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orðanc enta geweorc: the cunning work of Giants
This work is a setting of the Old English poem Maxims II, found in the Cotton Tiberius B I manuscript now housed in the British Library. The poem is written in the standard Old English alliterative metre, and presents a series of maxims that describe the natural and human worlds. The poem's development is highly organic, and it is likely to be the cumulative result of a long oral tradition. Its overarching structure (if any) is still debated. Although the the manuscript dates to c. 1100 A.D., it is likely that significant portions of the poem date to before 800 A.D.
This setting covers the first third of the complete poem. It begins in an impersonal mode - considering the wind, the weather and inexorable fate - but then shifts into something more human. The excerpt ends with the striking image "Ecg sceal wið hellme / hilde gebidan" ("the blade shall, in battle, meet the helm"). As if in answer, the piece morphs from impersonal song into the monks of Ely conducting funeral rites. King Cnut sails by, and the old culture is lost to the past.
Text note
Maxims II - Anonymous The Vulgate - St. Jerome