Cox, George - Aryan Mythology Vol 2.pdf

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WAYLAND.
that name remained unchanged in the language of theology,
the word devil passed into an immense number of forms, the
Gothic tieyal, diuval, diufal, the Icelandic djofull, Swedish
djevful, all of them, together with the Italian, French, and
Spanish forms carrying back the word SidftoXos to the same
root which furnised the Latin Divus, Djovis, and the San-
skrit deva. 1 To this devil were applied familiarly those
epithets which are bestowed in the Yedic hymns on the
antagonist of Indra. Like Vritra, he is often spoken of
simply as the fiend or the enemy (o Trovrjpos) ; more often
he is described as the old devil or serpent, the ealda deofol
of Csedmon, the old Nick 2 and old Davy of common English
speech at the present day. Like Pani, he is Yalant, the
cheat or seducer, 3 who appears in a female form as Valan-
dinne. 4 But to the Germans the fall of the devil from
heaven suggested the idea that, like Hephaistos, he must
have been lamed by the descent, and hence we have the lame
devil, or devil upon two sticks, who represents the limping
Hephaistos not only in his gait but in his office. Like
him, the Valant is a smith, and the name, which has
assumed elsewhere the forms Faland, Phaland, Poland,
Yalland, passes into the English form Wayland, and gives
us the Wayland Smith whom Tresilian confronts in Scott's
novel of Kenilworth. 5 Like the robbers who steal Indra's
cattle, he is also the dark, murky, or black being, the
Graumann or Greyman of German folk-lore. 6 Like the
Fauns and other mythical beings of Greek and Latin
mythology, he has a body which is either wholly or in part
that of a beast. Some times he leaves behind him the print
of a horse's hoof, and the English demon Grant, another
1 Grimm, Deutsche Mythologie, 939.
2 This name, one of a vast number of
forms through which the root of the
Greek W/xw. to swim, lias passed, denotes
simply a water-spirit, the nicor of the
Beowulf, the nix or nixy of German
fairy tales. The devil is here regarded
as dwelling in the water, and thus the
name explains the sailor's phrase 'Davy's
-locker.' Grimm, D. M., 456.
3 Nib. 1334.
4 lb. 1686 ; Grimm, D. M., 943.
5 Grimm, D. M., 945. In Sir W.
Scott's romance, Wayland is a mere impostor
who avails himself of a popular
superstition to keep up an air of mj st< ty
about himself and his work: but the
character to which he makes pretence
belongs to the genuine Teutonic Leg< od.
« Grimm, D. M., 945. This black
demon is the Slavish Tschernibog /.. rnibog),
who is repr. Bented as the enemy
of Bjelbog, the white god,— a dualism
which Grimm regards as of lute growth,
D. M., 936.
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