Editing Grendel (section)

==Story==
{{further|Beowulf#Summary}}
[[File:Beowulf - mearc stapa.jpg|thumb|250px|Beowulf's author often uses various substitute phrases for Grendel's name like ''mearc stapa'' ("mark-stepper"), an inhabitant of the borderland.]]

Grendel is a figure in the poem ''Beowulf'', preserved in the ''[[Nowell Codex]]''.{{sfn|Heaney|2012}} Grendel, being cursed as the descendant of the [[Bible|Biblical]] [[Cain]], along with [[elves]] and other [[eoten]]s, is "harrowed" by the sounds of singing that come every night from the [[mead hall]] of [[Heorot]] built by [[King Hroðgar]]. Unable to bear it any more, he attacks Heorot. Grendel continues to attack the Hall every night for twelve years, killing its inhabitants and making the mead hall unusable. The poet also details how Grendel consumes the men he kills, "now that he could hope to eat his fill."{{sfn|Jones|1972|p=12}}

Beowulf hears of these attacks and leaves his native land of the [[Geats]] to destroy Grendel. He is warmly welcomed by King Hroðgar, who gives a banquet in celebration. Afterwards, Beowulf and his warriors bed down in the mead hall to await the inevitable attack. Grendel stalks outside the building for a time, spying the warriors inside. He then makes a sudden attack, bursting through the door with his fists. The first warrior Grendel finds is still asleep, so he seizes the man and devours him. Grendel grabs a second warrior, but is shocked when the warrior grabs back with fearsome strength. As Grendel attempts to disengage, the reader discovers that Beowulf is that second warrior. Beowulf uses neither weapon nor armour in this fight. He also places no reliance on his companions and has no need of them. He trusts that God has given him strength to defeat Grendel, whom he believes is God's adversary.{{sfn|Nicholson|1963|p=236}} Beowulf tears off Grendel's arm, mortally wounding the creature. Grendel flees but dies in his marsh den. There, Beowulf later engages in a fierce battle with [[Grendel's mother]] in a mere, over whom he triumphs with a sword found there. Following her death, Beowulf finds Grendel's corpse and removes his head, which he keeps as a trophy. Beowulf then returns to the surface and to his men at the "ninth hour".{{sfn|George|1997|p=123}} He returns to Heorot, where a grateful Hroðgar showers him with gifts.{{sfn|Beowulf (OE)|loc=Stanzas 1651-1793}}

===Narrative role===
[[J. R. R. Tolkien]] (1936) argues for the importance of Grendel's role in the poem as an "eminently suitable beginning" that sets the stage for Beowulf's fight with the dragon: "Triumph over the lesser and more nearly human is cancelled by defeat before the older and more elemental." Tolkien argues that "the evil spirits took visible shape" in the characters of Grendel and the dragon; however, the author's concern is focused on Beowulf.{{sfn|Tolkien|1936|p=128}} Tolkien's essay was the first work of scholarship in which [[Anglo-Saxon literature]] was seriously examined on its literary merits – not just for scholarship about the origins of the English language, or what historical information could be gleaned from the text, as was common in the 19th century.{{sfn|Tolkien|2014}}