Beowulf the king of the Danes, whose mead hall in Heorot has been under attack by a monster known as Grendel. After Beowulf slays him, Grendel's mother attacks the hall and is then also defeated. Victorious, Beowulf goes home to Geatland (Götaland in modern Sweden) and later becomes king of the Geats. After a period of fifty years has passed, Beowulf defeats a dragon, but is mortally wounded in the battle. After his death, his attendants cremate his body and erect a tower on a headland in his memory. The full story survives in the manuscript known as the Nowell Codex.
The dragon (Beowulf) although Beowulf dies fighting the dragon, the dragon dies at the hand of the companion. The dragon battle is structured in thirds: the preparation for the battle, the events prior to the battle, and the battle itself. Wiglaf kills the dragon halfway through the scene, Beowulf's death occurs "after two-thirds" of the scene, and the dragon attacks Beowulf three times. Ultimately, as Tolkien writes in "" (1936), the death by dragon "is the right end for Beowulf," for he claims, "a man can but die upon his death-day". In 1918, William Witherle Lawrence argued in his article "The Dragon and