anthologies are Basic Writings, 2 vols., edited by Anton C.
Pegis (New York, 1945); Philosophical Texts, edited and
translated by Thomas Gilby (1951; reprint, Durham, N.C.,
1982); and Theological Texts, edited and translated by Thom-
as Gilby (1955; reprint, Durham, N.C., 1982). The best sin-
gle volume sampling of his writings in philosophy with good
introductions by Vernon J. Bourke is The Pocket Aquinas
(New York, 1960).Works on His Life and Writings
The most complete single volume on Thomas and his writings is
my own Friar Thomas d’Aquino: His Life, Thought, and
Works (1974; reprinted with corrigenda and addenda, Wash-
ington, D.C., 1983) with an annotated catalog of authentic
writings. Some of the more important biographical docu-
ments have been translated and edited by Kenelm Foster in
The Life of Saint Thomas Aquinas (Baltimore, 1959). All
modern studies of the writings must start with the pioneer
work of Pierre Mandonnet, Des écrits authentiques de Saint
Thomas d’Aquin (Fribourg, 1910), Martin Grabmann, Die
Werke, 3d ed. (Münster, 1949), and some others.
General Works on His Life and Thought
Bourke, Vernon J. Aquinas’ Search for Wisdom. Milwaukee, 1965.
Excellent alternating biographical and doctrinal chapters that
should be read carefully to savor the wisdom of Thomas.
Chenu, M.-D. Toward Understanding Saint Thomas Aquinas. Chi-
cago, 1964. Indispensable for understanding the medieval
context and genre of Thomas’s writings.
Chesterton, G. K. Saint Thomas Aquinas. London, 1933. A superb
appreciation of “the dumb ox” that Gilson and Pegis would
have liked to have written, by a natural Thomist.
Copleston, Frederick C. Aquinas. Baltimore, 1967. Most appreci-
ated by historians of philosophy.
Gilson, Étienne. The Christian Philosophy of Saint Thomas Aqui-
nas. Translated from the fifth edition with a catalog of au-
thentic works by I. T. Eschmann. New York, 1956. Gilson’s
chef d’œuvre, frequently revised over forty years of a distin-
guished career with all his pet views.
Maritain, Jacques. Saint Thomas, Angel of the Schools. London,
- Reflections on the life and significance of Thomas by
a distinguished modern Thomist.
McInerny, Ralph. Saint Thomas Aquinas (1977). Reprint, Notre
Dame, 1982. The best short introduction to Thomas and his
chief sources: Aristotle, Boethius, and Augustine.
Pegis, Anton C. Introduction to Saint Thomas Aquinas. New York,
- A handy volume with selections from both summas il-
lustrating principal themes of Thomas’s thought.
Pieper, Josef. Guide to Thomas Aquinas. New York, 1962. A
thoughtful invitation to explore the world of Thomas for re-
flective students.
Sertillanges, A. G. Saint Thomas Aquinas and His Work (1933).
Reprint, London, 1957. An exciting period piece by a uni-
versity chaplain in Paris after World War I.
Walz, Angelus M. Saint Thomas Aquinas: A Biographical Study.
Westminster, Md., 1951. A much-consulted historian’s view
of Thomas’s life and works; see the improved French adapta-
tion by Paul Novarino.
JAMES A. WEISHEIPL (1987)
THOR (ON, Þórr) was presumably the most popular god
of the ancient Scandinavian peoples, who conferred upon
him such epithets as ástvinr (“dear friend”) and fulltrúi
(“trusted friend”). The distribution of his cult is abundantly
documented by onomastic evidence; his name is found all
over present-day Scandinavia in place-names designating ei-
ther cult sites or places dedicated to him—woods, fields,
hills, brooks, and lakes (de Vries, 1957, pp. 116–120).
Equally abundant are the personal names with Thor- as
first component. About one-fourth of the immigrants to Ice-
land had such names, according to the Landnámabók. Viking
traders and raiders venerated him as their most powerful god
and honored him in their new settlements. Local sources re-
port the worship of Þórr by the Norse invaders of Ireland;
Þórr’s hammer, Mjo ̨llnir, appeared on the coinage of the
Scandinavian rulers of York in the tenth century; there was
apparently a temple dedicated to Þórr by Varangian North-
men in Kiev in 1046; the Danes settling in Normandy are
said to have invoked “Tur.” Even the Lapps, who were
strongly influenced by their Germanic neighbors, took Þórr
Karl (“old man”) into their pantheon as the hammer god
Horagalles. Furthermore, artifacts such as Þórr’s-hammer
amulets bear witness to the strength and survival of his wor-
ship even some time after the conversion to Christianity
(eleventh century). In this context the Cross of Gosforth in
Cumbria, England, is particularly striking, for this essentially
Christian symbol bears a graphic representation of one of
Þórr’s major myths, namely his fishing expedition with the
giant Hymir at the rim of the world ocean to catch the cos-
mic serpent Miðgarðsormr: the scene represents the god
“digging his heels so hard into the bottom of the boat” to
draw the serpent on board “that both his legs went through
it” (Snorri Sturluson, Gylfaginning 48).
Adam of Bremen, writing about 1080 and relying on
the report of a Christian who had traveled to Sweden, de-
scribed the temple of Uppsala as having a triad of divine stat-
ues: Óðinn, Þórr, and Freyr were worshiped there, but Þórr
occupied the central position “because he was the most pow-
erful of them all.” This statement, which contradicts Snorri’s
ranking of Þórr in the second place, after Óðinn, presumably
points to the fact that his closeness both to warriors and to
peasants gave him more prominence in popular circles than
the more “aristocratic” Óðinn. A satirical allusion to the so-
cial distribution of the cults of the two gods is recognizable
in an exchange between plain, honest Þórr and Óðinn dis-
guised as a ferryman in the Eddic poem Hárbarzljóð: “Óðinn
gets all the jarls slain by edge of swords, but Þórr gets the
breed of thralls.” The tradition represented by Adam, howev-
er, may also be found in the Old English homily De falsis
diis (Concerning false gods), commonly ascribed to Ælfric,
where Þórr is identified with Jupiter and is “arwurðost ealra
ðæra goda” (“the most venerable of all gods”). Several minor
sources suggest that Þórr was also able to raise and use winds.
For Snorri Sturluson (Gylfaginning 21), Þórr s the strongest
of the Æsir and the most important among them (afterTHOR 9165