EDWARD GIBBON: Historical Works, Memoirs & Letters (Including "The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire"). Edward Gibbon
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little reverence for Northern queens.
Note: The Suiones and the Sitones are the ancient inhabitants of Scandinavia, their name may be traced in that of Sweden; they did not belong to the race of the Suevi, but that of the non-Suevi or Cimbri, whom the Suevi, in very remote times, drove back part to the west, part to the north; they were afterwards mingled with Suevian tribes, among others the Goths, who have traces of their name and power in the isle of Gothland. — G]
42 May we not suspect that superstition was the parent of despotism? The descendants of Odin, (whose race was not extinct till the year 1060) are said to have reigned in Sweden above a thousand years. The temple of Upsal was the ancient seat of religion and empire. In the year 1153 I find a singular law, prohibiting the use and profession of arms to any except the king’s guards. Is it not probable that it was colored by the pretence of reviving an old institution? See Dalin’s History of Sweden in the Bibliotheque Raisonneo tom. xl. and xlv.]
43 Tacit. Germ. c. 43.]
44 Id. c. 11, 12, 13, & c.]
45 Grotius changes an expression of Tacitus, pertractantur into Proetractantur. The correction is equally just and ingenious.]
46 Even in our ancient parliament, the barons often carried a question, not so much by the number of votes, as by that of their armed followers.]
47 Caesar de Bell. Gal. vi. 23.]
48 Minuunt controversias, is a very happy expression of Caesar’s.]
49 Reges ex nobilitate, duces ex virtute sumunt. Tacit Germ. 7]
50 Cluver. Germ. Ant. l. i. c. 38.]
51 Caesar, vi. 22. Tacit Germ. 26.]
52 Tacit. Germ. 7.]
53 Tacit. Germ. 13, 14.]
54 Esprit des Loix, l. xxx. c. 3. The brilliant imagination of Montesquieu is corrected, however, by the dry, cold reason of the Abbe de Mably. Observations sur l’Histoire de France, tom. i. p. 356.]
55 Gaudent muneribus, sed nec data imputant, nec acceptis obligautur. Tacit. Germ. c. 21.]
56 The adulteress was whipped through the village. Neither wealth nor beauty could inspire compassion, or procure her a second husband. 18, 19.]
57 Ovid employs two hundred lines in the research of places the most favorable to love. Above all, he considers the theatre as the best adapted to collect the beauties of Rome, and to melt them into tenderness and sensuality,]
58 Tacit. Germ. iv. 61, 65.]
59 The marriage present was a yoke of oxen, horses, and arms. See Germ. c. 18. Tacitus is somewhat too florid on the subject.]
60 The change of exigere into exugere is a most excellent correction.]
61 Tacit. Germ. c. 7. Plutarch in Mario. Before the wives of the Teutones destroyed themselves and their children, they had offered to surrender, on condition that they should be received as the slaves of the vestal virgins.]
62 Tacitus has employed a few lines, and Cluverius one hundred and twenty-four pages, on this obscure subject. The former discovers in Germany the gods of Greece and Rome. The latter is positive, that, under the emblems of the sun, the moon, and the fire, his pious ancestors worshipped the Trinity in unity]
63 The sacred wood, described with such sublime horror by Lucan, was in the neighborhood of Marseilles; but there were many of the same kind in Germany.
Note: The ancient Germans had shapeless idols, and, when they began to build more settled habitations, they raised also temples, such as that to the goddess Teufana, who presided over divination. See Adelung, Hist. of Ane Germans, p 296 — G]
64 Tacit. Germania, c. 7.]
65 Tacit. Germania, c. 40.]
66 See Dr. Robertson’s History of Charles V. vol. i. note 10.]
67 Tacit. Germania, c. 7. These standards were only the heads of wild beasts.]
68 See an instance of this custom, Tacit. Annal. xiii. 57.]
69 Caesar Diodorus, and Lucan, seem to ascribe this doctrine to the Gauls, but M. Pelloutier (Histoire des Celtes, l. iii. c. 18) labors to reduce their expressions to a more orthodox sense.]
70 Concerning this gross but alluring doctrine of the Edda, see Fable xx. in the curious version of that book, published by M. Mallet, in his Introduction to the History of Denmark.]
71 See Tacit. Germ. c. 3. Diod. Sicul. l. v. Strabo, l. iv. p. 197. The classical reader may remember the rank of Demodocus in the Phaeacian court, and the ardor infused by Tyrtaeus into the fainting Spartans. Yet there is little probability that the Greeks and the Germans were the same people.
Much learned trifling might be spared, if our antiquarians would condescend to reflect, that similar manners will naturally be produced by similar situations.]
* Besides these battle songs, the Germans sang at their festival banquets, (Tac. Ann. i. 65,) and around the bodies of their slain heroes. King Theodoric, of the tribe of the Goths, killed in a battle against Attila, was honored by songs while he was borne from the field of battle. Jornandes, c. 41. The same honor was paid to the remains of Attila. Ibid. c. 49. According to some historians, the Germans had songs also at their weddings; but this appears to me inconsistent with their customs, in which marriage was no more than the purchase of a wife. Besides, there is but one instance of this, that of the Gothic king, Ataulph, who