TEUTONIC MYTHOLOGY. - Centrostudirpinia.it

HADU. 223
which may have reference to the streaks of the milky way ; a place
near Lethra, not far from Eoeskild, is said to have borne the name
of Bredeblick. 1 This very expression re-appears in a poem of the
twelfth century, though not in reference to a dwelling-place, but to
a host of snow-white steeds and heroes advancing over the battle
field : Do brahte Dietheriches vane zvencik clusint lossam in
foeither llickin uber lant, Both. 2635. In Wh. 381, 16 : daz
bluot uber die Uicke floz, si wurdn almeistic rotgevar, did the
blood flow over the paths of the field, or over the shining silks ?
If Bceldcey and Brond reveal to us that the worship of Balder
had a definite form of its own even outside of Scandinavia, we
may conclude from the general
diffusion of all the most essential
proper names entering into the main plot of the myth there, that
this myth as a whole was known to all Teutons. The goddess Hel,
as will be more fully shown in ch. XIII, answers to the Gothic im
personal noun halja, OHG. hella. Hoffr (ace. Ho5, gen. HaSar, dat.
HeSi), pictured as a blind god of tremendous strength (Sn. 31),
who without malice discharges the fatal arrow at Baldr, is called
Hotherus in Saxo, and implies a Goth. Hapus, AS. Hea&o, OHG.
Hadu, Frank. Chado,
of which we have still undoubted traces in
proper names and poetic compounds. OHG. Hadupraht, Hadufuns,
Hadupald, Hadufrid, Hadumar, Hadupurc, Hadulint, Haduwic
(Hedwig), &c., forms which abut close on the Catumerus in Tacitus
(Hadumar, Hadamar). In AS. poetry are still found the terms
heaSorinc (vir egregius, nobilis), Csedm. 193, 4. Beow. "737. 4927 ;
heaSowelm (belli impetus, fervor), Coedm. 21, 14. 147, 8. Beow. 164.
5633; heaSoswat (sudor bellicus), Beow. 2919. 3211. 3334; heaftowsed
(vestis bellica), Beow. 78 ; heaSubyrne (lorica bellica), Cod. exon.
297, 7 ; heatJosigel and heaSogleam (egregium jubar), Cod. exon.
486, 17 and 438, 6; heatfolac (pugnae ludus), Beow. 1862.
3943 ; heaSogrim (atrocissimus), Beow. 1090. 5378 ; heaftosioc
(pugna vulneratus), Beow. 5504 ; heaSosteap (celsus),
Beow. 2490.
4301. In these words, except where the meaning is merely intensi
fied, the prevailing idea is plainly that of battle and strife, and the
god or hero must have been thought of and honoured as a warrior.
Therefore Hafius, Ho&r, as well as Wuotan and Zio, expressed
phenomena of war ; and he was imagined blind, because he dealt
out at random good hap and ill
(p. 207). Then, beside Hoftr, we
8 Suhm. crit. hist. 2, 63.