The journal by, for and about those engaged in the reconstruction of pre-Christian Northern European cultures.

VOLUME I I

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rrir Is:EDITORS:Josh Rood

Matt WalkerJohn Wills

Erik Lacharity Bil Linzie

(WITH SPECIAL ASSISTANCE FROM)Cat Heath

Alyssa PaulsenTim Shanks

Christian AvisBenjamin Kowalski

Terence PlumCat Ellis

ART AND LAYOUT TEAM:Christine Foltzer

Dan Oropallo

RRIR WOULD LIKE TO GIVE A SPECIAL THANK YOU TO THE FOLLOWING:

Dr Karl SeigfriedMathias Nordvig

Stephen Pollington

We would also like to thank those scholars who chose not to be named but whose help was invaluable to us. Without your critiques, insight and advice,

our academic standards would be much lower.

In This IssueIntroduction ..............................................................................4

ArticlesHeathen: Linguistic Origins and Early Context ................................6Josh Rood

Establishing the Innangar ..............................................................17 Josh Rood

Cult and Identity in Modern Heathenry ..........................................27Shane Ricks

Symbel: The Heathen Drinking Ritual? ..........................................43John Wills

Feeding the Wolf .............................................................................59Dan Campbell

Frankish Tree Sido ..........................................................................68Erik Lacharity

Notes on the Finnish Tradition: Part 1 of 2 .....................................77Anssi Alhonen.

Self-Directed Language Learning ...................................................90Caspian Smith

Living Heathen

A Springtime Procession ...............................................................100 Christopher Robert

Two Yule Rituals ...........................................................................104Josh Heath

Beer and Brewing Culture ...........................................................112 Through the Eyes of a New England Heathen Mark Andersen

Some Brew Recipes ......................................................................117Mark Andersen, Jon Talkington

Living Lore

Skald Craft ....................................................................................125Jon Cyr

Poetry ............................................................................................139 Various people

A Snake Story ...............................................................................143Josh Heath

Ashlad and Redfoks ......................................................................146Tim Gladu

Book Reviews

Myths of the Pagan North .............................................................153By Christopher Abram

The Picts: A History ......................................................................155By Tim Clarkson

A Brief History of the Vikings ......................................................156by Jonathan Clementst

Before Scotland .............................................................................157By Alistair Moffat

The Lords of Battle .......................................................................158By Christopher Abram

Masks of Odin ...............................................................................160By Stephen S. Evans

Bibliography .................................................................................160

Contact Odroerir ...........................................................................172

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rrir is an accumulation of the research and experience of men and women engaged in the recon-struction of the heathen traditions of northern Europe. The journals contributors are involved in a grass-roots movement in both America and Europe a movement that encompasses greatly varied cultures, local customs and religious practices. The diversity of our contributors is matched only by our uniting belief that reconstruction of our various traditions is dependent on understanding their origins. This con-viction is the foundation that rrir is built upon, and our desire to act on it has driven us to maintain a high academic standard for the material we present. We are confident in saying that rrir is a credible resource for those interested in contemporary heathenism.

When we first conceived the idea of rrir, we were just a handful of individuals representing a va-riety of groups with a shared approach to heathenism. In our discussions with each other, we realized that our approach had produced few publications to which we might direct interested individuals. To simply di-rect people to a rare and expensive stockpile of academic works was not enough. We saw a need to provide documentation of our own dialogue if we wanted audiences to understand how we saw and understood heathenism ourselves. We also decided that, if we were to make an attempt to represent contemporary hea-thenism, we needed to insure to the best of our ability that our claims and conclusions were supported by (and consistent with) the work of modern authorities on the subjects we would be presenting. We were fortunate enough to be able to assemble a team that we felt confident could hold us to the high standard we set for ourselves; but information is nothing without a community.

Our ability to present this journal is greatly indebted to the rich variety of individual talent from through-out the heathen community and the enthusiasm with which people contributed and reviewed the material. We could not have done this without the deep insights and guidance of academic authorities on the matters we are presenting. Our work would have been impossible without the research and writing of contributors with whom we were previously unaware of, but now consider friends. We are indebted to those who were not even a part of the rrir team, but who volunteered to edit, proofread, and give advice that we gladly took. We have been humbled by their generosity. We never dreamed we would get the readership that we have, and we have been inundated with emails of support, advice and general inquiry. We have received more submissions artistic, poetic and academic than we have been able to make use of. We have re-alized with great joy that what was started out of fear that our voices werent being heard has become a rallying place for those across the heathen communities who are excited to present heathenism as it really was, as it really is and as it perhaps can be.

This Issue

Volume 1 was an introduction of sorts, and we would suggest that it be read before this present volume. It has also played another role which was critically important in order for rrir to really become what we envisioned. It set the tone of what sort of approach we take to heathenism, and it attracted others who do the same. That was precisely what we needed from a debut issue. Our goal to bridge the gap between the academic knowledge of ancient heathen traditions and the implementation of ongoing ones today de-pended on the contributions of others throughout the general heathen community. We wanted to expand with subsequent issues. We introduced rrir as a vessel that needed the wisdom, experience, and ar-tistic talent of the heathen community to help fill it. That is precisely what we received, and we have been able to expand tremendously.

The decentralized nature of our contribution base has resulted in a bit of a nebulously structured sec-ond volume. Article formats may show some variation, and the sections are not rigidly distinct from one

Introduction

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another. Terminology and personal and place-name spellings may differ slightly between authors de-pending on their region and background. This should be expected and we prefer to allow for an organic development for each issue rather than to try and force a particular stylistic and structural appearance at the cost of information. There is no established theme. The rrir team agreed only that we should strive to at least address some of the more basic topics before we can build off of them. In addition, our contributors gave an array of content, and we were able to expand the journal in multiple directions. Weve structured the content into four loosely categorized sections and tried to establish a flow between topics. The first section contains research oriented articles that cover a wide variety of subject matter relevant to heathen religion, society, and worldview. The second section is a shift in focus from research towards heathen experience, practice and implementation. The third section contains some living lore in prose and poetry. Lastly, we have our book reviews.

Regarding the variety of traditions contained in this and future issues; rrir overwhelmingly flows out of a Germanic heathen focus, but it would be academically dishonest to present heathenism as an insular, singular tradition. Historically, Germanic heathenism refers to a variety of local and regional religious practices. The same is true of our contributors. There was also a good bit of cultural exchange with neighboring European cultures. For this reason, we have decided to allow a place for some articles which focus on religious practices that are relevant to heathenism but are not necessarily Germanic, and whose authors may not even refer to as heathen. By default rrirs articles stem from the common Germanic heathen viewpoint, which naturally has variations. Articles which focus on a specific culture will always make clear which culture they are referring to, and those which focus on a culture which is not Germanic will contain the name of their focus in their title. In this way, rrir is able to present information from a variety of cultures related to heathenism without mixing them together or confusing them with one another.

We are proud of rrirs second volume, and we hope that the heathen community is also. Feel free to share this with friends, family, and community, and to contribute if you believe you have something to offer. Thank you for reading, and enjoy!

"Warrior" by D

an Oropallo

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ARTICLES

The modern English word heathen has long been the favorite label used in academic circles to identify the nonchristian peoples of western and northern Europe during the Middle Ages. Among Medieval his-torians it is used more precisely to identify those Germanic1 peoples who still practiced their indigenous religion. It has also been the title most favored by modern people who are engaged in the reconstruction of pre-Christian Germanic traditions, not only to describe those religious practices they are reviving, but also as a self moniker. Because the word heathen pertains to a particular demography,2 this article focuses on the context and implications that it would have had while that demography coexisted with the scribes who recorded it. I will identify the source of the word heathen and I will trace it throughout the time pe-riod which heathenism existed in Europe. It is my hope that this endeavor will allow the reader to have a serious understanding of the origins, early history, and more importantly the context of the word heathen, and what this might have meant for the people implied by it.

The word first appears in the Gothic language as a translation of several New Testament books by the bishop Ulfilas (ca 310-383). These books are still preserved in multiple manuscripts, but most notably the Codex Argentius3 where it is recorded on thin purple velum of high quality and written in gold and silver ink. The following passage is taken from his translation of chapter 7 of the Book of Mark. It contains the first recorded mention of the term as we know it.

wasu an so qino hain, Saurini fwnikiska gabaurai, jah ba ina ei o unhulon uswaurpi us dauhtr izos.

