This is a most remarkable passage, for Wyrd is distinctly called Metod, a word generally appropriated to God; but I am disposed to think that Metten, another word for Fate, was uppermost in the poet’s mind,—perhaps found in some heathen copy of the poem. “Ða gráman mettena,” _saevae parcae_. Boet. p. 161. (Rawl.) Footnote 747: Beów. l. 5145. Footnote 748: Beów. l. 5624. Footnote 749: Cod. Vercel. Anal. l. 3121. ----- These examples will suffice to show how thoroughly personal the conception of _Wierd_ remained; and in this respect there is no difference whatever between the practice in Beówulf and in the more professedly Christian poems of the Exeter and Vercelli codices, or Cædmon. But one peculiarity remains to be noticed, which connects our _Wierd_ in the most striking manner with the heathen goddesses generally, and the Scandinavian Nornir particularly. We have seen that _Wierd_ opposes, that she stands close to the doomed warrior, that she ravishes him away, that she sweeps away the power of men, that she decides or appoints the event, that she is hard and cruel and pursues her victims. But she also _weaves_, weaves the web of destiny, as we can say even to this day without violence. It is necessary to give examples of this expression: “Me ðæt wyrd gewæf[750],”—_Wierd_ wove that for me; similar to which is, “Ac him dryhten forgeaf wígspéda gewiofu[751],”—but the Lord gave him the weft of victory; where undoubtedly an earlier weaving Wyrd was thought of. “Ðonne seó þrag cymeð, wefen wyrd-stafum[752],”—when the time cometh, woven with _wierd_-staves, or letters, probably _runes_. There is a remarkable passage in the same collection[753], “Wyrmas mec ne áwǽfon, Wyrda cræftum, ða ðe geolo godwebb geatwum frætwað,”—Worms wove me not, with the skill of _Wierds_, those namely which the yellow silk for garments beautifully form. Here weaving is especially put forward as that in which _Wierd_ excels, her own peculiar craft and business[754]. ----- Footnote 750: Cod. Exon. p. 355. Footnote 751: Beów. l. 1386. Footnote 752: Cod. Exon. p. 183. Footnote 753: Ibid. p. 417. Footnote 754: I am almost inclined to think the words searorúna gespon, _the web of various runes_, merely a periphrasis for wyrd, taken in the abstract sense of _event_. Cod. Ex. p. 347. -----