Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 5, 1894.djvu/127

 6"/. Nico/as and Artemis. >■ 119

miracle speaks of the dominion of the Vandals in Africa/ and lastly, in a somewhat damaged text of a Vita dif- ferent from that of Metaphrastes, we find unmistakable traces of the tradition of sacrificing oxen to St. George.^ In general, we can hardly doubt that the cult of St. Nicolas is one of the oldest cults of Christianity ; it therefore seems to me very probable that his name should have so spread at the time Beoividf was written^ (eighth to tenth century) as to become a common noun for a sea-monster. If we find Eastern coins and ornaments in Ireland and England,* why should we not also find distant echoes of Eastern creeds ?

The philological side of the question can hardly be con- sidered difficult. We have already seen that the name of Nicolas in its nicknames still lives under the shape of Nickelman^ in Germany and Nick^ in England. The forms Nisse, Nissen, " must be explained", says Grimm, " from Niels, Nielsen, i.e., Nicolaus, Niclas".'^ From the root nicf ( = nick ?) sprang all the other names of water- spirits — Mid. H. G. 7iix (niches) ; O. H. G. nikJius ; A. S. nicor ; O. Ic. nykr, etc.

There can be, therefore, only some doubt about the etymology of the presupposed roots, 7iick or nik or niq, themselves, which both Sanders'' and Dr. Skeat^'^ decline to give. Professor Earle says : " It {nicor) is a word of

1 Assemanus, /. r., p. 418.

2 See Mikola Ugodnik, etc., p. 5, etc.

^ Ten Brink, Beoivulf, Strassburg, 1888, S. 246 ; and Prof. T. Earle, The Deeds of Beowulf, Oxiord, 1892, pp. li-lii.


 * Heyd, Geschichte des Levanienhandels, 1879, •> S. 97.

^ Grimm's Mythology, -p. 514.

^ Ibid., p. 488. "^ Ibid., p. 505.

^ Fr. Kluge, An Etymological Dictionary of the German Language^ London, 1891, p. 253. Compare Grimm's Deiitsches Worterbuchy, Leipzig, 1882, S. 861.

9 Worterbuch der deiitschen Sprache, Leipzig, 1861 ; see Neck: " Stamm fraglich."

" Etymological Dictionary, Oxford, 1884, p. 392; see Nick :" Root unknown."