Chapter 23

Lye quotes an AS. phrase 'ær sun go to glade,' which he translates 'priusquam sol vergat ad occasum, lapsum.' The noun formed from glîdan (labi) would be glâd, and glîdan is actually used of the sun's motion: heofones gim glâd ofer grundas, Beow. 4140 [and 'tô sete glîdan' twice in Andreas]. But 'gongan tô glâde' seems nonsense; perhaps we ought to suppose a noung glæde with the double meaning of splendor and gaudium. Both the ON. glaðr [[glad; bright]] and OHG. klat signify first splendidus, then hilaris, two notions that run into one another (as in our heiter = serenus and hilaris); klat is said of stars, eyes, rays (Graff 4, 288), and the sun, O. ii. 1, 13: êr wurti sunna sô glat (ere he grew so bright). The MHG. poet quoted on p. 705 says (Warnung 2037):

  sô ir die sunnen vrô sehet,When ye see the sun glad,

schœnes tages ir ir jehet,Ye own the fine day is hers,

des dankt ir, und Gote niht.Ye thank her, not God.

In Switzerland I find the remarkable proper name Sunnenfroh (Anshelm 3, 89. 286). But now further, the notions of bliss, repose, chamber, lie next door to each other, and of course brightness and bliss. The setting sun beams forth in heightened splendour, he is entering into his bliss: this is what 'gongan tô glæde' may have meant. In ON. I have only once fallen in with sôlarglaðan [[sunset]] (occasus), Fornald. sög. 1, 518. We learn from Ihre's Dialectlex. p. 57ª 165ª, that in Vestgötland 'gladas' is said of the sun when setting: solen gladas or glaas (occidit), soleglanding, solglädjen (occasus), which may mean that the setting sun is glad or glitters. That is how I explain the idiom quoted by Stald. 1, 463. 2, 520: the sun goes gilded = sets, i.e. glitters for joy. So in Kinderm. no. 165: sunne z'gold gange; in a song (Eschenburg's Denkm. 240): de sunne ging to golde; and often in the Weisthümer: so die sun für gold gat (1, 197), als die sonne in golt get (1, 501). Again, as the rising sun presents a like appearance of splendour, we can now understand better why the vulgar say he leaps for joy or dances on great festivals (p. 291); he is called 'the paschal piper,' Haupt's Zeitschr. 1, 547. Nor would I stop even there, I would also account for that noise, that clang once ascribed to the rising and setting sun (p. 720-1) by a deep affinity between the notions of light and sound, of colours and tones, Gramm. 2, 86-7. A strophe in Albrecht's Titurel describes more minutely the music of sunrise:

Darnâch kund sich diu sunne

wol an ir zirkel rîden (writhe):

der sueze ein überwunne,

ich wæn die süeze nieman möht erlîden.

mit dône dô diu zirkel ruorte;

seitenklanc und vogelsanc

ist alsam glîch der golt gên kupfer fuorte.
(Then in his orb the sun to whirling took, I ween such glut of sweetness none might brook; with dulcet din his orb he rolled, that clang of strings or bird that sings were like as copper beside gold.) Who can help thinking of the time-honoured tradition of Memnon's statue, which at sunrise sent forth a sound like the clang of a harpstring, some say a joyful tone at the rising and a sad at the setting of the sun. (12) Further on we shall be able to trace some other fancies about the break of day and the fall of night, to light and sound (see Suppl.).

But whither does the evening sun betake himself to rest, and where is his chamber situated? The oldest way of putting it is, that he dives into the sea, to quench his glow in the cool wave. The AS. Bth. (Rawl. 193ª): 'and þeáh monnum þynceð þæt hio on mere gange, under sœ swîfe, þonne hio on setl glîdeð.' So the ancients said dunai and mergere of the sun and stars, 'occasus, interitus, vel solis in oceanum mersio' (Festus). (13) Boëth. 4 (metr. 5) says of Boötes: cur mergat seras aequore flammas; and metr. 6: nec, cetera cernens sidera mergi, cupit oceano tingere flammas; which N. 223 translates: alliu zeichen sehende in sedel gân, niomer sih ne gerôt kebadôn (bathe) in demo merewazere. So, 'sol petit oceanum,' Rudlieb 4, 9. But the expression comes so naturally to all who dwell on the seacoast, that it need not be a borrowed one; we find it in ON. 'sôl gengr î œgi,' [[sol (the sun) goes in terror]] Fornm. sög. 2, 302, and in MHG. 'der sê, dâ diu sunne ûf gêt ze reste,' MS. 2, 66b. And, as other goddesses after making the round of the country are bathed in the lake, it is an additional proof of the Sun's divinity that 'she' takes a bath, a notion universally prevalent among the Slavs also: at eve she sinks into her bath to cleanse herself, at morn she emerges clean with renewed grandeur. The sea was thought to be the Sun's mother, into whose arms she sank at night. (14)

