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Norse Religious Practices

religious worship is the traditional religious rituals practiced by Norse pagans in Scandinavia in pre-Christian times. Norse religion was a folk religion (as opposed to an organized religion), and its main purpose was the survival and regeneration of society. Therefore, the faith was decentralized and tied to the village and the family, although evidence exists of great national religious festivals. The leaders managed the faith on behalf of society; on a local level, the leader would have been the head of the family, and nationwide, the leader was the king. Pre-Christian Scandinavians had no word for religion in a modern sense. The closest counterpart is the word sidr, meaning custom. This meant that Christianity, during the conversion period, was referred to as nýr sidr (the new custom) while paganism was called forn sidr (ancient custom). The center of gravity of pre-Christian religion lay in religious practice — sacred acts, rituals and worship of the gods.

Norse religion was at no time homogeneous but was a conglomerate of related customs and beliefs. These could be inherited or borrowed, and although the great geographical distances of Scandinavia led to a variety of cultural differences, people understood each other's customs, poetic traditions and myths. Sacrifice (blót) played a huge role in most of the rituals that are known about today, and communal feasting on the meat of sacrificed animals, together with the consumption of beer or mead, played a large role in the calendar feasts. In everyday practice, other foodstuffs like grain are likely to have been used instead. The purpose of these sacrifices was to ensure fertility and growth. However, sudden crises or transitions such as births, weddings and burials could also be the reason. In those times there was a clear distinction between private and public faith, and the rituals were thus tied either to the household and the individual or to the structures of society.

It is not certain to what extent the known myths correspond to the religious beliefs of Scandinavians in pre-Christian times, nor how people acted towards them in everyday life. The Scandinavians did not leave any written sources on their religious practice, and Christian texts on the subject are marked by misunderstandings and negative bias, since the Christians viewed the Nordic beliefs as superstition and devil worship. Some archaeological evidence has been discovered, but this is hard to interpret in isolation from written material.

Worship of the gods

A detail from runestone G 181 in the Swedish Museum of National Antiquities in Stockholm. The three men are interpreted as the Norse gods Odin, Thor, and Freyr.

Recent research suggests that great public festivals involving the population of large regions were not as important as the more local feasts in the life of the individual. Though they were written in a later Christian era, the Icelandic sagas are of great significance as sources to everyday religion. Even when the Christian influence is taken into account, they draw an image of a religion closely tied to the cycle of the year and the social hierarchy of society. In Iceland the local secular leader had the title of gothi, which originally meant priest but in the Middle Ages was a term for a local secular leader.

Ceremonial communal meals in connection with the blót sacrifice are mentioned in several sources and are thus some of the most described rituals. Masked dancers, music, and singing may have been common parts of these feasts.[7] As in other pre-Christian Germanic societies, but in contrast to the later situation under Christianity, there was no class of priests: anyone could perform sacrifices and other faith acts. However, common cultural norms meant that it was normally the person with the highest status and the greatest authority (the head of the family or the leader of the village) who led the rituals. The sources indicate that sacrifices for fertility, a safe journey, a long life, wealth etc. were a natural and fully integrated part of daily life in Scandinavian society, as in almost all other pre-modern societies across the world.

The worship of female powers is likely to have played a greater role than the medieval sources indicate, because those texts were written by men and pay less attention to religious practices in the female sphere.[10] A trace of the importance of goddesses can be found in place-name material that has shown that there are often place names connected to the goddess Freyja near place names connected to the god Freyr.[11] Fertility and divination rituals that women could take part in or lead were also among those which survived the longest after Christianization.

Different types of animals or objects were connected to the worship of different gods; for instance, horses and pigs played a great role in the worship of Freyr. This did not mean that the same animal could not also play a role in the worship of other deities (the horse was also an important part of the Odin faith). One of the most important objects in Norse paganism was the ship. Archaeological sources show that it played a central role in the faith from the petroglyphs and razors of the Bronze Age to the runestones of the Viking Age. Interpretation of the meaning of the ship in connection to the mythological material is only possible for the late period, when it was mainly associated with death and funerals.

Faiths statues and images

Drawing of an archaeological find from Öland, Sweden of a gold-plated depiction of Mjolnir in silver.

