Berserkers: Revisiting Michael Crichton’s “Eaters of the Dead”

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Camelot Chat! I’m your hostess, Shannon Watson; and today, we will be discussing Berserkers: Revisiting Michael Crichton’s “Eaters of the Dead.”

But let's bring it back to Bedivere first. Remember that in the last episode, we established that Sir Bedivere was known as the “Battle-Diademed,” that his fighting style was described as “furious… with sword and shield”, and that another of his names, Bedrydant, meant “Peter the Fang.”

Just exactly how might the courtly Sir Bedivere have acquired a nickname like “Peter the Fang?”

*** Keeping in mind that Bedr is Peter in Welsh and must have been a given name, which leaves us with “the Fang. ***

Maybe Sir Bedivere wasn't so “courtly,” after all? The “knights” in King Arthur’s Court actually originated from a much earlier, much “darker” time and place. Theirs was not the fairy castle with gilded towers, swans floating by in the dark blue moat below. No steel-clad soldiers in shining armor, here.

Arthur’s knights were much likelier to have been barbaric warriors along the lines of Braveheart. Some still used clubs: a weapon straight out of the Stone Age. Their fortresses would have matched up well, too, with Braveheart’s forts: small, wooden, and bristling with spikes called peels. The Roman castles in the fifth century were falling into ruin, and no one had enough men to man all of them anyway. But the frontier hillforts, the province of small, local chieftains, survived. At least, for a while.

So, rather than the handsome Sir Bedivere of French romance, we are confronted with a savage man, probably part-Pictish, who fought like a demon in battle and, as a consequence, was left with only one arm.

If Sir Bedivere was actually a battle-mad warrior named “Peter the Fang,” can we find evidence for such a paradigm in the fifth-century UK?

Turns out, we can.

For starters, there are the gangs. Oh, not gangs in the modern sense. But, come to think of it, gang, as a descriptor, is not entirely off the mark.

That’s because, in the British Isles of the fifth century, gangs of youths roamed free, living off the land. The Irish fianna were particularly noted for this practice.

In fact, evidence of them, in the form of outdoor cooking pits, litters the green knolls and valleys of Ireland. Most were situated near wood and water. Few have been found near settlements, although outlying ancient huts have been discovered alongside some of the pits. These cooking pits date back as far as the Bronze Age, and their name means something like “wild barbecue pit.”

In Britain, they were called “burnt mounds.” They had them in Sweden, too.

The Irish Brehon Laws reference the fianna and their practice of living wild. The fianna were young noblemen past the age for education and fosterage, who had not yet come into their inheritance. This rite of passage was intended to prepare them to settle down, own land, manage property, marry, and lead men.

It was also intended as the ultimate survival-skill bootcamp. Living entirely off the land, the fianna learned to hunt, fight, raid, and… compose poetry?

During the warm months, they lived wild. In the winter, they hired themselves out as medieval mercenaries to whatever chieftain would have them. They were a sort of barbaric police force, keeping order in towns and hamlets and during feasts, conducting raids on behalf of their chieftain, levying fines, and collecting debts.

One wonders, with their skill at rhyme, whether they also entertained at the feasts.

Some never married or settled down. They remained renowned warriors – solitary champions – their entire lives. Some of their names survive: Gawain, Cuchulainn, Bödvar Bjarki, Lancelot. Achilles, even, with his Myrmidons, from a much earlier time.

The fianna had their own look, too: a shaved, tattooed scalp, with the back-hair worn long. Party in the back. Punk in the front. When they came in from the cold northern woods, they must have been something to behold – and, if they had been living off the land for some time – something to smell.

This practice by male youths of roaming wild originated in the still more ancient Proto-Indo-European motherland. Its name may have come from – and here's another movie reference – a word, *koryos, that meant “wild ones.”

While the practice began on the Continent and continued in Ireland, it obtained in northern Britain and Scotland, as well. It was known there as comitatus. In fact, the Tales of the Elders of Ireland speak of the Irish fianna raiding Britain toward the end of Roman rule: directly preceding the time of King Arthur. And that of Bedivere.

