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Godwulf or Guðúlfr is a figure from Germanic mythology. In the two surviving sources mentioning the figure he is associated with divine genealogies.

Historia BritonumIn the 9th century Historia Brittonum Godwulf is mentioned as an ancestor of Horsa and Hengest:

"In the meantime, three vessels, exiled from Germany, arrived in Britain. They were commanded by Horsa and Hengist, brothers, and sons of Wihtgils. Wihtgils was the son of Witta; Witta of Wecta; Wecta of Woden; Woden of Frithowald; Frithowald of Frithuwulf; Frithuwulf of Finn; Finn of Godwulf; Godwulf of Geat, who, as they say, was the son of a god, There is some question regarding the ancestor of Godwulf, listed as "Geat" in Historia Brittonum. Regarding these questions, English scholar Hector Munro Chadwick comments:

"The genealogies do not end with Woden but go back to a point five generations earlier, the full list of names in the earlier genealogies being Frealaf—Frithuwulf—Finn—Godwulf—Geat. Of the first four of these persons nothing is known. Asser says that Geat was worshipped as a god by the heathen, but this statement is possibly due to a passage in Sedulius' Carmen Paschale which he has misunderstood and incorporated in his text. It has been thought by many modern writers that the name is identical with Gapt which stands at the head of the Gothic genealogy in Jordanes, cap. 14; but the identification is attended with a good deal of difficulty."[1]

Prose EddaIn the Icelandic Prose Edda, a 13th century work by Snorri Sturluson, chapter 3 of the Prologue contains his Euhmerized account of Norse mythology. In this section, Snorri gives a genealogy stating that Guðúlfr is one of the descendants of Thor and Sif. The genealogy also states that Guðúlfr is an ancestor of Odin.

Legendary King of the Goths.

Legendary King of the Goths.

Beowa, Beaw, Beow, Beo or Bedwig is a figure in Anglo-Saxon paganism associated with barley and agriculture. The figure is attested in the Anglo-Saxon royal genealogies as they were extended in the age of Alfred, where Beowa is inserted as the son of Scyld and the grandson of Sceafa, in lineages carried back to Adam.[1] Connections have been proposed between the figure of Beowa and the hero Beowulf of the poem of the same name and English folk song figure John Barleycorn.

Mythical rulersAccording to Anglo-Saxon legends recounted in Widsith and other sources such as Æthelweard (Chronicon), their earliest named ancestor was a culture-hero named Sceaf, who was washed ashore as a child in an empty boat, bearing a sheaf of corn. This is said to have occurred on an island named Scani or Scandza (Scania), and according to William of Malmesbury (Gesta regum Anglorum) he was later chosen as King of the Angles, reigning from Schleswig. His descendants became known as Scefings, or more usually Scyldings (after Sceldwea, see list below). Counting up the generations appears to place Sceaf around 100 BC, at the time that Schleswig-Holstein had recently become depopulated following the migrations of the Teutons, with the boat motif recalling the events of the Cimbrian Flood, although the legendary nature of the pedigree makes such chronological extrapolations dubious (some early writers apparently confused the Cimbrian Flood with the Great Flood, making Sceaf a son of Noah). An alternative scenario places the appearance of Sceaf, and the Cimbrian Flood itself, in 307–306 BC. Prior to this the Angles had inhabited both Schleswig-Holstein and the entire Jutland peninsula, whereas the Jutes had lived further to the east along the Baltic coast. In the disruption following the flood the Jutes migrated to Jutland, naming it after themselves and confining the Angles to Schleswig-Holstein alone. On this chronology King Teotobod is identified with Heremod, father of Sceldwea, who is said to have allied himself with the Jutes (Cimbri), and was later murdered.[5] The following list gives the supposed succession from father to son. Most of these rulers are also mentioned by Snorri Sturluson (Prose Edda) in their Norse forms, and he also gives seven names preceding Sceaf, beginning with the god Thor, that are not found in Anglo-Saxon genealogies.

Sceafa (Old English: sceafa), also spelled Sceaf (sceaf) or Scef (scef), was an ancient Lombardic king in English legend. According to his story, Sceafa appeared mysteriously as a child, coming out of the sea in an empty boat. The name also appears in the corrupt forms Seskef, Stefius, Strephius, and Stresaeus. Though the name has historically been modernized Shava (and Latinized Scefius), J. R. R. Tolkien used the modern spelling Sheave.

