Flyting is a contest of insults, often conducted in verse. The word has been adopted by
social historiansSocial history is an area of historical study, considered by some to be a social science, that attempts to view historical evidence from the point of view of developing social trends...
following the example of William J. Ong from
ScotsScots or Lowland Scots is the variety of Germanic language traditionally spoken in lowland Scotland and parts of Ulster. It is not to be confused with Scottish Gaelic, the Celtic language varieties traditionally spoken in the Highlands and Hebrides....
usage of the fifteenth and sixteenth century, in which makars (
makaris) would engage in public verbal contests of high-flying, extravagant abuse structured in the form of a poetic
joustJousting is a sport played by two knights mounted on horses. It consists of martial competition between two mounted knights using a variety of weapons, usually in sets of three per weapon , often as part of a tournament.Jousting was just one of a number of popular martial games...
; the classic written example is
The Flyting of Dumbar and KennedieSchir Johine the Ros, ane thing thair is compild, also known as The Flyting of Dumbar and Kennedie, is the earliest surviving example of the Scottish version of the flyting genre in poetry. The genre takes the form of a contest, or "war of words", between two poets, each trying to outclass the...
, which records a gloriously scurrilous contest between the poets
Walter KennedyWalter Kennedy was a Scottish makar associated with the renaissance court of James IV. He is perhaps best known as the defendant against William Dunbar in The Flyting of Dumbar and Kennedie, but his surviving works clearly show him to have been an accomplished "master" in many genres...
and
William DunbarWilliam Dunbar , Scottish poet, was probably a native of East Lothian. This is assumed from a satirical reference in the Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedie , where, too, it is hinted that he was a member of the noble house of Dunbar....
.
Flyting is a contest of insults, often conducted in verse. The word has been adopted by
social historiansSocial history is an area of historical study, considered by some to be a social science, that attempts to view historical evidence from the point of view of developing social trends...
following the example of William J. Ong from
ScotsScots or Lowland Scots is the variety of Germanic language traditionally spoken in lowland Scotland and parts of Ulster. It is not to be confused with Scottish Gaelic, the Celtic language varieties traditionally spoken in the Highlands and Hebrides....
usage of the fifteenth and sixteenth century, in which makars (
makaris) would engage in public verbal contests of high-flying, extravagant abuse structured in the form of a poetic
joustJousting is a sport played by two knights mounted on horses. It consists of martial competition between two mounted knights using a variety of weapons, usually in sets of three per weapon , often as part of a tournament.Jousting was just one of a number of popular martial games...
; the classic written example is
The Flyting of Dumbar and KennedieSchir Johine the Ros, ane thing thair is compild, also known as The Flyting of Dumbar and Kennedie, is the earliest surviving example of the Scottish version of the flyting genre in poetry. The genre takes the form of a contest, or "war of words", between two poets, each trying to outclass the...
, which records a gloriously scurrilous contest between the poets
Walter KennedyWalter Kennedy was a Scottish makar associated with the renaissance court of James IV. He is perhaps best known as the defendant against William Dunbar in The Flyting of Dumbar and Kennedie, but his surviving works clearly show him to have been an accomplished "master" in many genres...
and
William DunbarWilliam Dunbar , Scottish poet, was probably a native of East Lothian. This is assumed from a satirical reference in the Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedie , where, too, it is hinted that he was a member of the noble house of Dunbar....
. The term
"flyt" is Scottish for “quarreling,” or “contention.” After the Middle Ages, flyting became obsolete in Scottish literature, though the tradition itself never completely died out among Celtic authors.
Flyting is similar in both form and function to the modern
African AmericanAfrican Americans are citizens or residents of the United States who have origins in any of the black populations of Africa. In the United States, the terms are generally used for Americans with at least partial Sub-Saharan African ancestry...
practice of freestyle battles and the historic practice of
the dozensThe dozens is an element of the African American oral tradition in which two competitors, usually males, go head-to-head in a improvised competition of often good-natured, ribald trash talk. They take turns insulting—cracking, West Coast dissin'", or ranking on—one another, their adversary's mother...
.
In
Germanic culturesThe Germanic peoples are a historical ethno-linguistic group, originating in Northern Europe and identified by their use of the Indo-European Germanic languages which diversified out of Common Germanic in the course of the Pre-Roman Iron Age...
, the convention can be detected earlier, for example in the confrontation of
BeowulfBeowulf is a legendary Geatish hero and later turned king in the epic poem named after him, one of the oldest surviving pieces of literature in the English language.-Etymology and origins of the character:...
and
UnferðOld English epic poem Beowulf, Unferth or Hunferth is a thegn of the Danish lord Hroðgar. The name Unferth does not appear in any Old English manuscript outside of the Nowell Codex, which contains Beowulf, and the meaning of the name is disputed. Several scholarly theories about Unferth have been...
in
BeowulfBeowulf is an Old English heroic epic poem of unknown authorship, dating as recorded in the Nowell Codex manuscript from between the 8th and the early 11th century, set in Denmark and Sweden...