Comitatus was common among ancient Anglo-Saxons, too. The Germanic name for it is männerbund. We see just such a roving männerbund group in the epic Anglo-Saxon poem, Beowulf, upon which Michael Crichton’s book Eaters of the Dead, as well as its accompanying 1999 film, The Thirteenth Warrior, are based.

There, Beowulf – or as Crichton has it, Buliwyf – and his men go to the aid of the northern chieftain, Hrothgar, whose royal hall and lands the monstrous Grendel has been raiding. These are champions, a Germanic group of them, in fact, headed by Beowulf. Although, some scholars have pointed out that Grendel’s beastly behavior better matches that of the ancient berserker.

Three wooden halls that fit the description of Hrothgar’s great royal hall, Heorot, have been found in Denmark. One of them, just north of the others, was built in the mid-sixth century. A time that matches that of Beowulf. And followed that of Bedivere by no more than 100 years. Possibly less.

King Arthur may have pulled some of his knights from these wandering troops of young warriors. In fact, these – the fianna, the männerbund groups, those who went on comitatus – may be the origin of the Knights of the Round Table. Not so knightly, but fierce... and effective.

            Here's another clue. Two forest animals – one predator, one prey – seem to have been associated with the fianna. Joseph Nagy calls them mascots.

But I would suggest they were totems. The deer, the chief prize in the hunt. The wolf: the fierce, swift stalker of the forest.

We'll get back to that again in just a minute.

For now, let's return to the warrior culture. Specifically, battle frenzy.

Fifth-century warriors – Irish, Germanic, Caledonian – were known for their terrifying battle frenzy. Called by various names – ríastrad, or “warp-spasm,” and berserkergangr – battle frenzy reportedly caused a warrior to be possessed by rage. Warriors suffering from – or inducing – battle frenzy were believed to have transformed into alpha animals in battle, wearing the skins of beasts and foaming at the mouth.

This brings us to berserkers.

In the Dark Ages, chieftains kept elite corps of shapeshifters, who fought as their totem animal. Germanic shock troops battled as beran-sercas, or “bear-shirts,” a practice which indicated the wearing of bearskins and gave rise to the term, “berserker.” They foamed at the mouth. They bit their shields. They howled. They raved. In fact, berserkers were said to so lose themselves in the experience that at least one corps of bear-shirts was known to have broken rank and lunged at the foe before the signal to charge was given.

Michael Creighton depicts this very well in his book, Eaters of the Dead, which was beautifully rendered into the movie, The Thirteenth Warrior. The main adversaries in the book and film were a corps of bear-shirts: a barbaric people, who lived in caves and wore bearskins into battle… even though they rode in on horseback. They fought with bear claws, much like the bear-claw hammer King Arthur is said to have wielded in his siege against the Island Kingdoms. They were battle-mad. They darkened their faces with dung or mud or black paint. They were ferocious, relentless, and terrifying. These, then, and not Buliwyf’s crew, were the berserkers of the piece.

Much speculation, however, has obtained among scholars in the days since bear-shirts and berserkers roamed the land. What caused them to fight so fiercely? To quote a line straight out of The Thirteenth Warrior: “They believe they are bears.”

Were they? Were they shapeshifters? Did they really believe they were bears? Or did they only emulate the bear?

Was it a psychological state? Was it mental illness, booze, epilepsy, PTSD, self-induced hysteria?

Some hallucinogenic drug? Black henbane, found in a later Viking grave, has been suggested as the culprit. Its symptoms match those of berserker battle frenzy.

Furthermore, did ancient warrior troops only model themselves on the mighty bruin? Or were there other spirit-warriors? Like boars and wildcats. Like wolves: the fianna’s fearsome totem.

Fierce in the fight, with weapons of their own, like tusks and claws and horns. With fangs. Like Bedrydant.

Peter the Fang and the other young men of his time may have patterned themselves on wolfpacks. Perhaps, in addition to the bear-shirts, there were also wolf-shirts?

Find out next week on Camelot Chat.

If you can’t wait for more Arthurian lore till the next episode, you will find my historical fiction novel, The Wanderer and the Wolves, told from Queen Guinevere’s perspective, on Amazon.com. The link is included below. And be sure to check out my author page at ShanavereStudios.com.

Until next week: People who read live in many worlds. Books are the surest portals to those worlds. So, keep living, keep reading, and keep dreaming... till we meet again.