The woman was a hain, a Syrophenician by nation; and she besought him that he would cast forth the devil out of her daughter.4

In the context of the story, the woman in reference was a Greek who had been born in Syrian Phoenicia. She was not one of the Jews to whom Christ had been ministering prior to her arrival. She was an outsider to the group. She was a foreigner, and a stranger. The Book of Mark goes on to explain that Jesus met her when he had gone up the Mediterranean coast to the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon. While he was there,

1 For the sake of simplicity, this paper will use the term Germanic to refer to the people who have conventionally, been labeled Germanic, despite the issues that rise from pigeonholing vastly different groups of people under one moniker.

2 At least, within the circles I have described.3 Codex Argenteus . Codex Argenteus Online (2004): n. pag. Silverbibeln, Uppsala Universitetbliotek.4 Ibid.

Heathen Linguistic Origins and Early Context

By Joshua Rood

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this woman who is referred to as a hain asked Christ to drive out a demon that had taken up residence in her daughter. Christ hesitated to heal anyone other than his own people and responded rather harshly; Let the children first be fed, for it is not right to take the childrens bread and throw it to the dogs. The foreign woman responded; Yes, Lord: yet the dogs under the table eat of the childrens crumbs. With this response, Christ claimed that her daughter was healed.

There have been two conflicting theories pertaining to the origins and etymology of the term. The tra-ditional, widely accepted explanation is that the term heathen is a derivative of the abstract noun heath. The Indo European origin of the word heath is the root kait, used to signify an uncultivated forest. The definition has changed little and appears in Gothic haii (Feminine) and genitive haijs as field, open untilled land, pasture, open country. This corresponds precisely with Old English h, Middle Low German hde, Middle Dutch hde, heide, Dutch heide, hei, Old High German, Middle High German, German heide, and Old Norse heir. The prevalence of heath and its linguistic variations throughout all Germanic languages demonstrates that the word is not only very old, but that it reflects innate Germanic concepts. The word hain stems from the formative suffix haii-, and translates as being of the haii/of the heath.5 Accordingly, a heathen is literally a person who lives in the uncultivated wastelands of the wilderness. It is assumed that Ulfilas had chosen a Gothic word on model of the Latin pgnus. Indeed, pgnus had originally meant rustic villager in reference to the rural communities that existed outside of Romes great urban centers. However in the years after Christianity had established itself as an urban reli-gion and while ancient deities were still retained in rural districts, it came to refer to their religious status. Ulfilas would have recorded his translation during this latter period and may have wished to portray the woman as dwelling in the countryside or wastelands away from civilization. The traditional explanation for this is that it stressed the root sense of rural.6

In 1896, Sophus Bugge 7 challenged this explanation by offering that the word hain was not an original Gothic word at all, but was a product of the Classical Mediterranean world, and an offshoot of Armenian hetanos. This theory is consistent with his belief that the Germanic people had no original religious or mythological systems, and that they were all derivatives of the Classical or Christian world. His supposition has by and large been rejected, as should his explanation for hain. It is clear however, that the term was used as a Gothic gloss for the Greek hellnis (), which literally means Of the Greek Nation and is similar to Greek ethnos (, meaning nation or people). Ethnos and Latin gns (gentilis, our gentile) happen to be equivalents, each being in the Septuagint and Vulgate translations of the Hebrew Bible for the word goyim.8 When put into the context of the Hebrew Bible, goyim, ethnos, and gentili refer specifically to non-Jewish nations. Within a Christian context the meaning is shifted from non-Jewish nations to non-Christian. As we can see, none of these words hold any relation to heath or the concept of wilderness, and instead refer to a persons status as belonging to a foreign nation. In the Book of Mark then, in this context the woman was a Greek, not a Jew. Neither was she someone whom Christ had been associating with. She was other, religiously and nationally. This information is relevant

5 Simpson, John, and Weiner Edmund. heathen, a. Oxford English Dictionary. 2nd. United States: Oxford University Press, 19896 Metcalf, Allan. The World in So Many Words: A Country-by-Country Tour of Words That Have Shaped Our Language. Orlando:

Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1999.7 See Simeks Dictionary of Northern Mythology. In his most famous work, Studier over der nordiske Gude-og Heltesagns Oprindelse,

Bugge made his argument through attempting to connect the etymologies of Norse words to classical and biblical sources.( Loki from Luzifer, Urarbrunnr from Jordan, and Iavellir from Eden). In addition to this bias, Bugge fails to explain why a foreign word like het'anos would spread through the Germanic languages while the term gentili, which was far more popular in Ecclesiastical, writings does not.

8 Watkins, Calvert, ed., The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-European Roots, 2nd ed., Houghton Mifflin Co., 2000. See also Liddell, Henry George, and Robert Scott, eds. Intermediate Greek-English Lexicon, Oxford Univ. Press, 1883. See also Lewis, Charlton T., Elementary Latin Dictionary, Oxford, 1890.

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because we will see heathen used often by Germanic scribes as a translation for gentili in earlier Latin texts. We will also observe a pattern that develops which demonstrates its shifting definition during the period in which Christian and native German people were intermingling.

While the Bishop Ulfilas introduced what would become the word heathen in text during the mid 4th century, it does not appear in surviving records for the next several hundred years in any way other than in reproductions of the manuscript containing the Gothic Bible. Whether or not the word would have been spoken or written on perishable material during this period cannot be determined but it does not appear to have been used by any scribes, and it doesnt appear in any of the Law Codes that were recorded by the multiple Germanic people who had settled in and around the Roman borders on the continent. The Goths, along with most of the other tribes that dealt with the Roman world would subsequently become a part of that world. The wealth of tribal laws we have from this period are in Latin. The works of Germanic writers like Ulfilas had become a part of the literature of the Latin world, and they were bound and held in Rome with little contact or influence on other tribes aside from those which were highly Romanized.

Rome would deteriorate, and its culture with it. When Charlemagne had his renaissance in the begin-ning of the 9th century and attempted to revive Roman culture, the Carolingians helped import the writ-ings of Rome into the northern frontiers of Christian Europe. This enabled a classical ecclesiastical culture to be established, and heavily impacted the surrounding tribes who had not been Romanized and had retained their own cultures. Likewise, vernacular literacy had finally begun to pick up among Germanic groups as exemplified in the early 7th century Anglo Saxon law codes, and expanded in sub-sequent centuries. Through this route Germanic and Christian thought in northern Europe would inter-mingle and syncretize.

The Anglo Saxon laws do hold a wealth of valuable material, but while our records of them demonstrate that they are the oldest vernacular English texts and the word heathen does appear in them several times, we will need to investigate other sources before we can really put the laws into an appropriate context. There are two particular bodies of work which help to demonstrate the context that heathen had come to be used in. One of these sources was compiled during the reign of the Wessex king, Alfred the Great, shortly after his own peace treaty with the Danish king Guthrum and the establishment of the Danelaw around the 890s. This work, referred to as the Anglo Saxon Chronicle9 is exactly that. It is a chronicle of the English people through dated entries from the mythical Anglo Saxon past, the time of Christ, into the year of its compilation. Since this text was all compiled at once, the scribes needed to backdate entries which required that they draw from other sources. The so-called Anglo Saxons10 at this time would have also intermingled considerably with the Brythonic peoples, the Picts, and the Gaelic Irish. For this purpose it is also beneficial to explore the Irish Ulster Annals,11 considering how neatly the entries coincide between the two in relation to this study and the significant likelihood of influence between them.

The first mention of the word heathen within the Anglo Saxon Chronicle is from an extensive entry for the year 616 in reference to the death of the first Christian king of Kent, thelberht. The entry draws from an original source which is clearly Bedes Historiam Ecclesiasticam Gentis Anglorum: Liber Secundus (Ecclesiastical History of the English People, Book Two).12 The chronicles entry is a gloss of his work, translated from Latin into Old English, and in it the word heathen is used twice as a translation of Bedes

9 Garmonsway, G.N. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle London. Everyman Press. 197210 The term Anglo Saxon can be problematic as it generalizes more culturally specific Anglian, Saxon, Jutish peoples who were all in-

termingling at this time under one umbrella.11 Royal Irish Academy. Annala Uladh, Annals of Ulster; otherwise, Annala Senait, Annals of Senat: A Chronicle of Irish Affairs. Vol. 1.