. Flytings were used as either a prelude to battle or as a form of combat in their own right. The exchange is regular, if not ritualized, and the insults usually center on accusations of cowardice or sexual impropriety or perversion. Several
Norse mythologicalNorse, North Germanic, or Scandinavian mythology comprises the myths of North Germanic pre-Christian religion.Most of the written sources for Norse mythology were assembled in medieval Iceland in Old Norse, notably as the Edda....
poems contain flyting (or consist solely of flyting), including the poem
LokasennaLokasenna is one of the mythological poems of the Poetic Edda. The poem presents flyting between the gods and Loki....
, wherein
LokiIn Norse mythology, Loki is a god or jötunn . Loki's relation with the gods varies by source. Loki assists the gods, and sometimes causes problems for them. Loki is a shape shifter and in separate incidents he appears in the form of a salmon and a mare. Loki's positive relations with the gods ends...
insults the Norse gods in the hall of
ÆgirÆgir is a jötunn and a king of the sea in Norse mythology. He seems to be a personification of the power of the ocean. He was also known for hosting elaborate parties for the gods. In Snorri Sturluson's Skáldskaparmál, Ægir is identified with Gymir and Hlér who lived on the isle of Hlésey...
, and the poem
HárbarðsljóðHárbarðsljóð is one of the poems of the Poetic Edda, found in the Codex Regius and AM 748 I 4to manuscripts. It is a flyting poem with figures from Norse mythology-Synopsis:...
Hárbarðr (generally considered to be Odin in disguise) engages in flyting with the god
ThorThor is the red-haired and bearded god of thunder in Germanic mythology and Germanic paganism, and its subsets: Norse paganism, Anglo-Saxon paganism and Continental Germanic paganism....
.
Hilary Mackie has detected in the
IliadThe Iliad is an epic poem recounting significant events during a portion of the final year of the Trojan War — the Greek siege of the city of Ilion — hence the title...
a consistent differentiation between representations in Greek of Achaean and Trojan speech, where Achaeans repeatedly engage in public, ritualized abuse: "Achaeans are proficient at blame, while Trojans perform praise poetry" (Mackie 1998:83).
Taunting songs are part of many cultures predating Scottish flyting, such as
InuitInuit is a general term for a group of culturally similar indigenous peoples inhabiting the Arctic regions of Canada, Greenland, and Alaska...
civilization. Flyting also existed in
Arabic poetryArabic poetry is the earliest form of Arabic literature. Our present knowledge of poetry in Arabic dates from the 6th century, but oral poetry is believed to predate that. Arabic poetry is categorized into two main types, rhymed, or measured, and prose, with the former greatly preceding the latter...
in a popular form called
naqa'id, as well as the competitive verses of Japanese
HaikaiHaikai is a poetic genre that includes a number of forms which embrace the aesthetics of haikai no renga, and what Bashō referred to as the "poetic spirit" , including haiku, renku , haibun, haiga and senryū ."Haikai" is sometimes used as an abbreviation for "haikai no...
.
Echoes of the genre continue into modern poetry.
Hugh MacDiarmidHugh MacDiarmid is the pen name of Christopher Murray Grieve , a significant Scottish poet of the 20th century. He was instrumental in creating a Scottish version of modernism and was a leading light in the Scottish Renaissance of the 20th century. Unusually for a first generation modernist, he...
's poem
A Drunk Man Looks at the ThistleA Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle is a long poem by Hugh MacDiarmid written in Scots and published in 1926. It is composed as a form of monologue with influences from stream of consciousness genres of writing...
, for example, has many passages of flyting in which the poet's opponent is, in effect, the rest of humanity.
Robert Hendrickson,
The Encyclopedia of Word and Phrase Origins refers to flyting as a form of logomachy (ie, word fighting) and cites its use by pre-Islamic Arabs, who hurled curses at the enemy as they went into combat, as a colorful example.
A form of flyting can also be observed in the
Monkey Island-Places:* Monkey Island, Hainan, a nature reserve and tourist destination in China.* Monkey Island, North Carolina, a remote, natural island located in Currituck Sound, North Carolina. The island was once the site of the Monkey Island Hunting Club, which remains standing today. Approximately half...
games, in which the protagonist,
Guybrush ThreepwoodGuybrush Ulysses Threepwood is the main character of the Monkey Island series of computer adventure games by LucasArts. The voice of Guybrush is actor Dominic Armato in the third, fourth and fifth games, as well as The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition...
, must win sword fights with a series of insults and retorts. Though swords are held and a fighting stance assumed, no actual sword fighting ever takes place. This is commonly referred to as Insult Swordfighting.
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