftngas do
not seem to have had any parallels or analogues amongst those
of the royal house of the Svear, the people whose territory lay
O. Rupert Bruce-Mitford, 'Sutton Hoo', added to Beowulf and the SetJenth
Century (1971), 96.
•• ibid., passim. (Since Dr Bruce-Mitford distinguishes between Geats and
Swedes On the last page of this chapter, I assume that 'Swedish' earlier in the
piece = Svear.)