Queer Torture in the Middle Ages and Beowulf

Although we can credit the Middle Ages with creating the roots of many positive staples of modern life still around today such as the romance novel, legal studies, and the numerical system, some of societies more harmful roles and expectations also originated during the Medieval Period. Specifically, the gender roles and heteronormative presumptions that still dictate the lives of many people in our modern age were originally formed during this time. While I previously wrote about the ways in which some queer themes were accepted during the Middle Ages it would be a disservice to ignore all the violent and oppressive ways that queer people were treated during this same time. Between the inescapable influence of Catholicism, the growing focus of masculinity for men, and an overwhelming distrust for anything “other”, the rejection of queer themes is an undeniable aspect of the Middle Ages. Within the poem Beowulf we witness an example of a queer coded character tortured at the hands of a hero for the majority, a common fate for queer people in the Middle Ages.

When considering that the word “queer” is not a fixed term, but rather a word that depends on the social context of what is expected and considered normal at the time it is used, the monstrous character of Grendel in Beowulf can be considered a queer character portrayed in an extremely negative way. Grendel is a character clearly othered from the rest of the male characters in the poem, “A fierce evil demon suffered distress, long in torment, who dwelt in darkness. For day after day, he heard rejoicing loud in the hall: there was music of the harp, and the clear song of the scop, who sang of creation, the beginnings of men far back in time”. While in this quote Grendel is seen listening to the other characters sing together, as a part of a community, he is separated from the majority and alone. This separation from the majority invokes the image of many queer people, removed from society and forced to listen in from the outskirts. “Grendel is decidedly not like the men of Heorot—he is the loathsome, dangerous queer” (Zeikowitz). Considering that Grendel is the obvious enemy and villain of the poem, this places queerness as a theme as something to reject, fear, and destroy. The men that behave the way they are culturally expected to are seen as good and heroic, the character that doesn’t fit in is banished and killed.

Grendel’s coding as a queer character is even more concerning when considering the torture he goes through at the hand of the poem’s hero. His torture is described in poem with the line “the dreaded demon suffered terrible torture, as his shoulder tore open, a great wound gaping as sinews sprang apart, and the bone-locks burst”. Torture was an important aspect of the legal system during Medieval times and had a large cultural impact as it was often “authorized by the Catholic church and regularly used to uncover heresy by the Inquisition” (Tracy). Considering that homosexuality was considered going against the Church and therefore a punishable offense, the torture of queer people was more than common. “Misogyny and homophobia dominated the history of torture from the middle ages,” writes Gavin Yamey. There were torture devices designed specifically to punish women condemned for “adultery, pregnancy out of wedlock, self induced abortion, and sexual union with Satan” (Yamey) and other gruesome tools created specifically to humiliate gay men while they were being punished publicly. The torture that Grendel receives might be well deserved considering the murders he is responsible for throughout the plot of Beowulf, however when considering the relationship between homophobia and torture during the time the poem was written, this torture can be viewed in a very unsavory light.

Works Cited

Tracy, Larissa. Torture and Brutality in Medieval Literature: Negotiations of National Identity. D.S. Brewer, 2015.

Yamey, G. “Exhibition: Torture: European Instruments of Torture and Capital Punishment from the Middle Ages to the Present.” Bmj, vol. 323, no. 7308, 2001, pp. 346–346., doi:10.1136/bmj.323.7308.346.

Zeikowitz, Richard E. “Befriending the Medieval Queer: A Pedagogy for Literature Classes.” College English, vol. 65, no. 1, 2002, p. 67., doi:10.2307/3250731.