The telling of tales is one of the world's oldest professions. In pre-literate societies it was the bard, minstrel, poet or (to use an OE term) scop on whom the roles not only of entertainer but also of historian fell. The oral poet was the keeper of the collective memory and transmitter of the narratives which recreated a nation's or tribe's past and the achievements of its heroes, and thereby forged its present sense of identity. The OE poem known as Widsith, which is a sort of catalogue of the professional poet's repertoire, shows this well, and so does Deor, given below in section VI (Text 36). The poet of Beowulf, too, never misses the chance to promote his own craft within his story. After Beowulf's defeat of Grendel, the monster's blood is hardly dry on the ground before a bard among the Danish king's thegns is produced to commemorate the hero's exploit in song. Then, that same evening, a minstrel performs at a celebratory feast, applying a timely check on the triumphalism of the occasion by telling the sad tale of the Danish princess Hildeburh's ill-fated marriage to Finn of the Frisians (Text 31a below). It is a reminder to the Danes of how sorrow invariably seems to follow joy, and the allusive way in which this tale is told shows that the Beowulf-poet's audience were thoroughly familiar with it.