and dividing to take possession of the uncultivated countries which it met with in its progress. Very soon after, we see the same people, like a tree full of vigour, extending long branches over all Europe; we see them also carrying with them, wherever they came, from the borders of the Black Sea to the extremities of Spain, of Sicily, and Greece, a religion simple and martial as themselves, a form of government dictated by good sense and liberty, a restless unconquered spirit, apt to take fire at the very mention of subjection and constraint, and a ferocious courage, nourished by a savage and vagabond life. While the gentleness of the climate softened imperceptibly the ferocity of those who settled in the south, colonies of Egyptians and Phenicians mixing with them upon the coasts of Greece, and thence passing over to those of Italy, taught them at last to live in cities, to cultivate letters, arts and commerce. Thus their opinions, their customs and genius, were blended together, and new states were formed upon new plans. Rome, in the mean time arose, and at length carried all before her. In proportion as she increased in grandeur, she forgot her ancient manners, and destroyed, among the nations whom she overpowered, the original spirit with which they were animated. But this spirit continued Siberia on the north, in which direction the boundaries might be limited or extended to suit any particular theory, this region being for the ancients terra incognita. We would also venture to say that there is scarcely a nation or tribe known in European history that has not, by one writer or other, been called Scythian. We could cite works in which Pelasgi, Thracians, Celts, Goths, Saxons, Finns, Huns, Magyars, Turks, Tatars, and various other nations are respectively designated as Scythians, or of Scythian origin. Jamieson in his "Hermes Scythicus" gravely informs us that "with respect to their (the Scythians) origin, the most general opinion is, that they were the descendants of Magog, the second son of Japhet!!!" The confusion of ideas that long prevailed on this subject arose from writers applying the term "Scythians" ethnographically instead of geographically, applying it to designate a distinct race like the terms Teutons, Slavonians, Celts, &c., and not an assemblage of nations of various origin, such as we comprehend under the terms Europeans, Africans, Asiatics, &c. It is only in the latter signification that the word can be tolerated at the present day. When our author, therefore, talks of "a nation issuing from the forests of Scythia" he must be understood to mean the various races of Asiatic origin, some of them, as we have shown in our preceding remarks, remotely cognate, that spread themselves over Europe at an epoch far beyond the bounds of authentic history, as well as others who may have "trod upon the heels of their fathers" at a more recent period.-En. unaltered in the colder countries of Europe, and maintained itself there like the independency of the inhabitants. Scarce could fifteen or sixteen centuries produce there any change in that spirit. There it renewed itself incessantly; for, during the whole of that long interval, new adventurers issuing continually from the original inexhaustible country, trod upon the heels of their fathers towards the north, and, being in their turn succeeded by new troops of followers, they pushed one another forward, like the waves of the sea. The northern countries, thus overstocked, and unable any longer to contain such restless inhabitants, equally greedy of glory and plunder, discharged at length, upon the Roman empire, the weight that oppressed them. The barriers of the empire, ill defended by a people whom prosperity had enervated, were borne down on all sides by torrents. of victorious armies. We then see the conquerors introducing, among the nations they vanquished, viz. into the very bosom of slavery and sloth, that spirit of independence and equality, that elevation of soul, that taste for rural and military life, which both the one and the other had originally derived from the same common source, but which were then among the Romans breathing their last. Dispositions and principles so opposite, struggled long with forces sufficiently equal, but they united in the end, they coalesced together, and from their coalition sprung those principles and that spirit which governed, afterwards, almost all the states of Europe, and which, notwithstanding the differences of climate, of religion, and particular accidents, do still visibly reign in them, and retain, to this day, more or less the traces of their first common origin. It is easy to see, from this short sketch, how greatly the nations of the north have influenced the different fates of Europe; and if it be worth while to trace its revolutions to their causes, if the illustration of its institutions, of its police, of its customs, of its manners, of its laws, be a subject of useful and interesting inquiry; it must be allowed, that the antiquities of the north, that is to say, every thing which tends to make us acquainted with its ancient inhabitants, merits a share in the attention of thinking men. But to render this obvious by a particular example; is it not well known that the most flourishing and celebrated states of Europe owe originally to the northern nations, whatever liberty they now enjoy, either in their constitution, or in the spirit of their government? For although the Gothic form of government has been almost every where altered or abolished, have we not retained, in most things, the opinions, the customs, the manners which that government