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23-549: Recension I : RIA MS 23 N 10 ; BL MS Egerton 88 ; NLI MS G 7; TCD MS H 3.18; Lebor na hUidre Recension II : Yellow Book of Lecan ; RIA MS D IV 2; Lebor na hUidre ; BL Additional 33993; BL MS Egerton 1782 ; BL MS Egerton 92 ; Book of Fermoy ; TCD MS H 2.17; TCD MS H 3.18 Togail Bruidne Dá Derga ( The Destruction of Da Derga's Hostel ) is an Irish tale belonging to the Ulster Cycle of Irish mythology . It survives in three Old and Middle Irish recensions , it

46-411: A cup of water just in time to see two men cutting Conaire's head off. He kills both of them. Conaire's severed head drinks the water and recites a poem praising Mac Cécht. The battle rages for three more days. Mac Cécht is killed, but Conall Cernach escapes. The tale exists in three recensions: Recension I is the earliest version of the saga, which briefly summarises the main events of the narrative. It

69-460: A group of warriors chase a large and burly man , whom they consider a troll , and his young son, who already bears cheek and chin whiskers, to the edge of a steep seaside cliff . The father directs his young son, Grendel , to hide from the attackers' view; whereupon The Danes shoot the father dead, and his dead body plunges onto the beach far below. The Danish king sees the young Grendel, but spares him. Later, Grendel finds his father's body and cuts

92-507: A trophy. In revealing more about Grendel, Selma recounts that Grendel had once clumsily raped her and has protected her since that day; and Beowulf becomes her paramour . The Geats and Danes proceed to nail Grendel's arm to the rafters of the hall as a trophy. At night, the Danes are later attacked by Grendel's mother , the Sea Hag, who kills some men and reclaims her son's arm. Beowulf and

115-498: A version of Tochmarc Étaine and further dindsenchas lore. The translation by J. Gantz, in Early Irish Myths and Sagas (1986) has an introduction that discusses its probable relationship to a king's ritual death, more fully explored by John Grigsby, Beowulf and Grendel 2005:150-52. A related tale is De Sil Chonairi Móir . It has been argued that Geoffrey Chaucer 's The House of Fame borrows features from

138-562: Is alternatively known as Orgain Bruidne Uí Dergae ( The Massacre of Ua Derga's Hostel ), the title given in Lebor na hUidre , to keep it distinct from the later recensions. Recension II, a composite text, is the most famous version of the tale. On the basis of a number of contradictions, inconsistencies and duplicates in the tale, scholars such as Heinrich Zimmer, Max Nettlau and Rudolf Thurneysen suggested, each in his own way, that

161-575: Is non-Christian in essence, and no Christian interpretations are laid upon the marvels that it relates. In its repetitions and verbal formulas the poem retains the qualities of oral transmission. The tone of the work has been compared with Greek tragedy . After Conaire Mór has already broken several of his taboos, he travels south along the coast of Ireland. He is advised to stay the night at Da Derga's Hostel, but as he approaches it, he sees three men dressed in red and riding red horses arriving before him. He realises that three red men have preceded him into

184-578: Is part of the Book of Dun Cow . It recounts the birth, life, and death of Conaire Mór son of Eterscél Mór , a legendary High King of Ireland , who is killed at Da Derga's hostel by his enemies when he breaks his geasa . It is considered one of the finest Irish sagas of the early period, comparable to the better-known Táin Bó Cúailnge . The theme of gathering doom, as the king is forced through circumstances to break one after another of his taboos,

207-466: Is welcomed by Hrothgar, but the king's village has fallen into a deep despair and many of the pagan villagers convert to Christianity at the urging of an Irish monk . While Grendel does raid Hrothgar's village during the night, he flees rather than fight. Selma the witch tells Beowulf that Grendel will not fight him because Beowulf has committed no wrong against him. A villager, recently baptized and thus now unafraid of death, leads Beowulf and his men to

230-684: The Togail Bruidne Da Derga . A version of the saga appears in the second half of Sons of the Swordmaker, a 1938 novel by Irish author Maurice Walsh . 23 N 10 Dublin, Royal Irish Academy, MS 23 N 10 , formerly Betham 145 , is a Gaelic – Irish medieval manuscript . MS 23 N 10 is a late sixteenth-century Irish manuscript currently housed in the Library of the Royal Irish Academy , Dublin. It

253-519: The Danes destroy him. On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes , Beowulf and Grendel holds an approval rating of 47%, based on 34 reviews, and an average rating of 5.42/10. Its consensus reads, "Despite the impressive Icelandic scenery, Beowulf And Grendel fails to find its footing in the transition from epic tale to the big screen." On Metacritic , the film has a weighted average score of 53 out of 100, based on 16 critics, indicating "mixed or average reviews". Todd McCarthy of Variety stated that