To inhabitants of the inland, the horizon was blocked by a wood, hence the phrases: sôl gengr til viðar (Biörn sub v. vidr); solen går under vide (Ihre sub v.). (15) But the AS. word in: 'hâdor sægl wuldortorht gewât under wâðu scrîðan,' Andr. 1456, seems to be a different thing, the OHG. weidi (p. 132 n.). We say the sun goes behind the hills, to which corresponds the AS. 'sunne gewât under niflan nœs,' sub terrae crepidinem, Andr. 1306 (conf. under neolum næsse, El. 831); a Dan. folksong: solen gik til iorde, down to earth, DV. 1, 170; Ecke (Hagen) 129: diu sunne ûz dem himel gie. Or, the sun is down, MHG. 'der sunne (here masc.) hinder gegât,' MS. 2, 192b (see Suppl.). (16)

We will now examine other formulas, which express daybreak and nightfall without any reference to the sun.

What is most remarkable is, that day was imagined in the shape of an animal, which towards morning advances in the sky. Wolfram begins a beautiful watchman's song with the words: 'sîne klâwen durch die wolken sint geslagen (his claws through the clouds are struck), er stîget ûf mit grôzer kraft, ih sih ihn grâwen, den tac;' and in part third of Wh. (Cass. 317ª) we read: 'daz diu wolken wâren grâ, und der tac sîne clâ hete geslagen durch die naht. (17) Is it a bird or a beast that is meant? for our language gives claws to both. In AS. there is a proper name Dœg-hrefn, Beow. 4998, which in OHG. would be Taka-hraban; and Beow. 3599 describes daybreak in the words: 'hræfn blâca heofones wynne blîð-heort bodôde,' niger corvus coeli gaudium laeto corde nuntiavit. (18) That piercing with the claw to raise a storm (p. 633) makes one think of an eagle, while an Oriental picture, surprisingly similar, suggests rather the king of beasts, who to us is the bear. (19) Ali Jelebi in his Humayun-nameh (Diez p. 153) describes the beginning of day in language bombastic it may be, yet doubtless a faithful reflex of ancient imagery: 'When the falcon of the nest of the firmament had scattered the nightbirds of the flickering stars from the meadow of heaven, and at sight of the claws of the lion of day the roe of musk-scented night had fled from the field of being into the desert of non-existence.' The night, a timid roe, retires before the mighty beast of day: a beautiful image, and fulll of life. Wolfram again in another song makes day press forward with resistless force (see Suppl.).

But the dawn is also pictured in human guise, that of a beautiful youth, sent like Wuotan's raven as harbinger of day: 'dæg byð Dryhtnes sond' says the Lay of Runes. And in this connexion we ought to consider the formation of such names as Bældœg, Swipdœg, etc., for gods and heroes. This messenger of the gods stations himself on the mountain's top, and that on tiptoe, like the beast on his claws, that he may the sooner get a glimpse of the land: 'jocund day stands tiptoe on the misty mountain tops,' Rom. and J. 3, 5; a popular image, I have little doubt, and one that Hebel also uses about Sunday morning: 'und lisli uf de zeche goht und heiter uf de berge stoht de sunntig.' He climbs and pushes on swiftly, irrepressibly: der tac stîgende wart, Trist. 8942. der tac begund herdringen, Wolfd. 124. In AS. 'þâ wæs morgen leoht scofen and scynded' (praecipitatus et festinatus, shoved and shindied), Beow. 1828. Hence our poets call him der rîche, the mighty, as they do God (p. 20): rîche alsô der tac, MS. 1, 163ª. rîche muotes alsam der tac, Wigal. 5222. der tac wil gerîchen (prevail, prosper), MS. 1, 27b. 2, 23b; he is not to be checked, he chases night away. Put impersonally: thô iz zi dage want (turned), Otfr. iii. 8, 21; but also: der tac wil niht erwinden (turn aside, give it up), MS. 1, 147b. morge fruo, als der tac erstarket (gathers strength), Eracl. 587. dô die naht der tac vertreip, Frauend. 47. 58. He hurls her from her throne, and occupies it himself: ez taget, diu naht muoz ab ir trône, den sie ze Kriechen hielt mit ganzer vrône, der tac wil in besitzen, MS. 1, 2b; conf. basileuein said of the sun (see Suppl.).

