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The Indo-European Hero is a complex figure, a combination of the best and worst parts of human nature. Heroes often represent the noblest qualities of their cultures, but also possess violent instincts that make them dangerous even to their own people. In The Medieval Hero, Dr Connell Monette surveys a wide range of heroic tales from Celtic, Persian, and Anglo-Saxon tradition to decode the hidden truths about Heroes: their origins, their strengths and weaknesses, the source of their powers, and the Heroic Code. Monette demonstrates an impressive command of historical languages, and gives the reader both original passages and English translations of texts in Classical Persian, Old Irish, Old English, and Classical Greek. This book will enable the reader to better understand the Hero in ancient and medieval epics, and to correctly identify the dominant themes in modern adaptations of the heroic genre.
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THE MEDIEVAL HERO A Comparative Study in Indo-European Tradition 3rd Edition
CONNELL MONETTE
SIRIUS ACADEMIC PRESS 28203 SW 110th Ave Wilsonville, Oregon 97070 USA siriusacademic.com © Copyright by Connell Monette (2013) This book is a revised and corrected edition of an earlier version published in 2011 with Runa-Raven, and originally published in 2008 with Verlag Dr Müller as The Medieval Hero: Christian and Muslim Traditions, itself based on the author’s doctoral dissertation at the Centre for Medieval Studies at University of Toronto. First edition: 2008. Second edition: 2011. ISBN: 978-0-9847767-4-0 Cover design by Connell Monette and Waldo Thompson Images of the Sassanid plate (front cover) and Sassanid shield boss (back cover) are copyright of Wikimedia Commons
All rights reserved. No part of this work may be copied or reproduced in any way without the expression written permission of the author(s) and the publisher.
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FOREWORD Á te, pitar Marutām, sumnám etu / má nah súryasya samdŕśo yuyothāh. Abhí no vīró árvati kşameta / prá jāyemahi, Rudara, prajábhih. ‘Be kind, O Father of Maruts, do not cut us off from the sunlight. Oh Rudra, may the Hero not harm [us], may our children be many.’
– The Rigveda, 14th century BCE. The epic hero of the ancient and medieval world is a problematic character: he simultaneously embodies the bright dream of a protective and courageous aristocrat, and the brutal fact of a violent man with a talent for killing. This dichotomy is often found in the characters of Indo-European heroes, who are at once both responsible for the protection of their society/state and its stability, yet by virtue of their capacity for violence, are bound to exist on the margins of society – they are never fully accepted as trusted members of their community. The hero has several complex functions within epic literature: he serves as a mediator between the mundane and supernatural worlds; he serves to protect his society, but is sometimes the bringer of social chaos; he supports the monarch, yet often this relationship is fraught with tension. Curiously, the biographies of the medieval Irish and Persian heroes Cúchulainn and Rostam demonstrate a number of analogous episodes. This study examines these heroes’ genesis episodes, boyhood deeds, filicide episodes, heroic duels, Otherworld raids, and death tales; in addition, it finds significant thematic parallels between Old English Beowulf and the Persian Haftkhān-i-Rostam from the epic Shahnameh. These analogous episodes are used as a framework to see how Irish, Persian, and Old English literature deal with such concepts as loyalty, honor, fame, uncontrolled rage, the Otherworld – and the above all – the heroic code. This study then considers the potential modes of narrative transmission (oral and literary) that would explain the occurrence of these analogues, and questions whether the analogues are evidence