The Old English poem Widsith, line 32, in a listing of famous kings and their countries, has Sceafa Longbeardum, so naming Sceafa as ruler of the Lombards. In Origo Gentis Langobardorum the Lombards' origins are traced to an "island" in the north named Scadan or Scandan ("Scandinavia"). But neither this account or any other mentions Sceafa among their later kings or gives the names of any kings that ruled them in the land of their origin where they were said to have been known as the Winnili.

[edit] In genealogiesOther than this, Sceaf is mentioned only in chronicles tracing the lineage of the English kings, although variants are found in similar genealogies for the rulers of the Danes, Norwegians and Icelanders in the sagas. Most such genealogies stop at the god Woden, but some trace the supposed ancestors of Woden up to a certain Geat. The account in the Historia Britonum calls Geat a son of a god. Asser in his Life of Alfred writes instead that the pagans worshipped Geat himself for a long time as a god.

Moderns speculate on whether this Geat is any eponym of the people known as Geats, or whether it may be the name of a god, or whether it is both. The apparent Old Norse cognate form Gautr is a very common byname for Odin. The Icelandic Herrauðssaga speaks of King Hring who ruled East Götaland and was son of Gauti son of Odin. Jordanes in his The origin and deeds of the Goths traces the line of the Amelungs up to Hulmul son of Gapt, purportedly the first Gothic hero of record. This Gapt is felt by many commentators to be an error for Gaut.

A few of these genealogies provide mortal ancestors to Geat, tracing his ancestry to Sceaf and then tell of Sceaf's origin. Æthelweard in his Chronica writes of Sceaf:

This Scef came in a light boat to an island of the ocean which is called Scani, arms around about him, and he was a very young boy, unknown to the dwellers in the land. But he was accepted by them and cared for like one of their own kind, and afterwards they chose him as king, from whose family descended King Æthelwulf.

William of Malmesbury in his Gesta regum anglorum wrote:

.. Sceaf; who, as some affirm, was driven on a certain island in Germany, called Scandza, (of which Jornandes, the historian of the Goths, speaks), a little boy in a skiff, without any attendant, asleep, with a handful of corn at his head, whence he was called Sceaf; and, on account of his singular appearance, being well received by the men of that country, and carefully educated, in his riper age he reigned in a town which was called Slaswic, but at present Haithebi; which country, called old Anglia, whence the Angles came into Britain, is situated between the Saxons and the Goths.

However the genealogy in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle year 855, versions B and C, explains instead that Scef was born in Noah's ark, interpreting Sceaf as a non-Biblical son of Noah, and then continuing with the ancestry of Noah up to Adam as found in Genesis.

Sceaf is unknown outside of English sources except for one mention in the Prologue to Snorri Sturluson's Edda which, as seen below, is part of material obviously taken from English sources. However it is possible that the legendary royal family or people of the Skylfings mentioned in Norse texts may be connected or confused with traditions about Sceaf.

[edit] Scyld Scefing[edit] In BeowulfOlder than these is the Old English poem Beowulf which applies the story of the boy in the boat instead to the Danish who is the eponym of the legendary Danish royal lineage known as the Scyldings or Skjöldings. In the opening lines of Beowulf, Scyld is called Scyld Scefing, which might mean Scyld descendant of Scef, Scyld son of Scef, or Scyld of the Sheaf. The Beowulf poet does not explain. But after relating in general terms the glories of Scyld's reign, the poet describes Scyld's funeral, how his body was laid in a ship surrounded by treasures, the poet explains:

They decked his body no less bountifully
with offerings than those first ones did
who cast him away when he was a child
and launched him alone out over the waves.

No other source relates anything similar about Scyld/Skjöld, so it cannot be known whether this is a case of similar stories being told about two different heroes or whether originally separate figures have been confused with one another.

[edit] A rite involving scyld and sceafA connection between sheaf and shield appears in the 13th century Chronicon de Abingdon which relates a dispute over ownership of a river meadow named Beri between the Abbot of Abingdon and the men of Oxfordshire. The dispute was decided by a ritual in which the monks placed a sheaf (sceaf) of wheat on a round shield (scyld) and a wax candle upon the sheaf which they lit. They then floated the shield with sheaf and candle on the Thames river to see where it would go. The shield purportedly kept to the middle of the Thames until it arrived at the disputed field, which was then an island because of flooding, whereupon it changed its course and entirely circled the meadow between the Thames and the Iffley.