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564 CEEATION.
no mano (moon) ni liuhta noh der mareoseo (sea).
do dar niwiht ni was enteo ni wenteo,
enti do was der eino almahtico Cot (Almighty God alone).
The last line may sound completely Christian, and the preceding
ones may have nothing directly opposed to Christian doctrine ;
yet the juxtaposition of earth and heaven, tree and mountain,
sun [and star], moon and sea, also the archaic forms ero (terra),
ufhimil (ccelum), mareoseo (mare, Goth, marisaivs), which must
be thrown into the scale,
all have a ring of the Edda :
Vara sandr ne sasr, ne svalar unnir,
ior<5 fanz seva ne upphiminn,
gap var ginnunga, enn gras hvergi.
sol ]?at ne vissi hvar hon sali atti,
stiornor ]?at ne visso hvar J?aer stafti titto,
mani ]?at ne vissi hvat hann megins atti.
The words (
niwiht ni was enteo ni wenteo give in roundabout
phrase exactly the notion of ginnungagap. 1
These hints of heathenism have gained additional force, now
that OHG. and OS. songs are found to retain the technical term
muspilli = ON. muspell ; the close connexion between nifl, Nifllieim,
and the Nibelungen so intergrown with our epos (p. 372) does
not in any case admit of doubt. Now if these two poles of the
Scandinavian chaos entered into the belief of all Teutonic nations,
the notion of creation as a whole must have been as widely
spread. It has been shewn that the Old-German opinion about
giants, gods, men and dwarfs closely agreed with the Norse I ;
am now able further to produce, though in inverted order, the
same strange connexion described in the Edda between a giant s
and the world s creation.
body
Four documents, lying far apart in respect of time and place
(and these may some day be reinforced by others) transmit to us
a notable account of the creation of the first man. But, while
the Edda uses up the giant s gutted and dismembered frame to
make a heaven and earth, here on the contrary the whole world
is made use of to create man s body.
Conf also
tv, \ V P tf iL 1 3 : 6r 6 ioh himil
;-
wurti, ioh erda ouh so herti, and
the description of chaos in Caedmon 7. 8, particularly the term lieohtersceado 7,
;
1S r n thing PP sed to BiMe doctrine. Conf. Aristopb.
A
Si