1. WÓDEN, in Old-norse OÞINN, in Old-german WUOTAN.—The royal family of every Anglosaxon kingdom, without exception, traces its descent from Wóden through some one or other of those heroes or demigods who are familiar to us in the German and Scandinavian traditions[623]. But the divinity of Wóden is abundantly clear: he is both in form and in fact identical with the Norse Oþinn and the German Wuotan, the supreme god of all the northern races, whose divinity none will attempt to dispute[624]. Nor was this his character unknown to our early chroniclers; Malmesbury, speaking of Hengest and Hors, says: “They were the great-great-grandsons of that most ancient Wóden, from whom the royal families of almost all the barbarous nations derive their lineage; whom the nations of the Angles madly believing to be a god, have consecrated unto him the fourth day of the week, and the sixth unto his wife Frea, by a sacrilege which lasts even unto this day[625].” Matthew of Westminster[626] and Geoffry of Monmouth[627] repeat this with characteristic variations, both adding, apparently in the words of Tacitus[628], “Colimus maxime Mercurium, quem Wóden lingua nostra appellamus.” Æðthelweard, an Anglosaxon nobleman of royal blood, and thus himself a descendant of Wóden, had previously stated the same thing after the fashion of his own age,—the tenth century; he says of Hengest and Hors: “Hi nepotes fuere Uuoddan regis barbarorum, quem post, infanda dignitate, ut deum honorantes, sacrificium obtulerunt pagani, victoriae causa sive virtutis[629].” Again, he says: “Wothen, qui et rex multarum gentium, quem pagani nunc ut deum colunt aliqui.” Thus, according to him, Wóden was worshiped as the giver of victory, and as the god of warlike valour. And such is the description given by Adam of Bremen of the same god, at Upsala in Sweden: “In hoc templo, quod totum ex auro paratum est, statuas trium deorum veneratur populus, ita ut potentissimus eorum Thór in medio solum habeat triclinium, hinc et inde locum possident Wódan et Fricco. Quorum significationes eiusmodi sunt: Thór, inquiunt, praesidet in aere, qui tonitrus et fulmina, ventos imbresque, serena et fruges gubernat. Alter Wódan, id est _Fortior_, bella regit, hominumque ministrat virtutem contra inimicos. Tertius est Fricco, pacem voluptatemque largiens mortalibus. Cuius etiam simulachrum fingunt ingenti Priapo. Wódanem vero sculpunt armatum, sicuti nostri Martem sculpere solent. Thór autem cum sceptro Jovem exprimere videtur.” The Exeter book names Wóden in a similar spirit: Hǽðnum synne Wóden worhte weohs, wuldor alwealda rúme roderas[630],