Arts & Sciences
Riddle XXIX. Moon and Sun
Translated by R. K. Gordon, Anglo-Saxon Poetry (Everyman’s Library, 1926) · From Exeter Book Riddles (selection)
I saw a wondrous creature, a radiant air-vessel artfully adorned, bringing booty between her horns, spoil homewards from the foray. She wished to build herself a bower in the stronghold, set it up with skill, if so it might be. Then came a wondrous creature over the mountain-top — he is known to all dwellers on earth — snatched the spoil and drove the wanderer to her home against her will. Thence she departed westward on a journey of vengeance; she hastened forth. Dust rose to the heavens; dew fell on the earth; night went hence. No man afterwards knew where the creature journeyed.
This translation is printed as prose in its source edition.
Codex Note
One of roughly ninety riddles preserved in the Exeter Book; this is one of a further selection translated by R. K. Gordon. The manuscript gives no solutions — the title here follows the translator's own guess (numbering follows Tupper's edition, converted to this archive's Wyatt-based numbering).
Cite this poem
MLA
Anonymous (Old English). “Riddle XXIX. Moon and Sun.” Translated by R. K. Gordon, Anglo-Saxon Poetry. Poetry Codex, poetrycodex.com/poem/anonymous-old-english/40/.
Chicago
Anonymous (Old English). “Riddle XXIX. Moon and Sun.” Translated by R. K. Gordon, Anglo-Saxon Poetry. Poetry Codex. https://poetrycodex.com/poem/anonymous-old-english/40/.
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