Sometimes it appears, as if the day, whether pictured as man or as beast, were tethered, and delayed in dawning: ligata, fune ligata dies, Reinh. lxiv; he approaches slowly, hindered by the bands: ein nacht doch nicht gepunden ist an einen stekchen, hoer ich sagen, Suchenw. 22, 30. Has that in Fergût 1534, 'quam die dach ghestrict in die sale,' anything to do with this? In a Hungarian fairy-tale (Mailath 1, 137), midnight and dawn are so tied up, that they cannot get forward, and do not arrive among men. Stier's Volksm. pp. 3. 5. One MHG. poem represents day as on sale and to be had for money, Zeitschr. f. d. a. 1, 27; like a slave bound by a cord?

The Romance tongues (not the Teut.) often signify the break of day by a word meaning to prick: Fr. poindre, Sp. puntar, apuntar (said of the sun also, p. 738), It. spuntare; thus a la pointe du jour, at daybreak. This may indeed be understood of the day's first advance, as though it presented a sharp point, but also it may refer to day as a rider who spurs his steed, or to the tramping and trotting of a beast, which is also poindre, Reinh. p. xxxix (see Suppl.).

But more significant and impressive are the phrases that connect with daybreak (as well as with sunrise) the idea of a flutter and rustle, which might be referred to the pinions of the harbinger of day, but which carries us right up to the highest god, whose sovereign sway it is that shakes the air. Wuotan, when spoken of as Wuomo, Wôma, is a thrill of nature (p. 144), such as we actually experience at dawn, when a cool breeze sweeps through the clouds. Expressions in point are the AS. dœg-wóma Cædm. 199, 26. Cod. exon. 175, 4. dœgrêd-wôma, Andr. 125, 8. Cod. exon. 179, 24. morgen-swêg, Beow. 257. dyne on dægrêd, Cædm. 289, 27. ær dægrêde þæt se dyne becom, Cædm. 294, 4; conf. Introd. to Andr. and El. xxx. xxxi, and the allusion to Donar, p. 736. To this I would trace the 'clang' sent forth by the light of sunrise and sunset. And I venture to put the same sense on an O. Fr. formula, which occurs only in Carolingian poems: Gerard De Viane 1241, 'lou matin par son l'aube esclarcie.' Cod. reg. 7183, 3ª, 'un matin par son l'aube, quant el fu aparue'; ibid. 5ª, 'un matin par son l'aube, quant li jor esclaira'; ibid. 161c, 'au matin par son l'aube, si con chante li gaus (gallus).' Cod. 7535, 69c, 'a matin par son l'aube. I add a few instances from the Charlemagne, ed. Michel 239, 'al matin sun la (?) lalbe'; 248. 468. 727, 'al matin par sun lalbe'; 564, 'le matin par sun lalbe.' Was it not originally par sonum (sonitum) albae? Later they seem to have taken it in a different sense, viz. son = summum, summitas, Fr. sommet; Michel in Gloss. to Charlem. 133 gives a passage which spells 'par som laube,' and elsewhere we find 'par son leve,' on the top of the water, 'en sun cel pin,' up on this pine, Charlem. 594. 760, 'en son,' on the top, Renart 2617. In Provencal, Ferabras 182, 'lo mati sus en lalba'; 3484, 'lo matinet sus lalba.' In It., Buovo p. m. 84. 99. 155, una mattina su l' alba, i.e. sur l'aube, which gives only a forced meaning, as though it meant to say 'when the alba stood over the mountain top.'




ENDNOTES:

12. Pausan. 1, 42. Philostr. Vita Apoll. 6, 4. Heroic. 4. Pliny 36, 11. Tac. Ann. 2, 61. Juven. 15, 5. [Back]

13. Setting in the lake is at the same time depositing the divine eye as a pledge in the fountain. I will add a neat phrase from Wolfram, Parz. 32, 24: dô hete diu müede sunne ir liehten blic hinz ir gelesen. [Back]

14. Hanusch, Slav. myth. p. 231, who connects with it the splashing with water at the Kupalo feast, and derives that name from kupel, kapiel. [Back]

15. Esth. pääw katsub metsa ladwa, the sun walks on the tips of the wood. [Back]

16. Gudr. 116, 2: 'der sunne schîn gelac verborgen hinter den wolken ze Gustrâte verre' I understand no better than Geilâte (p. 739); but both seem to mean the same thing. [Back]

17. So in a Weisthum (3, 90): 'de sunne uppe dem hogesten gewest clawendich.' [Back]

18. Conf. volucris dies, Hor. Od. iii. 28, 6. iv. 13, 16. [Back]

19. The Arabs call the first glimmer of dawn the wolf's tail, Rückert's Hariri 1, 215. [Back]