TEUTONIC MYTHOLOGY. - Centrostudirpinia.it

248 OTHER GODS.
dagr, Swed. logerdag, Dan. loverdag, by which in later times no
doubt washing or bathing day was meant, as the equivalent
)?vottdagr shows ; but originally Zo^adagr, Zo^adagr may have
been in use, 1 and Logi, Loki might answer to the Latin Saturnus, 2 as
the idea of devil which lay in Loki was popularly transferred to the
Jewish Satan and [what seemed to be the same thing] the heathen
Saturn, and Locki in ON. is likewise seducer, tempter, trapper.
We might even take into consideration a by-name of OSinn in
Saem. 46 a , Saftr or perhaps Sa5r, though I prefer to take the first
form as equivalent to Sannr (true) and Sanngetall.
But that AS. Sceteresbyrig from the middle of the llth century
irresistibly recalls the burg on the Harz mts, built (according to
our hitherto despised accounts of the 15th century in Bothe s
Sachsenchroriik) to the idol Saturn, which Saturn, it is added, the
common people called Krodo ; to this we may add the name
touched upon in p. 206 (HreSe, HreSemonaS),
for which an
older Hruodo, Chrodo was conjectured. 3 We are told of an image
of this Saturn or Krodo, which represented the idol as a man
standing on a great fish, holding a pot of flowers in his right hand,
and a wheel erect in his left ; the Roman Saturn was furnished
with the sickle, not a wheel (see Suppl.). 4
Here some Slav conceptions appear to overlap. Widukind
(Pertz 5, 463) mentions a brazen simulacrum Batumi among the
Slavs of the tenth century, without at all describing it ; but Old
Bohemian glosses in Hanka 14a and 17 a
carry us farther. In the
first, Mercurius is called Radihost vnuk Kirtov (Radigast grand
son of Kirt), in the second, Picus Saturni films is glossed ztracec
1 Conf. Finn Magnusen, lex. pp. 1041-2, dagens tider p. 7.
2 I suppose the author had in his mind Homer s constant epithet, Kpovos
dyKv\op.r)TT)s wily, crooked-counselled Kronos. TRANS.
3 To Hrodo might now be referred those names Roysel (later spelling
Reusel) and Roydach in Gramaye, who understands them of Mars ; ancient
documents must first place it beyond doubt, which day of the week is meant.
There is an actual Hruodtac, a man s name in OHG. (Graff 5, 362), and an OS.
be related to
Hruodo, Hrodo as Baldag to Balder, and the contraction Roydag, Rodag would
be like Roswith for Hrodsuith. If Roydag should turn out to be the seventh
HrGddag is found in Trad. corb. 424, ed. Wigand ; these may
day of the week, it would be a strong testimony to the worship of Chrodo ;
it remain the third, we have to add, that the third month also was sacred to
Mars, and was called ffrefremonaS by the Anglo-Saxons.
4 The Kaiserchr. 3750 says, to Saturn we offer quicksilver ; whereas now
Saturn s symbol signifies lead. In Megenber;;, Saturn is called Satjdr. The
Saxon Saturn is supported by Hengest s reference to that god . (Extracted
from Suppl., vol. iii.)
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