TEUTONIC MYTHOLOGY. - Centrostudirpinia.it

SACRIFICE. 39
exon. 245, 29. 251, 24. h^Qugield, Cod. exon. 243, 23. OHG.
heidan&e/ sacrilegium : gote ir gelt bringent, Warn. 2906. offer-
micghelstar, sacrificium, Is. 395. dhiu blostar iro ghelstro, Is. 382.
Peculiar to the AS. dialect is the general term Idc, neut., often
rendered more definite by verbs containing
the notion of sacrifice :
onbldot J?et Idc gode, Csedm. 177,, 26. dryhtne Idc brohton, 60, 2.
Idc bebeodan v 173, 9. Idc onssegde, 107, 21. 113, 15. ongan Idc,
90, 19 (see SuppL). The word seems to be of the same root as the
Goth. masc. laiks (saltatio), OHG. leih (Indus, modus), ON", leikr,
and to have signified at first the dance and play that accompanied a
sacrifice, then gradually the gift itself. 1 That there was playing
and singing at sacrifices is shown by the passages quoted further
on, from Gregory s dialogues and Adam of Bremen.
The following expressions I regard as more definite (see SuppL).
Ulph. in Eom. 11, 16 renders airap-)^, the offering of firstfruits at
a sacrifice, delibatio, by ufarskafts, which I derive not from skapan,
but from skaban (shave) radere, since airapyai were the first
clippings of hair off the victim s forehead, Odyss. 14, 422. 3, 446.
If we explain it from skapan, this word must have passed from its
meaning of creare into that of facere, immolare. The Goth, vitod
is lex, the OHG. ivizot (Graff 1, 1112. Fundgr. 1, 398 b
) both lex
and eucharistia, the Fris. vitat invariably the latter alone ; just as
zakon in Serv. has both meanings [but in Euss. only that of lex].
-Ulph. translates Ovaia by Goth, hunsl, Matt. 9, 13. Mk. 9, 49.
then again \arpe(av Trpocrtyepeiv
in John 16, 2 by Jmnsla
Lu. 2, 24 ;
saljan, where the reference is expressly to killing. And Qvo-iao-rrjpiov
is called hunslastafis, Matt. 5, 23-4. Lu. 1, 11. But the corre
sponding AS. Msel, Engl. housel, allows of being applied to a
Christian sacrament, and denotes the eucharist, huselgong the
partaking of it, kdselfat the sacred vessel of sacrifice ; conf. Csedm.
260, 5 hdselMu halegu for the sacred vessels of Jerusalem. Like-
.wise the OK Ms/ in the Norw. and Swed. laws is used in a
Christian, never in a heathen sense. No Jiunsal is found in OHG.;
neither can I guess the root of the word. Twice, however, Ulph.
1 Serv. prilog offering, what is laid before, prilozhiti to offer ; Sloven, dar,
darina, daritva = dwpov. [Buss. clarii sviatiiye = dupa iepa means ^
eucharist.] The Sloven aldov, bloodless offering, seems not to be Slavic, it
resembles Hung, aldozat. Qvaia is rendered in 0. Slav, by zhrtva (Kopitar s
Glagol. 72C
), in Russ. by zhertva [fr. zhariti to roast, burn ? or zhrati devour,
zhera glutton ?].
the