Dublin: Printed for H.M Stationary, 1887. (Digitalized in 2011 with funding by University of Toronto)12 Venerabilis, Bede, (673-735) Historia Ecclesiasitca Gentis Anglorum. Londini: Sumptibus Societatis, (Digitilized by the Internet Archive

in 2011 with funding from University of Toronto)

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text. After relaying the death of thelberht, both texts go on to highlight the refusal of his son Eadbald to become a Christian. While Bede refers to Eadbald as living in a sinful manner that was so corrupt that it was not even heard among the gentes (gentiles), the entry in the Anglo Saxon Chronicle records sim-ply that he was living in henum (heathendom). Bede goes on to describe the departure of the bishops Mellitus and Justus from the barbaros (barbarians) of Kent who had refused to be converted. He did not use the term gentes in this instance however, and described their religious practices as being a daemoni-cis cultibus (demonic cult). The scribe who translated Bede chose not to differentiate between the terms gentes and daemonicis cultibis and used the term heene (heathen) a second time. The implications here are that while Bede chose the word gentes to refer to Eadbalds people who were part of a nation which was foreign to an established Christian nation, and daemonicis cultibus in clear condemnation of the worship of deities which were in Bedes opinion clearly evil; the English scribe who translated this work had decided to bring these two separate implications from two separate terms under the same moniker of hen. The term no longer implied foreign or country dweller. Its context is both that of being outside a Christian state and condemnable.

In the end of the eighth century, English territories were invaded and subjected to plunder and slaughter. The invaders were Danes.13 They were both foreign to the English and still held to their native religion. They also held no consideration for Christian sanctity, and targeted churches, slaughtered monks, and terrified the scribes who wrote about their incursions. They would go on to change the entire political and religious landscape of north and east England by establishing their Danelaw. Both the Irish and English sources record the wars between the Danes in the form of yearly entries between 793 with the Viking attack on Lindisfarne, to the peace treaties between Guthrum and Alfred in the end of the 9th cen-tury. Both sources provide a wealth of terminology which is exceptionally telling of the nomenclature that developed regarding the Danes during this century of conflict. Regarding the initial Viking raid in 793 when they destroyed the monastery at Lindisfarne and slaughtered the monks, the Ulster Annals say simply; Devastation of all the Isles of Britain by gentiles.14 The entry that appears in the Anglo Saxon Chronicles was recorded later:

Her wron ree forebecna cumene ofer Norhymbra land, t folc earmlic bregdon, t wron ormete odenas ligrescas, fyrenne dracan wron ge-sewene on am lifte fleogende. am tacnum sona fyligde mycel hunger, litel fter am, s ilcan geares on .VI. Idus Ianuarii, earmlice henra manna hergunc adilegode Godes cyrican in Lindisfarnaee urh hreaflac mansliht.

This year came dreadful fore-warnings over the land of the Northumbrians, terrifying the people most woefully: these were immense sheets of light rushing through the air, and whirlwinds, and fiery dragons flying across the firmament. These tremendous tokens were soon followed by a great famine: and not long after, on the sixth day before the ides of January in the same year, the harrowing inroads of heathen men made lamentable havoc in the church of God in Holy-island, by rapine and slaughter.15

Here the foreign invaders are referred to as henra manna by the Anglo Saxons, while the Irish

13 In this case, Danes does not refer to the people of modern day Denmark, but rather in implies people from Norway, Jutland, and Sweden. Essentially then, it refers to Scandinavians.

14 Annala Uladh, 188715 Avalon Project, 2008

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Annals label them gentilibur. Both sources go on to demonstrate a correlating pattern associating other-ness with the Danes.

Within the Irish Annals between 793 mentioned above and through the entire 9th century to follow, the Danes are interchangeably referred to as gentilibur and gaill (OI-foreigner). After 840, when they are first reported to have established a settlement at Dublin, we see them called dubh-gaill and dubh-genti. They are referred to as Normanna occasionally albeit rarely after 836 but this is clearly introduced by the Anglo Saxons as it is an Old English word. Only once, in 989, are they referred to as Danes. Both gentilibur and gaill (with its derivatives) are used to demonstrate the Danes status as outsiders to the community/religion, and while they were used to refer to any foreign group of people, by and large they become associated with the Danes, who are referenced with greater frequency through the 9th century, and who were heavily impacting the social and political landscape. Before 830 we see the words gentile and gaill used most often in reference to them, over other foreign groups at the time. After 830, when the Danes had become a considerable threat and had forced the different English factions to bury their residual differences or all be conquered, we see a notable spike in the terms usage. In just 10 years, between 830 and 840, the use of the terms gentili and gaill double what they had been for the preceding thirty seven years. Over the course of the 830s through 900, entries concerning the invading Danes dominate the an-nals and demonstrate how serious a presence they had become.16

The same overall pattern exists in the Anglo Saxon Chronicles. Prior to the 830s we only see three entries regarding the Danes. Two of these entries call them hen and one in 787 refers to them as Normanna from Hrealande, the land of thieves. Between 830 and 890 we see them referenced nearly thirty more times, interchangeably referred to as hen and Dniscan. The word hen appears for the final time in the chronicle in the entry for 871 regarding a series of battles between the Dniscan and their hen kings, after which peace treaties were signed.

It is likely that the Anglo Saxon Chronicler used the Ulster Annals or related documents as a source in his compilation, and we see the word heathen used as a gloss for gentili and any other word which signi-fied foreignness to both country and religion. However, over the course of nearly a century of continual struggle against invading Danish armies and reavers, these words had developed a connotation with the Danes specifically. In the Ulster Annals, after they had begun to settle and clearly had established cordial relationships with some of the islands factions, they were still unable to shake free from their association with othernesss. Instead of being properly called Danes, they were referred to as dubh-gaill to specify them from other gaill. Likewise, to the English, hen and Dniscan had developed to become implica-tive of one another. As the term had now come to designate a specific people and had essentially acquired a face for the name, it had also become indicative of the customs and practices of the Danish people in particular.

The word heathen only appears in the recorded Anglo Saxon laws after the conversion of the Danes when king Guthrum signed for peace with Alfred of Wessex. The very earliest that we see the word actually written and not backdated is in 826 where it appears in the Charter of Ecgberht from that year.17 Recorded Anglo Saxon law extends back into the early 7th century in the oldest vernacular laws of thelberht. Between the 7th century and the Danish invasion in the 9th, multiple laws were enacted to attempt to bring the various English people more in line with Ecclesiastical Canons and to extinguish indigenous, unchris-tian religious practices. These practices are described, for example, as witchcraft, auguries, sacrificing or making oaths on wells, stones, and trees, as well as incantations other than Christian prayers.18 The Laws

16 The recorded tallies between these two sources are this authors own.17 OED, 198918 Thorpe, Benjamin. Ancient Laws and Institues of England. Vol 1-2. New Jersey: Lawbook Exchange LTD, 2004

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of Withraed (690) record fines inflicted on those who offer to devils,19 and they appear in 8th century Canon Law. Despite the detailed descriptions of these forbidden practices, they were never actually given a label in vernacular until after the conversion of the Danish King Guthrum in 878. The word hen first appears in the Laws of Edward and Guthrum where it is recorded to be part of the treaty between Edwards father Alfred, and Guthrum for peace between the English and Danes, and for the conversion of the Danes. Prior to this point it had only ever been used as an English vernacular gloss of Latin and Gaelic texts. It was in reference to foreigners and Danes who were religiously and physically outside of the Christian world. Now it is written into a treaty intended, on behalf of the English, to bring those Danes of the Danelaw out of dangerous otherness and into Christendom. Edward has the treaty recorded in the preamble to his own laws recorded later in 901; they would love one God, and zealously renounce every kind of hendom (heathendom/heathenism).20 In his own laws Edward includes the doom: If anyone violate Christianity or reverence hendom, by words or by work, let him pay as well were, as wite or lah-slit, according as the deed may be.21

Once the Danes had been brought into the folds of the Christian world, we see henom used in contemporary law specifically targeting Danish religious practice. While English kings had previously at-tempted to put an end to the indigenous religious practices that had existed among the populace, it wasnt until now that those illegal practices were given a label; hendom.

Kings and ecclesia continued to further define that label in order to help eradicate those practices, and the definition of the word hendom was given greater specificity within English law codes. Dooms are enacted throughout them forbidding the practices of wil-weorunga (well-worship), stan-weorunga (stone worship), treow-weorunga (tree worship), and idola weounga (idol worship). All of these now fall under the definition of hendom. The canons of King Edgar (959) state:

We enjoin, that every priest zealously promote Christianity, and totally ex-tinguish every heathenism; and forbid well worshipings, and necromancies (lic-wiglunga), and divinations (Hwata), and incantations (galdra), and man worshipping, and the vain practices which are carried on with various spells, and with frithsplots, and with elders, and also with various other trees, and with stones, and with many various delusions, with which men do much of what they should not.22

The Laws of the Northumbrian Priests give a similar description:

If then anyone be found that shall henceforth practice any heathenship (henscipe), either by sacrifice or by fyrt, or in any way love witch-craft (Wicce-crft), or worship idols, if he be a kings thane, let him pay X half-marks; half to Christ, half to the king. We are all to love and wor-ship one God, and strictly hold one Christianity, and totally renounce all heathenship.23

The Anglo Saxon Laws of the eleventh century Danish king, Cnut attempts to actively define the word heathenism.

