"The earliest records of the Germanic peoples were recorded by the Romans, and in these works Odin is frequently referred to—via a process known as interpretatio romana (where characteristics perceived to be similar by Romans result in identification of a non-Roman god as a Roman deity)—as the Roman god Mercury.
The first clear example of this occurs in the Roman historian Tacitus's late 1st-century work Germania, where, writing about the religion of the Suebi (a confederation of Germanic peoples), he comments that "among the gods Mercury is the one they principally worship. They regard it as a religious duty to offer to him, on fixed days, human as well as other sacrificial victims.
Hercules and Mars they appease by animal offerings of the permitted kind" and adds that a portion of the Suebi also venerate "Isis". In this instance, Tacitus refers to the god Odin as "Mercury", Thor as "Hercules", and Týr as "Mars", and the identity of the "Isis" of the Suebi has been debated"
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"In a 2012 paper, Joseph S. Hopkins and Haukur Þorgeirsson propose a connection between a Vanir goddess, particularly Freyja, and the ship symbolism of the "Isis" of the Suebi.
The two propose that Old Norse texts mentioning Fólkvangr and Sessrúmnir present an image of a 'ship in the field', implying a strong association between Freyja and ship imagery, particularly the stone ships of Scandinavia."
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"Blót is the term for "sacrifice" in Norse paganism. A blót could be dedicated to any of the Norse gods, the spirits of the land, and to ancestors. The sacrifice involved aspects of a sacramental meal or feast.
The cognate term blōt or geblōt in Old English would have referred to comparable traditions in Anglo-Saxon paganism, and comparanda can also be reconstructed for the wider (prehistoric) Germanic Indo-European.
The word also appears in a compound attested in Old Norse as blót-hús "house of worship" and in Old High German as bluoz-hūz "temple". With a different nominative affix, the same stem is found in the Proto-Germanic noun *blōstrą "sacrifice" — attested in Gothic *𐌱𐌻𐍉𐍃𐍄𐍂 (*blostr) in 𐌾𐌿𐌸-𐌱𐌻𐍉𐍃𐍄𐍂𐌴𐌹𐍃 (guþ-blostreis) "worshipper of God" and Old High German bluostar "offering, sacrifice").
This stem is thought to be connected to the Proto-Germanic verb *blōaną "to blow; to bloom, blossom", as are the words for "blood" (Proto-Germanic *blōþą) and "bloom" (Proto-Germanic *blōmô).
Sophus Bugge was the first to suggest a connection between blót and the Latin flamen (< *flădmen), and both words can be traced back to the Proto-Indo-European stem *bhlād- "to bubble forth; to mumble, murmur, blather"
"The verb blóta meant "to worship with sacrifice",[2] or "to strengthen".[3] The sacrifice usually consisted of animals or war prisoners, in particular pigs and horses. The meat was boiled in large cooking pits with heated stones, either indoors or outdoors. The blood was considered to contain special powers and it was sprinkled on the statues of the gods, on the walls and on the participants themselves.
The drink that was passed around was beer or mead."
"The word is attested in an explicitly pre-Christian context primarily in Old Norse. Among many others (see List of names of Odin), the long-bearded god Odin bears the names jólfaðr (Old Norse for 'Yule father') and jólnir ('the Yule one').
In Ágrip af Nóregskonungasögum, written in the 12th century, it is explicitly stated that Christmas, iol, comes from a name of Odin, iolne.
In plural (Old Norse jólnar, 'the Yule ones') may refer to the Norse gods in general.
In Old Norse poetry, the word is often employed as a synonym for 'feast', such as in the kenning hugins jól (Old Norse 'Huginn's Yule' → 'a raven's feast')"
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