The poenitentials of the church and the acts of the witena-gemóts are full of prohibitions directed against the open or secret practice of heathendom[[622]]; from them we learn that even till the time of Cnut, well-worship and tree-worship, the sanctification of places, spells, philtres and witchcraft, were still common enough to call for legislative interference; and the heavy doom of banishment, proclaimed against their upholders, proves how deeply rooted such pagan customs were in the minds of the people. Still in the Ecclesiastical History of Beda, in the various works which in later times were founded upon it and continued it, in the poenitentials and confessionals of the church, in the acts of the secular assemblies, we look in vain for the sacred names in which the fanes were consecrated, or for even the slightest hint of the attributes of the gods whose idols or images had been set up. Excepting the cursory mention of the two female divinities already noticed, and one or two almost equally rapid allusions in later chronicles, we are left almost entirely without direct information respecting the tenants of the Saxon Pantheon. There are however other authorities, founded on traditions more ancient than Beda himself, from which we derive more copious, if not more definite accounts. First among these are the genealogies of the Anglosaxon kings: these contain a multitude of the ancient gods, reduced indeed into family relations, and entered in the grades of a pedigree, but still capable of identification with the deities of the North and of Germany. In this relation we find Wóden, Bældæg, Geát, Wig, and Frea. The days of the week, also dedicated to gods, supply us further with the names of Tiw, Ðunor, Fricge and Sætere; and the names of places in all parts of England attest the wide dispersion of their worship. These, as well as the names of plants, are the admitted signs by which we recognize the appellations of the Teutonic gods.
1. WÓDEN, in Old-norse OÞINN, in Old-german WUOTAN.—The royal family of every Anglosaxon kingdom, without exception, traces its descent from Wóden through some one or other of those heroes or demigods who are familiar to us in the German and Scandinavian traditions[[623]]. But the divinity of Wóden is abundantly clear: he is both in form and in fact identical with the Norse Oþinn and the German Wuotan, the supreme god of all the northern races, whose divinity none will attempt to dispute[[624]]. Nor was this his character unknown to our early chroniclers; Malmesbury, speaking of Hengest and Hors, says: “They were the great-great-grandsons of that most ancient Wóden, from whom the royal families of almost all the barbarous nations derive their lineage; whom the nations of the Angles madly believing to be a god, have consecrated unto him the fourth day of the week, and the sixth unto his wife Frea, by a sacrilege which lasts even unto this day[[625]].” Matthew of Westminster[[626]] and Geoffry of Monmouth[[627]] repeat this with characteristic variations, both adding, apparently in the words of Tacitus[[628]], “Colimus maxime Mercurium, quem Wóden lingua nostra appellamus.” Æðthelweard, an Anglosaxon nobleman of royal blood, and thus himself a descendant of Wóden, had previously stated the same thing after the fashion of his own age,—the tenth century; he says of Hengest and Hors: “Hi nepotes fuere Uuoddan regis barbarorum, quem post, infanda dignitate, ut deum honorantes, sacrificium obtulerunt pagani, victoriae causa sive virtutis[[629]].” Again, he says: “Wothen, qui et rex multarum gentium, quem pagani nunc ut deum colunt aliqui.” Thus, according to him, Wóden was worshiped as the giver of victory, and as the god of warlike valour. And such is the description given by Adam of Bremen of the same god, at Upsala in Sweden: “In hoc templo, quod totum ex auro paratum est, statuas trium deorum veneratur populus, ita ut potentissimus eorum Thór in medio solum habeat triclinium, hinc et inde locum possident Wódan et Fricco. Quorum significationes eiusmodi sunt: Thór, inquiunt, praesidet in aere, qui tonitrus et fulmina, ventos imbresque, serena et fruges gubernat. Alter Wódan, id est Fortior, bella regit, hominumque ministrat virtutem contra inimicos. Tertius est Fricco, pacem voluptatemque largiens mortalibus. Cuius etiam simulachrum fingunt ingenti Priapo. Wódanem vero sculpunt armatum, sicuti nostri Martem sculpere solent. Thór autem cum sceptro Jovem exprimere videtur.” The Exeter book names Wóden in a similar spirit:
Hǽðnum synne
Wóden worhte weohs,
wuldor alwealda
rúme roderas[[630]],
that is, “For the heathen Wóden wrought the sin of idolatry, but the glorious almighty God the spacious skies:” and an early missionary is described to have thus taught his hearers: “Wóden vero quem principalem deum crediderunt et praecipuum Angli, de quo originem duxerant, cui et quartam feriam consecraverant, hominem fuisse mortalem asseruit, et regem Saxonum, a quo plures nationes genus duxerant. Huius, inquit, corpore in pulverem resoluto, anima in inferno sepulta aeternum sustinet ignem[[631]].”
