ABSTRACT
What Tacitus noted of the Germans of the first century AD has a convincing ring, and is borne out by the crude yet impressive wooden figures surviving from both Germanic and Celtic territory. Such figures served as symbols for the divine powers without any attempt to represent them as either handsome or monstrous beings; they existed as vague symbols of those ‘hidden presences’. Animal or bird symbols might also represent the power and presence of divinities. Although anthropomorphic figures of gods were known in the northern Bronze Age, it was not until the Romans were established in Gaul and Britain that the new fashion of depicting deities in the form of men and women gradually became popular among the native population (p. 45). Stories of the gods, however, must have been told from very early times, and as these developed the deities were likely to take on more human shapes and characteristics, while retaining majestic or demonic powers. Thus Thor is described as a huge red-bearded man with flaming eyes and a quick temper, and the Dagda is a robust, pot-bellied figure in shabby clothes but of enormous virility and strength. Irish goddesses who give birth to divine offspring in rivers are represented as daughters of Irish kings, while the divine Freyja is something between a lusty giantess and a fair maiden whose white arms light up the darkness of the underworld. They are not sentimentalized and do not become amiable figures, although they may be gift-bearers and bring great benefits to mankind; on the contrary, they remain ruthless, unpredictable and prone to take offence, so that it is dangerous to encounter them.
