TEUTONIC MYTHOLOGY. - Centrostudirpinia.it

One might be tempted
HOLDA, HOLLE. 271
to derive dame Holda from a character
in the Old Testament. In 2 Kings 22, 14 and 2 Chron. 34, 22 we
read of a prophetess ?TT7il Huleddah, Huldah,
for which Luther
puts Hulda ; the Septuagint has O\8a, the Vulgate Olda, but the
Lat. Bible Viteb. 1529 (and probably others since) Hulda,
following Luther, who, with the German Holda in his mind, thus
domesticated the Jewish prophetess among his countrymen.
Several times in his writings he brings up the old heathen life we
had an instance a page or two back. 1
I do not know if any one
before him had put the two names together; but certainly the
whole conception of a dame Holda was not first drawn from the
Olda of the Vulgate, which stands there without any special
significance; this is proved by the deep-rootedness of the name
in our language, by its general application [as adj. and com.
noun] to several kinds of spirits, and by the very ancient negative
unholda.
Were it only for the kinship of the Norse traditions with our
own, we should bid adieu to such a notion as that. True, the
Eddie mythology has not a Holla answering to our Holda ; but
Snorri (Yngl. saga c. 16. 17) speaks of a wise woman (volva,
seiSkona) named Suldr, and a later Icelandic saga composed in
the 14th century gives a circumstantial account of the enchantress
Hulda, beloved of OSinu, and mother of the well-known halt-
goddesses ThorgerSr and Irpa. 2 Of still more weight perhaps
are some Norwegian and Danish folk-tales about a wood or
mountain wife Sulla, Huldra, Huldre, whom they set forth, now
as young and lovely, then again as old and gloomy. In a blue garment
and white veil she visits the pasture-grounds of herdsmen, and
mingles in the dances of men ;
but her shape is disfigured by a tail,
which she takes great pains to conceal. Some accounts make her
beautiful in front and ugly behind. She loves music and song, her
lay has a doleful melody and is called huldreslaat. In the forests
you see Huldra as an old woman clothed in gray, marching at the
head of her flock, milkpail in hand. She is said to carry off
people s unchristened infants from them. Often she appears, not
alone, but as mistress or queen of the mountain-sprites, who are
1 I believe Luther followed the Hebrew, merely dropping the final h t as
he does in Jehova, Juda, &c. TRANS.
2 Muller s sagabibl. 1, 3636.