Page:The Mythology of the Aryan Nations.djvu/599

Rh than shut out in the outer cold beyond its padlocked gates.^ But chap. more particularly the devil was a being who under pressure of hunger might be drawn into acting against his own interest ;' in other words, he might be outwitted, and this character of a poor or stupid devil is almost the only one exhibited in Teutonic legends.^ In fact, as Professor Max Miiller remarks, the Germans, when they had been "indoctrinated with the idea of a real devil, the Semitic Satan or Diabolus, treated him in the most good-humoured manner ; " and it has been well said that " no greater proof can be given of the small hold which the Christian Devil has taken of the Norse mind, than the heathen aspect under which he constantly appears, and the ludicrous way in which he is always outwitted."^

But this freedom was never taken with Satan. While that name waviand remained unchanged in the language of theology, the word devil the Smith, passed into an immense number of forms, the Gothic tieval, diuval, diufal, the Icelandic djofuU, Swedish djevful, all of them, together with the Italian, French, and Spanish forms carrying back the word 8ta/3oXos to the same root which furnished the Latin Divus, Djovis, and the Sanskrit deva.* To this devil were applied familiarly those epithets which are bestowed in the Vedic h}Tnns on the antagonist of Indra. Like Vritra, he is often spoken of simply as the fiend or the enemy (6 Troi'-rjpos;) ; more often he is described as the old devil or serpent, the ealda deofol of Casdmon, the old Nick,^ old Davy, and old Harry (Ahriman) of common English speech at the present day. Like Pani, he is Valant, the cheat or seducer,® who appears in a female form as Valandinne.'' But to the Germans the fall of the devil from heaven suggested the idea that, like Hephaistos, he must have been lamed by the descent, and hence we have the lame devil, or devil

' The Master Smith, in the heathen- legend of Eleemon may be compared ish story so entitled, entraps the devil with any of the popular tales in which into a purse, as the Fisherman entraps Satan is overmatched by men whom he the Jin in the Arabian Tale, and the despises. — Grimm, 969. devil is so scared that when the Smith * Dasent, Ahorse Talcs, introd. ciiL presents hmiself at the gate of hell, he * Grimm, Deutsche Mytltoloqie, 939. g;ives orders to have the nine padlocks For the belief of the gipsy hordes re- carefuUy locked. Sir G. Dasent remarks garding the heaven-god and the earth- that the Smith makes trial of hell in mother see Tylor, Priiintive Culture. the first instance, for, "having behaved * This name, one of a vast number ill to the ruler " of heaven, and " actu- of forms through which the root of the ally quarrelled with the master"' of hell, Greek j^x'". to swim, has passed, de- he " was naturally anxious " to know notes simjaly a water-spirit, the nicor of whether he would be received by either. the Beowulf, the nix or nixy of German

— Ibid. cii. fairy tales. The devil is here regarded without laughing. This is but saying locker." — Grimm, D. M. 456. that he had the genuine humour of our • A'ib. 1334. Teutonic ancestors. His version of the ' lb. 1686 ; Grimm, D. M. 943.
 * It has been said of Southey that as dwelling in the water, and thus the he could never think of the devil nameexplainsthesailor'siihiase"Davy's