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276-674: The Geats return to Grendel's cave a third time to investigate. They find an underwater passage hidden in a pond within the cave. Beowulf dives through this passage and find Grendel's body in the cave on the other end. When examining the body, he is suddenly attacked by the Sea Hag and slays her with a sword from among her treasure. He then notices that the battle had been observed by the child of Grendel and Selma. Later Beowulf, with Grendel's son watching, buries Grendel with ceremony. Shortly thereafter, Beowulf and his band of Geats leave Denmark by ship, having warned Selma that she must hide her son, lest

299-460: The cliff above Grendel's cave. However, the Geats do not enter, having no rope to climb down the cliff. When the villager is found dead, Beowulf and his men return with a rope and gain entry to Grendel's secret cave, where one of Beowulf's men mutilates the mummified head of Grendel's father. That night, Grendel invades Hrothgar's great hall, kills the Geat who desecrated his father's head, and leaps from

322-449: The film was "too genteel" in spite of its impressive cinematography and believability. Mick LaSalle from The San Francisco Chronicle felt that, by attempting to make the classic legend a morality tale, it lessened the film's impact, also criticizing Polley as being miscast. The New York Times ' s Manohla Dargis gave the film two out of four stars, commenting that, while it featured excellent cinematography and production values,

345-418: The film was undone by its reinterperatation of Grendel and removal of all the mystical elements of the original story. Nick Schager of Slant Magazine offered similar criticism, stating that the film "fail[ed] to generate a requisite degree of mythic grandeur" which greatly diminished the scope and power of the original epic. Schager also criticized the film's added vulgarity, and Polley's casting. The film

368-477: The fire is put out. Conaire, protected by his champion Mac Cécht and the Ulster hero Conall Cernach , kills six hundred before he reaches his weapons, and a further six hundred with his weapons. He asks for a drink as he is cursed with a magical thirst, but all the water has been used to put out the fires. Mac Cécht travels across Ireland with Conaire's cup, but none of the rivers will give him water. He returns with

391-607: The head off to take it home. Many years later, the severed (and mummified) head is inside a cave, apparently the centerpiece of a primitive memorial. The boy Grendel has now become as large and powerful as his father, and contemplating the head, he plans revenge . When Hrothgar finds twenty of his warriors killed inside his great hall, the Danish king falls into a depression. Beowulf , with the permission of Hygelac , king of Geatland , sails to Denmark with thirteen Geats to slay Grendel for Hrothgar. The arrival of Beowulf and his warriors

414-492: The house of a red man (as Dá Derga means "Red God"), and another of his geasa has been broken. His three foster-brothers, the three sons of Dond Désa, whom Conaire had exiled to Alba ( Britain ) for their crimes, had made alliance with the king of the Britons, Ingcél Cáech, and they were marauding across Ireland with a large band of followers. They attack Da Derga's Hostel. Three times they attempt to burn it down, and three times

437-493: The original poem: four new characters (Grendel's father, the witch Selma, Father Brendan, and Grendel's son) are introduced, and several related plot points were developed specifically for the film. The story takes place in the early half of the 6th century CE in what is now Denmark , but the filming of the movie in Iceland provided many panoramic views of that country's landscape. In 500 CE, Hrothgar , king of Denmark , and

460-407: The recension represents a conflation of two, possibly three, variant sources. However, Máire West has pointed out the weaknesses inherent to their approach and instead favours the more flexible view that the author drew from a greater variety of written and oral sources. The youngest and longest version is represented by Recension III, to which further materials have been added, including a king-list,

483-410: The second story, but is caught in a trap by Beowulf. Grendel, refusing capture, escapes by severing his captive arm. He flees to the beach and collapses into the water, where his body is claimed by a mysterious webbed hand. Thereafter Hrothgar admits to Beowulf that he had killed Grendel's father for stealing a fish but had spared the child Grendel out of pity. Grendel's severed arm is kept by the Danes as

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506-515: Was a cooperative effort among Eurasia Motion Pictures (Canada), Spice Factory (UK), and Bjolfskvida (Iceland), and it was filmed in Iceland . In 2006, a documentary of the difficult making of Beowulf and Grendel , called Wrath of Gods , was released and went on to win six film awards in Europe and the U.S. While some of the film remains true to the original poem, other plot elements deviate from

529-449: Was formerly in the possession of Sir William Betham (1779–1853). The manuscript is highly valuable for its compilation of medieval Irish literature, copied in 1575 at Ballycumin, County Roscommon . The responsible scribes were Aodh, Dubhthach, and Torna, three scholars of the Ó Maolconaire (anglicised: O'Mulconry), a learned family also known for compiling Egerton 1782 ( British Library ) in 1517. Beowulf and Grendel The film

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