[tied] Re: I, Hercules [was: A "Germanic" query]

From: tgpedersen
Message: 12481
Date: 2002-02-25

--- In cybalist@..., "Piotr Gasiorowski" <gpiotr@...> wrote:
> Underlying "translatio Romana" was the belief that all religions
and cults were au fond identical, so that it was natural and
necessary to establish one-to-one correspondences between the gods
_and_ mythological figures known to the Romans from their own
cultural centre and whatever the Germani believed in. Those
correspondences were typological (analogous), not historical
(homologous) from our point of view, but the Romans took them
seriously. I'm sure Tacitus really thought that Tiu, once an
important war-god, was the Germanic name for Mars (or Ares), and that
it was therefore legitimate to say that the Germani worshipped Mars.
A bearded giant with a huge hammer or club, with which he killed evil
mosters, protecting the order of the universe, was "obviously"
Hercules/Herakles even if the Germani called him Thunar. The
alternative identification with Jupiter (and Zeus) emphasised the
association of Thunar and Jupiter with lightning. Show me one
Germanic cultural hero named Eril/Erul/Erl. The word is a common noun
or a tribal name. We would have derivatives instead ("Herculean(s)"
rather than "Hercules") if an eponymous hero had come first.
>
> Piotr

All true and very persuasive, but are other explanations possible?

Erlkoenig? (just kidding) ;-)

True, you'd expect something eg. with the suffix -ijo- (as in <wagn-
ijo-> found on a shield in Illerup Aadal). And Jordanes writes not
Heruli, but Herulei.

I know what "interpretatio Romana" is, thank you. BTW I came across
an example in Lucian's essay "Heracles". He comtemplates a Celtic
painting of Hercules ("whom the Celts call Ogmios") and is puzzled
that the painter has depicted him as an old and balding man, although
he has all the attributes of Hercules, club, lion's hide, when a very
cultured Celt strikes up a conversation with him about the painting
and explains that the reason why Hercules of the painting has his
tongue pierced with a leash which is similarly fastened to the ears
of his followers, is that Hercules was a very eloquent persion who
accomplished most of his deeds by persuasion. Now that was news to me!

But on the same subject: Which "interpretatio" is Herodotus using
when he mentions the seven gods of the Scythians, of which five have
Scythian names but Heracles and Ares Greek ones?

And BTW, how do you reconstruct <thunar>?

Torsten