Origi?i of Mythology. 205 



nations bore, Teutons; as it certainly is of the word Tues- 

 day^ in Danish Tiisday^ or Tysday ; in Swedish Tisdag. 

 It is no small confirmation of this opinion of the origin 

 of dia^ or dis^ that the Germans call Tuesday, dienstag, 

 using fkn, tan, which signifies fire or the sun, in the 

 place of dis or dia. They use also dingsdag, as do the 

 Dutch, which is evidently a corruption of the same 

 word.* 



This deity the Gauls claimed as their common father, 

 as we are informed by Cesar. " Galli se omnes ab Dite 

 patre prognatos pr^edicant ; idque ab Druidibus prodi- 

 tum dicunt." - 



But Woden, whose name in Danish is Odin, was 

 claimed by the ancient Gothic tribes as the great leader 

 who conducted them from Asia, and to him they paid 

 particular honors. He answers to the Hermes of the 

 Greeks, and the Mercury of the Romans, and his name 

 is the basis of dies Mercurii, Wednesday, Wodnesday, 

 in all the Teutonic dialects. 



Faber supposes Woden to be Noah. That Woden is 

 the same character which the Orientals venerate under 

 the name of Bitdha, Bod, Buddo, Budso, seems to be ge- 

 nerally agreed ; and Budha, Bryant maintains, is the 

 symbol of the Ark. Sir William Jones suspects him to 

 have been the great Sesac, or Shishak.f 



Whether this personage was Noah, or any other real 

 person, we may never be able to determine with certain- 

 ty, as no historical recorcls which can be deemed au- 

 thentic, now exist, of a date sufficiently ancient, to dis- 

 sipate the obscurity which hangs over this subject. The 

 Cashmirians boast of his descent in their country ; and 

 Sir William Jones has attempted to show, from the Hin-. 

 doo books, that this deity jyid his worship were intro- 

 duced into India from the west, about ten or eleven cen- 

 turies before the Christian era. 



To throw some light on the history of this character, 

 we may observe that in Hindoostanee, as well as in the 

 languages derived from the Sanscrit, Budha signifies 



* Cluver, lib. i. 26. — Ma^llet's North. Antiq. ch. 4 and 5. 



t Faber. i. 287, 299. and ii. R5. — Bryant, vol. iii. 553. — Asiat. 

 Ees. i, 425— .\> 257—101. i. p. 8. 



