have departed unto Odin. It is useless, therefore, to give ourselves up to groans and complaints, or to put our relations to needless expenses, since we can easily follow the example of our fathers, who have all gone by the way of this rock." There was such another in Sweden*, appropriated to the same use, which was figuratively called the Hall of Odin, because it was a kind of vestibule or entry to the palace of that godt. Lastly, if none of these reliefs were afforded, and especially when Christianity had banished these cruel practices, the heroes consoled themselves at least by putting on complete armour as soon as they found their end approaching; thus making (as it were) a solemn protest against the kind of death to which they were forced involuntarily to submit. After this it will not be thought wonderful that those who followed a great chieftain in some expedition, should make a vow not to survive their commander; or that this vow should always be performed in all its rigour. Neither will it * There are several of these rocks in Sweden, called Ättestupor (stem or family rocks). One situated on the borders of a lake in the province of Bleking, and two others in West Gothland, bear the name of Valhalla. To another of these rocks, called Stafva Hall, is attached the remarkable local tradition, that at an annual festival held there in pagan times, a number of people, after dancing and singing, and partaking in the general amusement, threw themselves from it into the lake below, in the same manner as the classic writers tell us was practised by the Scythians and Hyperboreans. See Geijer. G. Sch. I. 103.-ED. + We have a particular description of this place by Sir William Temple; which it will be worth while to produce at large. "I will not," he says, " trouble myself with more passages out of the Runic poems concerning this superstitious principle [of preferring a violent death, &c.], but will add a testimony of it, which was given me at Nimeguen, by count Oxenstern, the first of the Swedish ambassadors in that assembly. In discourse upon this subject, and in confirmation of this opinion having been general among the Goths of those countries, he told me there was still in Sweden a place which was a memorial of it, and was called Odin's Hall. That it was a great bay in the sea, encompassed on three sides with steep and ragged rocks; and that in the time of the Gothic paganism, men that were either sick of diseases they esteemed mortal or incurable, or else grown invalid with age, and thereby past all military action, and fearing to die meanly and basely (as they esteemed it) in their beds, they usually caused themselves to be brought to the nearest part of these rocks, and from thence threw themselves down into the sea, hoping by the boldness of such a violent death to renew the pretence of admission into the Hall of Odin, which they had lost, by failing to die in combat, and with their arms."-Miscellanea, part II. essay 3, part 4.-P. be surprising that private soldiers should sometimes form among themselves a kind of society or confraternity, in which the several members engaged, at the expense of their own lives, to avenge the death of their associates, provided it were honourable and violent. All these dangers were, in their opinion, so many favourable and precious occasions of meriting glory and eternal happiness. Accordingly, we never find any among these people guilty of cowardice, and the bare suspicion of that vice was always attended with universal contempt. A man who had lost his buckler, or who had received a wound behind, durst never more appear in public. In the history of England *, we see a famous Danish captain named Siward, who had sent his son to attack a province in Scotland, ask with great coolness those who brought the news of his death, whether he had received his wounds behind or before? The messengers telling him he was wounded before, the father cries out, 66 Then I have only cause to rejoice: for any other death would have been unworthy of me and my son. A conqueror could not exercise a more terrible vengeance upon his captives, than to condemn them to slavery. "There is," says Saxo, "in the heart of the Danes, an insurmountable aversion to servitude, which makes them esteem it the most dreadful of all conditions." The same historian describes to us a king of Denmark, named Frotho, taken in battle by a king his enemy, and obstinately refusing all offers of life which that prince could make him. To what end,” says he, "should I reserve myself for so great a disgrace? What good can the remainder of my life afford me, that can counterbalance the remembrance of my misfortunes, and the regret which my misery would cause me? And even if you should restore me my kingdom, if you should bring me back my sister, if you should repair all the loss of my treasure, would all this recover my honour? All these benefits would never replace me in my former state, but future ages would always say, Frotho hath been taken by his enemy.' In all combats, and the number of them is prodigious in the ancient histories of the north, we always find both parties continually repeating the words glory, honour, and contempt of death, and Brompton. Ubb. Jom. Chronic. p. 946. by this means raising one another to that pitch of enthusiasm which produces extraordinary actions. A general never forgot to remind his troops of these motives when he was going to give battle; and not infrequently they prevented him, and flew to the engagement of themselves, chanting songs of war, marching in cadence, and raising shouts of joy. Lastly, like the heroes of Homer, those of ancient Scandinavia, in the excess of their over-boiling courage, dared to defy the gods themselves. "Though they should be stronger than the gods," says a boastful warrior speaking of his enemies, "I would absolutely fight them."