Fate was a major factor in the life of pagan cultures of any time period. This is welldocumented in the epic poem Beowulf, in which a pagan warrior wins because it is hisdestiny to win, not because of any free will. This is amply demonstrated throughout thetext.For instance, in line20, the text states “then Scyld departed at the destined hour.”This is but one of many examples that demonstrate the role of fate in death in pagansocieties. They believed that a man could not do anything to avoid it, but had to embraceit. This may be one of the reasons that Beowulf goes to confront the dragon; he feels thepull of fate, and realizes that if it was his time to die, he would die. If, however, he wasfated to live, that would allow him to triumph. Therefore, there was nothing he could’vedone to alter his future. This is partially elaborated on by the text in lines 1580-1583: “Theeminent prince was doomed to reach the end of his days on earth, his life in this world.So too was the dragon, though he had guarded the hoard for generations,” and in lines1717-1721: “fate hovered over him, so soon to fall on that old man, to seek out hishidden spirit, to split life and body; flesh was to confine the soul of the old man only alittle longer.”This idea that fate is inflexible, that the future is already planned, is in partresponsible for the massive amount of blatant foreshadowing in the story. In this way, theoutcome of the entire battle is known even at the beginning of the story, giving it a bit ofan omniscient point of view. The mortals in the story do not know the outcome of theirlives, but it is revealed to you almost constantly. Other examples of fate andforeshadowing intertwined are in lines 644-646: “But after that night fate decreed that heshould no longer feed off human flesh.”, lines 715-718: “Grendel’s death, his departurefrom this world, was destined to be wretched, his migra...
