The stag sprung up from his mossy bed
      When he caught the piercing sounds,
And the oak-boughs crash’d to his antler’d head
      As he flew from the viewless hounds;
And the falcon soar’d from her craggy height,
      Away through the rushing night !

The banner shook on its ancient hold,
      And the pine in its desert-place,
As the cloud and tempest onward roll’d
      With the din of the trampling race;
And the glens were fill’d with the laugh and shout,
      And the bugle, ringing out !

From the chieftain’s hand the wine-cup fell,
      At the castle’s festive board,
And a sudden pause came o’er the swell
      Of the harp’s triumphal chord;
And the Minnesinger’s thrilling lay
      In the hall died fast away.

The convent’s chanted rite was stay’d,
      And the hermit dropp’d his beads,
And a trembling ran through the forest-shade,
      At the neigh of the phantom steeds,
And the church-bells peal’d to the rocking blast
      As the Wild Night-Huntsman pass’d.

The storm hath swept with the chase away,
      There is stillness in the sky,
But the mother looks on her son to-day,
      With a troubled heart and eye,
And the maiden’s brow hath a shade of care
      Midst the gleam of her golden hair !

The Rhine flows bright, but its waves ere long
      Must hear a voice of war,
And a clash of spears our hills among,
      And a trumpet from afar;
And the brave on a bloody turf must lie,
      For the Huntsman hath gone by !

Felicia Hemans : The Wild Huntsman
 
 
It is a popular belief in the Odenwald, that the passing of the Wild Huntsman announces the approach of war. He is supposed to issue with his train from the ruined castle of Rodenstein, and traverse the air to the opposite castle of Schnellerts. It is confidently asserted that the sound of his phantom horses and hounds was heard by the Duke of Baden before the commencement of the last war in Germany.
 
 
 
 

She is dressed in a trailing white garment, a white veil covers her head, below which her long flaxen hair hangs, twisted with strings of pearls; her face is deathly pale as that of a corpse. In her right hand she carries a bunch of keys, in her left a nosegay of Mayflowers. She walks solemnly down the long corridor. The tall guardsmen present arms, pages and lackeys give way before her, the guards who have just relieved their comrades open their ranks; the figure passes through them, and goes through a folding door into the royal ante-room.

“It is the White Lady ; the King is about to die,” whispers the officer of the watch, brushing a tear from his eye.

“The White Lady has appeared,” is whispered through the crowd, and all know what that portends.

At noon the King’s death was known to all. “Yes,” said Master Schneckenburger, “he has been gathered to his fathers. Mistress Berchta has once more announced what was going to happen, for she can foretell everything, both bad and good. She was seen before the misfortunes of 1806, and again before the battle of Belle-Alliance. She has a key with which to open the door of life and happiness. He to whom she gives a cowslip will succeed in what­ever he undertakes.”

Schneckenburger was right. It was Bertha, or Berchta, who made known the King’s approaching death, but she was also the prophetess of other important events. Berchta ( from percht, shining ) is almost identical with Holda, except that the latter never appears as the White Lady. Many Germanic tribes wor­shipped the Earth-goddess under the name of Berchta, and there are numbers of legends about her both in North and South Germany.

One evening in the year was dedicated to her, and was called Perchten-evening ( 30th December or 6th January ), when she was sup­posed, as a diligent spinner, to oversee the labours of the spinning-room, or, magic staff in hand, to ride at the head of the Raging Host, in the midst of a terrific storm. She generally lived in hollow mountains, where she, as in Thuringia, watched over and tended the “Heimchen,” or souls of babes as yet unborn, and of those who died an early death. She busied herself there by ploughing up the ground under the earth, whilst the babes watered the fields. Whenever men, careless of the good she did them, disturbed her in her mountain dwelling, she left the country with her train, and after her departure the fields lost all their former fruitfulness.

Once when Berchta and her babes were passing over a meadow across the middle of which ran a fence that divided it in two, the last little child could not climb over it; its water-jar was too heavy. A woman, who a short time before had lost her little baby, was close by, and recognised her dead darling, for whom she had wept night and day. She hastened to the child, clasped it in her arms, and would not let it go.