* And in Saxo Grammaticus we hear another wishing ardently that he could but meet with Odin, that he might attack him: expressing his mind by verses to this effect:-" Where at present is he whom they call Odin, that warrior so completely armed, who hath but one eye to guide him? Ah, if I could but see him, this redoubted spouse of Frigga; in vain should he be covered with his snow-white buckler, in vain mounted upon his lofty steed, he should not leave his abode of Lethra without a wound. It is lawful to encounter a warrior god." The same author relates that a Danish prince, named Hother, resisted the united forces of Odin, Thor, and the squadrons of the gods. "And the victory," he adds, "would have remained with the gods, if Hother, breaking through their thickest ranks, and assailing them with such fury as a mortal can superior beings, had not rendered the mallet of the god Thor useless, by cutting it off at the handle. Weakened by this sudden and unexpected stroke, the gods were forced to betake themselves to flight." It was a received opinion among them, that a man might attack and fight the gods; and it is needless to remark with Saxo, that these were only imaginary deities. No one is tempted to take such relations literally, and they only deserve to be mentioned because they show us what manner of thinking prevailed among the people who invented stories of this sort. From them we may at least infer that the confidence with which their bodily strength and courage inspired these ancient Danes must have been excessive to make them brave and defy whatever was most formidable in their system of religion. But Diomedes's wounding Venus concealed in a * Bartholin, lib. i. c. 6. cloud, his defying Jupiter, as well as the other combats of men with the gods described in the Iliad, have already shown us to what a degree of intoxication and madness men may arrive, who think themselves above all fear. A passion so strong, so general and so blind, could not but give a tincture of its character to whatever it could possibly extend to; and therefore we must not be surprised that they should take it into their heads almost to deify the instruments of war, without which that passion could not have been gratified. The respect they had for their arms made them also swear by instruments so valuable and so useful, as being the most sacred things they knew. Accordingly, in an ancient Icelandic poem, a Scandinavian, to assure himself of a person's good faith, requires him to swear "by the shoulder of a horse, and the edge of a sword."* This oath was usual more especially on the eve of some great engagement: the soldiers engaged themselves, by an oath of this kind, not to flee though their enemies should be never so superior in number. From the same source proceeded that propensity to duels and single combats, so remarkable among all the Teutonic nations, and which of all their barbarous customs has been most religiously kept up by their present descendants. In Denmark, and through all the north, they provoked a man to fight a duel, by publicly calling him Niding or "infamous: " for he who had received so deep a stain, without * It is therefore with peculiar propriety and decorum (as is well observed by his commentators) that Shakspeare makes his Prince of Denmark call upon his companions to swear upon his sword. Come hither, gentlemen, And lay your hands again upon my sword, Hamlet, A. 1, sc. ult.-P. In the same manner as giving the lie is the highest provocation in modern times, because it implies a charge of meanness, falsehood and cowardice; so the word Niding or Nithing anciently included in it the ideas of extreme wickedness, meanness and infamy. It signified a villanous base wretch, a dastardly coward, a sordid stingy worthless creature. No wonder that an imputation of this kind should be so reproachful among an open and brave people, or that they would rather do anything than incur it. We have a remarkable proof in English history how much this name was dreaded and abhorred by our ancestors. King William Rufus having occa endeavouring to wash it out with the blood of his adversary, would have lost much more than the life he was so desirous to save. Banished by public indignation from the society of men, degraded from his quality of citizen, and scarce regarded as a human creature, he had nothing left for it but a shameful and insecure flight. [Nithing was unquestionably the most insulting epithet that a Northman could apply to an adversary. There was, moreover, a peculiar way of applying it that greatly increased its virulence, although it gave the aggrieved party the right to seek redress by an action at law. This was by setting up what was called a Nithing-post or Nithing-stake [Nidstaung]. A mere hazel twig stuck in the ground by a person who at the same time made use of some opprobrious epithet, either against an individual or a community, was quite sufficient to come under the legal definition of a Nithing-post. Several superstitious practices were, however, commonly observed on the occasion which were supposed to impart to the Nithing-post the power of working evil on the party it was directed against, and more especially to make any injuries done to the person sion to draw together a sudden body of forces, only sent word to all such as held of him in fee, that those who did not repair to his assistance should be deemed Nithing; and without further summons they all flocked to his standard. Rex irâ inflammatus, says Matthew Paris, stipendiarios milites suos Anglos congregat, et absque morâ, ut ad obsidionem veniant, jubet, nisi velint sub nomine Nithing, quod Latine nequam sonat, recenseri. Angli (qui nihil contumeliosius et vilius estimant quam hujusmodi ignominioso vocabulo notari) catervatim ad regem confluentes, ingentes copias conficiunt. (M. Par. sub ann. 1089.) The word Nithing for some ages after continued in use in this kingdom, but chiefly in the sense of stingy, niggardly, &c. The translator has seen an ancient MS. poem, that was written between the reigns of Edward III. and Edward IV. in which a person is thus exhorted, Looke thou be kind and curteous aye, Of meate and drinke be never Nithing. which sense of the word still obtains in Denmark, as we learn from Bartholin. Denotat Niding modernis Danis virum sordide parcum atque tenacem. Lib. i. c. 7, p. 98.-P. There are three old Norse words, naud, need, German noth; nithr, downward; and nid, contumely, infamy, disgrace, from which etymologists respectively derive the word Nithing. The derivation from nid is at least the most significant, and the word seems to correspond with the Greek veidos, which has the same meaning, and with the German neid, Moso-Goth neiths, envy. |