“Wífman beó ðæs ylcan wyrðe, gif heó tilað hire cilde mid ǽnigum wiccecræfte, oððe æt wega gelǽton ðurh ða eorðan tihð: eala ðæt is mycel hǽðenscipe.”
The Canons enacted under Eádgár give the following full details of popular heathendom[[870]]:—
“And we enjoin, that every priest zealously promote Christianity, and totally extinguish every heathenism; and forbid well-worshippings, and necromancies, and divinations, and enchantments, and man-worshippings, and the vain practices which are carried on with various spells, and with ‘frithsplots,’ and with elders, and also with various other trees, and with stones, and with many various delusions, with which men do much of what they should not.”
Many of these heathen practices still continue to subsist, at least in the memory and traditions of the peasantry in remote parts of England. Devonshire, for example, still offers an unexhausted field for the collector[collector] both of popular superstitions and popular tales, counterparts of which are current in Germany. The Anglosaxon herbals[[871]] furnish various evidences of heathendom connected with plants, but I pass over these in order to give one or two detailed Saxon spells, which are of the utmost value, as bearing unmistakeable marks of Anglosaxon paganism. The following spells are taken from a MS. in the Harleian collection, No. 585.
1. “Wið Cyrnel. Neogone wǽran Noðþæs sweoster, þá wurdon ða nygone tó viii. ⁊ þa viii. tó vii. ⁊ þa vii. tó vi. ⁊ þa vi. tó v. ⁊ þa v. tó iiii. ⁊ þa iiii. tó iii. ⁊ þa iii. tó ii. ⁊ þa ii. tó i. ⁊ þa i. tó nánum. þis þe libbe cyrnneles ⁊ scrofellef ⁊ weormeþ ⁊ ǽghwylces yfeles. Sing benedicite nygon síþum[[872]].”
2. “Se wífman se hire cild áfédan ne mǽg, gange tó gewitenes mannes birgenne ⁊ stæppe ðonne þriwa ofer ða byrgenne, ⁊ cweðe ðonne þriwa ðás word: Ðis me tó bóte ðǽre láðan lætbyrde: Ðis me tó bóte ðǽre swæran swært byrde: Ðis me tó bóte ðǽre láðan lambyrde. And ðonne ðæt wíf seó mid bearne, ⁊ heó to hire hláforde on reste gá, ðonne cweðe heó:
“Up ic gonge,
ofer ðe stæppe,
mid cwican cilde,
nalæs mid cwellendum,