The article argues that undue importance has been accorded to the Breca episode of the swimming feat, which was interpreted as comparable with the dragon fight and contests with the Grendel kin; and that this discouraged close scrutiny of the textual mainstays of the received interpretation, such as the name, office and motivation of Unferth, the terms in which Beowulf describes his own feat, and the manuscript evidence for his threat of hell.