All throughout history and literature, heroes come and go. When they come they bring a sense and feeling of added pride and joy and when they leave they bring with them those feelings and leave behind a feeling of emptiness and sadness. The same can be said in the epic poem, Beowulf, when Beowulf leaves Hrothgar, the man who he has risked his life for twice, to return to his home all are hit with this all too familiar feeling of sadness and the feelings of kinship shine through, Hrothgar says his farewell as a father would to a sun, and when he returns to his home and speaks to his true king, Hygelac, one can see the comitatus that these two share, both the caring for and ultimate respect for one another. When Beowulf decides to leave Heorot and head back to his home, Hrothgar is deeply saddened, so much that his paternal love for Beowulf can clearly …show more content…
While telling his incredible stories to Hygelac, Beowulf tells exactly what happened, not stretching from the truth at all, at times even giving himself less credit then he deserves, this shows just how much Beowulf respects Hygelac, so much that Beowulf feels he must be completely truthful with Hygelac. During Beowulf’s story about his fight with Grendel, he does not stray form the truth at all when he says Grendel was, “still unready to leave the hall empty-handed; renowned for his might, he matched himself up against me, wildly reaching.” (2082-2084) As Beowulf speaks to Hygelac, he is expected to boast about how he slaughters Grendel, singlehandedly with no armor or weapons however, he does nothing of the sort, he tells the story detail for detail, showing his respect for Hygelac as he tells pure facts and even says he and Grendel were a fair matchup. Beowulf’s modesty towards Hygelac displays comitatus in its fullest, and Beowulf’ respect to the honor