TEUTONIC MYTHOLOGY. - Centrostudirpinia.it

THUNAE. 175
country about the 1
year 1240 or 1244 three j times did priests and
people march round (nudis pedibus et in laneis), but all in vain,
because in calling upon all the saints they had forgotten the Mother
of God ; so, when the saintly choir laid the petition before God,
Mary opposed. In a new procession a solemn salve regina was
sung : Et cum serenum tempus ante f uisset, tanta inundatio pluviae
facta est, ut fere omnes qui in processione aderant, hac illacque
dispergerentur. With the Lithuanians, the holy goddess (dievaite
sventa) is a rain-goddess. Heathendom probably addressed the
petition for rain to the thundergod, instead of to Elias and Mary. 2
Yet I cannot call to mind a single passage, even in ON. legend,
where Thorr is said to have bestowed rain when it was asked for ;
we are only told that he sends stormy weather when he is angry,
Olafs Tryggv. saga 1, 302-6 (see SuppL). But we may fairly take
into account his general resemblance to Zeus and Jupiter (who are
expressly veno?, pluvius, II. 12, 25 : ve Zevs cruz/e%e?), and the pre
valence of votis imlrem wcare among all the neighbouring nations
(see SuppL).
A description by Petronius cap. 44, of a Eoman procession for
rain, agrees closely with that given above from the Mid. Ages :
Antea stolatae ibant nudis pedibus in clivum, passis capillis, menti-
bus puris, et Jovem aquam exoralant ; itaque statim urceatim (in
bucketfuls) pluebat, aut tune aut nunquam, et omnes ridebant, uvidi
tanquam mures. M. Antoninus (eZs eavrov 5, 7) has preserved the
beautifully simple prayer
of the Athenians for rain :
AOrjvaiwv, vcrov, vcrov, w <t\e Zev, Kara TT}? dpovpas r?}?
teal TWV 7re$lo)v (see SuppL). According to Lasicz, the Lithuanian
prayer ran thus : Percune devaite niemuski und mana dirvu (so I
emend dievu), melsu tavi, palti miessu. Cohibe te, Percune, neve
in meum agrum calamitatem immittas (more simply, strike not),
ego vero tibi hanc succidiam dabo. The Old Prussian formula is
spare us, = Lith.
To
said to have been : Dievas Perkunos, absolo mus !
apsaugok mus !
all this I will add a more extended petition in
Esthonian, as Gutslaff3 heard an old peasant say it as late as the
1
Aegidius aureae vallis cap. 135 (Chapeauville 2, 267-8). ,
Chron.
belg.
magn. ad ann. 1244 (Pistorius 3, 263).
2 Other saints also grant rain in answer to prayer, as St Mansuetus in
Pertz 6, 512 b . 513 b ; the body of St Lupus carried about at Sens in 1097,
Pertz 1, 106-7. Conf. infra, Rain-making.
3 Joh. Gutslaff, kurzer bericht und unterricht von der falsch heilig ge-