Gons OF THE NORTH, By Brian Branston• (Thames and Hudson,
25s.) Gons OF THE NORTH, By Brian Branston• (Thames and Hudson, 25s.) IT is true that we know next to nothing of the Norse gods before the writing of the pros! Edda, in Christian times. What is more, this Edda .of Snorri's is not a religious work, but a compendium of stock mythology for the use, of poets. We first meet the inhabitants 01., Asgard at a time when their worshippers had abandoned them. It is excusable, therefore. that Mr. Branston should treat his material purely, and sometimes a little ironically, as myth. 14,0 approach, in fact, is partially euhemeristic. In that he regards many of the gods as deified, heroes; partially Jungian, 'in his reading 0' others as archetypes connected with the recur- rences of natural phenomena. But in reading his carefully compiled studies of each god, one
May well be struck by the number of religious motives that occur, like that of Odin's sacrifice of himself 'on the windy tree . . . for nights all of nine,' himself an offering to himself, Whereby he won wisdom. It may well be true, in fact, that the Norse gods as we know them have been so travestied by storytellers that their primitive significance has almost dis- appeared. However, Mr. Branston presents them attractively, and his book has poetic
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