Several written sources mention statues of heathen gods. They are mostly described as either anthropomorphic or as wooden staves with a face carved at the top. Ahmad ibn Fadlan writes about such poles in his description of a Scandinavian sacrifice at the Volga. This account has a suggestion of the mythological connection, but it is impossible to decipher it.[16] No such large statues from the Viking Age have been found, only small figures and amulets. This may be because larger statues were deliberately destroyed. After Christianization, the possession of such figures was banned and severely punished. Many accounts of missionaries have the destruction of heathen idols as their climax, symbolizing the triumph of the strong Christian god over the weak, "devilish" native gods. The sagas sometimes mention small figures that can be kept in a purse. Such figures are known from archaeological findings across Scandinavia. They include hammer-shaped jewelry, golden men or figures of gods.

Sources from different periods also suggest that chariots were used in fertility rituals across Scandinavia over a very long period. In his Germania, Tacitus refers to a sacred chariot in the faith of Nerthus. Also, the Dejbjerg chariots from the Roman Iron Age, the Oseberg ship from the Viking age and the medieval tale about Gunnar Helming have survived until today. It is possible that this motif can be traced as far back as the processions of the Bronze Age.

Public faith

Although no details are known, it is possible to form an unclear image of some of the rituals and religious practices through interpretation of the sources that have survived. The sources are heterogeneous since the written accounts are from the late heathen period and written in a Christian context. Thus it is also hard to determine whether a ritual was private or public.[5] The only heathen shrine about which there is detailed information is the great temple at Uppsala in modern Sweden, which was described by the German chronicler Adam of Bremen in a time where central Sweden was the last political center where Norse paganism was practiced in public.

Centers of faith

Further information: Hörgr, Vé (shrine), and Heathen hofs

Reconstruction of the temple in Uppåkra by Sven Rosborn, archaeologist at Fotevikens Museum

Remains of so-called multifunctional centers have been discovered in several places in Scandinavia. Near Tissø, archaeologists have unearthed a complex consisting of, among other things, a central mead hall connected to a fenced area with a smaller building. The hall is likely to have been associated with the great festivals and the fenced area to have contained a hörgr. This complex is similar to others found in Scandinavia.,[19] such as Borg in Lofoten, Uppsala in Uppland, Uppåkra in Scania, Gudme in Funen and Lejre in Zealand. Since the 1970s, discoveries have significantly expanded knowledge about the public faith. The excavations have shown that large buildings were used for both secular and religious purposes from the 600s and into the Viking Age and the Middle Ages. Such structures are likely to have been both religious and political/economic centers. The combination of religious festivals and markets has been common to most cultures through most of history, since a society where travel is difficult and communication limited uses such occasions to get several things done at the same time. Thus, the religious festivals were also the time and place for things, markets and the hearing of court cases. The religious festivals have to be seen in the light of these other activities. In some places the same area was used for these festivals from the Roman Iron Age until the Middle Ages, while in other places different locations were used in succession. Excavations of the complex at Tissø have shown that it grew from the 7th century until the 10th century. The most recent findings are from 1020 to 1030, when the great hall seems to have been dismantled.

Locally there were several kinds of holy places, usually marked by a boundary in the form of either a permanent stone barrier or a temporary fence of branches. Thus, a holy space was created with rules of its own, like a ban on spilling blood on holy soil. The importance of these holy places should be understood in connection to the cosmological ideas people had. It is known that different types of divine forces were tied to different places and that there were different rituals connected to them. In addition to sacred groves, texts mention holy wells and the leaving of offerings at streams, waterfalls, rocks, and trees; these may have been to the landvættir as well as, or rather than, the gods. There is no mention of worship of the jötnar and it is unknown whether there were places sacred to them.

The sources disagree about faiths buildings, so there are varying opinions about their form and nature. However, it seems that for some buildings, sacral use was secondary. The Germanic languages had no words in pre-Christian times that directly corresponded to the Latin templum, the ancestor of the modern word temple. Thus, it has long been a topic for discussion whether there were buildings exclusively meant for religious purposes in pre-Christian Scandinavia. It is most likely that religious buildings were erected in some places, as the words hörgr and hof are found in several place-names. Other sources suggests that the ritual acts were not necessarily limited to religious buildings. Whether "temples" were built is likely to have depended on local custom and economic resources. A hof or a hörgr did not need to be connected to one of the faiths centers.

