It will be necessary, in the next place, to identify the other nations which occupied the interior of Europe from the second to the fifth century, with one of the great nations before alluded to, in order to arrive at the point in question. The incursions made by the barbarians, as they were called, from the North into Italy, which eventuated in the overthrow of the Roman empire, have generally been attributed to people who crossed the Baltic into Denmark, thence into Germany, where, uniting with other tribes, they concentrated their power, and established an empire between the Euxine and Adriatic, on both sides of the Danube. The most distinguished of these German nations, as they were called, were the Goths, Vandals, Visigoths, and Gepidæ. 'In ancient times,' says Procopius, 'they were called Sauromatæ and Melanchlæri, and by some the Gætic nation. They thus differ from each other in name, but in nothing else; for they are all fair, yellow-haired, and good-looking; they observe the same institutions, and worship the same God, as they are all of the Arian sect; and they use the same language, which is called Gothic. It therefore appears to me, that they were all originally the same nation.'[5]
The affinities of language which are so apparent in the languages of the north of Europe and Germany, as well as in Great Britain, do not require any evidence to prove their identity of origin; and if their language was the same, the natural conclusion is, that the people were the same. Gibbon states, that the German nations originally emigrated from Scandinavia; but his authority was Jornandes, who abridged the history of the Goths, as written by Cassiodorus, before alluded to, which is considered as indifferent authority.
Acknowledging the Goths and Scandinavians to be the same, one originated in the other, or each, migrating from the parent stock, must have taken a different course to reach their respective countries. The latter must necessarily have passed around the Gulf of Bothnia to reach Sweden and Norway, or must have passed to the south of the Baltic, through the country of the Goths. The former course is altogether improbable, and the latter makes them a branch of the Gothic nation, which is far the most probable. After quoting numerous authors on this subject, Vans Kennedy comes to the conclusion, that from the Hellespont the Thracians gradually extended themselves to the shores of the Baltic, and thence to Scandinavia. This hypothesis is far the most reasonable, inasmuch as it has support from the analogies of languages; from a close resemblance in the complexion, color of hair, eyes, etc., and from the testimony of history itself. The Thracians, as before observed, were one of the primitive nations of Europe. They are repeatedly noticed by Homer, who speaks of them as a numerous and hardy race. Alluding to their country, he says:
'To where the Mysians prove their martial force,
And hardy Thracians tame the savage horse;
And where the far-famed Hippomolgian strays,
Renown'd for justice and for length of days;
Thrice happy race!'
Iliad, b. xiii., v. 1, p. 13.
They are afterward spoken of by Herodotus, and subsequently by Procopius, from the latter of which we have quoted. As a nation, the Thracians have long been extinct. Even of their language there remains no vestige, except what is seen in the Teutonic languages at the North; those of the South, of Pelargic origin, are by some philologists derived from the Thracian, inasmuch as the affinities of the languages of the north and south of Europe are sufficient to deduce them from some earlier language, all traces of which are extinct.
This subject might be carried much farther, by tracing the analogies of language which exist between the German and Sanscrit, or between the English and Sanscrit, and of the affinity between the Persian and the two European languages named. They are all so striking as to place it beyond a doubt that some connexion existed at a very remote period of antiquity, between the people by whom these languages are spoken. On this point, the great philologist Adelung observes, that it has excited the greatest wonder and astonishment. 'The fact is undeniable; and the German found in Persian consists not only of a remarkable number of radical words, but also in particles, and is even observable in the grammatical structure. This circumstance will admit of two explanations, either from a later intermingling of the two languages, after they were completely formed, or from their both being derived from the same mother tongue.'[6]
Having thus traced the Scandinavians to the Thracians, which latter people, from their proximity to Asia, must have preserved parts of their mother tongue, particularly if that was the Persian or Zend, and noticed the remarkable affinity existing, even in our day, in the languages of Teutonic people (of which the Scandinavians are one) and the Persian, the antiquity of the former, and their descent from one of the original nations of Asia, will be sufficiently apparent, to take up the subject which heads this article.
The early history of the North was traditionary, until the introduction of Christianity, with which Roman letters were also introduced. These were easily adapted to express the various sounds of their languages; and being much more convenient and applicable to reduce their songs, tales, and histories into, than the characters heretofore used, they were soon after embodied in them. The letters in use, previous to the introduction of the Roman alphabet, were Runic. This alphabet consisted of sixteen letters, which are said to be Phœnician in their origin, and to have been introduced by Odin. They were used to sculpture important events on rocks and monuments, many of which are still found in various parts of the North, as well as in Great Britain. In another place, a more particular account will be given of these Runes, as they are called, accompanied by translations.
It does not appear that the Runic letters had ever been employed to much extent, on parchment, to record passing events, or to preserve the lays, which memory alone had transmitted from generation to generation. Like all other people of antiquity, the Scandinavians had their bards, synonymous with the rhapsodists of Greece. They were known by the name of Skalds, and were both poets and historians. 'They were the companions and chroniclers of kings, who liberally rewarded their genius, and sometimes entered the lists with them in trials of skill in their own art. A regular succession of this order of men was perpetuated—a list of two hundred and thirty in number, of the most distinguished in the three kingdoms of Norway, Denmark, and Sweden, among whom are several crowned heads, and distinguished warriors of the heroic age. Canute the Great retained several Skalds at his court, among whom was one from Iceland, 'who,' says Snorre Sturleson, 'having composed a short poem on Canute, went, for the purpose of reciting it, to the king, who was just rising from table, and thronged with suitors. The impatient poet craved an audience from the king for his lay, assuring him that it was very short. The wrath of Canute was kindled, and he answered the Skald with a stern look: 'Are you not ashamed to do what none but yourself has dared—to write a short poem upon me? Unless, by the hour of dinner to-morrow, you produce a drapa, above thirty strophes long, on the same subject, your life shall pay the penalty.' The inventive genius of the poet did not desert him. He produced the required poem, and was liberally rewarded by the king with fifty marks of silver.[7] The improvisatores of modern times forcibly remind us of the northern Skalds, who, without the genial skies and classic land of Italy to excite their imagination, produced their lays with equal facility, and expressed their ideas, which correspond with the wildness and rigidity of the North, as the Italian bards assimilate their effusions with the mildness of their climate, and the delightful landscapes with which they were surrounded. Southey thus alludes to them: