TEUTONIC MYTHOLOGY. - Centrostudirpinia.it

74
TEMPLES.
circular dance) round an old oak. 1 In a thicket near the village of
Wormeln, Paderborn, stands a holy oak, to which the inhabitants
of Wormeln and Calenberg still make a solemn procession every
year. 2
I am inclined to trace back to heathenism the proper name of
Holy Wood so common in nearly all parts of Germany. It is not
likely that from a Christian church situated in a wood, the wood
and in such forests, as a rule, there is
itself would be named holy ;
not a church to be found. Still less can the name be explained by
the royal ban-forests of the Mid. Ages; on the contrary, these
forests themselves appear to have sprung out of heathen groves,
and the king s right seems to have taken the place of the cultus
which first withdrew the holy wood from the common use of the
people. In such forests too there used to be sanctuaries for crimi
nals, EA. 886-9.
An old account of a battle between Franks and Saxons at
Notteln in the year 779 (Pertz 2, 377) informs us, that a badly
wounded Saxon had himself secretly conveyed from his castle into a
holy wood : Hie vero (Luibertus) magno
curn merore se in castrum
recepit. Ex quo post aliquot dies mulier egrotum humeris clam in
sylvam Sytheri, quae fuit tliegathon sacra, nocte portavit. Vulnera
ibidem lavans, exterrita clamore effugit. Ubi multa lamentatione
animam expiravit. The strange expression thegathon is explained
by T ayaOov (the good), a name for the highest divinity (summus
et princeps omnium deorum), which the chronicler borrowed from
Macrobius s somn. Scip. 1, 2, and may have chosen purposely, to
avoid naming a well-known heathen god (see Suppl.). Sytheri,
the name of the wood, seems to be the same as Sunderi (southern),
a Sundernhart
a name given to forests in more than one district, e.g.
in Franconia (Hofers urk. p. 308). Did this heathen hope for heal
ing
on the sacred soil ? or did he wish to die there ?
The forest called Dat hillige holt is mentioned by a document
in Kindlinger s Miinst. beitr. 3, 638. In the county of Hoya there
stood a Hdligen-loh (Pertz 2, 362). A long list of Alsatian
documents in Schopflin allude to the holy forest near Hagenau ;
218 (A..D. 1065) : cum foresto heiligenforst nominato in comitatu
Gerhardi comitis in pago Nortcowe. no. 238 (1106) : in sylva
1 Weddigen s westphal. mag. 3, 712,
2 Spilckers beitrage 2, 121.
no.