Other forms of the faith’s buildings were the hall and the vé. Place names containing the word sal (hall) occur in several places and it is possible that this word was used for the multi-functional halls. Earlier scholars often translated sal as barn or stable, which has been shown to be inaccurate. Such a hall is more likely to have been a long house with only one room. This was a prestigious type of building used for feasts and similar social gatherings in the entire Germanic area. In place names the word sal is mostly connected to Odin, which shows a connection with political power. Old place names containing the word sal may thus mean that a religious hall once stood there. Another word for hall, höll, was used to describe another kind of sacral building, not meant for habitation but dedicated to special purposes like holding feasts. In the legend of Beowulf, Heorot is named as such. However, the word höll is not found in place names and is likely to have been borrowed into East Norse from German or English in the late period.

The vé is another kind of holy place and is also the most unambiguous name used for holy places in Scandinavia. The word comes from the Proto-Germanic *wîha, meaning "holy". Originally this word was used for places in nature but over time religious buildings may have been built.

Gamla Uppsala

Adam of Bremen's description of the sacrifices and the religious center in Uppsala is the best known account of pre-Christian rituals in Sweden.[34] There is general agreement that Gamla Uppsala was one of the last strongholds of heathen religion in central Sweden and that the religious center there was still of great importance when Adam of Bremen wrote his account.[35] Adam describes the temple as being gilded everywhere and containing statues of the three most important gods. The most important was Thor, who was placed in the middle, with Odin at one side and Fricco (presumably Freyr) at the other. He tells that Thor reigned in the skies where he ruled rain, wind and thunder, and that he provided good weather for the crops. In his hand he held a scepter. Odin was the god of war and courage, his name meant "the furious" and he was depicted as a warrior. Fricco, on the other hand, was the god for peace and physical satisfaction, and was thus depicted with a huge phallus. Each god had his own priests and people sacrificed to the gods whose help they needed: Thor was called upon in times of famine and disease, Odin was called upon to gain victory and Fricco was called upon for fertile marriages.

According to Adam, the temple at Uppsala was the center for the national worship of the gods, and every nine years a great festival was held there where the attendance of all inhabitants of the Swedish provinces was required, including Christians. At these festivals men and male animals were sacrificed by hanging. Adam recounts from Christian eyewitness accounts that up to 72 corpses could be hanging in the trees next to the temple during these sacrifices. He uses the Latin term triclinium, meaning banquet hall, for the central religious building and says that it was used for libations. In Roman culture such a building was not considered a temple proper, but it had a function similar to that of Heorot in the legend of Beowulf. For comparison the Iron Age hall at Berg in Lofoten had benches along three of the walls just like the Roman triclinium.

In recent Strahinja, remains of a large building have been found in Uppsala. It was 100m long and was in use from 600 to 800. It was built on an artificial plateau near the burial mounds from the Germanic Iron Age and was presumably a residence connected to the royal power, which was established in the area during that period. Remains of a smaller building have been found below this house and the place is likely to have been in use as a religious center for very long time. The memory of the hall (sal) remains in the name Uppsala. The building was surrounded by a fence which could not have had any defensive function but could have marked the royal or sacral area. Around 900 the great hall burned down, but new graves were placed on the site. The traces of postholes under the medieval church have traditionally been interpreted as the site of the temple, but some scholars now believe the building was a later feast hall and that there was never a "temple" as such, but rather a hall used for banquets and political and legal functions as well as sacrifices. Gamla Uppsala was used for about 2000 years but the size and complexity of the complex was expanded up until the Viking Age,[38] so that Uppsala in the period from 500 to 1000 was the center of royal power and a location of a sizeable religious organization.

Religious leaders

A goði leads the people in sacrificing to an idol of Thor in this painting by J. L. Lund.

Norse religion did not have any class of priest who worked as full-time religious leaders. Instead there were different kinds of leaders who took care of different religious tasks alongside their secular occupation.[42] From Iceland the terms goði (gothi) and gyðja are known for "priest" and "priestess" while the terms vífill and lytir are primarily known from the East Norse area. However, the title gothi is also known from Danish rune stones. The king or the jarl (earl) had overall responsibility for the public faith in his realm while the head of the household was responsible for leading the private faith.[43]

Thus, religious as well as secular power in Norse society was centered on individuals. It was secured through ties of friendship and loyalty and meant that there never were any totally consolidated structures of power. The king could only exercise his power where he or his trusted representatives were personally present. A king thus needed to have homesteads throughout the realm as the physical seat of his government. It is unclear which of them were royal and which of them were owned by local aristocracy, but place names can give an indication. The common Swedish place name Husaby or Huseby could be an old term for a royal homestead. The same was true for leaders of lesser rank in the hierarchy; they too had to be present for the rituals to work.

