As Socrates said, “He is a man of courage who does not run away, but remains at his post and fights against the enemy.” Beowulf showcases great courage throughout this epic poem that is crucial to his success and earns him his fame and pride. He does these courageous acts with loyalty to his people and king. Lastly, Beowulf has a sense of pride in having a perfect reputation, and some call this cockiness but in order to be great one must have a certain amount of cockiness.
Beowulf not only has the brutality of a great hero he also possesses the commendable trait of loyalty. He is loyal to his vilage because he promises them that he will give everything he has to protect the village from the dragon. In line 2890 Beowulf says, “A warrior will sooner/die than live a life of shame” this shows that he would rather die being loyal than live a life of shame because he didn’t stick to his word. Although he was of old age he bravely sets out to battle the dragon alone because no one would accompany him and he stayed true to his word and fight the dragon for the goodness of his village. He in fact gives his ALL to keep his word, he ends up losing his life but as he promised he slays the dragon and keeps his word showing his loyalty till his last breath.
Beowulf’s sense of pride and cockiness is shown when he refuses to go against his word and doesn’t accept failure and doesn’t back down because he wants to keep his prestigious reputation. He wanted to leave a legacy that would have generations talking about him. By never backing down he wanted the world to think he is a great hero. His sense of pride is what got him killed. His ego would not let him say no even at an old age he couldn’t say no and go against his word because that would ruin the perfect perception people had on him. In line 5 Beowulf says, “The truth is this:when the going was heavy in those high waves,I was the strongest swimmer of all.” This shows that even when it isn’t needed Beowulf insists on showing his superiority. In this example he has a swimming contest with Breca which is totally uncalled for and selfish actions like this catch up to him. Essentially his pride in his reputation caused his demise but he knew that eventually he would fall but he wanted to go down fighting, to keep his reputation golden.
Beowulf’s mighty quarrels against several different monsters show his fearless courage to take on whatever challenge is at hand. For example, in line 433 Beowulf says, “I hereby renouncesword and the shelter of the broad shield, the heavy war-board: hand-to-handis how it will be, a life-and-deathfight with the fiend.” He takes on Grendel without any armor because he is confident in his fighting ability and he is fearless even when he is without any armor. He also takes on Grendel’s mother in the depths of a dark lake wit armor weighing him down. To make the situation even more mysterious, at the time lakes were very unknown parts of the world. Beowulf sees this opportunity and demonstrates how fearless he is and makes the terrifying jourmey to the bottom of the lake and slays Grendel’s mother. No matter how unmatched he was, or how intimidating and powerful his enemy was he never backed down. Beowulf’s courage is his most admirable and important trait because he wouldn’t be in the position to be heroic and achieve greatness if he didn’t have the courage to take on the challenges he faced.
Beowulf beautifully incorporated all of these traits throughout his life to create the perfect heroic character. He possessed three main traits: courage, pride and loyalty. Beowulf was loyal to the people who trusted him, fearless in the eyes of all, and confident but not cocky. All of these traits work as a machine, if Beowulf had lacked any of these traits he could become corrupt or weak or hated, but he balanced them appropriately. It was the perfect formula for a great hero.
