Unique Creatures in Old English Poetry, with a Note on anstapa (The Panther 15a)

The first element in more or less original compounds like OE ān-haga/-hoga, ān-floga (only in The Seafarer), ān-stapa (only in The Panther) and ān-genga is commonly translated as «lone(ly)» or «solitary». By a careful re-reading of the passages in which these words occur, the present investigation shows that sometimes this interpretation can be questioned, and that in some cases a meaning «unique, unparalleled, singular» is to be preferred. In determining the meaning of the ān-element in such compounds, the immediate Latin source may prove decisive (cf. The Phoenix 87a ān-haga, and possibly The Panther 15a ān-stapa), but the context plays an important role, especially when an allegorical meaning lies in the background, which is a common feature of all the occurrences discussed here, from Beowulf to Ælfric (ān-genga), from The Phoenix to Guthlac B (ān-haga/-hoga), from The Seafarer (ān-floga) to The Panther (ān-stapa). Even if conclusive evidence cannot be offered for all cases, the point of this article is that at least good grounds exist for questioning the overall standard interpretative pattern of this class of words, and to maintain that the Anglo-Saxon poets may have answered to the metaphorical issues of their subject-matters by occasionally investing some of these terms with original or possibly with intentionally ambiguous meanings.