REH’s Writings

PoemPermanent catalogue Work

Song Before Clontarf

1textual state2Characters

Opening lines

Lean on your sword, red-bearded lord, and watch your victims crawl;Under your feet they weakly beat the dust with their dying hands.The red smokes roll from the serf’s roof-pole and the chieftain’sshattered hall —

Textual states

Shown in a practical developmental order where possible: synopsis/outline, numbered drafts, submission states, then published or posthumous states. This display order does not itself assert exact chronology or textual authority.

Letter-preserved textSong Before Clontarf

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Characters in this Work

Exhaustively reviewed. Counts are across the exact Poetry textual states currently catalogued for this Work; a zero result means no qualifying individual Character/entity was found in those states.

Deathpersonified Death booming from the heather in “Song Before Clontarf”; kept poem-specific rather than merged by name alone1 textual state the red-bearded lordunnamed red-bearded warrior lord addressed throughout “Song Before Clontarf”; the poem does not establish a secure historical identity1 textual state