The most potent influence of Teutonic women rests upon their guardianship of the sacred runes, which are a primeval, Teutonic method of searching the future: the power of divination. The Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian word run signifies a letter, a writing, or literally a secret, mystery, confidential speech, counsel. A letter was also called runstaef. Little staffs with significant signs and symbols were thrown by women, as dice are cast, to the accompaniment of prayers and charms, and from the result of the cast prophecies were made. Odin (Wodan) himself taught the wise women the greatest of runes "which [in this connection] means both writing and magic, and many other arts of life." Whittier, Kallundborg Church, says of them: "Of the Troll of the Church they sing the rune: By the Northern Sea in the harvest moon."
The runes or charms are twofold. The good and wholesome ones are called galdr; the pernicious ones, carrying with them sickness, madness, and death, are called soidr. The women of magic possessed of the art of the runes were called volur or seidkona, and wandered through the land in fantastic attire, a dark cloak set with pearls around their limbs, a cap of black lambskin on the head, a staff with a brass button, set with stones, in their hand. Wherever they appeared, they were reverently invited to a feast and propitiated in every way, that they might be induced to practise beneficent magic arts during the night. They enjoyed an almost semi-divine veneration. There were, however, "balewise women" against whom the Scandinavian warrior was warned. "The sons of men need an eye of foresight wherever the fray rages, for balewise [horrible, hideous] women often stand near the way [with baleful runes] blunting swords and minds."
A still higher, more divine and poetic mission than that of bond breakers is assigned to the Valkyries i.e., choosers of the slain or Walmaids. Odin, the supreme god of the Germanic Olympus, sends them out to every battlefield to turn the tide of battle and to make choice of those who are to be slain. Glittering in their armor and their waving golden hair, bright as the sun, they ride through the air and above the sea with shields and helmets and sparkling breastplates to execute the orders of the war god, whose handmaidens they are. With their spears they designate the heroes who shall fall and whom they afterward conduct to Valhalle (Valholl), the hall of the slain, the heaven longed for by the Germanic warrior. This magnificent hall is in Asgard, the garden of the Ases, the gods of Old Norse mythology. Here Odin receives and welcomes the gods and all the einherjes, the brave warriors who died in battle.
The hall is resplendent with gold; spears support its ceiling, it is roofed with shields, and coats of mail adorn it. According to the Elder Edda it has six hundred and forty doors, through which nine hundred and sixty einherjes may enter side by side. The Valkyries make it a perfect paradise. As the servants of the divine host they bear the drink, take care of the mead horns and wait upon the table. Here they appear in the loveliness of their peaceful, housewifely mission. This unwarlike side of their nature should be emphasized, for it is apt to be forgotten when we think of Valkyries as spirits of the clouds flying over land and sea, driven by the wind, messengers of the storm god, shining in lightning, rattling in thunder.
Nowhere does the poetry inherent in the primitive Germanic conscience, in spite of all its apparent, warlike savagery, appear in a brighter light than in the many sagas relative to those superhuman, semi-divine beings. Their conception sheds a brilliant light upon the soul life of the primitive German as we consider it in connection with womanhood, and especially with womanhood elevated to the level of the divine.
In one way might the Valkyries be brought into subjection to man. A hero who surprised them bathing in the quiet forest lake obtained power over them if he succeeded in carrying off their feather garments, for he thus prevented them from flying away. In this respect the swan-maiden and the Valkyries are identical. A swan-maiden thus surprised must then follow the hero as his wife, until she perchance finds again her feather garment, for this will permit her to fly away as a swan. One of the loveliest passages in the Nibelungenlied is the story where fierce Hagen, the slayer of the sunny hero Siegfried, surprises the prophetesses of the Danube by stealing their raiment, and thereby forces them to reveal to him the future fate of himself and of the Burgundians wandering to the court of the Hunnish king Attila, or Etzel:
"Spake one of the mere women Hadburg was her name:
Here will we tell you, Hagen, O noble knight of fame;
If you now, gallant swordsman, our raiment but restore,
Your journey to Hunland, and all that waits you more.