(Alemannic and Bavarian), Old Saxon, Old English (Anglo-Saxon), and Old
Norse. These show mutual similarities of metre and diction that point to a
common origin. Insofar as their subject matter is heroic, they look back to the
Gothic world of the fourth and fifth centuries; the Gothic lays of that time
probably stood in a common line of tradition with those of which Tacitus had
written.
Germanic heroic poetry is represented by two stray pages from the Old
High German Hildebrandslied, by the likewise eighth-century Beowulf and a
few other Old English pieces such as the Finnsburh and Waldere fragments,
theBattle of Brunanburh, and the late Battle of Maldon, and by a number of
Norse poems of the ninth to twelfth centuries. Most of these last are included
in the so-called Elder or Poetic Edda, others are preserved in the prose sagas
or other sources, and one, the Biarkamál, in a Latin hexameter version in Saxo
Grammaticus’History of the Danes. The ninth- or tenth-century Latin epic
Waltharius may also be noticed for its Germanic subject matter, related to that
ofWaldere.
The Edda further contains mythical poems about the gods and gnomic
poetry. Besides the Edda there is a large body of verse by the skalds, profes-
sional court poets, composed in a less archaic, highly elaborate style. Two
ninth-century skaldic poems of importance for mythology are Thiodolf ’s
Haustlo ̨ng and Bragi’sRagnarsdrápa. The Old English corpus includes narra-
tive poems on Christian subjects, reflective and gnomic poems, riddles, and
spells. Two spells and a prayer in Old High German, the Merseburg Charms
and the Wessobrunn Prayer, will also engage our attention.
Complementing this poetic literature, two substantial prose works of the
early thirteenth century are of especial importance. Snorri Sturluson’s Prose
Edda consists of three parts: Gylfaginning, a delightfully written compendium
of Nordic myths about the gods, based on older poetic sources; Skáldska-
parmál, a survey of poetic language, with much reference to mythical
material; and Háttatal, a treatise on verse-forms. Saxo’sHistory, mentioned
above, is a Latin work in sixteen books, of which the first nine in particular
are a precious repository of Danish legend.
TheBaltic countries were not converted to Christianity till a comparatively
recent date –– Latvia in the thirteenth century, and Lithuania in the fifteenth ––
and then only superficially. The consequence is on the one hand that there
is no native literature until even later, but on the other hand that pagan gods
and mythology remained alive in the popular consciousness long enough to
be reported by Christian writers and to leave many traces in songs and
ballads. The tradition of these songs is very abundant, especially in Latvia,
where over 60,000 were recorded in the nineteenth century. There have
also been collections of folk-tales, riddles, and the like. Pagan cult practices
18 Introduction