Then the little one said : “How warm and comfortable I feel in my mother’s arms ; but weep no more for me, mother, my jar is full and is growing too heavy for me. Look, mother, dost thou not see how all thy tears run into it, and how I’ve spilt some on my little shirt ? Mistress Berchta, who loves me and kisses me, has told me that thou shouldst also come to her in time, and then we shall be together again in the beautiful garden under the hill.”

Then the mother wept once more a flood of tears, and let the child go.

After that she never shed another tear, but found comfort in the thought that she would one day be with her child again.

Berchta appears in many legends as an enchantress, or as an enchanted maiden, who provided a rich treasure for him who was lucky enough to set her free from the magic spell that bound her. Still more frequently, however, she took up her abode in princely castles as the “Ahnfrau,” or Ancestress of the family to whom the castle belonged. In these stories the Goddess of Nature is hardly recognisable.

It is told that the widowed Countess Kunigunde of Orlamund fell in love with Count Albrecht the beautiful, of Hohenzollern. He told her that four eyes stood in the way of a marriage between them, and she, thinking that he referred to her children, had them secretly murdered. But, as the tale informs us, he had meant his parents, who disapproved of the marriage. He felt nothing but abhorrence of the murderess when he found out what she had done, and she, repenting of her sin, made a pilgrimage to Rome, did severe penance, and afterwards founded the nunnery of the Heavenly Crown, where she died an abbess. Her grave, as well as those of her children and of the Burggraf Albrecht, are still shown there. From that time she appeared at the Plassenburg, near Baireuth, as the “Ahnfrau,” who made known any evil that was going to happen; later on she went to Berlin with the Count’s family, and is still to be seen there as the tale at the beginning of this chapter shows.

Another account makes the apparition out to be the Countess Beatrix of Cleve, who was married to the Swan-Knight so often mentioned among the old heroes of the middle ages. The House of Cleve was nearly related to that of Hohenzollern, and in the mysterious Swan-Knight we recognise the god of Light, who comes out of the darkness of night and returns to it again.

A more simple version refers to a Bohemian Countess, Bertha of Rosenberg. She was unhappily married to Johann of Lichtenberg, after whose death she became the benefactress of her subjects, built the Castle Neuhaus, and never laid aside the white garments of widowhood as long as she lived. In this dress she appeared, and even now appears, to the kindred families of Rosen­berg, Neuhaus and Berlin, on which occasion she prophesies either good or evil fortune.

The Germanic races carried the worship of this Earth-goddess with them to Gaul and Italy, in the former of which countries a proverbial expression refers to the underground kingdom of the goddess, by reminding people “du temps que Berthe filait” It was that time of innocence and peace, of which almost every nation has its tradition, for which it longs, and to which it can only return after death.

Historical personages have also been supposed to enact the part formerly given to the Earth-mother.

A tradition of the I2th century informs us that Pepin, father of Charlemagne, wished to marry Bertrada, a Hungarian princess, who was a very good and diligent spinner. His wooing was suc­cessful, and the princess and her ladies set out on their journey to Pepin’s court. The bride’s marvellous beauty was only marred by her having a very large foot.

Now the chief lady-in-waiting was a wicked woman, and jealous of Bertrada ; so she gave the princess to some villains she had bribed, in order that she might be murdered in the forest, and then she put her own ugly daughter in her mistress’s place. Although Pepin was disgusted with his deformed bride, he was obliged to marry her according to compact; but soon afterwards, on finding out the deception that had been practised upon him, he put her from him.

Late one evening when out hunting, he came to a mill on the river Maine. There he saw a girl spinning busily. He recognised her as the true Bertrada by her large foot, found out how her intended murderers had taken compassion on her, and how she had finally reached the mill. He then discovered his rank to her, and entreated her to fulfil her engagement to him. The fruit of this marriage was Charlemagne.

