GENERAL WORDS FOR SEX AND KINSHIP 151 



Dort hoch auf jenein berge 



da get ein miilerad, 



das malet nichts denn liebe 



die nacht biss an den tag (Uhland, 33), 



and more coarsely in the reply of the miller's wife to 

 her husband who knocks for admittance : 



Ich steh fiirwahr nicht aufe, 



Ich lass dich nicht herein. 



Ich habe die Nacht gemalen 



Mit sechs schonen jungen Knaben ; 



Davon bin ich so mild (Simrock, No. 285). 



Both Volkslieder remind us of the Grottasongr, the 

 mill-song of the Edda, wherein the mountain giants' 

 brides grind peace and war, bliss and riches, at Frodi's 

 mill. These women are typical of the old mother-age 

 half-seeresses, half-warriors, Amazonian figures who rule 

 the destinies of men. For long ages the mill was a 

 symbol of woman's civilisation, grinding was woman's 

 work, and so for centuries much of the old malial free- 

 dom attached itself to the mill. 



Thus from the ideas involved in the root mdl and 

 its cognates we have evidence of a striking kind of the 

 old kin -gathering and its common meal the concio of 

 the mdg, followed by the conjunctio of the gemahelun. 

 The group -habits develop in different directions, and 

 are still to be found as fossils in mediaeval marriage 

 customs, mediaeval legal ceremonies, and in the license 

 of the mediaeval Hexenmahl. 1 



(7) We have not yet, however, exhausted the 



1 Religious festivals, e.g. the Lugnassad, and outdoor sports (e.g. the 

 "Hollow of the Fair") were associated in early Celtic days with marriages. 

 See Rhys, Hibbert Lectures, 1886, pp. 416, 418. 



