Very little information is available in book form regarding the spiritual beliefs and practices of the Gothic tribes, certainly not in the English language although I have seen a number of publications which have been published recently. As I have not had a chance to obtain and read the aforementioned books I will not comment on them at this stage. From an esoteric point of view I can recommend two excellent books which cover various aspects of their beliefs which were published some years ago. These are Nigel Pennick's The Inner Mysteries of the Goths (1995, Cappall Bann Publishing) and Edred Thorsson's The Mysteries of the Goths (2007, Limited First Edition, Runa Raven Press).
What gave me the impetus to write this article were a series of recent meditations that I had on the ancestral aspect of the Gods and this ancestral aspect is particularly pronounced in the beliefs of the Goths. According to Rudolf Simek in his Dictionary of Northern Mythology the term Anses was a term used for the Gods by the Gothic East Roman bureaucrat Jordanes. According to Jordanes they were a mythical dynasty of heroes or demi-gods. Simek recognises the etymological connection between Anses and Aesir. He also states that the prefix in found in many personal names during Migration Age.
My readers will surely note the similarity between Anses and ancestors. However I would point out that this word has French and Latin roots, being absorbed into Middle English as ancessour. (See Concise Dictionary of English Etymology (Walter W. Skeat) Whilst Anses has a similar meaning to Aesir to me it reminds me far more of our ancestral connection to the Gods. This short article is not the place for me to discuss the various ways in which we can claim kinship with the Gods. I intend to explore this concept more fully on this blog in the near future.
Edred Thorsson refers to four principal deities in his book: Gauts, *Teiws, *Fairguneis and *Iggws. My readers will note that only Gauts does not have an asterisk before the name. This is because Gauts is historically attested whilst the latter three are reconstructed deities using the disciplines of comparative linguistics and comparative mythology.
Gauts is said to be the original ancestor of the Goths and He has the alternative appellation of Gapt. Edred makes the interesting observation that Gauts is identical with the Gautr of the Eddas, one of the many heiti, or bynames of Odin. He also informs us that the Old Norse Gautr has the connotation of being a 'progenitor' which he argues fits in with Odin's role as the 'All-Father'. Both Woden and Gauts feature at the head of the lineages of Anglo-Saxon kings.
Rudolf Simek makes the additional observation that Gautr as Gapt/Gaut is the mythical ancestor of the Langobards. In the Langobadian Edictus Rothari he appears as Gausus. He concludes that he thus should be considered to be the ancestor of the Goths. Regarding the alternative form of the name Gapt he states he was the ancestor of the Amales and likewise was worshiped as a God. This is of course a typical feature of ancient Germanic society where the eponymous ancestor was regarded as their primary deity, the source of their race. According to an early 14th century saga Bosa saga ok Herraud King Hring of Ostergotland is the son of King Gauti, the son of Odin of Sweden. Some versions of the lineage of the House of Wessex place Geat above Woden but scholars view this as a later interpolation.
As I have made clear in the preceding paragraph the Gothic version of Odin places great emphasis on the chief deity being the ancestor not only of the royal house but the entire tribe or nation. We see an aspect of this in Eddic mythology in the Lay of Rig in the Elder Edda. Although Rig is generally identified with the God Heimdall I believe this to be an error and have argued this point before on my blogs when discussing the Germanic caste system. I believe that Rig (King) is none other than the ALL-FATHER Himself, Odin. As such he implanted His divine DNA in all the castes of Germanic society, making Him our divine progenitor in the same way that the Goths viewed Gauts.
Regarding the other principal Gods, Edred comments that the Gothic *Teiws is the same deity as Tiwaz/Tyr and points out that the Gothic letter tyz is reconstructed by scholars as *teiws which corresponds with the Elder Futharc *tiwaz Rune. The God *Fairguneis is the reconstructed Gothic Thunder God and my readers will remember I discussed the possibility of a 'lost' alternative term for the Proto-Germanic Thunder God *Thunaraz in an earlier article. I pointed out how this early name acted as a linguistical 'bridge' for similar deities in other Indo-European cultures. Edred states the name is etymologically connected with the word for oak. He argues that this would have translated as 'oak-god'. This name would then have been related to the weapon the god carried (an oak club, perhaps)." *Iggws is linked by Edred to the Germanic Ingwaz, known as Yngvi-Freyr in Sweden. Edred makes the claim that there is real evidence for the existence of this deity in the Gothic family of Gods and "that he was consciously syncretised with the new Christian cult. Iggws is the Gothic letter which corresponds to the Greek letter X (Chi).
In this short introductory article I have attempted to give my readers a taster of Gothic mythology and I maintain that we need to engage in further exploration of this fascinating Germanic culture as part of our general efforts in reviving the exoteric outer religion of Germanic heathenism amongst our peoples.