Dr. W. Wagner : Asgard and the Gods 1880

 
Naturally, the sparse account of the White Lady of the Hohenzollerns above could do with some specific examples; as far as I know, the last member of the family to actually see her was Kaiser Wilhelm II, but I have no idea whether she appeared at Doorn for his passing… However note the pure conception of our forefathers regarding those who died in infancy as opposed to the degraded and base christian superstition taught to the Catholic faithful of ‘limbus infantium‘ as destiny for those unbaptised by man — a teaching his present German Holiness has discarded with admirable ruthlessness. Not of course that some other cultures are any more elevated… Having just watched Shogun Assassin, a simple drama quite free from the dubious idea that each life is a precious thing, some notes on the Jizo Bodhisattva indicate the utter drivel taught by another path to enlightenment:

As the patron saint of infants, Jizo takes particularly keen interest in children who die prematurely. When they are sent to the underworld to build stone towers (as punishment for the grief caused to their parents by their early death) and beaten by a demon, Jizo comes to rescue them. Even today, there are often heaps of stones around Jizo statues, as many believe that a stone presented to Jizo will shorten the time that their child suffers in the underworld.

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Both the Bundeswehr and the late Nationale Volksarmee have/had no more legitimacy than Hitler’s mob, but although republican do/did obviously still carry out a little of the great tradition… Torchlight Parades are always so pretty.

Both uniforms are getting on the silly side, with ties and all ( and ugly impracticable Allied-Type helmets; which is kind of ironical now the Yanks are sensibly starting to model their helmets on the stahlhelm… ) and look really remarkably similar despite any supposed ideological differences betwixt state capitalism and the free-market kind.

[See post to watch Flash video]

[See post to watch Flash video]

Note the holy atmosphere of the NVA bash — no doubt anything would be a break from the necessity of writing up a daily report on one’s neighbours; and the poor production values of something shot in 1989 which films like 1962 outside the Iron Curtain. Note also the use of Jingling Johnnies aka La Pavillon Chinois which seem to really take one back…

[See post to watch Flash video]

Aged about 9 I lost on a train my Edwardian copy of Olaf The Glorious; I could get a modern reprint, but I’ve never since seen an original despite spending my life in second-hand bookshops, and asking for it most times. Similiarly, I may, or may not, have lost my copy of Fortescue ( by I think, Sinclair Gaudie and Harold Lamb ) a spoof of mid-victoriana.

Of particular note was the eponymous hero’s descent into — very comparative — vice in attending a Judge & Jury show presided over by the genial Renton Nicholson at the Coal Hole in the Strand ( and also at the Cider Cellars in Covent Garden ) Eheu Fugaces, this was when London still had interesting things to do… A Gabs Ray site can explain a little of the show; plus there’s a puritanic view of the end here. Even Thomas Hardy cheered himself up there. Nicholson was also a writer; here’s a story of his, The Actor’s Tale, from HorrorMasters * although it’s not horror.

A few times I used to bulk up my C.V. with working at Renton Nicholson’s, Strand, London. It does sound like any firm one can imagine, and it was a surety few hiring morons would make any connection.

 
* As a child I was often rather terrified each night; and as a child I read deeply of this kind of Victorian junk on ghosts etc.. It is possible the two facts may be intimately related… ( particularly the one about a nun’s visiting skeleton being shattered, and coming back as individual bones reconstituting at the end of the bed. )

Andrew Lang : The Sagas

 
Allfather’s curse on nithings is stronger than that on evil-doers: therefore we too must despise weaklings and those who associate with them more than those who actively seek us harm; both take us to hell, but the weak feign it is the way to heaven.

And pace the post mentioning Brezhnev, a blogger here points out one of the great soviet achievements, ordered by that very Chairman, in destroying Königsberg Castle and replacing it with…

*blinks*

I saw, I took, I cast you by,
I bent and broke your pride.
You loved me well, or I heard them lie,
But your longing was denied.
Surely I knew that by and by
You cursed your gods and died.

And a myriad suns have set and shone
Since then upon the grave
Decreed by the King of Babylon
To her that had been his Slave.

The pride I trampled is now my scathe,
For it tramples me again.
The old resentment lasts like death,
For you love, yet you refrain.
I break my heart on your hard unfaith,
And I break my heart in vain.

Yet not for hour do I wish undone
The deed beyond the grave,
When I was a King in Babylon
And you were a Virgin Slave.

W. E. Henley : “Or Ever The Knightly Years Were Gone”

Here is Hildr singing an Ode to Allfather, with the video arranged by BornInMidgard1987 on YouTube:

[See post to watch Flash video]