Kennings

Kennings 

What common objects do the following kennings describe? 

Earth Candle                 Information Super Highway                     Whale Road 

The kenning is an Anglo-Saxon literary device, very common in Anglo-Saxon poetry, in which a new noun or noun phrase replaces a more familiar noun. Examples include calling the sea the whaleroad, a sword a battle friend, the body bone house. In poetry, the kenning forces removal of the familiar and invites deeper thinking about how to describe and encapsulate the ordinary in an extraordinary way. 

If you call a school a “Scholar’s home” --then you have created a kenning. 

The folks at Coca-Cola might agree that a cold Coke is “humanity’s beverage.” 

Part 1: 

With a partner, consider carefully how you could creatively rename each of the following using the kenning technique. 

1. A teacher 
2. Fireman 
3. Meatloaf 
4. Pop tarts 
5. Love
6. A bus driver 
7. Television
8. Police
9. Music 
10. Computer 

Part 2: 

Select a topic. Now generate as long a list of kennings as possible about that chosen topic, and then shape a kenning poem of your own (your poem doesn’t have to rhyme). You must have at least 20 kennings. For example: (from Sharon Rodd—a student) 

A Mother is.... 

Nose wiper, bottom swiper,  

Peacemaker, morning maker, 

Food provider, task collider, 

Lie detector, nagging heckler, 

“No” repeater, moral preacher, 

Bedroom tidier, taxi driver, 

Chore finder, chore reminder, 

Cuddly soother, household hoverer, 

Fun wrecker, homework checker, 

Manners monitor, always on at ya, 

Love radiator, family mediator, 

“never too old for hugs” articulator