The Wanderer Anglo Saxon History, mythology, Folklore and religion

Tiw . ... The god Tiw was a deity of chief importance to the Anglo-Saxons as he was the god of war, swordplay, and the sky. Even though the Anglo-Saxons appealed to both Thunor and Woden in matters of warfare, Tiw was the official god of war. Tiw could also have been the original Allfather. He is the Germanic version of Tyr the God of War. Tiw is shrouded in a great deal of mystery, speculation, a...

Sources There are literary sources that tell us how Heathenry was practiced before the advent of Christianity. The main such sources include medieval Icelandic Eddas and Sagas, Anglo-Saxon poetry, the works of the 8th-century English monk Saint Bede, and the Germania by the Roman historian Tacitus. Although most of these were written in Christian times, they record the religious beliefs and practi...

Around the year 1000 CE, a field blessing ritual went like this: The first four sods were taken at night and soaked in oil, honey, yeast, holy water and the milk of every animal to be kept in the field. A field fertility invocation half in Latin and half in Angle Saxon was then said after which the sods were kept in a church until after four masses have been said. The sods were then returned to th...

The Origin and Initial Function of the Runes Here we take a further look at the Anglo-Saxon Runes and the many duties they undertook in Anglo-Saxon and Germanic society. The Old English version of the runic alphabet called the Futhorc and named for its first six letters is distinguished from its ancestor, the Common Germanic Elder Futhark, by its increase in the number of runes to twenty-eight and...

With its branches in the heavens and its roots in the underworld, the World Tree is a common feature of religions and mythologies around the globe. Stories of such trees have been recorded in the Americas, Asia, India, Africa, the Middle East, and Europe — and while the species and specifics may vary from place to place, one thing almost always holds true: the Cosmic Tree is central to the structu...

Anglo-Saxon Paganism or Anglo-Saxon Heathenry is a modern religion based on the ancient pagan tribal religions of the Germanic tribes that moved into what is now England in the 5th century. These tribes are generally thought to be the Angles, Jutes, and Saxons, although portions of other tribes such as the Frisians may have migrated also. It is therefore closely related to the ancient Norse pagan...

When Edward Ironside was murdered in 1016, Canute the Dane seized the crown of Wessex. The following year, conscious of the threat posed to his rule by Edmund's small sons, Edmund and Edward Ætheling, he banished them to Sweden, with a `letter of death'. The Swedish king, however, spared their lives, and the Continental wanderings of the Anglo-Saxon princes began; their uncertain fate greatly exer...

Anglo Saxon Runes The word RUNE means secret or mystery. Runes had a religious meaning and were used in religious ceremonies. They were a charm or a spell as well as a way of writing messages. The Anglo-Saxons believed that if you used the right runes in the right order, they could have magical powers. For example, a prisoner could magically release himself by carving certain runes You can see tha...

The king of the Anglo-Saxon gods was Woden, a German version of the Scandinavian god Odin , who had two pet wolves and a horse with eight legs. Other gods were Thunor, the god of thunder; Frige, goddess of love; and Tiw, the god of war. No detailed account of Woden and his mythic adventures survives from the Anglo-Saxon era; nevertheless, this ancestral figure remains present in the cultural imagi...

In this episode, we talk indirectly and directly about Wyrd and what it means, we talk about the conversion of the English to Christianity and lots of things that happened before and after the conversion. We talk about Wyrd and discuss the Norns as well as the belief that Wyrd was part of the Christian god's plan according to Alfred's writings.  But overall this is an enjoyable episode that l...

In this episode, we read three Anglo Saxon Poems. We start with the Seafarer, then move on to the Wife's lament and finally moving on to the Wanderer. All of these poems are very well known and show a way of thought that is no longer with us. The poems hint at life and how it was lived, They also delve into depression and unbalanced psychosis. These poems were written by people who knew similar pe...

This is a podcast dedicated to Anglo Saxon Poetry and Anglo Saxon Heathenism. Each episode we will either have a reading of a poem or we will have a discussion about what we think the poem means, or I will put my thoughts up in the show notes for all to read. If this is the kind of thing you like, please subscribe to the podcast and leave comments for me.