This extract is taken from the epic poem Beowulf, which dates between 700 and 1000 CE.

Its origins are mysterious, and it is thought it has been composed by a Christian author using Old English, a mixture of German dialects.

Moreover this extract is made of three sequences: the first sequence has the function of narrating Grendel's attack, in the second sequence Beowulf's warriors' attempt to defend their lord is described and the last sequence narrates Beowulf's victory and Grendel's return to his desolate lair.

Therefore the text is about the fight between Grendel and Beowulf and Beowulf's final success.

Grendel is characterized as “the captain of evil”, moreover the author underlines his greed by the expressions “bolted down his blood” and “gorged him in lumps”, and by the alliterative use of harsh sounds like “r” and “w”.

Beowulf is characterized with a positive connotation: the author highlights his courage (he fought against a monster), his power and his reputation (using the expression “Beowulf's warriors worked to defend their lord's life) and also hi uniqueness (using the expression “harder than anything he had ever encountered in any man on the face of earth”).

The language used in the extract has an elevated style but is simple to understand, because the poem was in an oral form and so people had to remember it easily.

At line 738 there is an inversion that recalls Old English, the real language of the poem.

For the listener of its time it was very simple to understand, but for the contemporary reader a translate of the text in contemporary English was needed and so it lost its syntactical structure.