19 Ibid.20 Ibid21 Ibid22 Ibid23 Ibid

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We forbeda eornostlice lene henscipe. Henscipe bi t man idola weorige t is t man weorige hene godas and sunnan oe mnan fr oe flod wter-wllas oe stanas oe niges cnnes wu-treowa. Oe wicce-crft lufige. Oe mor-weore ge-fremme. On nige wisan. Oe on blote oe on frht oe on swler gedwimra nig ing dreoge.

We earnestly forbid all heathenism. Heathenism is that men worship idols; that is, that they worship heathen gods, and the sun or the moon, fire or riv-ers, water-wells or stonesor forest trees of any kind, or love witchcraft, or promote murder-work in any wise; or by blot or by divination; or perform anything pertaining to such illusions.24

With Cnuts definition, hen had evolved to fully represent the indigenous religious practices of the Danes, as well as those of all the peoples of northern Europe who were still to be Christianized. The words original meaning of foreigner was essentially lost, and it had taken on a much more specialized definition which most closely sums up the religions of the Germanic people. Over the course of the next several hundred years this definition will become solidified in the vernacular writings throughout northern Europe and Scandinavia. The Anglo Saxon epic Beowulf describes the practices of the Danes as hen.25 The Scandinavian sagas and poems which make up the largest body of literature we have pertaining to old Nordic religion, all use the cognate heini. Within these writings, the word heathen always relates to the old religion.

The collective body of literature that was composed in Iceland during the 13th century, not only marks the end of the period which this article investigates. It provides some of the finest examples of how the term had come to be used to describe specific people and their religious practices. One of the primary reasons for this is that a good deal of sagaic subject matter relates to the period of intense religious conflict and change that Norway and Iceland experienced, during the tenth century. Norwegian kings and chief-tains were forced to address the pressing Christian religion, which eventually took a foothold within the courts of the king. Christianity in turn was forced to reconcile with the reality of a predominantly heathen Norway. Members of both religions served in the courts of kings such as Hkon the Good where politics between the two groups played out and were brought into contrast with one another.

Writing about Hkons death in his Heimskringla, Snorri Sturluson depicts one of the most vivid scenes regarding the two religions.

En tt mr veri lfs auit, segir hann, mun ek af landi fara ok til kristinna manna, ok bta at, er ek hefi brotit vi gu; en ef ek dey hr heini, veiti mr ann grpt er yr snist. Litlu sar andaist Hkon konungr ar hellunni, sem hann hafi fddr verit. ok urpu ar haug mikinn ok lgu ar konung me alvpni sitt ok hinn bezta bna sinn, en ekki f annat. Mltu eir sv fyrir grepti hans, sem heiinna manna sir var til, vsuu honum til Valhallar.26

24 Ibid25 Heaney, Seamus. Beowulf; A New Verse Translation. New York, W. W. Nortan & Company. 2000.26 Surluson Snorri, Linder, Nils, KA. Haggson. Heimskringla: ea, Sgur Noregs konunga. Snorra Sturlusonar, Uppsala : W. Schultz,

(1869-1872.)

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If I be granted to live, (Hkon) said, I would leave the country to abide among Christians and do penance for what I have sinned against God. But if I die here, among heathens, then give me such a burial place as seems most fitting to you. And a short while afterwards king Hkon died on the same slab of rock where he was bornThey raised a great mound and in it buried the king in full armor and in his finest array, but with no other valuables. Words were spoken over his grave according to the custom of heathen men, and they put him on the way to Valhalla.27

The Saga of Hkon the Good, while written in the 13th century, demonstrates that the term heathen specifically referred to the old religion within the minds of 13th century Icelanders. Its definition had changed little since it had been developed and put into writing in England during the 10th century, but it had spread and become saturated into the linguistic culture of the North. The term had grown out of and had developed contemporarily with the people that it came to refer to. By the time Scandinavia had been integrated into what was at this point in history becoming a European identity of Christendom, the older traditions were likewise identifiable as heathen.

Thus far, I have traced the use and context of the word heathen as it developed throughout the time period that the indigenous religious practices of the Germanic and Scandinavian people would have ex-isted, thrived, come into contact with, and subsequently struggled against condemnation and strict legal restrictions. Both the Christian church and kings tried ceaselessly to eliminate these practices with one hand while recording their own perspective on them with the other. These are the people who we have looked to for information regarding native Germanic religion, and they have painted history in their own light. The context that we have investigated the word heathen from has been an entirely Christian per-spective. After all, the word was developed and defined from the Christian side of the fence, but it still only provides us with one side of a two party dialogue. Christian kings, churchmen, and writers came to describe the people of northern Europe as heathens, and had no interest in intentionally preserving a fair reaction from those people. The remainder of this article is an attempt to give a voice to the other side of the conversation. To provide some clues as to what the term might have meant to the people that we see referred to as heathen. To try and suggest any perspective by a people over a large period of time, who had no way or recording their own words is of course, inherently theoretical. We have nothing written by heathen hands which may tell us how they reacted to the Christian-dubbed moniker. However, this investigation still offers valuable insight into some of the underlying heathen worldview and how it might have affected individual people reaction to the term.

To the Goths and most other Germanic people, the word hain was related to the haijs (the heath) and the literal meaning of the word hain was heath dweller. I have already said that to the indig-enous Germanic people, the term heath dweller would have been synonymous within their culture as the definition of gentili , someone of a foreign nation and religion to Latin speaking, Christian Romans. While Ulfilas28 obviously had a Christian audience in mind when he penned his Gothic Bible, it must be noted that these were not traditional Nicene Christians. They practiced a Christianity that would soon be declared heretical, which was called Arianism. In many ways, we can look to Germanic people who had converted to Arianism for assistance in understanding their native religious concepts. According to James

27 Sturluson, Snorri, Hollander Lee M. (Trans) Heimskringla; History of the Kings of Norway. Austin: University of Texas Press, 200928 For an interesting look at Wulfilas own religious change, see Sivan, Hagith. Ulfilas Own Conversion. The Harvard Theological

Review. Vol. 89, No. 4 (Oct., 1996), pp. 373-386: Cambridge University Press.

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Russells Germanization of Early Medieval Christianity,29 when Ulfilas presented his bible to the Goths, the majority of the people were not yet Christian and those who converted did so to Arianism. Theology, specifically the Arian denial of the trinity mattered little to most Goths, Theodoric and the nobility essen-tially viewed religion as a part of politicsThe Ostrogoths as a people clung to Arianism for political and social, not theological reasons.30 Arianism was their national religion. It was how they identified in order to maintain their own culture, and so that they would not be absorbed into the universalism of the Roman Empire and rising Catholicism. Furthermore, Arianism was understandably slow to penetrate the elemental world of pagan cult practice, long so much a part of agrarian life. Arianism allowed them to be Christians and hence, part of the greater world of Romanitas without forsaking their Gothic pride or their ancestors. Arianism must be understood as a tribal religion.31 Ulfilas translation of the New Testament was fashioned to allow for the natural Germanic state of a tribal, folk centered point of view.

This brings us to the native Germanic point of view. To heathen Europeans and even early Christians, religion was not simply a matter of personal belief and it was not as centralized as the invading Christian belief system. It was very much local. It was tied directly to the community that practiced it. There is a very real and very simple reason why this essay is concerned with the word heathen and not one which better describes the native Germanic religious customs. They have left us no native name for their reli-gion with which we may refer to. What they have left us are concepts which help give a better depiction of their religious worldview. The closest word we have relating to the Germanic religion is Old Norse sir.32 It has cognates in every old Germanic language and refers dually to the customs and the religion of a people. Both of these entities are subsequently tied to the laws of a people. Simply put, the sir of a Germanic tribe are what define their social mores, their right and wrong, their morality and their identity as a people. The native religion of the Germanic people was tied directly to their land and to their social connections which shaped their sir.

Since the Germanic concept of religion was inseparable from land, law, and community, it could be understood in terms of both physical and conceptual boundaries, generally defined as gars.33 Beyond the boundaries of a peoples recognized community or territory, their religion no longer existed because their laws, customs and identity no longer existed. A foreigner in this context would be beyond a communitys sir in every way, and sir is as close a concept for religion as the heathen Germanic people have left us

This information puts the word heathen in a different context. A heath dweller to a member of an early Germanic tribe would not simply be an individual living in the country. That individual would be a foreigner, outside of their cultural identity, their customs, their laws, and their morality. That individual would dwell beyond the gars where their gods dwelt, their ancestors had developed, and their sir main-tained. It is no wonder Germanic Christians wielded this word against those which were both foreign and outside of Christianity. The invading Danes were indeed heathens to the Anglo Saxons. However, this understanding of the word does not seem to promote a group of people like the Danes or anyone else actu-ally calling themselves heathen. Yet evidence suggests that at least in some circles, they did.

