Strange Survivals. Baring-Gould Sabine
church wall in token of the abolition of heathenism.
1
Sacrifices of the same kind were continued. Livy, xxii. 57: “Interim ex fatalibus libris sacrificia aliquot extraordinaria facta: inter quæ Gallus et Galla, Græcus et Græca, in Foro Boario sub terra vivi demissi sunt in locum saxo conseptum, jam ante hostiis humanis, minime Romano sacro, imbutum.”
2
Jovienus Pontanus, in the fifth Book of his History of his own Times. He died 1503.
3
These cauldrons walled into the sides of the churches are probably the old sacrificial cauldrons of the Teutons and Norse. When heathenism was abandoned, the instrument of the old Pagan rites was planted in the church wall in token of the abolition of heathenism.
4
There is a rare copper-plate, representing the story, published in Cologne in 1604, from a painting that used to be in the church, but which was destroyed in 1783. After her resurrection, Richmod, who was a real person, is said to have borne her husband three sons.
5
Magdeburg, Danzig, Glückstadt, Dünkirchen, Hamburg, Nürnberg, Dresden, etc. (see Petersen: “Die Pferdekópfe auf den Bauerhäusern,” Kiel, 1860).
6
Herodotus, iv. 103: “Enemies whom the Scythians have subdued they treat as follows: each having cut off a head, carries it home with him, then hoisting it on a long pole, he raises it above the roof of his house – and they say that these act as guardians to the household.”
7
The floreated points of metal or stone at the apex of a gable are a reminiscence of the bunch of grain offered to Odin’s horse.
8
Aigla, c. 60. An Icelandic law forbade a vessel coming within sight of the island without first removing its figure-head, lest it should frighten away the guardian spirits of the land. Thattr Thorsteins Uxafots, i.
9
Finnboga saga, c. 34.
10
Hood is Wood or Woden. The Wood-dove in Devon is Hood-dove, and Wood Hill in Yorkshire is Hood Hill.
11
See numerous examples in “The Western Antiquary,” November, 1881.
12
On a discovery of horse-heads in Elsdon Church, by E. C. Robertson, Alnwick, 1882.
13
“Sir Tristram,” by Thomas of Erceldoune, ed. Sir Walter Scott, 1806, p. 153.
14
See an interesting paper and map, by Dr. Prowse, in the Transactions of the Devon Association, 1891.