Hovamol

Okay, I am not into poetry. Although this poem wasn't too flowery, I am just not a big fan of poetry so this wasn't a fun reading for me. However, I did notice a few things of interest:

1) The contradiction between the welcoming atmosphere and immidiate care and "welcoming speech" given to a stranger who wanders into a gathering in the darkness of night seen here,

"Fire he needs who with frozen knees
Has come from the cold without;
Food and clothes must the farer have,
The man from the mountains come.

Water and towels and welcoming speech
Should he find who comes, to the feast;
If renown he would get, and again be greeted,
Wisely and well must he act."

and the warning and implicit need for protection from dangerous strangers or strange situations in the verse,

"For never he knows When the need for a spear
Shall arise on the distant road."

Why is it that this culture focuses SO much on accepting and meeting strangers (such as traveling strangers to a new kingdom, etc) with such openness and trust? It just seems so weird when paired with the attitude of vengence and manslaughter also embedded within the society's guidelines. Especially in comparision to this day and age where a stranger would more probably be met with a slammed door in the face or a threat to bodily harm instead of immediate acceptance if they appeared in the middle of the night at one of your family gatherings.

2) The appearance of several of the Christian "Seven Deadly Sins" throughout the poem. The first appears in #20 & #21, where the reference to both Guilt and Gluttoney is made with the verses,
" The greedy man, if his mind be vague,
Will eat till sick he is;The vulgar man, when among the wise,
To scorn by his belly is brought.

The herds know well when home they shall fare,
And then from the grass they go;
But the foolish man his belly's measure
Shall never know aright."

Then later, Pride,

"his pride will wax, but his wisdom never,
Straight forward he fares in conceit"

Then towards the end, Lust,

"Seek never to win the wife of another,
Or long for her secret love"

This last stanza also seemed to be an alternate translation to the Christian commandment "thou shall not covet thy neighbor's wife."

It was intriuging to me to see such ancient interpretations of modern Christian belief, and although they seemed to put a much much stronger focus on Wisdom (stanzas #8-11, 22-27, 54-5 just to name a few), there are so many parallels between the relgious standards of the two time periods I can almost invision living back then.