View source for Meremenna Symbel

{{short description|1910 poem by J.R.R. Tolkien}}
{{poem infobox
| title=''Meremenna Symbel''
| image=
| caption=
| imageWidth=
| imageHeight=
| other names=''The Sirens'',<br>''Sirens'',<br>''The Sirens Feast''
| written=[[July]] of [[1910]]
| revised=Possibly [[May]] of [[1914]]
| published=''[[The Collected Poems of J.R.R. Tolkien]]''
| subject=[[Sirens]]
}}

'''''Meremenna Symbel''''',<ref name=collectedpoems>{{CP|5}}, pp. 17-8</ref> also referred to as '''''The Sirens''''',<ref>{{CG|Po}}, "By Title", p. 855 (entry "''The Sirens''. Unpublished.")</ref> is a poem written by [[J.R.R. Tolkien]] in [[July]] of [[1910]].<ref name=chronology>{{CG|C}}, p. 19 (entry "July 1910")</ref>

==Poem excerpt==
<poem style="font-style:italic; margin-left:20px;">
:Clawed by the frothy fingers of the hungry deep
::That moaned in restless agony around
:Stood darkly once, its cruel and unrelenting steep
::Towered high, an isle by no man living found.<ref name=collectedpoems/></poem>

==Background==
Sometime in [[July]] of [[1910]],<ref name=chronology/> [[J.R.R. Tolkien]] wrote the poem '''''The Sirens Feast'''''<ref name=collectedpoems/> on the same manuscript that he wrote ''[[Wood-sunshine]]''<ref>{{CP|4}}, p. 14</ref> on.<ref name=collectedpoems/> At some later date,<ref name=chronology/> Tolkien inscribed "July 1910"<ref name=chronology/> on the manuscript and wrote the title in the margins.<ref name=collectedpoems/> A few years later, possibly in [[May]] of [[1914]], Tolkien revised the poem,<ref>{{CP|Introduction}}, p. xv</ref> giving it ''The Sirens'' as a shortened name, but also naming it ''Meremenna Symbel'' ("The Sirens Feast") in [[Old English]].<ref name=collectedpoems/> On the manuscript for the second version, Tolkien also wrote the date of its initial composition in addition to inscribing "(pract[ically] unaltered)" and "Before untitled" on it.<ref name=collectedpoems/>

In a list of poems marked "[[Attempts at Verse]]", Tolkien included the poem with the spelling '''''Meremenna symbel''''' ("The Sirens").<ref>{{CP|A3}}, p. 1377 (list "A")</ref> Sometime after [[14 July]] of [[1915]], Tolkien included the poem, labeled as '''''meremennena symbel''''' ("The Sirens Feast"), in another list of poems.<ref>{{CP|A3}}, p. 1379 (list "C")</ref> Near "the end of 1915 or the start of [[1916]]", Tolkien included ''The Sirens Feast''<ref name=collectedpoems/> under the name '''''Sirens''''' as part of a list of poems he compiled,<ref>{{CP|A3}}, p. 1381 (list "D")</ref> only to strike it through.<ref>{{CP|Introduction}}, p. xxiii</ref>

In [[September]] of [[2024]], the poem was published for the first time as entry 5 in ''[[The Collected Poems of J.R.R. Tolkien]]'' along with the earliest version.<ref name=collectedpoems/> In their commentary, [[Wayne G. Hammond]] and [[Christina Scull]] described the [[Wikipedia:Sirens|Sirens]] in the poem as deriving from [[Wikipedia:Greek mythology|Greek mythology]] and being "generally depicted as women combined with [[birds]]", unlike [[mermaids]].<ref name=collectedpoems/> In a note to line 13 in the first version of the poem, Hammond and Scull explain that "''Gan'' is an obsolete form of ''gone''".<ref name="collectednote">{{CP|5}}, p. 18 (note "A13:")</ref> In a note on their "Addenda and Corrigenda to ''The Collected Poems of J.R.R. Tolkien''", Hammond and Scull corrected their note to line 13 to "a dialectal English form of the verb ''go''".<ref name="note">{{webcite |author= [[Christina Scull]] and [[Wayne G. Hammond]]|articleurl= https://www.hammondandscull.com/addenda/collected_poems_by_date.html|articlename= Addenda and Corrigenda to ''The Collected Poems of J.R.R. Tolkien'' (2024) Arranged by Date|dated= 24 December 2024|website= HS|accessed= 30 December 2025|archiveurl= |archivename= |archivedate=}}, "Prior to 24 December 2024"</ref> Their notion was disputed by "some readers", who "suggested that ''gan'' is to be related not to Old English ‘''go''’ but to OE ''ginnan'' ‘begin’, thus ‘''gan''’ = ‘began’, or else should be understood to mean ‘did’, as Middle English gan is sometimes translated".<ref name="note"/>

==See also==
*''[[The Merryman]]''

{{References}}

{{Poems}}

[[Category:Old English names]]
[[Category:Poems by J.R.R. Tolkien]]