funeral-ale

Tolkien once described "Beowulf" - and by extension much of Anglo-Saxon, or Old English, poetry - as "a drink dark and bitter: a solemn funeral-ale with the taste of death."

'The Word Exchange' book review: Old English poetry isn't lost in translation Michael Dirda 2011

Tolkien once described "Beowulf" - and by extension much of Anglo-Saxon, or Old English, poetry - as "a drink dark and bitter: a solemn funeral-ale with the taste of death."

'The Word Exchange' book review: Old English poetry isn't lost in translation Michael Dirda 2011

Tolkien once described "Beowulf" - and by extension much of Anglo-Saxon, or Old English, poetry - as "a drink dark and bitter: a solemn funeral-ale with the taste of death."

'The Word Exchange' book review: Old English poetry isn't lost in translation Michael Dirda 2011

Tolkien once described "Beowulf" - and by extension much of Anglo-Saxon, or Old English, poetry - as "a drink dark and bitter: a solemn funeral-ale with the taste of death."

'The Word Exchange' book review: Old English poetry isn't lost in translation Michael Dirda 2011

It was at old "Father Bluetooth's funeral-ale" (drunken burial-feast), that Svein, carousing with his Jomsburg chiefs and other choice spirits, generally of the robber class, all risen into height of highest robber enthusiasm, pledged the vow to one another; Svein that he would conquer

Early Kings of Norway Thomas Carlyle 1838