Vol. 3 Preface

In addition to the fairy-tale and folk-tale, which to this day supply healthy nourishment to youth and the common people, and which they will not give up, whatever other pabulum you may place before them, we must take account of Rites and Customs, which, have sprung out of antiquity and continued ever since, may yield any amount of revelations concerning it. I have endeavoured to shew how ignition by friction, Easter fires, healing fountains, rain-processions, sacred animals, the conflict between summer and winter, the carrying-out of Death, and the whole heap of superstitions, especially about path-crossing and the healing of diseases, are distinctly traceable to heathen origins. Of many things, however, the explanation stands reserved for a minute inquiry devoting itself to the entire life of the people through the different seasons of the year and times of life; and no less will the whole compass of our law-antiquities shed a searching light on the old religion and manners. In festivals and games comes out the bright joyous side of the olden time; I have been anxious to point out the manifold, though never developed, germs of dramatic representation, which may be compared to the first attempts of Greek or Roman art. The Yule-play is still acted here and there in the North; its mode of performance in Gothland (p. 43) bears reference to Freyr. The little wights' play is mentioned on p. 44n.; on the bear's play (p. 785) I intend to enlarge more fully elsewhere. Sword-dance and giant's dance (p. 304), Berchta's running (p. 279), Whitsun play (p. 785), Easter play (p. 780), the induction of summer or May, the violet-hunt and the swallow's welcome are founded on purely heathen views; even the custom of kilt-gang, like that of watchmen's songs (p. 749), can be traced up to the most antique festivities.

Such are our sources, and so far do they still carry us: let us examine what results the study of them hitherto has yielded.

Divinities from the core of all mytholgy: ours were buried almost out of sight, and had to be dug out. Their footmarks were to be traced, partly in Names that had stubbornly refused to be rooted out, yet offered little more than their bare sound; partly, under some altered guise, in the more fluid but fuller form of the Folk-tale. This last applies more to the goddesses, the former to the gods. Gods and heroes are found in the very names of runes, the first of which in Old Norse is Freyr, others are Thor, Zio, Eor, Asc, Man, but nowhere goddesses.

The gods that have kept the firmest hold are the three marked in the days of the week as Mercury, Jupiter, Mars; and of these, Wuotan stands out the most distinct. Jonas, Fredegar, Paulus Diaconus and the Abrenuntiatio name him, he towers at the head of ancient lines of kings, many places bear the indelible impress of his name. Woedenspanne signified a part of the human hand, as the North named another part 'ûlf-liðr,' wolf-lith, after the god Týr. Unexpectedly our 13^th century has preserved for us one of his names [Wish], which lies in abeyance even in the Norse system, yet is the one that stands in the closest contact with the women that do the god's bidding, with the wand that unlocks his hoard, with the mantle that carries him through the air, nay, is the only one that puts all these in the true light. The Norse name Omi is not quite so clearly explained by the AS. Wôma, though the word marks unmistakably the stormful god whom we know more certainly through our legend of the 'furious host': the wide cloak and low hat are retained in the name Hackelbernd, which I venture to trace back to a Gothic Hakul-baírands (p. 146-7). As Longbeard, the god deep-sunk in his mountain-sleep is reproduced in the royal heroes Charles and Frederick: who better than Wuotan, on whose shoulder they sit and bring him thoughts and tidings, was entitled to inquire after the flying raven? Ravens and wolves scented his march to victory, and they above all other animals have entered into the proper names of the people. In the Norse sagas the questioner is a blind graybeard, who just as plainly is old Oðin again. Father of victory, he is likewise god of blessing and bliss, i.e. Wish over again, whose place is afterwards occupied by Sálida (well-being). Since he appears alike as god of poetry, of measurement, of the span, of the boundary and of the dice-throw, all gifts, treasures, arts may be regarded as having proceeded from him.

Though a son of Wuotan and yielding to him in power or influence, Donar (Thunar, Thor) appears at times identical with him, and to some extent as an older god worshipped before Wuotan. For, like Jupiter, he is a father, he is grandfather of many nations, and, as grandfather, is a god of the hills, a god of the rocks, a hammer, sits in the forest, throned on the mountain top, and hurls his old stone weapon, the lightning's bolt. To him the oak was sacred, and his hammer's throw measured out land, as did afterwards Wuotan's wand. He rather flies furiously at the giants than fights battles at the head of heroes, or meditates the art of war. I think it a significant feature, that he drives or walks, instead of riding like Wuotan: he never presents himself in the wild hunt, nor in women's company. But his name is still heard in curses (Wuotan's only in protestations, p. 132); and as Redbeard, Donar might sit in the mountain too. The heroes all go to Wuotan's heaven, the common folk turn in at Donar's; beside the elegant stately Wuotan, we see about Donar something plebeian, boorish and uncouth. He seems the more primitive deity, displaced in the course of ages (yet not everywhere) by a kindred but more comprehensive one.

If Wuotan and Donar are to be regarded as exalted deities of heaven, much more may Zio, Tius, be accepted as such, whose name expresses literally the notion of sky, while Wuotan signifies the air, and Donar the thunderstorm. And as Wuotan turns the tide of battle, Zio presents himself as the special god of war; as Donar flings the hammer and Wuotan the spear, he is god of the sword, as exhibited in the names Sahsnôt and Heru. But here much remains dark to us, because our legend has lost sight of Zio altogehter. Like Wuotan, he also seems to rush down from the sky in the form of tempest.

