Зображення сторінки
PDF
ePub

era, for they have left no written records behind them. We have already spoken of what we can learn from ancient finds.

[graphic]

FIG. 10.-Altar from the Iron Age.

About the Teutons, taken as a whole, the Roman historians Cæsar and Tacitus give

not a few important points of information, especially the latter in his historical books and in his brief account of Germany.

4. Runes.-But about the third century after Christ the Gothic-Germanic people

[graphic][merged small]

learned to use an alphabet remodeled from the Latin, the so-called "Runes." The Runes

[graphic][ocr errors][subsumed][subsumed][subsumed][ocr errors][graphic][subsumed][subsumed][graphic][ocr errors][subsumed][ocr errors][graphic][graphic][merged small]
[graphic][graphic][graphic][graphic][graphic][subsumed][merged small]

soon reached also the Northern races, where they were scratched upon objects in common use, as combs, clasps, weapons, and drinking or sacrificial horns. Here belong the aforementioned golden horns from Gallehus in southern Jutland. These were found in 1639 and 1734 and had a value in our money of about 17,000 kroner ($4,760). At the very beginning of our century they were stolen on account of their great value and melted over, so we now must content ourselves with drawings and casts of these splendid monuments of antiquity, which may have been a sacrificial gift. They consisted of two smooth golden horns of very fine gold with an outer casing of tight-fitting rings likewise of gold, on which there were engraved figures and ornaments, and between these again there were raised figures firmly soldered (Figs. 11-13). Many attempts have been made to interpret these pictorial representations, which easily have a religious significance. Worsaae, our renowned archæologist, was of the opinion that one horn represented life in hell (the serpents), the other life in Val

« НазадПродовжити »