In evoking the world of the Germanic hall, Old English poetry is rich in references to feasting, but such references concentrate particularly on drinking, while ignoring food altogether. This question of the ignoring of food provides the starting point for this book, raising also a number of related issues which are explored in the book, including that of the significance of drinking in the poetry; attitudes to food in Anglo-Saxon culture; and the place of food and drink in early medieval Christian teaching. Connected to attitudes to food is the whole concept of eating, which at a basic level belongs to the realm of what has been called the 'material body' and which in Old English poetry is mostly associated with animals and grotesque figures.