This week’s choice is “Dane-geld” by Rudyard Kipling: a warning against submitting to the demands of villainous blackmailers.
And that is called paying the Dane-geld;
Rudyard Kipling (1865—1936)
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.
Poem 217. Dane-geld (A.D. 981—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 plays it is lost!”
This poem warns of the danger that if one appeases bullies, they just return to extract more. Kipling takes his theme from the rapacious nature of the Danish Vikings in the 10th—11th Centuries, but the theme was applicable in 1911 when Kipling wrote the poem; in the 1930s when the phrase ‘paying Dane-geld’ frequently referred to the policy of appeasement, and now as another despotic ruler issues blackmailing threats of using his nuclear weapons and withholding grain shipments from the target of his avaricious ambitions until the rest of the world satisfies his twisted desires.
I like this poem because it explains the dangers of paying off blackmailers and bullies and shows us that people like Putin must be resisted and defied at all costs. The dates given in the title are those generally accepted in Kipling’s day for the reign of Ethelred the Unready, the English king associated with paying the Dane-geld.
Links
- Read about the poem at the Kipling Society.