Scholarly Reception
The scholar J. R. R. Tolkien made a study of the surviving texts in an attempt to reconstruct what may have been the original story behind the Finnesburg Fragment and Beowulf's "Finnesburg Episode". This study was ultimately edited into the book Finn and Hengest. Tolkien ultimately argues that the story is historical, rather than legendary, in character.
Tolkien argues that Finnsburuh is most likely an error by either Hickes or his printer, since that construction appears nowhere else, and the word should be Finnesburh. It is not clear whether this was the actual name of the hall or only the poet's description of it. Where exactly the hall was, or even whether it was in Frisia, is not known.
Uniquely in the surviving Old English corpus, the fragment contains no Christian references, and the burning of Hnæf is clearly pagan. It is short and about a battle, but the two fragments of the battle-poem Waldere manage to be explicitly Christian in hardly more space.
Read more about this topic: Finnesburg Fragment
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