29 Russell, James. The Germanization of Early Medieval Christianity; A Sociohistorical Approach to Religious Transformation. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994

30 Ibid.31 Ibid.32 Hoops, Johannes. Beck, Heinrich. Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde, Volume 28. Berlin. Walter de Gruyter; 2nd Revised

edition; 200533 Hastrup, Kristen. Culture and History in Medieval Iceland: An Anthropological Analysis of Structure and Change. New York, Oxford

University Press, 1985 See also Vikstrand, Pers. sgarr, Migarr, and tgarr. A Linguistic Approach to a Classical Problem. Norse Religion in Long-Term Perspectives. Origins, Changes, and Interactions. Ed. A. Andrn, K. Jennbert & C. Raudvere. Lund 2006. (Vgar till Midgrd 8.) S. 354-357.

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Returning to the middle of the 9th century, to the death of Hkon the Good and the events in Norway that followed his death, we can get a more spectacular glimpse at the point of view of unconverted Norwegians than through the prose of 13th century Icelanders. An impressive collection of skaldic poetry is preserved within the sagas that pertain to this period. Since skaldic poetry was composed in stylized, alliterative verse, it preserves in oral tradition much easier than prose, and many of the poems are attributed to the skalds within the sagas, and not the writer of the saga themselves. Through skaldic poetry, we are given the opportunity to study the closest thing to genuine heathen language outside of runestones. Within the preserved collection of skaldic poetry, there are multiple occasions on which the term heathen is used.

Eyvindr Finnsson Skldaspillir34 was one such skald who, among others, served at the court of Hkon the Good. Two of Eyvindrs poems and fourteen single stanzas have been preserved, and one of them, Hkonarml35 was written in dedication to Hkon after he was killed in the battle of Stor around 961. While Hkon was a Christian, Eyvindr was a heathen, and in a twist of fate, his dedication poem to Hkon sends the dead king off to Valhalla. In the final lines, the poem reads;

Deyr f. Cattle die Deyja frndr, Kinsmen die,eyist land ok l; Land and lieges are whelmed;sz Hkon fr ever since Hkonme heiin go, to the heathen gods fared,mrg er j um j. Many a liege is laid low.36

This is the earliest appearance of the word heiinn in Old Norse that we have preserved. According to Christopher Abrams, The fact that Eyvindr felt the need to specify the gods were heathen seems to indicate a new awareness that there were alternatives to traditional paganism. This term asserts the pagans identity as a religious group, but such an assertion of identity would hardly be necessary if their own religion was the only one they knew about.37 There are at least two other appearances of the word heiinn within skaldic poetry that allegedly date before 1000. Hallfrer Vandraskld makes use of it in lausavsa 838 and Tindr Hallkelsson uses it in a fragment of a drpa about Jarl Hkon.39 The authentic-ity of single verses such as these two later examples is probably more questionable, but combined they provide solid evidence that Eyvindrs Hkonarml is not an isolated instance where the term is used as a self identifier by a heathen.

All three poets would be a part of Jarl Hkon Sigurarsons retinue following the deaths of King Hkon the Good and Haraldr Greycloak. Jarl Hkon was not only a powerful ruler, but he was a heathen who sought to reestablish the old religions dominance in Norway. This was a period when Christianity was pressing in from all sides, creating an environment of constant pressure and conflict with the native Norwegian religion. The courts of Jarl Hkon were hyper aware of their heathenism, and they sought to bolster and entrench it. As previously stated, they had never needed a name to contrast themselves with before the encroachment of Christianity. It seems very reasonable that at least within the courts of kings and poets, where the new and old religions competed for power, adherents to the old religion required

34 Pulsiano, Phillip. Wolf, Kirsten. Medieval Scandinavia: An Encyclopedia, Garland Encyclopedia of the Middle Ages; Vol. 1. New York, Garland, 1993

35 Sturluson, Schultz, 187236 Ibid.37 Abram, Christopher. Myths of the Pagan North; The Gods of the Norsemen. New York: Continuum International Publishing Group, 201138 Pulsiano, Wolf, 1993.39 Ibid. These skalds were also discussed with between this author and Professor Abrams via email.

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a name for their identity which they could fix into the lexicon. They appear to have chosen heiinn. This reaction to the perceived threat of Christianity is reminiscent of the appearance of Mjlnir pendants throughout Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, in areas where Christianity was most prevalent, and was likely a heathen reaction to the threat of the cross.

It cannot be said how the men and women who populated the communities and farmsteads that were miles removed from the halls of kings might have reacted to the label they were given. All we have is the information presented to speculate with, and it might well have been an individual or communal issue. After all, these were active, breathing communities of men, women and children living in a time of tremendous change over which they had little control. People would have reacted individually. We must remember that even our skaldic examples, even if they are in their original form, express the words of one man, composing for a specific audience.

Heathen is a word that would not have been necessary as a descriptor but for Christianity, and yet I cannot provide any better substitute. It may be more appropriate to identify heathen people by their clan names, or the regions and cults they belonged to, rather than sum them all together under one identity. However, in general there was clearly an overarching socio-religious structure which tied the various pre-Christian Germanic people together into a commonality which must be recognized as something for the purpose of distinguishing it from Christianity and other religions as well. We seem to have stuck with the term heathen, despite the connotations it holds. Those people of western and northern Europe who retained their native beliefs are then lumped together as heathen and distinguished from one another with their tribe or regional name which would have been closer to the name of their religion. While the term is ingrained in the history of northern Europes conflict with Christianity, if one understands that history and the context with which the word developed, it may not be a bad thing.

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As modern heathens who have dedicated our lives to reestablishing the pre-Christian traditions of Scandinavia and Northern Europe, we know how important the concept of heathen worldview is. Its well understood that in order to develop practices that are rooted in ancient heathen religion, we need to be able to understand and adopt the outlook that heathen peoples may have held.1 This requires recognition of part of the spatial and cosmological landscape that helped shape heathen societies. This landscape is essential to comprehending every other bit of mythological and cultural information, because the protocol for religion, custom, and morality was built into it. The concepts and basic layout presented here can be used to establish part of the foundation for a working modern heathen worldview, from which lore and academia may be processed and applied, and modern traditions may be developed.

Innangar and tangar

For the Germanic peoples, space as it is encountered and perceived in the created worlds of men and other beings, exists, to any significant degree only as a location or container for the occurrence of actionwhether of individual men, of men acting in consort or in opposition, of men and mon-sters, or whatever. In all cases, immediate actions are discontinuous and separable deriving power and structure from the past.2

From a modern perspective, concepts like religion and accompanying ideas like cosmology, morality, and holiness are universal and world encompassing. If there is divinity, it is generally seen as either omni-present, or beyond this world. Morality is universally applicable, and determined through this perceived divinity and a personalized individual relationship between it and those who believe in it. This was not the case in heathen Scandinavia or central and western Europe, where the model for their cosmological, cultural, and political systems were intimately bound to the immediate geographical and social terrain. In general, the heathen Europeans recognized space, societies, and action as belonging within identified boundaries.3 Religion and concepts of holiness would have also been tied to physical and social locality. In many ways, these systems correlated with geographic enclosures, represented as physical plots. The common word used to designate these plots appears as Old Norse gar, Old English geard, and even modern English yard. The original meaning of the word was wall or hedge, and it evolved to indicate an enclosure, plot of ground or space in relation to that wall.4

The cosmological places retained in Norse literature such as sgarr, Migarr, tgarr can easily be understood in relation to the walls (either symbolically or literally) that distinguish their contained space from other space. Asgard5 is the enclosure that contains the collective sir. Midgard (middle enclosure)

1 See Rood, J. Reconstructionism in Modern Heathenry: An Introduction Odroerir, Vol 1, 2011. 2 Bauschatz, Paul. The Well and the Tree; World and Time in Early Germanic Culture. Amherst, University of Massachusetts Press, 19823 Ibid.4 Oxford English Dictionary. Second Edition, Oxford University Press, 19895 Due to the variety of languages and forms that many of the names and terms covered in this paper appear in, I have decided to present them

in the form that their sources provide, and then I will often standardize them in an Anglicized or common version. This is only for the sake of consistency in this paper, and the reader should always be aware of the variation that words and names appear in.

