old times Torsharg (the sanctuary of Thor). This town ought to have had the image of Thor in its seal, if towns in heathen times had possessed any seals. But there were no seals then; they were not used until the Middle Ages, when it was impossible to put the image of a heathen god in the seal. In its stead we find in the seal of Torshälla the image of Olaf, the saint who had replaced Thor in the popular belief (Fig, 29). The fact that the saint is represented as standing in a boat, which is not elsewhere the case, deserves special attention, because Thor sometimes is figured as standing in a boat, when he is fishing for Midgårdsonnen.[1]
Thor has survived the fall both of heathenism and of the Roman Catholic Church in Sweden. Even to the present day many traits are preserved in the language, as well as in popular belief, which show that the ideas formed by our heathen forefathers of this god are still alive, and that he was not conceived of merely as a god of thunder, but was also in other ways considered as enjoying the power which belongs to the sun god, especially as regards fertility.
Writing about Wärend, that old part of Småland where so much of the belief and customs of former ages still remains, Mr. Hyltén-Cavallius says,[2]—"They still look upon the thunder as a person whom they call alternately "Thor" or "Thore-Gud," "Gofar," and "Gobonden." He is an old red-bearded man. In 1629 a peasant from Warend was summoned for blasphemy against God. He had said about the rain,—"If I had the old man down here I would pull him by the hair on account of this continual raining." Thus it is Thor that gives the summer rain, which therefore in Wärend is called "Gofar-rain," "Gobonda-rain," or "As-rain." The rumbling of the thunder is produced by Thor's driving in his chariot through the clouds. It is therefore called Thordön after
- ↑ George Stephens, Mémoires de la Societé Royale des Antiquaires du Nord, 1884-9, p. 32 (Fig.).
- ↑ Wärend och Wirdarne, vol. i. p. 230 (Stockholm, 1863).
