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TEEES. 651
increased the difficulty, and savours of antiquity. 1
particle of skin that was knocked out should be eaten,
Why the
it is hard
to say ; was it to indicate that they were allowed to participate
in the sacrifice? (p. 46 ; see Suppl.).
And not only were those trees held sacred, under which men
sacrificed, and on which they hung the head or hide of the
slaughtered beast, but saplings that grew up on the top of sacri
ficed animals. A willow slip set over a dead foal or calf is not
to be damaged (Sup. I, 838) ; are not these exactly Adam o
Bremen s arbores ex morte vel tabo immolatorum divinae ? (p.
76). 2
Of hallowed trees (which are commonly addressed as frau,
dame, in the later Mid. Ages) the oak stands at the head (pp.
72-77) : an oak or beech is the arbor frugifera in casting lots
(Tac. Germ. 10). Next to the oak, the ash was holy, as we may
see by the myth of the creation of man ; the ashtree Yggdrasill
falls to be treated in Chap. XXV. The wolf, whose meeting of
f The common
you promises victory, stands under ashen boughs.
people believe that tis very dangerous to break a bough from
the ask, to this very day/ Rob. Plot s Staffordshire p. 207. One
variety, the mountain-ash or rountree, rowan-tree, is held to have
magical power (Brockett p. 177), 3
(conf. Chap. XXVII., Ronn).
With dame Hazel too our folk-songs carry on conversations, and
hazels served of old to hedge in a court of justice, as they still do
cornfields, RA. 810. According to the Ostgota-lag (bygdab. 30),
any one may in a common wood hew with impunity, all but oaks
and hazels, these have peace, i.e. immunity. In Superst. I, 972 we
are told that oak and hazel dislike one another, and cannot agree,
any more than haw and sloe (white and black thorn ; see Suppl.).
Then the elder (sambucus), OHGr. holantar, enjoyed a marked
degree of veneration ;
holan of itself denotes a tree or shrub (AS.
cneowholen=ruscus). In Lower Saxony the sambucus iiigra is
1 So the best head had to be touched backwards, RA. 396 ; so men sacrificed
with the head turned away (p. 493), and threw backwards over their heads (p. 628).
2 A scholium on Ad. of Bremen s Hist. eccl. (Pertz, scr. 7, 379) is worth
quoting : Prope illud templum (upsaliense) est arbor maxima, late ramos extendeiis,
aestate et hieme semper virens : cujus ilia generis sit, nemo scit. Ibi etiam est fons,
ubi sacrificia Paganorum solent exerceri, et homo vivus immergi, qui dum immergitur
(al. invenitur), ratum erit votum populi. To sink in water was a good
sign, as in the ordeal (BA. 924; conf. Chap. XXXIV., Witch s bath).
3 Esculus Jovi sacra, Pliny 16, 4 (5).