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Date: 4 May 2025 09:53 pm (UTC)
cimorene: A colorful wallpaper featuring curling acanthus leaves and small flowers (smultron ställe)
From: [personal profile] cimorene
Everybody is FULLY pagan in these novels.

There are multiple specific gods alluded to, but not actually named, perhaps because he's made the odd choice to translate literally everthing into English including the names in ROTM. Like, the clan are called Wolfings in HOTW but in ROTM they are all "sons of the wolf" now and the main five characters are called Face-of-God (heroic town-bred protagonist of the House of the Face, the Face referring indirectly to a specific god who miiiiiiight be Dellingr?), The Bride (his childhood fiancee of the House of the Steer and I tried so hard to find any evidence of any name that could be similar to this but no dice), The Sunbeam (the female political leader of the Wolfings), Folk-might (The Sunbeam's brother and the male war-leader of the Wolfings), and Bow-May (Sunbeam and Folk-might's foster sister of the Wolfings and a fighting maiden who is unironically portrayed as the greatest archer who has ever lived). "The gods of the people" and "the gods and ancestors of the people" are referred to collectively for all the germanic peoples here and a war-god (probably Tír) and a male earth-god (probably Freyr) are also mentioned, besides the God of the Face who may or may not be Dellingr.

And they don't really mention Christianity at all, either, which struck me as odd while reading. That also inclines me to think that leaving it out was a deliberate choice. I suppose it isn't implausible, though, that it just hasn't come up, since there are no characters from other cultures to raise the issue. But OTOH, another aspect of how this is not really realistically set in reality is that other and neighboring lands, apart from the invading Huns, are not very significant, even though they are known from trade. There is no sense of threat from the Romans or any other cultures in their lives.

That doesn't 100% guarantee that no goths (from other tribes than the ones in ROTM) have encountered Christianity (they are aware of other germanic tribes and parts of the tribes in the book who have migrated to the Roman empire), but even the leaders of the little society of shepherds/woodsmen/farmers/this one town in this one little valley are completely unaware of it. Also they clearly don't pay taxes or tribute to any higher authority than themselves - that's a big deal in both of these books, but since it springs so clearly from Morris's socialism, it is clearly an artistic choice on his part. The lack of Christianity may reflect his preferences rather than his thoughts about time period.

I don't think I've read any of the epics that do portray the Goths yet, although I did read a little bit about Hlöðskviða and a few quotes a few weeks ago! According to Wikipedia, besides that, there are two other sagas which mention them, Gutasaga & Hervarar saga ok Heiðreks. I will certainly investigate these now that my curiosity is aroused. It's possible it will give me more of an idea of where and when to picture the events, which will at least help me picture the artisan objects Morris describes, if not the clothes...
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