Chapter 7

It is therefore not without significance, that also the wanderings of the Herald of gods among men, in whose hovels he now and then takes up his lodging, are parallelled especially by those of Oðinn and Hænir, or, in christian guise, of God and St. Peter.

Our olden times tell of Wuotan's wanderings, his waggon, his way, his retinue (duce Mercurio, p. 128).---We know that in the very earliest ages the seven stars forming the Bear in the northern sky were thought of as a four-wheeled waggon, its pole being formed by the three stars that hang downwards:

Apkton q , hn kai a m a x a n epiklhsin kaleousin. Il. 18, 487. Od. 5, 273. So in OHG. glosses: ursa wagen, Jun. 304; in MHG. himelwagen, Walth. 54, 3. (28) herwagen Wackern. Ib. 1. 772, 26. The clearest explanation is given by Notker cap. 64: Selbiu ursa ist pî demo norde mannelîchemo zeichenhaftiu fone dien siben glatên sternôn, die allêr der liut wagen heizet, unde nâh einemo gloccun joche (29) gescaffen sint, unde ebenmichel sint, âne (except) des mittelôsten. The Anglo-Saxons called the constellation wænes þîsl (waggon's thill, pole), or simply þîsl, but carles wæn also is quoted in Lye, the Engl. charles wain, Dan. karlsrogn, Swed. karlwagn. Is carl here equivalent to lord, as we have herrenwagen in the same sense? or is it a transference to the famous king of christian legend? But, what concerns us here, the constellation appears to have borne in heathen times the full name of Wuotanes wagan, after the highest god of heaven. The Dutch language has evidence of this in a MS. of as late as 1470: ende de poeten in heure fablen heetend (the constell.) ourse, dat is te segghene Woenswaghen. And elsewhere: dar dit teekin Arcturus, dat wy heeten Woonswaghen, up staet; het sevenstarre ofde Woenswaghen; conf. Huydec. proeven 1, 24. I have nowhere met with plaustrum Mercurii, nor with an ON. Oðins vagn [[Othinn's Wagon]]; only vagn â himnum [[wagon in heaven]].

It is a question, whether the great open highway of heaven---to which people long attached a peculiar sense of sacredness, and perhaps allowed this to eclipse the older fancy of a 'milky way' (caer Gwydion, p. 150)---was not in some districts called Wuotanes wec or strâza (way or street). Wôdenesweg, as the name of a place, stood its ground in Lower Saxony, in the case of a village near Magdeburg, Ch. ad ann. 973 in Zeitschr. für archivk. 2, 349; an older doc. of 937 is said to have Watanesweg (conf. Wiggert in the Neu. mitth. des thür. vereins VI. 2, 22). praedium in Wôdeneswege, Dietm. Merseb. 2, 14 p. 750. Annal. Saxo 272. Johannes de Wdenswege, Heinricus de Wôdensweghe (Lenz.) Brandenb. urk. p. 74 (anno 1273), 161 (anno 1303). later, Wutenswege, Godenschwege, Gutenswegen, conf. Ledebur n. arch. 2, 165, 170. Gero ex familia Wodenswegiorum, Ann. Magdeb. in chron. Marienthal. Meibom 3, 263. I would mention here the lustration der koninges strate, RA. 69; in the Uplandslag vidherb. balkr 23, 7 the highway is called karlsveg, like the heavenly wain above. But we shall have to raise a doubt by and by, whether the notion of way, via, is contained at all in Wodensweg.

Plainer, and more to the purpose, appear the names of certain mountains, which in heathen times were sacred to the service of the god. At Sigtýs bergi, Sæm. 248. Othensberg, now Onsberg, on the Danish I. of Samsöe; Odensberg in Schonen. Godesberg near Bonn, in docs. of Mid. Ages Gudenesberg, Günther 1, 211 (anno 1131), 1, 274 (anno 1143), 2, 345 (anno 1265); and before that, Wôdenesberg, Lacomblet 97. 117, annis 947, 974. So early as in Caesarius heisterb. 8, 46 the two forms are put together: Gudinsberg vel, ut alii dicunt, Wudinsberg. Near the holy oak in Hesse, which Boniface brought down, there stood a Wuodenesberg, still so named in a doc. of 1154 (Schminke beschr von Cassel, p. 30, conf. Wenk 3, 79), later Vdenesberg, Gudensberg; this hill is not to be confounded with Gudensberg by Erkshausen, district Rotenburg (Niederhess. wochenbl. 1830, p. 1296), nor with a Gudenberg by Oberelsungen and Zierenberg (ib. p. 1219. Rommel 2, 64. Gudenburg by Landau, p. 212); so that three mountains of this name occur in Lower Hesse alone; conf. 'montem Vodinberg, cum silva eidem monti attinente,' doc. of 1265 in Wenk II, no. 174. In a different neighbourhood, a Henricus comes de Wôdenesberg is named in a doc. of 1130, Wedekind's notes 1, 367; a curtis Wôdenesberg in a doc. of 973, Falke tradit. corb. 534. Gotansberg (anno 1275), Langs reg. 3, 471: vineas duas gotansberge vocatas. Mabillon's acta Bened. sec. 5, p. 208 contain the following: 'in loco ubi mons quem dicunt Wonesberth (l. Wônesberch = Wôdanesberg) a radicibus astra petit,' said to be situate in pagus Gandavensis, but more correctly Mt. Ardenghen between Boulogne and St. Omer. Comes Wadanimontis, aft. Vaudemont in Lorraine (Don Calmet, tome 2, preuves XLVIII. L. ), seems to be the same, and to mean Wodanimons. (30) A Wôdnes beorg in the Sax. Chron. (Ingram pp. 27. 62), later Wodnesborough, Wansborough in Wiltshire; the corruption already in Ethelwerd p. 835: 'facta ruina magna ex utraque parte in loco qui dicitur Wodnesbyrg' for Wodnesberg; but Florence, ed. 1592, p. 225, has 'Wodnesbeorh, id est mons Wodeni'. (31) A Wôdnesbeorg in Lappenberg's map near the Bearucwudu, conf. Wodnesbury, Wodnesdyke, Wôdanesfeld in Lappenb. engl. gesch. 1, 131. 258. 354. To this we must add, that about the Hessian Gudensberg the story goes that King Charles lies prisoned in it, that he there won a victory over the Saxons, and opened a well in the wood for his thirsting army, but he will yet come forth of the mountain, he and his host, at the appointed time. The mythus of a victorious army pining for water is already applied to King Carl by the Frankish annalists (Pertz 1, 150. 348), at the very moment when they bring out the destruction of the Irminsûl; but beyond a doubt it is older and heathen: Saxo Gram. 42 has it of the victorious Balder. The agreement of such legends with fixed points in the ancient cultus cannot but heighten and confirm their significance. A people whose faith is falling to pieces, will save here and there a fragment of it, by fixing it on a new and unpersecuted object of veneration. After such numerous instances of ancient Woden-hills, one need not be afraid to claim a mons Mercurii when mentioned in Latin annalists, such as Fredegar.  
 



ENDNOTES:

28. Septentrion, que nos char el ciel apelon; Roman de Rou.  (back)

29. Crossbeam, such as bells (glocken) are suspended on; conf. ans, âs, p. 125.  (back)

30. We know of Graisivaudan, a valley near Grenoble in Dauphiné, for which the Titurel has Graswaldane; but there is no ground for connecting it with the god.  (back)

31. Our present -borough, -bury, stands both correctly for burh, byrig, castle, town (Germ. burg), and incorrectly for the lost beorg, beorh, mountain (Germ. berg).-----Trans.  (back)