Old English was the language spoken by the Anglo-Saxon people who inhabited Britain before the Norman conquest of 1066. They loved to ask each other riddles. Can you choose the answer to these ones, translated into modern English from the Exeter Book?
Four dilly-dandies, Four stick standies, Two crookers, Two lookers, And a wig wag.
When I am alive I do not speak. Anyone who wants to takes me captive and cuts off my head. They bite my bare body. I do no harm to anyone unless they cut me first. Then I soon make them cry.
My home is not quiet but I am not loud. The lord has meant us to journey together. I am faster than he and sometimes stronger, but he keeps on going for longer. Sometimes I rest but he runs on. For as long as I am alive I live in him. If we part from one another, it is I who will die.
I am all on my own, wounded by iron weapons and scarred by swords. I often see battle. I am tired of fighting. I do not expect to be allowed to retire from warfare before I am completely done for. At the wall of the city, I am knocked about and bitten again and again. Hard edged things made by the blacksmith's hammer attack me. Always I wait for something worse. I have never been able to find a doctor who could make me better or give me medicine made from herbs.
I was abandoned by my mother and father. I wasn't yet breathing. A kind woman covered me with clothes, kept me and looked after me, cuddled me as close as if I had been her own child. Under that covering I grew and grew. I was unkind to my adopted brothers and sisters.
I stood straight where...and my brother. We were both hardened. Our shelter was worthier, adorned more highly, as the two of us stood on top. The forest always protected us, on dark nights, its helm of arboreal branches made a shield against downpours. The Almighty molded us. Now our kinsmen, our younger brothers must come after us, and snatch away our shelter.
This mother is pregnant with virtue, buoyed with wonders, laden with food, bedecked with treasures, beloved by heroes. Her strength is magnified, her might is revealed...she is dear to the prosperous, helpful to the poor, noble, extraordinary; boldest and strongest, most covetous and greediest, she tramples on the foundation of everything grown under the heavens.
I am bulging-breasted, big-throated; I have a head and my tail is elevated, eyes and ears and a single leg, a spine and stiff beak, a stretched-out neck and two sides, with a stake up the middle, my place set high above the people. I put up with the strain when that which shakes the wood strikes me, and streaming rain sluices over me standing, harsh hail and rime hood me. Frost grips, and snow falls on my hollow stomach
I am a prince’s shoulder-companion, a warrior’s follower, beloved by my lord, a king’s comrade. Sometimes a fair-haired lady lays her hand on me, a nobleman’s daughter, although she is dignified. I have in my bosom what waxed in a wood. Sometimes I ride on a bold steed on the border of a host; my tongue is hard. Often I give a speech-bearer after a song a certain reward for words. My manner is good, and I am dusky of self. Say what I am called.
Wonder-wrought waves: water become bone!
I thought it passing strange that an insect can feast on a man's finest song, gorge on his grandiloquence, riddle his most righteous rhetoric. But then I realized: the wee wriggler wandered away not one whit the wiser
I share a common fate with the sea, spinning the months around in alternate cycles. When the glory of my light-flowing form wanes so, too, the sea loses its swollen flood tides.
No one can see me or catch me in their palms. I spread the noisy sound of my voice quickly through the world; I can break to pieces the oak with my loud, crashing strength, As I beat against the high poles of the sky and traverse the fields.
Formed in a marvelous way, born without seed I loan my sweet breast with treasure from flowers; By my art the golden platters of kings grow yellow; Always I bear the small, sharp spears of cruel war And though I lack hands, my spear stings more cruelly than weapons forged by smiths.
I am a faithful vigilant guardian, always watching the house; In the deep night, I walk through the unseeing shadows, For I do not lose the sight of my eyes, even in black caverns. Against the hateful thieves who ravage the stores of grain, I ambush, I silently set a snare of death. A roaming huntress, I invade the lairs of wild beasts, But I do not wish to chase fleeing herds alongside dogs who bark and bring cruel war against me.
Open-palmed hands formed me out of two substances. My inner core glows white, made of flax. Or else shines bright, plundered from a slender rush. But when my outward body bursts into yellow flower, it pours forth, spewing flames, heat and fire, as moist tears drop in profusion from my brows. Yet, in this way, I destroy the horrid shadows of night And soon my burned heart leaves behind only ashes.
Their dark bodies, dun coated, when the breeze bears them up over the backs of the hills are black, diminutive. Bold singers, they go in companies, call out loudly; they tread the timbered cliff, and at times the eaves of men's houses.
Swing from his thigh, a thing most magical!...Leveling the head of this hanging instrument, his wielder hoist his hem above the knee: it is his will to fill the well-known hole that it fits fully when at full reach.
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