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474 WIGHTS AND ELVES.
an adj. vit, wiz occurs nowhere else that I know of, the ON.
vitr (gen. vitrs) being provided with a suffix -r. If this etymology
is tenable, bilwiz is a good genius, but of elvish nature ; he haunts
mountains, his shot is dreaded like that of the elf (p. 460), hair
is tangled and matted by him as by the alp (p. 464). One
passage cited by Schm. 4, ] 88, deserves particular notice : so
man ain kind oder ain gewand opfert zu aim pilbispawm, if one
sacrifice a child or garment to a pilbis-tree, i.e. a tree supposed
to be inhabited by the pilwiz, as trees do contain wood-sprites
and elves. Borner s Legends of the Orlagau, p. 59. 62, name a
witch Bilbze. The change of bilwiz, bihvis into bilwiht was a step
easily taken, as in other words also s and h, or 6 and lit inter
change (lios, lioht, Gramm. 1, 138), also st and lit (forest, foreht,
Gramm. 4, 416) ; and the more, as the compound bilwiht gave
a not unsuitable meaning, good wight/ The Gl. bias. 87 a offer
a wihsilstein (penas), nay, the varying form of our present names
for the plica (p. 464), weichselzopf, wicliselzopf, wichtelzopf (bich-
telzopf) makes the similar shading off of bilweichs, bilweclis, bilwicht
probable : I have no doubt there is even a bilweichszopf,
1
bilwizzopf to be found.
Popular belief in the last few centuries, having lost the old and
higher meaning of this spiritual being, has retained, as in the case
of the alb, of Holla and Berhta, only the hateful side of its nature :
a tormenting terrifying spectre, tangling your hair and beard,
cutting up your corn, it appears mostly in a female form, as a
sorceress and witch. Martin von Amberg s Mirror of Confession
already interprets pilbis by devil, as Kilian does belewitte by
lamia, strix. The tradition lingers chiefly in Eastern Germany,
1 Another Polish name for plica, beside koltun, is wieszczyce (Linde 6, 227), and
vulgar opinion ascribes it to the magic of a wieszczka wise woman, witch. This
-iceis in bilwiz.
wieszczyce agrees with our weichsel-zopi, and also with the -wiz,
If we could point to a compound bialowieszczka (white witch, white fay ; but I
nowhere find it, not even among other Slavs), there would arise a strong suspicion
of the Slavic origin of our bilwiz ; for the present its German character seems to
me assured both by the absence of such Slavic compound, and by the AS. bilwit
and Nethl. belwitte : besides, our wiz comes from wizan, and the Pol. wieszcz from
wiedzie<5 [O.S1. vdeti, to wit] , and the kinship of the two words can be explained
without any thought of borrowing. Of different origin seem to me the Sloven,
paglawitz, dwarf, and the Lith. Pilvitus (Lasicz 54) or Pilwite (Narbutt 1, 52), god
or goddess of wealth. [The Euss. veshch (shch pron. as in parish-church) has the
same sound as wieszcz, but means thing, Goth, vaiht-s ; for kt, ht becomes shch,
as in noshch, night. I am not sure therefore that even wieszczka may
"
little wiht." TRANS.]
not be