Establishing the Innangar Some Concepts Relating to Custom, Morality, and Religion

By Joshua Rood

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most simply means the enclosure that contains the inhabited world. Utgard, specifically referring to Eddic poetry, could refer to the outer enclosure surrounding Midgard. While these mythological spaces may have been universally recognized to some degree, they would not have been the cosmological centerpiece of the heathen Scandinavians, and they certainly would not have been the foundation of their religious worldview. Aside from concerns regarding Christianization of the literature, the preserved mythology does not accurately represent the layout of the heathen cosmology when taken at face value for numerous reasons. Firstly, skalds shaped poetry to fit their specific agenda and target audience (most often an aris-tocratic court). Many poems that we have preserved are as much or more of a social commentary as they are a reflection of religious belief. Secondly, the mythology that we have only represents a fraction of the body of mythos that would have existed among heathen peoples. Icelandic poetry primarily represents Icelandic cosmology, shaped through the eyes of the skald who presents it. It does not necessarily repre-sent, for example, Vendil, Trondheim, Wessex or Jutish myth. While concepts of Asgard, Midgard, and Utgard existed in some form among these people, they are only a fraction of what would have been in the background of heathen religious focus. Individual groups would have been focused on a more specific, more locally relevant microcosm.

The mythological landscape to the heathen was not centered around a universal depiction of The world of men, surrounded by the world of the unknown, and looked after by the world of the gods, whom men seek out for help. The center of their world can more accurately be related to the gars that surrounded the cultivated and orderly safety of their given community, and separated it from the world beyond. In most cases this borderline was drawn between the farmstead as the center of the world, and the outlying lands surrounding it as periphery.6 Hastrup refers to these counter spaces as they appear in Iceland as inni and ti, innangar and tangar, and elaborates that these two spaces should be understood as being that which lies within the controlled space of close-knit social relations and that which is outside of it. The identification of these boundaries may have at times been represented with physical enclosures, but were by no means geographically fixed. Innangard and utangard were primarily conceptual, and created distinct semantic spaces in relation to one another.

Utgard is not simply a name for the fixed space beyond Midgard, the world of men. It has a much more personal, much more important place within heathen worldview. Per Vikstrand points out that it is widely used throughout Scandinavian languages and implies An outlying farmstead, dependent on or owned by another, more central farm or village, or the fences delimiting the inlying fields of a village from the out-lying fields.7 In Swedish dialects, there are epithets such as utgrds, utangrds, and utangrding, which contextually mean not from our farm; from somewhere else.8 That which was utangard was that which was beyond the semantic barrier that separated it from a persons social community upon which they were dependant and which was dependent upon them. A wide range of beings, from landvttir to jtnar to trlls, from wolves to deer could inhabit a communitys utangards. They would have been perceived as uncontrolled, uncultivated, and wild. Also dwelling in the utangards were people and other established communities with their own innangard and utangard. They, like anything else beyond a persons familiar community, were constantly interacted with for better or worse. However, they were semantically sepa-rate from an individuals own inner yard.

6 Hastrup, Kristen. Culture and History in Medieval Iceland: An Anthropological Analysis of Structure and Change. New York, Oxford University Press, 1985

7 Vikstrand, Pers. sgarr, Migarr, and tgarr. A linguistic Approach to a Classical Problem. in Old Norse Religion in Long-term Perspectives. Origins, Changes, and Interactions. Ed. A. Andrn, K. Jennbert & C. Raudvere. Lund 2006. (Vgar till Midgrd 8.) S. 354357.

8 Ibid.

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Within the innangard of a community lay its laws, its social mores, and the expression of its identified religion. These concepts were intimately intertwined, and in many cases can hardly be distinguished from one another. The law of a community was coterminous with its traditional customs, which were often religious in nature. These customs gave a community its identity, sanctified its religion, and reaffirmed its laws. The geographical landscape of a community specifically shaped those religio-political traditions, and formed the foundation that they were developed from. Local sovereignty was so important that kings who sought to rule vast territories were required to participate in regional religious events, even while they tried to consolidate their own religious and political control.

The barriers between communities were never static. They shifted with the social, political, and reli-gious winds. People and groups could become part of the recognized innangard of a community, or they could leave it. Communities could split or they could merge. One of the prime purposes of marriage was to join two communities. Religio-political ceremonies such as sumbl (OE symbel) were intended to bind groups of otherwise unrelated people (usually warriors and aristocrats) into fictive kinship.9

In Iceland, outlawry literally entailed going outside of that established community. An outlaw existed beyond the protective confines of a settlement, as defined by the word for greater outlawery, skggangr (lit. forest-going). Skggarmenn were equated with the otherness beyond the community, which meant that they existed outside of the laws, customs, and religion. At the Icelandic Althing of the year 1000, the heathens and Christians declared themselves to be r lgum out of law with each other.10 Hedeager speculates that part of the supernatural qualities attributed to smiths, artisans and travelling religious ex-perts (shamans) are derived from the perception that they travel between the cultivated and settled spaces and the wild and dangerous territories of the utangards.11 Hastrup suggests that the berserkr (bear-shirt), who were often outlawed, moved from the social space of a community into the other space that is be-yond it when his mind shifted and berserksgangr came over him.

While heathen society held a shared heritage, and certainly there were wide spread myths, beliefs, and customs, they were expressed within the confines of, and in regard to the well being of specific recognized communities. The nature of this expression of religious and political custom can be clearly demonstrated in the heathen notion of religion and holy.

Sidu: Custom and mortality

The Common Germanic term sidu, with equivalents as Old Norse sir, Gothic sidus, Old English sidu, seodu, siodu, Old High German situ, sito, and with modern equivalents in every Germanic language ex-cept English, is the closest word we have to religion in old Germanic languages.12 Likewise, it refers to concepts of ritual, tradition, custom and law. All of these are culturally circumscribed, and it cannot prop-erly be translated as any one of these terms without losing a great deal of its context. Sir is found in Old Norse prose texts, and throughout medieval laws and skaldic poetry. In prose literature, sir is attested in religious and ritual contexts regarding pre-Christian Scandinavia, but it also refers to morality, and proper behavior. Snorri Sturlusson describes the sacrificial cult in Trondheim, Norway in the following terms;

9 Enright, Michael. Lady with a Mead Cup. Portland, Four Courts Press. 199610 Hastrup, 198511 Hedeager, L. Scandinavian Central Places in a Cosmological Setting in Central Places in the Migration and Merovingian Period.

(Eds) Hardh, B. and Larsson, L. Almqvis & Wiksell International. 200212 Hoops, Johannes. Beck, Heinrich. Reallexikon der germanischen Altertumskunde, Volume 28. Berlin. Walter de Gruyter; 2nd Revised

edition; 2005

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at var forn sir, er blt skyldi vera, at allir bndr skyldu ar koma sem hof var ok flytja annug fng sn, au er eir skyldu hafa, mean veizlan st.

It was ancient custom/ritual that when sacrifice was made, all farmers were to come to the hof and bring along with them the food they needed while the feast lasted.13

The account describes the public sacrificial rituals, the holy objects and the participants in the cult ac-tivity all as a part of forn sir (ancient religious custom). The religious rituals of the Norwegian colonists performing land-taking rites in Iceland are also called forn sir. Vatnsdla Saga relates that Smundr landed in Skagafjrur, where land was unsettled in every direction. He set out carrying fire in accor-dance with the old custom/ritual (at fornum si) and laid claim to land14 It has been suggested that the purpose of these rituals was to symbolically transform unknown, unoccupied territory into habitable land with structures, form and norms. If this is true, it would have symbolically established the boundaries that separated the newly established innangard from the surrounding wilderness.15

The term is often used to describe the religious activity concerning death ceremonies. Eyrbyggja Saga mentions the last services to the dead which Arnkell had rendered to his father rlf. Wrapping cloth around his fathers head, he got him ready for burial according to the sivenju of the time.16 Snorri uses the term sivenja when describing the rituals of the funeral and inheritance feast after the death of King nundr Yngvarsson, which included libation ceremonies, oathing, and the entering of the high-seat as part of a ritual.17 In Yngingla Saga, the practice of raising burial mounds for notable men and holding specific yearly sacrifice are also referred to as the sir in that land.18 In Hkonar Ga Saga, after the king had died, Snorri relates that;

Mltu eir sv fyrir grepti hans, sem heiinna manna sir var til, vsuu honum til Valhallar.

Words were spoken over his grave according the sir of heathen men, send-ing him to Valhalla.19

The term sir is used for religion, belief, and faith in a general sense as well, and did not always imply a form of action. Ancient religious customs/heathen practices (hinn forni sir/ heiinn sir) are contrasted with Christian liturgy and beliefs (hinn ni sir(new custom)/kristinn sir).20 Throughout the sagas, hea-then religion is referred to as heiinn sir. In lfsdrpa Tryggvasonar, the skald praises the king for supposedly turning the people away from the doubtful sir and who had rejected wicked gods (fra vondum si ok nitti illum godum).21 In Laxdla Saga, Gest explains one of Gudruns dreams;

13 Sturluson, Snorri, Hollander Lee M. (Trans) Heimskringla; History of the Kings of Norway. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2009 See also Surluson Snorri, Linder, Nils, KA. Haggson. Heimskringla: ea, Sgur Noregs konunga Snorra Sturlusonar, Uppsala : W. Schultz, (1869-1872.)

