Chapter 13

here Redimonet seems, by the displacement so common in the names of months, to be the month before March, as Chorion uses his Retmonat for February as well. Von Arx explains the word quite differently, and I think untenably, by a mountain. Apart from the Swiss term altogether, I believe the AS. name was really Hrêð or Hrêðe = OHG. Hruod or Hruodâ, and derived, as I said on p. 206, from hruod gloria, fama; so that we get the meaning of a shining and renownful goddess. The Trad. fuld. 2, 196, furnish a female name Hruadâ, gen. Hruadûn, and in 1, 42. 2, 26, another nom. Hruadun, this last apparently formed like ON. Fiörgyn and Hlôdyn. The AS. adj. hrêð or hrêðe means crudelis (Cædm. 136, 21. 198, 2), perhaps victoriosus? I am in doubt about hrêð, sigehrêð, Beow. 5146. 974. 1631; they waver between an adj. and a subst. sense, and in the last passage, 'Beowulfe wearð guðhrêð gifeðe,' victoria is evidently meant. When the AS. Menologue, line 70, translates Martius by reðe, this may stand for hrêðe.

We Germans to this day call April ostermonat, and ôstarmânoth is found as early as Eginhart (temp. Car. Mag.). The great christian festival, which usually falls in April or the end of March, bears in the oldest of OHG. remains the name ôstarâ gen. -ûn; (79) it is mostly found in the plural, because two days (ôstartagâ, aostortagâ, Diut. 1, 266ª) were kept at Easter. This Ostarâ, like the AS. Eástre, must in the heathen religion have denoted a higher being, whose worship was so firmly rooted, that the christian teachers tolerated the name, and applied it to one of thier own grandest anniversaries. (80) All the nations bordering on us have retained the Biblical 'pascha'; even Ulphilas writes paska, not áustrô, though he must have known the word; (81) the Norse tongue also has imported its pâskir, Swed. påsk, Dan. paaske. The OHG. adv. ôstar expresses movement toward the rising sun (Gramm. 3, 205), likewise the ON. austr [[east]], and probably an AS. eástor and Goth. áustr. In Latin the identical auster has been pushed round to the noonday quarter, the South. In the Edda a male being, a spirit of light, bears the name of Austri, so a female one might have been called Austra; the High German and Saxon tribes seem on the contrary to have formed only an Ostarâ, Eástre (fem.), not Ostaro, Eástra (masc.).(82) And that may be the reason why the Norsemen said pâskir and not austrur: they had never worshipped a goddess Austra, or her cultus was already extinct.

Ostara, Eástre seems therefore to have been the divinity of the radiant dawn, of upspringing light, a spectacle that brings joy and blessing, (83) whose meaning could be easily adapted to the resurrection-day of the christian's God. Bonfires were lighted at Easter, and according to a popular belief of long standing, the moment the sun rises on Easter Sunday morning, he gives three joyful leaps, he dances for joy (Superst. 813). Water drawn on the Easter morning, is like that at Christmas, holy and healing (Superst. 775. 804); here also heathen notions seem to have grafted themselves on great christian festivals. Maidens clothed in white, who at Easter, at the season of returning spring, show themselves in clefts of the rock and mountains, are suggestive of the ancient goddess (see Suppl.).

Beda's account of Hrede and Eástre (84) shall be followed now by a statement reaching back to the 11^th century, and deserving attention if only for its great age, concerning a goddess Zisa worshipped at Augsburg in the heathen times.

The Cod. Monach. Lat. 2 (of 1135), and the Cod. Emmeran. F. IX fol. 4ª (of 12-13th cent.) contain identic 'Excerpta ex Gallica historia'. (85)

