Part 9 (1/2)

[248] The great opulence of a temple of the Suiones, as described by Adam of Bremen (Eccl. Hist. ch. 233), is a proof of the wealth that at all times has attended naval dominion. ”This nation,” says he, ”possesses a temple of great renown, called Ubsola (now Upsal), not far from the cities Sictona and Birca (now Sigtuna and Bioerkoe). In this temple, which is entirely ornamented with gold, the people wors.h.i.+p the statues of three G.o.ds; the most powerful of whom, Thor, is seated on a couch in the middle; with Woden on one side, and Fricca on the other.” From the ruins of the towns Sictona and Birca arose the present capital of Sweden, Stockholm.

[249] Hence Spener (Not.i.t. German. Antiq.) rightly concludes that the crown was hereditary, and not elective, among the Suiones.

[250] It is uncertain whether what is now called the Frozen Ocean is here meant, or the northern extremities of the Baltic Sea, the Gulfs of Bothnia and Finland, which are so frozen every winter as to be unnavigable.

[251] The true principles of astronomy have now taught us the reason why, at a certain lat.i.tude, the sun, at the summer solstice, appears never to set: and at a lower lat.i.tude, the evening twilight continues till morning.

[252] The true reading here is, probably, ”immerging;” since it was a common notion at that period, that the descent of the sun into the ocean was attended with a kind of hissing noise, like red hot iron dipped into water. Thus Juvenal, Sat. xiv, 280:--

Audiet Herculeo stridentem gurgite solem.

”Hear the sun hiss in the Herculean gulf.”

[253] Instead of formas deorum, ”forms of deities,” some, with more probability, read equorum, ”of the horses,” which are feigned to draw the chariot of the sun.

[254] Thus Quintus Curtius, speaking of the Indian Ocean, says, ”Nature itself can proceed no further.”

[255] The Baltic Sea.

[256] Now, the kingdom of Prussia, the duchies of Samogitia and Courland, the palatinates of Livonia and Esthonia, in the name of which last the ancient appellation of these people is preserved.

[257] Because the inhabitants of this extreme part of Germany retained the Scythico-Celtic language, which long prevailed in Britain.

[258] A deity of Scythian origin, called Frea or Fricca. See Mallet's Introduct. to Hist. of Denmark.

[259] Many vestiges of this superst.i.tion remain to this day in Sweden. The peasants, in the month of February, the season formerly sacred to Frea, make little images of boars in paste, which they apply to various superst.i.tious uses. (See Eccard.) A figure of a Mater Deum, with the boar, is given by Mr. Pennant, in his Tour in Scotland, 1769, p. 268, engraven from a stone found at the great station at Netherby in c.u.mberland.

[260] The cause of this was, probably, their confined situation, which did not permit them to wander in hunting and plundering parties, like the rest of the Germans.

[261] This name was transferred to _gla.s.s_ when it came into use. Pliny speaks of the production of amber in this country as follows:--”It is certain that amber is produced in the islands of the Northern Ocean, and is called by the Germans _gless_. One of these islands, by the natives named Austravia, was on this account called Glessaria by our sailors in the fleet of Germanicus.”--Lib. x.x.xvii. 3.

[262] Much of the Prussian amber is even at present collected on the sh.o.r.es of the Baltic. Much also is found washed out of the clayey cliffs of Holderness. See Tour in Scotland, 1769, p. 16.

[263] Insomuch that the Guttones, who formerly inhabited this coast, made use of amber as fuel, and sold it for that purpose to the neighboring Teutones. (Plin. x.x.xvii. 2.)

[264] Various toys and utensils of amber, such as bracelets, necklaces, rings, cups, and even pillars, were to be met with among the luxurious Romans.

[265] In a work by Goeppert and Berendt, on ”Amber and the Fossil Remains of Plants contained in it,” published at Berlin, 1845, a pa.s.sage is found (of which a translation is here given) which quite harmonizes with the account of Tacitus:--”About the parts which are known by the name of Samland an island emerged, or rather a group of islands, ... which gradually increased in circ.u.mference, and, favored by a mild sea climate, was overspread with vegetation and forest. This forest was the means of amber being produced. Certain trees in it exuded gums in such quant.i.ties that the sunken forest soil now appears to be filled with it to such a degree, as if it had only been deprived of a very trifling part of its contents by the later eruptions of the sea, and the countless storms which have lashed the ocean for centuries.” Hence, though found underground, it appears to have been originally the production of some resinous tree.

Hence, too, the reason of the appearance of insects, &c. in it, as mentioned by Tacitus.

[266] Norwegians.

[267] All beyond the Vistula was reckoned Sarmatia. These people, therefore, were properly inhabitants of Sarmatia, though from their manners they appeared of German origin.

[268] Pliny also reckons the Peucini among the German nations:--”The fifth part of Germany is possessed by the Peucini and Bastarnae, who border on the Dacians.” (iv. 14.) From Strabo it appears that the Peucini, part of the Bastarnae, inhabited the country about the mouths of the Danube, and particularly the island Peuce, now Piczina, formed by the river.

[269] The habitations of the Peucini were fixed; whereas the Sarmatians wandered about in their wagons.

[270] ”Sordes omnium ac torpor; procerum connubiis mixtis nonnihil in Sarmatarum habitum foedantur.” In many editions the semicolon is placed not after _torpor_, but after _procerum_. The sense of the pa.s.sage so read is: ”The chief men are lazy and stupid, besides being filthy, like all the rest. Intermarriage with the Sarmatians have debased.” &c.

[271] The Venedi extended beyond the Peucini and Bastarnae as far as the Baltic Sea; where is the Sinus Venedicus, now the Gulf of Dantzig. Their name is also preserved in Wenden, a part of Livonia. When the German nations made their irruption into Italy, France and Spain, the Venedi, also called Winedi, occupied their vacant settlements between the Vistula and Elbe. Afterwards they crossed the Danube, and seized Dalmatia, Illyric.u.m, Istria, Carniola, and the Noric Alps. A part of Carniola still retains the name of Windismarck, derived from them. This people were also called Slavi; and their language, the Sclavonian, still prevails through a vast tract of country.