Archaic England : $b an essay in deciphering prehistory from megalithic monuments, earthworks, customs, coins, place-names, and faerie superstitionsBayley, Harold
History
Archaic England : $b an essay in deciphering prehistory from megalithic monuments, earthworks, customs, coins, place-names, and faerie superstitions
Bayley, Harold
Archaeology; England -- Antiquities
Scandinavian legend tells of a potent enchantress who had dwelt for 300
years on the Island of Kunnan (Canaan?) happy in the exquisite innocence
of her youth. Mighty heroes sued for the love of this fairest of giant
maidens, and the sea around Kunnan is said to be still cumbered with the
fragments of rock which her Cyclopean admirers flung jealously at one
another. Ere, however, she was married "the detestable Odin" came into
the country and drove all from the island. Refuging elsewhere the Lady
of Kunnan and her consort dwelt awhile undisturbed until such time as a
gigantic Oluf "came from Britain". This Oluf (they called him the Holy)
making the sign of the cross with his hands drove ashore in a gigantic
ship crying with a loud voice: "Stand there as a stone till the last
day," and in the same instant the unhappy husband became a mass of rock.
The tale continues that on Yule Eve only could the Lord of Kunnan and
other petrified giants receive back their life for the space of seven
hours.[166]
Now Janus _alias_ Saturn had on his coins the figure of a ship's prow;
he was sometimes delineated pointing to a rock whence issued a profusion
of water; seven days were set apart for his rites in December; and the
seven days of the week were no doubt connected with his title of
Septimanus. In Britain the consort of the Magna Mater Keridwen ( =
_Perpetual Love_) or Ked was entitled Tegid, and like Janus and St.
Peter Tegid was entitled the Door-keeper. In Celtic _te_ meant _good_,
whence Tegid might reasonably be understood as either _Good God_ or _The
Good_. Tegid also meant, according to Davies, _serene baldness_, an
interpretation which has been ridiculed, but one which nevertheless is
in all probability correct for every ancient term bore many meanings,
and because one is right it does not necessarily follow that every other
one is wrong.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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