14 Vatnsdla Saga, Icelandic Saga Database, sagadb.org 15 Hoops, Johannes and Beck, Heinrich, 200516 Eyrbyggja Saga, Icelandic Saga Database, sagadb.org17 Hollander 2009, Schultz 1869-187218 Ibid.19 Ibid. Also Niles, Haggson, Sturluson, 1872.20 Hoops, Johannes and Beck, Heinrich, 200521 Ibid.

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en nr er at mnu hugboi, at at mund muni orit siaskipti, ok muni s inn bndi hafa tekit vi eim si, er vr hyggjum, at miklu s hleitari.

My mind forbodes me that by the time a siaskipti (change of faith/belief) will have come about and your husband will have taken the si (faith/belief) which we are minded to think is the more exalted.22

Not only did sidu embody the customs and religion of a particular people in a particular land, but it was also the common word used as a description of morality. In the Eddic poem Helgaqvia Hundingsbana in fyrri, Sinfjtli accuses Gumundr of being silauss (indecent or without morals).23 Its used to refer to exemplary military conduct, such as bravery. When lfr Tryggvason is said to have fought alone against two brave kings and one jarl, he became renowned for such conduct (til sliks siar). The same word that identified the customs of a people was so powerfully tied to their ideas of morality, that from the 12th to the 15th century it appears in Icelandic texts that describe Christian virtues. In the Harmsl its used to describe Christs purity. vt hugga frir hug mnn siir nir,24 Because you comfort my mind with your sweet virtues/purity.25 In contrast, we can find an example in Hugsvinnsml where it refers to im-morality, or poor character.

Eigi skalt egja, tt sr ess beinn, yfir annars sium26

You must not keep silent, even when asked to be, about anothers poor ways/immorality27

Its use to define morality is most obvious in the Old English word sedeful/sideful/sidefulle, which sur-vives into the late Middle English period, and appears in multiple original and translated works as some-thing akin to full of virtue, morality, good customs. Literally it can be defined as full of sidu. lfric of Eynsham uses it in his Homilies to describe Christ.

a betwux isum eode eall aet folc to Egeas bottle, ealle samod clypigende and eweende, t swa halig wer hangian ne sceolde; sidefull mann

Then in the meanwhile all the folk went to the house of geas, all crying together and saying, that so holy a man ought not to hang; a man strict of conduct, full of pure morals28

The sidu of a particular people was their customs, which expressed their religion and defined their social mores. It was their word for morality,29 their right and wrong. It directly reflects the native

22 Laxdla Saga, Icelandic Saga Database, sagadb.org23 Hoops, Johannes and Beck, Heinrich, 200524 Gamli kanki, Harmsl ed. Katrina Attwood volume 7, Skjaldedigtning, taken from Skaldic Project, skaldic.arts.usyd.edu.au25 Translated by this author with the help of Georg Ptur Sveinbjrnsson.26 Hugsvinnsml ed Wills, Tarrin and Wrth, Stefanie, taken from Skaldic Project, Skaldic.arts.usyd.edu.au27 Rood, Sveinbjrnsson 2011.28 Thorpe, Benjamin The Homilies of the Anglo-Saxon Church: The First Part, Containing The Sermones Catholici, or Homilies of Aelfric.

Vol 1 London, Aelfric Society, 1844. Quote edited by this author.29 Literally the English word morality and the term social mores has taken the place of the word sidu after it had become defunct in

the English language.

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German perspective of religious morality. Their right and wrong was not a matter of judgment which the gods bestowed on individuals for abiding by universally ordained codes. It was proper action within a community, and it was that community that defined what proper and improper action entailed through the establishment of customs which were an expression of religious belief. Sidu was tied directly to a peo-ples land and social connections, and it identified them and their religion. By preserving custom, a com-munity preserved and strengthened their identity and their social order. At the center of this identity were established gods, ancestors and local wights, who shaped the wholeness and health of that community.

Holiness; established and maintained

Like sidu, holiness was not universal or all permeating. It also wasnt a state of purity, contained in a far-off otherworld. It was something that could be established and cultivated within earthly boundar-ies and maintained by specific communities. In Old English a frigeard/frisplot (frith yard), and in Scandinavia a Stavgrd (stave-yard) was a space that was set aside as sacred.30 Like the parameters of a community, this space could be, and often was marked off, physically designating it from space beyond its boundaries. Christian law forbade the creation or worship of these sites, specifically around groves, wells and mounds. The commonly used term to designate sacred space is CG wh, ON v, which was widely applied to words for cult centers, temples sites, idols, and mounds. We see it in the ON term var, mean-ing gods, and it implied holiness set into a physical place, and separated from the surrounding world. Wh did not have to be strictly associated with natural locations. According to Charlotte Fabech, during the Migration Period the hall and hof (building used as a temple) with hrgr (altar fashioned form piled stones) and idols were as sacrosanct as natural spaces. Hedeager points to the hall and the close-lying hof as being the cosmological, social, and political center of the Gudme settlement. Terry Gunnell argues that the rising power of the aristocracy, tied to the Odin cult, brought numinosity out of natural v spaces and into the hall at the center of society.31 What matters in all of these cases is not whether a space is naturally holy, but rather that they are all given a hallowed nature that is manifest in their specific location.32

The holiness of the wh appears to be determined similarly to the sidu of the community. It is validated through repeated ritual action which reaffirms the tradition and identity of the group participating, and further cultivates the holiness of that space. The ritual action in these places can be defined as worship. It is expressed in the ON term drr, Danish drka which not only means to honor, but also to cultivate, to reaffirm, to establish.33 Likewise, OE weorian (worship)34 means to glorify, as well as to decorate, to give worth (weor) to, and to grow.35 To worship something is to reaffirm and build on its worth and its holiness, perhaps by decorating it or through words and actions. The sagas and travelers accounts tell us that within sanctuaries, idols were furnished with gold and silver rings and other ornaments. Likewise, the temples were covered with gold. Adam of Bremen describes the holy grove at Uppsala as being filled with

30 Fabech, Charlotte Centrality in Old Norse Mental Landscapes: A Dialogue Between Arranged and Natural Places? in Old Norse Religion in Long-term Perspectives. Origins, Changes, and Interaction. Ed. A. Andrn, K. Jennbert & C. Raudvere. Lund 2006. (Vgar till Midgrd 8.) 26-33

31 Gunnell, Terry. The Goddess of the Marshes, a lecture given in Arhus, Denmark in November 2007.32 Fabech, 200633 Fritzner, Johann. Ordbog over Det Gamle Norske Sprog 2nd edition 1886-96)34 Bosworth, Joseph, and Toller, Northcote. An Anglo-Saxon Dictionary: Based on the Manuscript Collections of Joseph Bosworth. United

States: Oxford University Press, 1972.35 We may note that the ON drr meaning to cultivate and the OE connection to growth both share a connection with cultivation.

Obviously that which is cultivated resides within the familiar territories of a people, but I also find that it is a very appropriate description for the maintenance of and development of a communities well being (luck/wholeness/health) through worship.

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the hanged bodies of animals and people, which defined its sacredness.36 How many of these descriptions are exaggeration, we cannot be sure. However, archeologists have excavated a tremendous wealth of what has been identified as the remains of sacrifices.37 Approximately 100 tiny, golden, miniature boats were discovered near Nors in Jutland.38 The remains of a hof at Tiss, Zealand contained a large gold ring, along with many animal bones and multiple silver hoards. Similar cult sites with hoards have been found in Tune in Gotland where more than 400 ring fragments have been discovered. At Borg in stergtland a cult house was found that held 98 amulet rings and 75kg of unburnt animal bones. A hrgr was found within with 2 amulet rings on it. A silver hoard from Eketorp in Nrke contained amulets, a snake pendant, coins, and even a Mjlnir pendant which many modern pendants are modeled after. The biography of the hoard estimates it at being active for 300 years. Likewise natural places identified as cult sites have been found, for instance at the hills of Ravlunda, Scania, the mountains of lleberg, Vstergtland and the bogs of Hannenov, Denmark which all contain gold neck rings and deposited coins.39 Hedeager relates that the settlement of Gudme in Denmark is not only surrounded by 3 hills with sacred names (Albjerg-hill of the shrine, Gudbjerg-hill of the gods, Galbjerg-either hill of sacrifice or of galdr,) but that the great wealth excavated there, including bracteates of an Odinic nature, coins, ornamented scabbard mounts and ingots indicate Gudme was not just a central place for trade, but one with sacred connotations.

