Exeter Book Riddle 65
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Exeter Book Riddle 65 (according to the numbering of the Anglo-Saxon Poetic Records)[1] is one of the Old English riddles found in the later tenth-century Exeter Book. Suggested solutions have included Onion, Leek, and Chives, but the consensus is that the solution is Onion.[2]
As edited by Krapp and Dobbie and translated by Andrew Higl, the riddle reads:[3][1]: 230
Cwico wæs ic, ne cwæð ic wiht, cwele ic efne seþeah.
ær ic wæs, eft ic cwom. æghwa mec reafað,
hafað mec on headre, ond min heafod scireþ,
biteð mec on bær lic, briceð mine wisan.
Monnan ic ne bite, nympþe he me bite;
sindan þara monige þe mec bitað.
I was alive but did not speak; even so I die.
Back I came before I was. Everyone plunders me,
keeps me confined, and shears my head,
bites on my bare body, breaks my sprouts.
I bite no one unless the person bites me;
many there are who do bite me.