The most known type of religious leader is the gothi, as several holders of this title appear in the Icelandic sagas. Because of the limited knowledge about religious leaders there has been a tendency to regard the gothi and his female counterpart, the gyðja, as common titles throughout Scandinavia. However, there is no evidence pointing to that conclusion. In historic times the gothi was a male politician and judge, i.e. a chieftain, but the word has the same etymological origins as the word "god," which is a strong sign that religious functions were connected to the title in pre-historic times. In pre-Christian times the gothi was thus both politician, jurist and religious expert.

Other titles of religious leaders were þulr (thul), thegn, völva and seiðmaðr (seidman). The term thul is related to words meaning recitation, speech and singing, so this religious function could have been connected to a sacral, maybe esoteric, knowledge. The thul was also connected to Odin, the god of rulers and kings, and thus poetry and the activities in the banquet halls. It is a possibility that the thul function was connected to the king's halls. Both the völva and the seiðmaðr were associated with seid.

Human sacrifice

It has been a topic for discussion whether human sacrifice was practiced in Scandinavia. There has been great disagreement about why, for instance, two bodies were found in the Oseberg tomb or how to interpret Ibn Fadlan's description of the killing of a female thrall at a funeral among the Scandinavian Rus on the Volga. The many discoveries of bog bodies and the evidence of sacrifices of prisoners of war dating back to the Pre-Roman Iron Age show that ritual killings in one form or another were not uncommon in Northern Europe in the period before the Viking Age. Furthermore, some findings from the Viking Age can be interpreted as evidence of human sacrifice. Sagas occasionally mention human sacrifice at temples, as does Adam of Bremen. Also, the written sources tell that a commander could consecrate the enemy warriors to Odin using his spear. Thus, war was ritualized and made sacral and the slain enemies became sacrifices. Violence was a part of daily life in the Viking Age and took on a religious meaning like other activities. It is likely that human sacrifice occurred during the Viking Age, but nothing suggests that it was part of common public religious practice. Instead it was only practiced in connection with war and in times of crisis.

Developments

Excavations of the religious centers have shown that public religious practice changed over time. In Southern Scandinavia, the great public sacrificial feasts that had been common during the Roman Iron Age were abandoned. In the 6th century the great sacrifices of weapons were discontinued. Instead there are traces of a faith that was tied more to the abode of a ruler. This change is among other things shown by golden plates and bracteates becoming common. Gold was a precious material and was thus connected to the ruler and his family. The changes are very remarkable and might be a sign that the change of religion in Scandinavia started in an earlier time than was previously believed and was closely connected to the establishment of kingdoms.

Private religion

The rituals of the private religion mostly paralleled the public. In many cases the line between public and private religion is hard to draw, for instance in the cases of the yearly blót feasts and crisis and life passage rituals. In the private sphere the rituals were led by the head of the household and his wife. It is not known whether thralls took part in the worship and in that case to what extent. The rituals were not limited to seasonal festivals as there were rituals connected to all tasks of daily life. Most rituals only involved one or a few persons, but some involved the entire household or the extended family.

Rites of passage

These rituals were connected to the change of status and transitions in life a person experiences, such as birth, marriage and death, and followed the same pattern as is known from other rites of passage. Unusually, no Scandinavian sources tell about rituals for the passage from child to adult.

Birth and naming

Goddess "Frigga Spinning the Clouds" by J. C. Dollman.

Until very recent times a birth was dangerous to the mother as well as the child. Thus, rites of birth were common in many pre-modern societies. In the Viking Age, people would pray to the goddesses Frigg and Freyja, and sing ritual galdr-songs to protect the mother and the child. Fate played a huge role in Norse culture and was determined at the moment of birth by the Norns. Nine nights after birth, the child had to be recognized by the father of the household. He placed the child on his knee while sitting in the high seat. Water was sprinkled on the child, it was named and thus admitted into the family. There are accounts of guests being invited to bring gifts and wish the child well. Children were often named after deceased ancestors and the names of deities could be a part of the name. People thought certain traits were connected to certain names and that these traits were carried on when the names were re-used by new generations. This was part of ancestor worship. Putting the child on the knee of the father confirmed his or her status as a member of the clan bestowed the rights connected to this status. The child could no longer be killed, or exposed by the parents, without its being considered murder. Exposing children was a socially accepted way of limiting the population. The belief that deities were present during childbirth suggests that people did not regard the woman and the child as excluded from normal society as was the case in later, Christian, times and apparently there were no ideas about female biological functions being unclean.