Deposits in sacred spaces consisted of religious objects, as well as monetary wealth and status symbols. Most often, particularly when the sacred space was associated with a hall or a hof in the center of a settle-ment it would be associated with the religio-political leader, and was contained in the same space where communal binding rituals (sumbl, for example) would take place. These spaces were closely associated with the history of that community, where objects were laid down, much like the law (ON lg, literally lay as in laid down) that defined the tribe. They would have been religiously charged by the continual acts of reciprocal exchange that took place there.40

We should also consider that what we archaeologically uncover are the remains of rituals, not the rituals themselves. We know that animals were sacrificed, as we find their bones at cult sites, and we can assume that there is some truth to the descriptions of cult ritual in the sagas, but we cannot determine the extent of their accuracy. If the descriptions of blt are consistent with reality, then the spattering of blood on the idols, rings, hrgr and pillars would be a part of the ritual action that is deposited in a holy place. Not only is the blood literally layered upon the wood and stone, but the ritual action and the words spoken are as well. The actual actions that took place and words spoken during cultic ritual are not deposited with the bones of sacrificed animals and the votive offerings, but the sidu of a group is defined in many ways through proper action during cultic ritual. What that specific action was would have varied from place to place and from occasion to occasion, but in all ways it would have been an important designator of group identity and socio-religious mores. In return for appropriate gifts and the correct observance of sidu, which tied them to the living community, the beings honored, be they gods, ancestors, or local wights, would grant gifts in return, including holiness.

36 Adam claims that the grove is made sacred through the death and purification that took place in the grove. Whether or not this is truly the case or Christian bias, the sacrifices that adorn the location do add to its sacredness.

37 Not all hoards indicate religious ritual. Many have not been identified as being such, and it is always speculative as to whether or not a find was religiously deposited, and why. Multiple circumstances must be taken into account, but recently more and more hoards that have previously been identified as simple treasure hoards were in fact temple hoards. An example of this is the Hoen treasure found near the Drammen River in Norway. Charlotte Fabech talks more about this in her cited article.

38 Simek, Rudolf; (trans) Angela Hall Dictionary of Northern Mythology. Rochester, NY. Boydell & Brewer Ltd, 200739 Fabech, 200640 Ibid. Also see Tarzia, Wade. The Hoarding Ritual in Germanic Epic Tradition in Journal of Folklore Research. Vol. 26. No. 2, Indiana

University Press, 1989

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Our word holy is derived from the adjective heilag (Gothic, OHG, OS and OE), and its original mean-ing was hale, healthful, whole. As a noun it is found in OHG, OE and ON as heil/heill meaning good luck, the potential to prosper, to heal, fertility. While these may all seem to be mundane qualities, they define holiness, and it is a blessing from the gods, and which could attach itself to certain people, objects, and places. Tacitus reports that the Suebi gathered in a sacred grove where they held sacrifice, and that the figures and emblems which they took into battle were kept in that grove. Oath rings, which were report-edly sacred and which all men were to swear oaths on are reported to have been kept inside of the temple, and regularly reddened with blood. One meaning of the word heill is that of amulet, and it may either be an object filled with holiness, or an omen, which we see often associated with sacrifices and religious rites in the sagas.41 While holiness was a gift from the gods, it could also be taken away by them through negligence of communal sidu, and improper gifts or performed rituals.

Even though they may have been set aside as manifested holiness, either due to the actions that took place within their confines, or because of some perceived holiness already cultivated in that spot, places of sacrifice would have been perceived within the community barriers. According to Fabech regarding natural worship places (groves, bogs, hills); It is characteristic that you can see the main settlement from the find spot, and that the find spot is visible from the settlement. Thus they are natural elements in the construction or cultivation of the central places. They are natural constituents of the arranged centre com-plexes. Geographically they tend to fall within the physical innangard of a settlement, which is broken up by natural terrain. The centrally established settlement could organize the natural surroundings into an ideal religious landscape. According to Hedeager, a community might often organize the settlement and surrounding landscape as a microcosm of the Nordic cosmological world. Whether or not this was literally the case, it certainly seems evident in locations such as Gudme and Odense (Odins V), which have been argued to mirror the layout of Norse cosmology, and correlates more appropriately with our understanding that the heathen religious world was a local microcosm of the greater Germanic cosmology. Certainly not every aspect of a community was drawn on physical boundaries. Not every holy grove lay directly beside a settlement. However, if a community identified with that grove, and carried out their religious customs there, then it was a part of their perceived landscape and their innangard.

Conclusion

While the pre-Christian cultures of Northern and Central Europe held a shared religious heritage which may be categorized as heathen, it would have manifested through unique, regional and local traditions, myths, and social mores. The holy lake that the goddess Nerthus was bathed in was central to her holi-ness, and to the identity of the tribes that were located in that region. The hills surrounding Gudme, and the layout of the settlement reflected and reinforced the religious and cultural traditions of that community. The Saxons had their sidu, and the Vendil had their sir. We can infer a great deal concerning heathen belief and tradition as a whole by investigating pan-Germanic religiosity, but we must also recognize central role of region, locality and tribal/kin identity. Today we identify with, and strive to reestablish the heathen religion of Europe, and this religiosity certainly has clear boundaries of what may and may not be defined as heathen. We should be sure that our customs and social mores are consistent with those that we are reviving. Consistency does not mean that we emulate, however. As we have seen, customs should be relevant to a groups immediate land and needs. We should develop customs that are tied to our land and our local communities. We can look at, respect, and perhaps even honor local folklore and myths

41 Green, D. H. Language and History in the Early Germanic World. New York, Cambridge University Press, 1998

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in a heathen fashion. We should reestablish appropriate boundaries of innangard and utangard, not as human society and other. Rather, we can identify those who belong to our close-knit community, our family, our friends and neighbors, our kindred and tribe, and those that are not a part of that. We can infer that morality isnt drawn from emulating the gods42 as they appear in the myths we have, nor is it a do as you will concept. Ethics and matters of right and wrong should be tied to how a person benefits or harms the well being of their innangard, which should be beneficial to local and regional society, and in line with federal and local law. Morality also entails the development and maintenance of proper customs and a gifting relationship with the gods, ancestors, and wights that a group wishes to identify with. I call myself a heathen, but it is more appropriate to identify myself as a member of my own specific kindred, which is part of a greater regional community whose taboos, holidays, and customs I adhere to. There is a grove that is maintained by a local family, and which is a big part of our identity as well as for a big portion of the local heathen community. That grove is holy to us, and we hold sacrifices to the gods that we worship there, and we gift and hold a close relationship with the family that tends it. We have idols that receive offerings, and we have specific traditions regarding those idols that we abide by. There are local holidays that are only celebrated by the heathen community in my region, and those holidays are dependent upon our regional geography and seasons. Our customs are being passed on to our children, and continue to develop organically, fused with our gods, our land, our ancestors and our neighborhoods. These living, breathing, growing traditions stem directly out of the foundation of heathen worldview, as we have been able to reconstruct it.

42 The gods certainly play an important role in our morality, but not through individual emulation of their actions and specific words. If we keep the concepts of this article in mind, we can infer that specific actions and words from the gods are intended to benefit specific communities in specific situations, and are also perceived through specific cultural models that are directly relevant to the upkeep of an individual community. The gods are their own and do as gods will. If they established the oldest sidu, which was to benefit and maintain their own tribe, its a groups responsibility to do the same, and to establish a reciprocal relationship with their gods, in order to maintain wholeness between them.

This is Laerad Kindreds depiction of our microcosmic landscape as we perceive it. Art by Dan Oropallo

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The pine that stands in the villageno bark or needles to cover it;so is a man; that no one lovesWhy shall he live long?

Hvaml, st. 50.1

The transition from the intellectual effort of reconstructing pre-Christian and conversion era Germanic worldviews and religiosity to a practical living religion can be a bit of a conundrum for modern heathens. There are two extremes that find frequent and common commentary in modern heathenry. On one end of the spectrum is the tendency for reconstructionist heathens to attempt to replicate cultic ritual precisely as it is portrayed in the literary or archaeological remains. At the other end of the spectrum is the tendency to create an entirely new ritual model that has no basis in historic heathenry whatsoever. While as a matter of necessity most heathens fall somewhere in between2, they often do so with remarkably little variation.

There are a number of reasons for this apparent lack of variation among average heathens. The com-bined research efforts and tendency to share resources dealing with the limited nature of the data regarding these s