• Nessuna parola chiave trovata

The idea that loyalty is the central pillar of Germanic heroic society has so often been put forward by generations of well-known scholars that it is considered a truism. Aside from few statements tracing the origin of the principle back to Tacitus’s time, definitions from this concept and its implications are taken for granted a rarely made explicit.
Nevertheless it has always been held that the value of Germanic heroic society are reflected, unchanged since Tacitus time, in the whole body of Old English poetry in spite of the admixture of Christian elements. It has been illustrated how Anglo Saxon poets use Christian elements in their poems. Pre-Christian elements or Germanic concepts are shaped differently in the various poems so that their original meaning is destroyed and major connotations shift to fit in with Christian teaching.
Still the opinion that the heroic code of conduct with its pre-Christian values based on the concept of loyalty has survived unchanged since Tacitus time in what it is commonly called Anglo-Saxon secular heroic poetry has hardly been contested. Although the presence of Christian elements has been recognised, scholar have persistently emphasised the Germanic elements of this body of literature, treating it also as a homogeneous entity of writing. Here again the various way in which Old English poets have handled the Germanic heroic concept of loyalty in an essentially Christian background have failed to be shown.
This discussion will go through an introduction to the concept of loyalty, its nature, and its development from the sources, its use in literature, and the criticism that has been going on around this theme.