Two others, though never appearing in the week, must yet be reckoned among the great gods. Froho, a god of hunting, of generations, fertility and summer, had long planted his name in the heart of our language, where he still maintains his ground in the derivatives frôn and frönen; his sacred golden-bristled boar survived in helmet-crests, in pastry, and at the festive meal. Year by year in kingly state Froho journeyed through the lands (p. 213. 760). He is the gracious loving deity, in contrast with the two last-mentioned, and with Wuotan in one aspect; for, as Wish, Wuotan also seems kindly and creative like Froho.

As to Phol, scarcely known to us till now, I have hazarded so many conjectures that I will not add to their number here. If, as appears most likely, he is synonymous with Paltar (Balder), he must pass for a god of light, but also of fire, and again of tempest; under another view he haunted wells and springs. He approximates the higher elemental powers, and could the more easily be perverted into a diabolic being. Equally lost to Germany is the name of the Norse Loki, who represents fire in another aspect, and was still better qualified to stand for the devil. The stories of his artfulness, his cunning tricks, have reproduced themselves repeatedly in all branches of our race.

I now turn to the Goddesses. A mother of gods, Nerthus, is named to us by Tacitus; her name is the exact counterpart to that of a Norse god, who confirms her existence, as Freyr would confirm that of Freyja, had she come down to us only as the High German Frouwa, and from the Gothic fráujô. Say that her name of Nerthus has long ago died out, if it ever extended to all branches of our race; a whole group of beings almost identical with her lives on in fadeless legend: Holde, Berhte, Fricke, Harke, Gaue, Stempe, Trempe. At the first glance none of these names seem to go very high up; yet, Berhte at all events is introduced in poems of the 14-15^th century, and the matter begins to wear another look the moment we can set her beside the Carolingian Berhta, beside the Eddic Biört (p. 1149), beside the deeply rooted tradition of the 'white lady.' Of dame Holda the legend was never written down till the 17^th century; if Holda was in the Venus-mountain, which goes as far back as the 14^th, she at once gains in importance; then further, in the 12^th century we can point to Pharaïldis (p. 284); and if, to crown all, Huldana in the stone inscription is correct (p. 266), we can have but little doubt of a Gothic worship of Hulþô (p. 990). Now, as Berhta and Holda are adjective names, I was fain to claim for Nerthus also an adj. basis naírthus, with the sense of mild, gracious, fair. Frigg too (p. 301-2) I interpret by the adj. free, fair, gracious. If Gaue, Gauden, is a corruption of the masc. Wôden, it might still have an accessory notion of good. Frouwa is obviously the fem. to Froho, and still asserts her full power in our present frau. Almost all names of the female deities have still a transparent meaning; as compared with those of the male, there is something innocent and inviolable in them, and for that reason they seem to have been treated tenderly or tolerated. The delicacy and inoffensive matter of the myth have shielded it longer in popular legend.

The goddess Hellia has exchanged her personal meaning for a local one, that of hell. Ostara, Eástre, is preserved at least in the name of the high festival; and Hreda, if my conjecture be sound, in the word for a bride's gerada (outfit), as Zio was in the name of the sword. Folla and Sindgund have only come to light through the latest discoveries.

This muster of divinities is strong enough to support the whole remaining framework of mythology; where such pillars stand, any amount of superstructure and decoration may be taken for granted. Considered in and for themselves, almost all the individual deities appear emanations and branches of a single One; the gods as heaven, the goddesses as earth, the one as fathers, the other as mothers, the former creating, governing, guiding, lords of victory and bliss, of air, fire and water, the goddesses nourishing, spinning, tilling, beautiful, bedizened, loving.

As all the sounds of language are reducible to a few, from whose simplicity the rest can be derived---the vowels by broadening, narrowing, and combination into diphthongs, the mute consonants by subdivision of their three groups each into three stages, while particular dialects shift them from one stage to another in regular gradation; (1)---so in Mythology I reduce the long array of divine personages to their unity, and let their multiplicity spring out of this unity; and we can hardly go wrong in assuming for deities and heroes a similar coincidence, combination and gradation, according to their characters and particular functions. How Wuotan, Donar, and Zio partly run into one another has been shown; Logi (lowe, blaze) becomes Loki (lock, bolt), g becomes k, the sense of fire is exchanged for that of bolts and bars (of hell), as Hamar and Heru came to signify the implements they used. We have seen Wuotan reappear in long-bearded Charles, in red-bearded Frederick. On comparing the Norse hero-legend with the German, we see remarkable instances of this shifting and displacement of names and persons. Gudrun in the Edda occupies the place of our Krîmhilt, while Grîmhildr is her mother's name; in the Vilkinasaga Mîmir is the smith and Reginn the dragon, in the Völsungasaga Reginn is the smith and Fâfnir the dragon. If these changes took place at haphazard, there would be nothing in them; but they seem to proceed by regular graduation, without leaps.




ENDNOTES:

   T

 TH

    D

     T

TH

Greek

        ta       thugatere      duo

L. Germ.

       the

   daughters       two

H. Germ.

       die

    töchter      zwei

It will be seen that the High Germ. is always a stage in advance of Low Germ., and this a stage in advance of Greek, Latin, Sanskrit, &c. The Germ. z is sounded ts; and s, like h, is a breathing.---trans. [Back]