Germanic seer
Seers as prophets and fortune tellers are attested among the Germanic peoples and cultures in the period from antiquity to the high Middle Ages .
Of the Cimbri and Teutons , Strabo (7.2) reports that their campaign ( Cimber Wars ) 120 BC. Was accompanied by certain old women who foretold the future from the blood of prisoners.
Cassius Dio (Historia Romana 55, 1) reports from the Drusus campaign in the Low German Plain (9 BC) that a physically tall or superhuman looking woman was warned against him from passing through to the Elbe, so that Drusus broke off the campaign.
Tacitus reports around 100 AD in his Germania (Chapter 8) that the Germanic peoples believed that there was something sacred and visionary in women .
List of known seers
- Albruna , from the manuscript (Tacitus, Germ. 8.2) "Aurinia (m)" as improved ( conjecture ) is " with the secret knowledge of albums provided ". Apparently she had some reputation during the campaigns of Drusus and Tiberius and therefore appears in the reports of Tacitus.
- Ganna , a seer who, according to Cassius Dio (67.5), was held in high esteem by the Semnones during Domitian's time .
- Veleda , from the tribe of the Brukterer , appears several times in the sources and becomes famous when it foretells the fall of the Roman troops at the time of the Batavian revolt (69/70 AD). Your name could also be just a title (seer, wise woman), according to the ancient Celtic velet "seer, poet".
Other seers are the Gambara mentioned in the original legend of the Lombards and the Thiota from Alamannia , attested in the Fulda annals (MG.1 365) for the year 847 .
A literary-fictional reception of a pagan seer can be found in the figure of Þórbjörg lítilvölva from the Old-West Norse saga literature in the Eiríks saga rauða . The presentation reflects old, traditional pagan contents.
literature
- Walter Baetke: The religion of the Teutons in source certificates. 3. Edition. Moritz Diesterweg publishing house, Frankfurt am Main 1944.
- Dagmar Beate Baltrusch: And what does Thusnelda say? On the power and influence of Germanic women. In: Ernst Baltrusch, Morten Hegewisch, Michael Meyer, Uwe Puschner, Christian Wendt (eds.): 2000 years of the Varus battle. History - archeology - legends. de Gruyter, Berlin / Boston 2012, ISBN 978-3-11-028251-1 , pp. 71–94. ( Topoi. Berlin Studies of the Ancient World , 7)
- Reinhold Bruder: The Germanic woman in the light of runic inscriptions and ancient historiography. In: Stefan Sonderegger (Ed.): Sources and research on the linguistic and cultural history of the Germanic peoples, New Series Vol. 57 (181), Verlag De Gruyter, Berlin - New York 1974, ISBN 3-11-004152-9 .
- Ånders Hultgard: seers. In: Heinrich Beck, Dieter Geuenich, Heiko Steuer (Eds.): Reallexikon der Germanischen Altertumskunde , Vol. 28. Verlag De Gruyter, Berlin - New York 2005, ISBN 3-11-018207-6 , pp. 113-121.
- Rudolf Much: The Germania of Tacius. 3. Edition. (Ed.) Wolfgang Lange with the collaboration of Herbert Jankuhn and Hans Fromm. University Press Winter, Heidelberg 1967.
- Franz Rolf Schröder: Source book for Germanic religious history. De Gruyter publishing house, Berlin and Leipzig 1933.
- Rudolf Simek : Lexicon of Germanic Mythology (= Kröner's pocket edition . Volume 368). 3rd, completely revised edition. Kröner, Stuttgart 2006, ISBN 3-520-36803-X , pp. 367-369.
- Jiří Starý: Inductive, intuitive and inspired mantics in classical and Old Norse sources of the Germanic religion . In: Wilhelm Heizmann, Klaus Böldl, Heinrich Beck (Eds.) Analecta Septentrionalia - Contributions to the North Germanic cultural and literary history (Festschrift for Kurt Schier) , de Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2009, ISBN 978-3-11-021870-1 , Pp. 607-645. ( Real Lexicon of Germanic Archeology - Supplementary Volumes 65)
- Sabine Tausend: Germanic seers In: Klaus Tausend: Inside Germaniens - Relations between the Germanic tribes from the 1st century BC. BC to the 2nd century AD In: Geographica Historica, Vol. 25. Verlag Franz Steiner, Stuttgart 2009, ISBN 978-3-515-09416-0 , pp. 155-174.