Finn has been spoken of already as one of these; also Gautr, as one of the forms of divinity. Grîmr is another, coming from the old Norse word grîma, a mask or helmet. Odin was called Grimr, meaning the concealed, or possibly the helmeted; and the names beginning with Grim may generally be referred to the hidden god.
Grîmhild, or in High German, Krimhild, was originally one of the Valkyrier, or choosers of the slain, who was so called, as being endowed with a helmet of terror. Hidden battle-maid, or helmeted battle-maid, would be her fittest translation. In the northern version of the Nibelungenlied, Grimhild is the witch-mother of Sigurd’s wife, Gudrun, and performs a part like that of the Oda, or Uta, in the German and Danish versions, in which the heroine herself is called Kriemhild, or Chriemhild, and does her fatal part in wreaking revenge for the murder of her husband. Grimhhildur was somewhat used in the North, but nothing was so fashionable as Grim, who occurs twenty-nine times in the Landnama-bok, and with equal frequency in Domesday; besides that one of these Danish settlers left his name to Grimsby, in Lincolnshire.
Grim has, of course, his kettle, in the North, Grimketyl, or Grimkjell; in Domesday, Grimchel; an allusion, probably, to creation, quaint as is the sound to our ears. Grimperaht, or helmeted splendour, first was turned into Grimbert, then into the common German surname of Grimmert. Grimar in the North was Grimheri in Germany. Grim was in greater favour as a prefix in the High German dialects than in the North, and chiefly in the Frankish regions.
Grimbald, helmeted prince, was a monk of St. Omer, transplanted by King Alfred to Oxford, in the hope of promoting learning, and he thus became a Saxon saint. Grimvald, helmeted ruler, was a maire du palais in the Faineant times of the Franks; and in Spanish balled el Conde Grimaltos, a knight at the court of Charlemagne, was slandered and driven away with his wife to the mountains, where the lady gives birth to a son, who was baptized Montesinos, from the place of his birth, and educated in all chivalry till he was old enough to go to Charlemagne’s court, refute the slander by the ordeal of battle, and restore his family to favour. Grimaldo was a name borne by the Lombard kings, and left remains in the great Grimaldi family of Genoa.
Most of our English Grims were importations, and there are few of them, though we have Grimulf in Domesday, probably a Dane.
Section IV.—Frey.
Every false religion preserves in some form or other the perception of a Divine Trinity, and the Teutonic Triad consisted of Odin, Frey, and Thor, whose images always occupied the place of honour in the temples, and who owned the three midmost days of the week.
The history of the word freyr is very curious. The root is found in pri, Skt., to love or rejoice, the Zend frî, the Greek φίλος. To be glad was also to be free; so freon or frigon means to free and to love, and thence free in all its forms (N. fri; Goth, frige; H. G. frei; L. G. freoh). Thus, again, the Germans came by froh, and we by fresh. Fro was both glad and dear; and as in Gothic frowida was joy, so is freude in modern German; and we exult in frolics and freaks. He who loved was known by the present participle, frigonds, the friend of modern English, the same in all our Teutonic tongues; and as the effect of love is peace, the term was fred or fried, our Saxon frith, which we have lost in the French-Latin word. To be free was to be noble, so the free noble was Frauja, the name by which Ulfilas always translates Κύριος, in the New Testament, by a beautiful analogy, showing, indeed, that our Lord is our Friend and our Redeemer, loving us, and setting us free.
Frauja, or free, was the lord and master, so his wife was likewise frea, both the beloved and the free woman; the northern frue, German frau, and Dutch vrowe, all, as donna had done in Italy, becoming the generic term for woman.
Out of all the derivatives of this fertile and beautiful term, there were large contributions to mythology, and a great number of names.