![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
finncullenWith no offense to Niniel.
Another poem by Kipling, this one dealing with the principle of paying "Dane Geld" - the money that was paid to Viking raiders in exchange for not being raided. It was a principle adopted by the Border Reivers on the English/Scottish border in later centuries who gave settlements the choice of paying the Reivers or being pillaged.
Incidentally the era of the border reivers gave us some interesting new phrases including
Blackmail: "Mail" was the term for rent you see, which the tenants paid to the landlord for their land. The green mail was that rent you paid by day, but the black mail was the other rent you paid - to the reivers to keep them away.
Hot Pursuit: Raiding across the border was illegal of course, even in retaliation for another raid - but with one exception - if the reivers were caught in the act and fled it was permissible to pursue them, even across the border but only so long as a kindled fire burned - what typically happened was that the pursuers would raise up a bale of hay on spears and burn it, carrying it aloft as they rode. Once it burned out they had to turn back. Up until that point they were in "hot pursuit"
Anyway - the poem. It applies not only to the historic concept of course, but speaks of a general principle of refusing to compromise with oppressors.
*glances at Westminster*
Dane-Geld
A.D. 980-1016
It is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation
To call upon a neighbour and to say: --
"We invaded you last night--we are quite prepared to fight,
Unless you pay us cash to go away."
And that is called asking for Dane-geld,
And the people who ask it explain
That you've only to pay 'em the Dane-geld
And then you'll get rid of the Dane!
It is always a temptation for a rich and lazy nation,
To puff and look important and to say: --
"Though we know we should defeat you, we have not the time to meet you.
We will therefore pay you cash to go away."
And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
But we've proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane.
It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say: --
"We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that pays it is lost!"
Another poem by Kipling, this one dealing with the principle of paying "Dane Geld" - the money that was paid to Viking raiders in exchange for not being raided. It was a principle adopted by the Border Reivers on the English/Scottish border in later centuries who gave settlements the choice of paying the Reivers or being pillaged.
Incidentally the era of the border reivers gave us some interesting new phrases including
Blackmail: "Mail" was the term for rent you see, which the tenants paid to the landlord for their land. The green mail was that rent you paid by day, but the black mail was the other rent you paid - to the reivers to keep them away.
Hot Pursuit: Raiding across the border was illegal of course, even in retaliation for another raid - but with one exception - if the reivers were caught in the act and fled it was permissible to pursue them, even across the border but only so long as a kindled fire burned - what typically happened was that the pursuers would raise up a bale of hay on spears and burn it, carrying it aloft as they rode. Once it burned out they had to turn back. Up until that point they were in "hot pursuit"
Anyway - the poem. It applies not only to the historic concept of course, but speaks of a general principle of refusing to compromise with oppressors.
*glances at Westminster*
Dane-Geld
A.D. 980-1016
It is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation
To call upon a neighbour and to say: --
"We invaded you last night--we are quite prepared to fight,
Unless you pay us cash to go away."
And that is called asking for Dane-geld,
And the people who ask it explain
That you've only to pay 'em the Dane-geld
And then you'll get rid of the Dane!
It is always a temptation for a rich and lazy nation,
To puff and look important and to say: --
"Though we know we should defeat you, we have not the time to meet you.
We will therefore pay you cash to go away."
And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
But we've proved it again and again,
That if once you have paid him the Dane-geld
You never get rid of the Dane.
It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation,
For fear they should succumb and go astray;
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested,
You will find it better policy to say: --
"We never pay any-one Dane-geld,
No matter how trifling the cost;
For the end of that game is oppression and shame,
And the nation that pays it is lost!"
