TEUTONIC MYTHOLOGY. - Centrostudirpinia.it

GROVES. 73
reddiderunt. Tune autem summae sanctitatis antistes consilio inito
cum fratribus ex supradictae arboris materia oratorium *) construxit,
dedicavit. From that time
illudque in honore S. Petri apostoli
Christianity had in this place a seat in Hesse ; hard by was the
ancient capital of the nation, Mattium (Marburg), id genti caput,
Tac. Ann. 1, 56 ;
which continued in the Mid. Ages to be the chief
seat of government. According to Landau, the oak and the church
built out of it stood on the site of St. Peter s church at Fritzlar.
The whole region is well wooded (see Suppl.).
Not unsimilar are some passages contained in the Vita S.
Amandi (f 674), on the wood and tree worship of the northern
Franks: Acta Bened. sec. 2. p. 714, 715, 718)
pagum esse, cui vocabulum Gandavum, cujus
: Amandus audivit
loci habitatores ini-
quitas diaboli eo circumquaque laqueis vehementer irretivit, ut
incolae terrae illius, relicto deo, arbores et ligna pro deo colerent,
atque fana vel idola adorarent. Ubi fana destruebantur, statim
monasteria aut ecclesias construebat. Amandus in pago belvacense
verbum domini dum praedicaret, pervenit ad quendam locum, cui
vocabulum est Rossonto juxta Aronnam fluvium . . . respondit
ilia, quod non ob aliam causam ei ipsa coecitas evenisset, nisi quod
auguria vel idola semper coluerat. insuper ostendit ei locum, in
quo praedictum idolum adorare consueverat, scilicet arborem, quae
erat daemoni dedicate/, . .
f nunc igitur accipe securim et hanc
succidere festina .
nefandam arborem quantocius
Among the Saxons and Frisians the veneration of groves lasted
much longer. At the beginning of the llth century, bishop Unwan
of Bremen (conf. Adam. Brem. 2, 33) had all such woods cut down
among the remoter inhabitants of his diocese : lucos in episcopatu
suo, in quibus paludicolae regionis illius errore veteri cum profes-
sione falsa christianitatis immolabant, succidit; Vita Meinwerci,
cap- 22. Of the holy tree in the Old Saxon Irminsijul I will treat
in ch. VI. Several districts of Lower Saxony and Westphalia
have until quite recent times preserved vestiges of holy oaks, to
which the people paid a half heathen half Christian homage. Thus,
in the principality of Minden, on Easter Sunday, the young people
of both sexes used with loud cries of joy to dance a reigen (rig,
1 Other MS. have mole (
or metallo . A brazen image on the oak is not
to be thought of, as such a thing would have been alluded to
or follows.
in what precedes