Untitled - Centrostudirpinia.it

BOAE. DOG. BEAE. 667
which makes his name a handle to the tongue of the scorner. It
seems worthy of notice,, that dogs can see spirits (Sup. I, 1111),
and recognise an approaching god while he is yet hidden from
the human eye. When Grimnir entered the house of Geirro^r,
there was eingi Jiundr sva olmr, at a hann mundi hlaupa/ the
king bade seize the dark-cloaked giant, er eigi vildo hundar
ara^a/ Ssem. 39. 40. So when Hel prowls about, the dogs per
ceive her. The Greeks had exactly the same notion : at Athena s
approach, no one espies her, not even Telemachos, only Odysseus
and the dogs, Od. 16, 160 :
ov& apa T^Xe/ma^o? iBev awrlov, ovS evb r
ov TTcb 7TttVT6<Tcn, Oeol e
<ydp
(paivovrai,
re
r]<Tev,
(they did not bark, but fled whining through the tent). The
howling of dogs is ominous (Sup. I, 493), and gives notice of fire.
OSinn is provided with dogs, VrSris grey/ Seem. 151 a
; so are
whence arose the
the norns (p. 410), norna grey/ 273 a . But
story in the early Mid. Ages, of St. Peter and his dog
AS. Saturn and Solomon (Kemble p. 186), one asks: e
? In the
saga me,
hwilc man erost wsere wift Jiund sprecende ? and the other
answers : ic J?e secge, sanctus Petrus/ The Nialss. cap. 158 p.
275 contains a spell to save from the power of the watersprite :
runnit hefr Jiundr fcinn, Petr postoli, till Roms tysvar (twice), ok
mundi (would) renna it J?rr3ja sinn, ef J?u leyfdir (see Sup pi.).
Among wild beasts of the wood were some that men regarded
with awe, and treated with respect : above all, the bear, wolf and
fox. I have shewn that it was an ancient and widespread custom
in Europe to bestow names of honour on these three (Reinh. p.
2
Iv. ccvii. 446), and that with our ancestors the bear passed for
A doc. of 1290 (Lang s
the king of beasts (p. xlviii. seq. ccxcv.).
Reg. 4, 467) presents the surname Chuonrat der heiligbar ; with
this connect the name Halecbern (Trad. corb. Wig. 268), the
ON. Hallbiorn, and the still older names, male and female, ON.
and not bark
1 In a Dan. folksong 1, 207-9 they bark at a spectre. Barking
ing are the same thing here.
2 A striking confirmation appears in V. Hugo s Notre Dame de Paris 2, 272 : he
states, from a book or from oral tradition, that the Gipsies call the fox piedbleu,
coureur des bois, the wolf piedgris, pieddore, and the bear vieux or grandpere.