'Dum hec circa renum geruntur, in noricorum (interlined bawariorum, Cod. Vind. CII. pauwariorum) finibus grave vulnus romanus populus accepit. quippe germanorum gentes (interlined suevi), que retias occupaverant, non longe ab alpibus tractu pari patentibus campis, ubi duo rapidissimi amnes [interlined licus et werthaha (CII vuerdaha)] inter se confluunt, in ipsis noricis finibus (interlined terminis bawariorum et suevorum) civitatem non quidem muro sed vallo fossaque cinxerant, quam appellabant zizarim (CII. cizarim) ex nomine dee cize, (86) quam religiosissime colebant. cujus templum quoque ex lignis barbarico ritu constrictum, postquam eo (87) colonia romana deducta est, inviolatum permansit, ac vetustate collapsum nomen (88) colli servavit. hanc urbem titus annius pretor ad arcendas barbarorum excursiones kal. sextilibus (interlined exacta jam estate) exercitu circumvenit. ad meridianam oppidi partem, que sola a continenti (interlined littoribus) erat, pretor ipse cum legione martia castra operosissime communivit. ad occidentem vero, qua barbarorum adventus erat, ávar, bôgudis regis filius, cum equitatu omni et auxiliaribus macedonum copiis inter flumen et vallum loco castris parum amplo infelici temeritate extra flumen (interlined werthaha) consedit. pulchra indoles, non minus romanis quam grecis disciplinis instructa. igitur quinquagesimo nono die, qua eo ventum est, cum is dies dee cize (CII. dee cize) apud barboros celeberrimus, ludum et lasciviam magis quam formidinem ostentaret, immanis barbarorum (interlined suevorum, CII. svivorum) multitudo, ex proximis silvis repente erumpens ex improviso castra irrupit, equitatum omnem, et quod miserius erat, auxilia sociorum delevit. avar, (89) cum in hostium potestatem regio habitu vivus venisset, [sed que apud barbaros reverentia ?] more pecudis ibidem mactatur. (90) oppidani vero non minori fortuna sed maiori virtute pretorem in auxilium sociis properantem adoriuntur. romani haud seguiter resistunt. duo principes oppidanorum habino (91) et caccus (92) in primis pugnantes cadunt. et inclinata jam res oppidanorum esset, ni maturassent auxilium ferre socii in altera ripa jam victoria potiti. denique coadunatis viribus castra irrumpunt, pretorem, qui paulo altiorem tumulum (interlined perleih) frustra ceperat, romana vi resistentem obtruncant. legionem (93) divinam (interlined martiam), ut ne nuncius cladis superesset, funditus delent. Verres solus tribunus militum amne transmisso in proximis paludibus se occultans (94) honestam mortem subterfugit. nec multo post sicilie proconsul immani avaricia turpem mortem promeruit. nam cum se magistratu abdicaret, judicio civium damnatus est.'

The same fragment, only without the interlined words and without marginal additions, stands in Goldast's Rerum suev. script. aliquot veteres, Ulm 1727 fol. p. 3 under the rubric: 'Velleii Galli fragmentum de victoria Suevorum contra Romanos' (conf. Haupts zeitschr. 10, 291). It has the readings 'dea Cisa' and 'Cisara,' and for Caccus 'Cacus,' but agrees in the other names. Further, for loco parum amplo, I find the better reading apto. The parenthesis 'sed--reverentia' is wanting, so is the concluding sentence 'nam--damnatus est'. I should believe that Goldast had borrowed it all from Wolfg. Lazius's Reip. Rom. libri xii. Francof. 1591 p. 52, if this copy had not some variations too; the heading runs: 'Velleii excerpta ex Gallica historia'; it has Cisara, but Cize, also 'Habbino, Caccus, amplo,' and concludes with promeruit. Lazius says: 'quam nos historiam in pervetusto codice membrau. literis antiquissimis scriptam reperimus'; that would be the sixth MS. known hitherto, and copies must have been pretty numerous in the 11-12th centuries. The one that Goldast had before him may probably been the oldest.

