The pre-Christian religion of the West Germanic and Anglo-Saxon peoples of the continent and early England, known mainly through outside Roman testimony (Tacitus's Germania, first century CE) and later Christian writing looking back at practices already fading (Bede's eighth century De Temporum Ratione), rather than through any native scripture. It shares deep roots and some names with Old Norse religion but survives in a thinner, more fragmentary documentary record, often only a single passing mention for an entire figure.
History & Origin
Much of what Roman writers recorded about continental Germanic gods came through interpretatio romana, matching each one to a Roman counterpart, so Tacitus names Wodan as Mercury, Donar as Hercules and Tiw as Mars rather than giving the Germanic names outright. Reconstructing the underlying tradition means reading back through that Roman filter, which shapes and limits what can be recovered as much as it preserves it.
Correspondences & Relations
Cross-Tradition Connections
Associated With
This source names Continental Germanic Paganism directly: "cultic site by the Chatti people of continental Germanic paganism."
The Continental Saxons practiced this tradition until the war's forced conversions and legal compulsion ended it as an openly practiced religion in the region; the Irminsul destroyed at the war's opening was one of its central cult sites.
Worship Of
Sources
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