Marriage

As it was the core of the family, marriage was the most important social institution in pagan Scandinavia. A wedding was thus an important transition not only for the couple but also for the families involved. A marriage was a legal contract with implications for, among other things, inheritance and property relations, while the wedding itself was the solemnization of a pact in which the families promised to help each other. Because of this the male head of the family had the final say in these matters. However, it is clear from the sagas that the young couple also had a say since a good relationship between the spouses was crucial to the running of a farm. A wedding was a long and collective process subject to many ritual rules and culminating in the wedding feast itself. The procedures had to be followed for the divine powers to sanction the marriage and to avoid a bad marriage afterwards. However, accounts in the sagas about the complicated individual emotions connected to a marriage tell us that things did not always work out between the spouses.

As a prelude to marriage the family of the groom sent the groom and several delegates to the family of the bride to propose. Here the date of the betrothal was set. This was the first legally binding step between the families, and the occasion was used to negotiate the inheritance and property relations of the couple as well as the dowry (heimanfylgja) and wedding present (mundr) from the groom's family. Those were the personal property of the bride. Usually the bride's family were less wealthy than the groom's, but in most cases the difference was not great. Thus the dowry was an investment by the bride's family that made it possible for her to marry into a more powerful family. When an agreement on these matters had been reached, the deal was sealed at a feast. These conditions were reserved for the dominating class of freeholders (bóndi/bœndr), as the remaining parts of the population, servants, thralls and freedmen were not free to act in these matters but were totally dependent on their master.

The wedding (brudlaup) was the most important single ritual in the process. It was the first public gathering of the two families and consisted of a feast that lasted for several days. Anything less than three days was considered paltry. The guests witnessed that the process had been followed correctly. The sources tell very little about how a wedding was related to the gods. It is known that the goddess Vár witnessed the couple's vows, that a depiction of Mjolnir could be placed in the lap of the bride asking Thor to bless her, and that Freyr and Freyja were often called upon in matters of love and marriage, but there is no suggestion of a worship ritual. From legal sources we know that leading the couple to the bridal couch was one of the central rituals. On the first night the couple was led to bed by witnesses carrying torches, which marked the difference between legal marital relations and a secret extra-marital relationship.

Ancestor worship

The Royal mounds of Gamla Uppsala in Sweden from the 5th and the 6th centuries. Originally, the site had 2000 to 3000 tumuli, but owing to quarrying and agriculture only 250 remain.

Ancestor worship was an element in pre-Christian Scandinavian culture. The ancestors were of great importance for the self-image of the family and people believed that they were still able to influence the life of their descendants from the land of the dead. Contact with them was seen as crucial to the well-being of the family. If they were treated in the ritually correct way, they could give their blessings to the living and secure their happiness and prosperity. Conversely, the dead could haunt the living and bring bad fortune if the rituals were not followed. It is not clear whether the ancestors were seen as divine forces themselves or as connected to other death-related forces like elves.

The status of the dead determined the shape of the tomb and the burial mounds were seen as the abode of the dead. They were places of special power which also influenced the objects inside them. The evidence of prehistoric openings in mounds may thus not indicate looting but the local community's efforts to retrieve holy objects from the grave, or to insert offerings. Since the excavation of a mound was a time- and labor-consuming task which could not have happened unnoticed, religious historian Gro Steinsland and others find it unlikely that lootings of graves were common in prehistoric times. There are also several mythological tales and legends about retrieval of objects from burial mounds and an account in Ynglingasaga of offerings to Freyr continuing through openings in his burial mound at Uppsala.

The connection between the living and the dead was maintained through rituals connected to the burial place like sacrifice of objects, food and drink. Usually the graves were placed close to the dwelling of the family and the ancestors were regarding as protecting the house and its inhabitants against bad luck and bestowing fertility. Thus, ancestor worship was of crucial importance to survival and there are signs that it continued up until modern times in isolated areas. Ancestor worship was also an element in the blót feasts, where memorial toasts to the deceased were part of the ritual. Also, elf blót was closely connected to the family.