Either one or the other of them, both Otto von Freisingen and the author (or continuator) of the Auersberg chronicle seem to have had before them. The former tries to connect the story with Quintilius Varus (instead of Verres), and after relating his overthrow, adds (chron. 3, 4): 'Tradunt Augustenses hanc caedem ibi factam, ostenduntque in argumentum collem ex ossibus mortuorum compactum, quem in vulgari perleich (Mone, anz. 1, 256), eo quod legio ibi perierit, usque hodie vocant, vicumque ex nomine Vari appellatum monstrant'. The Auersberg chronicler's account, though he almost verbally adopts the older fragment, I hold it needful to insert here, because the marginal glosses are curiously interwoven with the text, and referred to 'discovered-inscriptions on stone'. (95)

De Augusta Vindelicorum vel Rhetiae. sicut ex scriptis veterum colligitur haec civitas tria nomina accepit. Germanorum quippe gentes primum considentes in partibus Rhetiae, quae nunc est pars Sueviae, non longe ab alpibus in planitie, loco tamen munito propter concursum duorum rapidorum fluminum, hanc urbem construxerunt, et non muris sed fossatis eam firmaverunt, et ex nomine deae Zizae, quam religiosissime colebant, Zizerim eam nominabant. hujus quoque deae templum ex lignis barbarico ritu constructum, etiam postquam Romani eam incolere coeperunt, inviolatum permansit. at vetustate collapsum nomen colli servavit, in quo postmodum in lapide exsculpti hi versus sunt reperti:

quem male polluerat cultura nefaria dudum

gallus monticulum hunc tibi Ziza tulit.




ENDNOTES:

79. T. 157, 1. 3. 5. O. i. 22, 8. iii. 6, 16. iv. 9, 8. Hymn. 21, 4. Fragm. theol. xiv. 17. Back

80. Conf. Ideler's chronologie 1, 516. Back

81. For oriens he chooses urruns, for occidens sagqs, i.e., rising and sinking of the sun, not that he did not know vistr (versus occidentem), root vis (repose, stillness, evening). Back

82. Composite proper names: Ostroberht, Austroberta, Austregisil, Ostrogotha (like Visigotha, Vistrimund, Westeralap, Sundarolt, Nordberaht, &c. &c.) Back

83. In the Basque language ostara means May, the budding leafing time, from ostoa, leaf, foliage: a mere accidental resemblance. Back

84. I might introduce into the text an AS. Ricen, if I knew any more about her than what Lye's glossary quotes from Cod. Cot. 65, 87: Ricenne Diana. It is formed like þinen (ancilla), wylpen (bellona), &c. Back

85. I owe their communication to Schmeller's kindness. The same piece is found at Vienna in two forms: in the Cod. Lat. CII (olim hist. prof. 652) sec. xi. ineuntis fol. 79. 80; and in the Cod. CCXXVI (olim univ 237) sec. xii. In both it stands between Jorn. De reb. get. and De regn. succ. CII has interlinear glosses and marginal notes (exactly like the Munich MSS.) by a scarcely later hand, which also writes the heading 'Excerptum ex Gallica historia'. CCXXVI adopts the interlinears into the text, but otherwise agrees. Back

86. On margin: 'Quem male polluerat cultura nefaria dudum gallus monticulum hunc tibi ciza tulit'. Back

87. On margin: 'post conditam urbem augustam a romanis'. Back

88. Marg. note: 'ut usque hodie ab incolis cizunberc nominetur.' Back

89. Marg. note: 'ex cujus vocabulo, quia ibi mactatus et tumulatus est chrikesaveron (CII chrekasaver) nomen accepit. grecus enim erat'. Back

90. On margin: 'Hoc nomen terris bogudis dat regia proles grecavar (CII grecus auar), pecudis de suevis more litatus.' Back

91. On margin: 'Prefectus habeno se victum hicque sepultum perpetuo montis nomine notificat. qui juxta montem occisus et supultus nomen monti habenonberch dedit, quem rustici havenenberch (CII havenonperch) dicunt.' Back

92. CII: 'a cujus nomine putamus iekingen nominari.' Back

93. On margin: 'de hac ibi perdita legione adhuc perleich nominatur.' Then in smaller but contemporaneous writing: 'Indicat hic collis romanam nomine cladem martia quo legio tota simul periit. subdidit hunc rome prepes victoria petro, hoc sibemet templum qui modo constituit.' Back

94. On margin: 'hic quia in paludibus adjacentibus latuit, lacui uerisse huc usque nomen dedit'. Back

95. Chron. Conradi ursperg. Argent. 1532, p. 308. ed. 1609, p. 225. Back