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A paper which considers the differences between the lifestyles and human societies described in Beowulf and Chaucer's Canterbury Tales, with particular reference to the importance of community structure in the former and the greater social diversity in the latter. Bibliography lists 2 sources
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4 pages (~225 words per page)
File: JL5_JLbeo.rtf
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took place in the period between which the two texts were written. In Beowulf, for example, the culture is that of the Anglo-Saxons, with small communities organised along cooperative lines:
there was both settled agriculture and a warrior ethos, with a hierarchical social structure relying heavily on a code of family honour and hospitality.
As Lacey and Danziger (2003) point out, there were times of severe privation and times of feasting, and the latter combined the
necessities of nutrition with the social and seasonal festivals which were at the heart of the culture. Lacey and Danziger also note that for members of the church hierarchy, committed
as they were to the ascetic life, it was a sign of their community involvement to provide hospitality and lavish amounts of food for others. It is clear from the
epic poems such as Beowulf that the hall, and the feast, were essential and central parts of social culture, since they not only gathered the community together and therefore reinforced
social solidarity and commitment but also gave the poorer people seasonal festivals to look forward to: something which was vital for those living what was basically a harsh and unrewarding
rural lifestyle. Lacey and Danziger comment that the popular image of the medieval hall, with its rush-covered floor and central fire, has in fact been proved to be comparatively accurate
according to archaeological finds which, as they note, even confirm the existence of blow fly maggot germinating among the refuse on the floor (Lacey and Danziger, 2003, PG).
By the year 1000 there was a much stronger emphasis on the
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