Wight worship

Land wights were unnamed collective entities. They were protective deities for areas of land and there were many religious rules for how to deal with them to avoid conflicts. This was used by Egil Skallagrimson. When he was driven from Norway into exile in Iceland, he erected a nithing pole (níðstang) to frighten the Norwegian land wights and thus bring bad luck to Norway as revenge for the Norwegian king's treatment of him. According to the saga the cursing pole consisted of a gaping horse's head mounted on top of a pole which he drove into the ground at the beach.

In the Viking Age, women are likely to have played the main role in the wight faith. This faith included sacrifices of food and drink on certain locations either near the farm or other places like waterfalls and groves where wights were believed to live. During Christianization the attention of the missionaries was focused on the named gods; worship of the more anonymous collective groups of deities was allowed to continue for a while and could have later escaped notice by the Christian authorities. The wights also lived on in folklore as nixies and tomter.

Types of rituals

Blót

Blót is the term for "sacrifice" in Norse paganism. A blót could be dedicated to any of the Norse gods, the spirits of the land, and to ancestors. The sacrifice involved aspects of a sacramental meal or feast.

The cognate term blōt or geblōt in Old English would have referred to comparable traditions in Anglo-Saxon paganism, and comparanda can also be reconstructed for the wider (prehistoric) Germanic Indo-European.

Etymology

The word blót is an Old Norse strong neuter noun (genitive blóts). The corresponding Old English neuter blōt (genitive blōtes) may be influenced by Old Norse; the Old English gospels have prefixed ge-blōt "sacrifice".

The reconstructed Proto-Germanic form of the noun is *blōtą "sacrifice, worship". Connected to this is the Proto-Germanic strong verb *blōtaną with descendants in Gothic 𐌱𐌻𐍉𐍄𐌰𐌽 (blōtan), Old Norse blóta, Old English blōtan and Old High German bluozan, all of which mean "to sacrifice, offer, worship".

The word also appears in a compound attested in Old Norse as blót-hús "house of worship" and in Old High German as bluoz-hūz "temple". With a different nominative affix, the same stem is found in the Proto-Germanic noun *blōstrą "sacrifice" — attested in Gothic *𐌱𐌻𐍉𐍃𐍄𐍂 (*blostr) in 𐌾𐌿𐌸-𐌱𐌻𐍉𐍃𐍄𐍂𐌴𐌹𐍃 (guþ-blostreis) "worshipper of God" and Old High German bluostar "offering, sacrifice"). This stem is thought to be connected to the Proto-Germanic verb *blōaną "to blow; to bloom, blossom", as are the words for "blood" (Proto-Germanic *blōþą) and "bloom" (Proto-Germanic *blōmô). Sophus Bugge was the first to suggest a connection between blót and the Latin flamen (< *flădmen), and both words can be traced back to the Proto-Indo-European stem *bhlād- "to bubble forth; to mumble, murmur, blather".

Rites and beliefs

The verb blóta meant "to worship with sacrifice", or "to strengthen". The sacrifice usually consisted of animals or war prisoners, in particular pigs and horses. The meat was boiled in large cooking pits with heated stones, either indoors or outdoors. The blood was considered to contain special powers and it was sprinkled on the statues of the gods, on the walls and on the participants themselves.

The drink that was passed around was beer or mead.

A special toast was reserved for the celebration of Jól: til árs ok friðar, "for a good year and frith (peace)".

Dates

The autumn blót was performed in the middle of October (about four weeks after the autumn equinox), [citation needed] the Winter Nights, indicating the beginning of winter. The great midwinter blót, or Jól, took place in the middle of January. Freyr was the most important god at the Midwinter and autumn blót,[citation needed] and Christmas ham (the pig was for Freyr) is still a main Christmas course in parts of Scandinavia. The Summer blót was undertaken in the middle of April (about four weeks after the spring equinox) and it was given to Odin. Then, they drank for victory in war and this blót was the starting date for Viking expeditions and wars.

For the early Anglo-Saxons, November was known as Blōtmōnaþ, as this later Old English passage points out:

Se mónaþ is nemned on Léden Novembris, and on úre geþeóde blótmónaþ, forðon úre yldran, ðá hý hǽðene wǽron, on ðam mónþe hý bleóton á, ðæt is, ðæt hý betǽhton and benémdon hyra deófolgyldum ða neát ða ðe hý woldon syllan.

The month is named in Latin Novembris, and in our speech blót-month, because our forefathers, when they were heathens, always blóted in this month, that is, that they took and devoted to their idols the cattle which they wished to offer.

