Pagan/pagan elements in BeowulfIn Beowulf the pagan element, which coexists alongside the Christian one, sometimes in an apparently contradictory way, is multifaceted. Certainly the pagan element seems to be too deeply woven into the text of Beowulf for us to suppose that it is due to additions made by the scribes. While the poet's reflections and the characters' statements are mostly Christian, the customs and ceremonies, on the other hand, are almost entirely pagan/pagan. This fact seems to indicate a pagan work that was subjected to revision by Christian minstrels. “The poet's heroic age is full of 'emphatically pagan and exceptionally good' men, men who believe in a God whom they thank on every conceivable occasion. Yet they perform all the pagan rites known to Tacitua, and are not Christians” (Frank 52). One of the most important pagan practices in Beowulf is the funeral rite of cremation. In the narrative following Grendel's conquest, a beggar sings the episode of Finnsburh, the story of a Danish peacemaker who lost her husband, brother, and son in the feud. Once the tribes agreed to peace: Then Hildeburh ordered her own dead son to be placed on the pyre beside her uncle Hnaef, their boxes of bones burned and buried in the fire. Beside them both the noblewoman cried, she cried with songs. The warrior stood up; the mighty deadly fire rushed towards the sky, thundered before the mound. Their heads melted, their gashes opened, blood poured out of their body parts... among the newspapers, edited by Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1987.Ward & Trent, et al. The Cambridge history of English and American literature. New York: Sons of G. P. Putnam, 1907–21; New York: Bartleby.com, 2000The poet “mentions pagan error, briefly and in passing (175-88), before describing noble pagan monotheists for about 3,000 lines” (Frank 58).SECONDARY BIBLIOGRAPHYFrank, Roberta. "The Poet Beowulf's Sense of History." In Beowulf – Modern Critical Interpretations, edited by Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1987. Robinson, Fred C.. “Appositive Word Meanings and Religious Perspectives.” In Modern Critical Interpretations: Beowulf, edited by Harold Bloom. New York: Chelsea House Publishers, 1987.