had a tendency to produce? Is not this, in fact, the principal source of that courage, of that aversion to slavery, of that empire of honour which characterize in general the European nations; and of that moderation, of that easiness of access, and peculiar attention to the rights of humanity, which so happily distinguish our sovereigns from the inaccessible and superb tyrants of Asia? The immense extent of the Roman empire had rendered its constitution so despotic and military, many of its emperors were such ferocious monsters, its senate was become so mean-spirited and vile, that all elevation of sentiment, every thing that was noble and manly, seems to have been for ever banished from their hearts and minds; insomuch that if all Europe had received the yoke of Rome in this her state of debasement, this fine part of the world, reduced to the inglorious condition of the rest, could not have avoided falling into that kind of barbarity, which is of all others the most incurable; as, by making as many slaves as there are men, it degrades them so low as not to leave them even a thought or desire of bettering their condition. But nature had long prepared a remedy for such great evils, in that unsubmitting, unconquerable spirit, with which she had inspired the people of the north; and thus she made amends to the human race, for all the calamities which, in other respects, the inroads of these nations, and the overthrow of the Roman empire produced. "The great prerogative of Scandinavia (says the admirable author of the Spirit of Laws), and what ought to recommend its inhabitants beyond every people upon earth, is, that they afforded the great resource to the liberty of Europe, that is, to almost all the liberty that is among men. The Goth Jor nandes (adds he) calls the north of Europe the forge of mankind. I should rather call it, the forge of those instruments which broke the fetters manufactured in the south. It was there those valiant nations were bred, who left their native climes to destroy tyrants and slaves, and to teach men that nature having made them equal, no reason could be assigned for their becoming dependent, but their mutual happiness." If these considerations be of any weight, I shall easily be excused for having treated at so much length the antiquities of the north. The judicious public will see and decide whether I have conceived a just idea of my subject, or whether, from an illusion too common with authors, I have not ascribed to it more importance than it deserves. I should not be without some apprehensions of this kind, if that were always true which is commonly said, that we grow fond of our labours in proportion as they are difficult. Many tedious and unentertaining volumes I have been obliged to peruse: I have had more than one language to learn; my materials were widely scattered, ill digested, and often little known. It was not easy to collect them, or to accommodate them to my purpose. These are all circumstances ill calculated, it must be owned, to give me much assurance. But I have likewise met with very considerable assistances; several learned men have treated particular points of the antiquities of the north with that deep erudition which characterizes the studies of the last I cannot mention, without acknowledgment and praise, Bartholinus, Wormius, Stephanius, ..Arngrim Jonas, Torfæus, &c. Is it necessary that I should take notice, before I conclude, that I am about to delineate a nation in its infancy, and that the greatest part of the other Europeans were neither less savage, nor less uncivilized, during the same period? I shall give sufficient proofs of this in other places, being persuaded that there is among nations an emulation of glory, which often degenerates into jealousy, and puts them upon assuming a pre-eminence upon the most chimerical advantages; that there glows in their bosoms a patriotic zeal, which is often so blind and ill informed, as to take alarm at the most slender and indifferent declarations made in favour of others. 60 NORTHERN ANTIQUITIES. CHAPTER I. OF THE FIRST INHABITANTS OF DENMARK, AND PARTI- It is useless to inquire at what period of time Denmark began to be inhabited. Such a research would doubtless lead us up to an age when all Europe was plunged in ignorance and barbarity. These two words include in them almost all we know of the history of the first ages. It is very probable, that the first Danes were like all the other Teutonic nations, a colony of Scythians*, who spread themselves at different times over the countries which lay towards the west. The resemblance of name might induce us to believe that it was from among the Cimmerian Scythians (whom the ancients placed to the north of the Euxine Sea) that the first colonies were sent into Denmark; and that from this people they inherited the name of Cimbri, which they bore so long before they assumed that of Danes. But this resemblance of name, which many historians produce as a solid proof, is liable to so many different explanations, that it is better to acknowledge once for all, that this subject is as incapable of certainty, as it is unworthy of research. Whatever was the origin of the Cimbri, they for a long time before the birth of Christ inhabited the country, which received from them the name of the Cimbrica Chersonesus, or Cimbric Peninsula, and probably comprehended Jutland, Sleswic, and Holstein, and perhaps some of the neighbouring provinces. The ancients considered this people as a branch of the Germans, and never distinguished the one from the other in the descriptions they have left us of the manners * See the note page 55. |