Locations

A building where the blót took place was called a hov (compare German Hof) and there are many place names derived from this in e.g. Scania, West Götaland and East Götaland. Excavations at the medieval churches of Mære in Trøndelag and at Old Uppsala provide the few exceptions where church sites are associated with earlier churches.

There were also other sacred places called Hörgr, Vé, Lund and Haug. Hörgr means altar possibly consisting of a heap of stones, Lund means "grove" and Ve simply "sacred place". The Christian laws forbade worshipping at the haug or haugr meaning "mound" or "barrow".

Denmark

Lejre

The German historian Thietmar, Count of Merseburg wrote that the Daner had their main cult centre on Zealand at Lejre, where they gathered every nine years and sacrificed 99 people but also horses, dogs and hens. There are however no historical records from Scandinavian sources nor any archeological findings supporting this. Archaeological excavations have indeed revealed Lejre to be of great importance and in fact the seat of the royal family dating to at least the Iron Age. There is not conclusive evidence that Lejre was the site of a main cult centre though, but excavations around lake Tissø not far to the West, have revealed an ancient hof of great importance.

Norway

Mære

Snorri Sturluson relates of a meeting between the peasants of Trøndelag and king Haakon I of Norway, a meeting which ended in a religious feud centered around the blót. Haakon was raised at the Christian English court and had returned to claim the throne of his father Harald Fair hair (the unifier of Norway) and intended to Christianize the country. In spite of the fact that the peasants had elected Haakon king at the Thing they opposed his religious ideas.

It was an old custom, that when there was to be sacrifice all the bóndis [freeholders] should come to the spot where the temple stood and bring with them all that they required while the festival of the sacrifice lasted. To this festival all the men brought ale with them; and all kinds of cattle, as well as horses, were slaughtered, and all the blood that came from them was called hlaut, and the vessels in which it was collected were called hlaut-vessels. Hlaut-staves were made, like sprinkling brushes, with which the whole of the altars and the temple walls, both outside and inside, were sprinkled over, and also the people were sprinkled with the blood; but the flesh was boiled into savory meat for those present. The fire was in the middle of the floor of the temple, and over it hung the kettles, and the full goblets were handed across the fire; and he who made the feast, and was a chief, blessed the full goblets, and all the meat of the sacrifice. And first Odin's goblet was emptied for victory and power to his king; thereafter, Njord's and Freyja's goblets for peace and a good season. Then it was the custom of many to empty the Brage-goblet (1); and then the guests emptied a goblet to the memory of departed friends, called the remembrance goblet.

— Hákon the Good's Saga, section 16, Sacred Texts website.

During this ceremony, the king also had to participate, although he was a Christian, and he had to drink of the mead that was offered and consecrated for Odin, Njord and Freyja. The peasants also wanted him to eat of the meat, but he only gaped over the handle of the cauldron and held a linen cloth between his mouth and the meat. The peasants were not at all satisfied with a king who would not participate fully in the blót. The King had however, been seriously humiliated and later he converted to the old faith. The tradition says that he was buried in the old ways.

Sweden

Gotland

The Gutasaga relates of the blót on the island of Gotland in the Baltic Sea:

Firi þan tima oc lengi eptir siþan. Troþu menn a hult. oc a hauga. wi. oc. stafgarþa. oc a haiþin guþ. blotaþu þair synnum oc dydrum sinum Oc fileþi. miþ matj oc mundgati. þet gierþu þair eptir wantro sinnj. land alt. hafþi sir hoystu blotan miþ fulki. ellar hafþi huer þriþiungr. sir. En smeri þing hafþu mindri blotan meþ fileþi. matj. Oc mungati. sum haita suþnautar. þi et þair suþu allir saman.

Before this time, and a long time thereafter, they believed in groves and barrows, sanctuaries, and sacred enclosures and in the pagan gods. This they did due to their superstition. The whole country (the althing) had the largest blót with sacrifice of people, otherwise every trithing had its blót and smaller things had smaller blót with cattle, food and drinks. They were called food-, or cooking-brethren, because they prepared the meals together.