To Wóden was dedicated the fourth or mid-day of the week, and it still retains his name: this among other circumstances tends to the identification of him with Mercurius[[632]]. The Old-norse Rúnatale þáttr which introduces Oþinn declaring himself to be the inventor of runes[[633]], is confirmed by the assertion in the dialogue of Salomon and Saturn, which to the question “Who invented letters?” answers, “I tell thee, Mercury the giant”—that is, “Wóden the god:” and this is further evidence of resemblance. A metrical homily in various collections, bearing the attractive title De falsis diis, supplies us with further proof of this identification, not only with Wóden, but with the Norse Oþinn: it says,
| Sum man was geháten Mercurius on life, se was swíðe fácenful and swícol on dǽdum, and lufode eác stala and leásbrednysse: ðone macodon ða hǽðenan him tó mǽran gode, and æt wega gelǽtum him lác offrodon, and tó heágum beorgum him bróhton onsægdnysse. Ðæs god wæs árwurða betwux callum hǽðenum, and he is Oþon geháten óðrum naman on Denisc. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Ðone feorðan dæg hí sealdon him tó frófre ðám foresædan Mercurie heora mǽran gode[[634]]. | A man there was, called Mercury during life, who was very fraudulent and deceitful in deeds, and eke loved thefts and deception: him the heathen made a powerful god for themselves, and by the road-sides made him offerings, and upon high hills brought him sacrifice. This god was honourable among all the heathen, and he is called Odin by another name in Danish. |
| . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . The fourth day they gave for their advantage to the aforesaid Mercury their great god. | |
Thus we have Mercurius, Wóden and Oþinn sufficiently identified. A careful investigation of the inner spirit of Greek mythology has led some very competent judges to see a form of Hermes in Odysseus. This view derives some corroboration from the Teutonic side of the question, and the relation in which Wóden stands to Mercurius. Even Tacitus had learnt that Ulixes had visited Germany, and there founded a town which he called Asciburgium[[635]]; and without insisting on the probability that Asciburgium grew out of a German Anseopurc or a Scandinavian Asgard, it seems not unreasonable to suppose that some tales of Wóden had reached the ears of the Roman, which seemed to him to resemble the history of Odysseus and his wanderings. Such a tale we yet possess in the adventures of Thorkill on his journey to Utgardaloki, narrated by Saxo Grammaticus, which bears a remarkable likeness to some parts of the Odyssey[[636]]; and when we consider Saxo’s very extraordinary mode of rationalizing ancient mythological traditions, we shall admit at least the probability of an earlier version of the tale which would be much more consonant with the suggestion of Tacitus, although this earlier form has unfortunately not survived. Wóden is, like Odysseus, preeminently the wanderer; he is Gangradr, Gangleri, the restless, moving deity. Even the cloak, hood or hat in which Oþinn is always clad[[637]] reminds us both of the petasus of Hermes and the broad hat which Odysseus generally wears on ancient gems and pottery. That Wóden was worshiped æt wega gelǽtum, and that he was the peculiar patron of boundaries, again recalls to us this function of Hermes, and the Ἔρμαια. When we hear that offerings were brought to him upon the lofty hills, we are reminded that there was an ἄκριος, or Mountain Hermes too, though little known; and the Ἑρμῆς προμάχος, perhaps as little known as his mountain brother, answers to the warlike, victory-giving deity of our forefathers in his favourite form.