Uppsala

Old Uppsala and Temple at Uppsala

The German chronicler Adam of Bremen has described how it was done at the Temple at Uppsala at Old Uppsala in Sweden, ca 1070:

Thor was the most powerful god and ruled over thunder and lightning, wind and rain, sunshine and crops. He sat in the centre with a hammer (Mjolnir) in his hand, and on each side were Odin, the god of war, in full armor and Frey, the god of peace and love, attributed with an enormous erect phallus. All the pagan gods have their priests who offer them the people's sacrifices. If there is disease or famine, they sacrifice to Thor, if war to Odin and if weddings to Frey.

Every ninth year there is a blót of nine days, a common feast for everyone in Sweden. Then they sacrifice nine males of each species, even men, and the bodies are hung from the branches of a grove near the temple. No one is exempt from this blót and everyone sends gifts to the shrine, even the kings. Those who are Christian have to pay a fee not to take part in the blót. [citation needed]

Adam of Bremen considered this financial penalty to be very harsh.

A depiction of a Goði leading the people in sacrificing to an idol of Thor in this painting by J. L. Lund.

It is possible that the last nine-day blót was performed in 1078. The Temple at Uppsala was probably destroyed by king Ingold I in 1087. For quite some time there had been civil war between Christians and pagans every nine years, and this was the year of the last battle.

According to Snorri, there was a main blót at the Temple at Uppsala in February, the Dísablót, during which they sacrificed for peace and for the victories of the king. The blót was also performed to see how large the next harvest would be. Then the Thing of all Swedes was held and there was a grand fair, the Disting. The Disting survived Christianity, and the tradition has never been interrupted. The fair is still held every first Tuesday in February in Uppsala, even though the date has sometimes been moved within the month. In 1968, the tradition of discussing official matters was resumed.

Specific blóts

The old Norse calendar consisted of a summer half year and a winter half year, not the four seasons modern Europeans are accustomed to. The winter half of the year began in mid-to-late October, the summer half of the year began in mid-to-late April. Some blót were associated with these turning points.

Beginning of Winter half year

Winter Nights,

Haust blót "autumn sacrifice", mentioned in the Ynglinga saga and in other texts

Völsi blót: The Völsi was the penis of a stallion, and the rites surrounding it are described in Völsa þáttr. It was taken from a stallion during the autumn butchering, and it is said that the mistress of the homestead considered it to be her god and kept it in a coffin together with linen and leeks (see also horse sacrifice). In the evening everybody gathered in the main building. The mistress presented the penis from the coffin, greeted it with a prayer, and let it pass from person to person. Everybody greeted it with the religious phrase May Mörnir receive the holy sacrifice!.[7]

The álfablót or Elven blót was small scale and was celebrated at the homestead and led by its mistress. Not much is known about these rites, since they were surrounded by secrecy and strangers were not welcome during the time of the rituals. However, since the elves were collective powers closely connected with the ancestors some assume that it had to do with the ancestor cult and the life force of the family.

Dísablót

During winter

Yule, an important sacrifice celebrated sometime after Winter solstice. When Christianity arrived in Scandinavia the yuleblót/winterblót was celebrated on 12 January (note: Date as of the previous Julian calendar. Hence it is not on January 12 in the current calendar.)

At the midpoint of the Winter half of the year

Þorrablót (Iceland)

Freyr blot (Sweden): The Óláfs saga Tryggvasonar en mesta has an account of a priestess of Freyr travelling across eastern Sweden (Uppland or Södermanland) with an image of the god in wintertime, celebrating a sacrifice for fertility.

Beginning of Summer half year

This point in time is known as First Day of Summer in modern Iceland

Dísablót

Sigrblót: the Ynglinga saga states one of the great festivals of the calendar is at sumri, þat var sigrblót "in summer, for victory".

Modern reception

Further information: Heathen holidays

Pre-Christian Scandinavian traditions have left traces in Scandinavian folklore. A conscious revival of Norse paganism has also taken place, in the 19th century in Romantic nationalism, and since the later 20th century under the name Asatru or Germanic Neopaganism.

In Scandinavian Yule or Christmas traditions in particular, such as the Christmas porridge, of which an extra bowl often is served and carried outdoors, because this is a meal shared with the guardian of the homestead, the tomte (nisse in Danish and Norwegian, tonttu in Finnish), a land wight.[citation needed]

The Þorrablót is an Icelandic tradition introduced in the 19th century, deliberately harking back to the term blót associated with pre-Christian times.

Modern adherents of the reconstructionist Germanic neopaganism (in English-speaking countries also known as "heathenism") have developed traditions of blót rituals celebrated in a contemporary context since the 1970s.

6 notes · View notes