Product Code Database
Nehalennia (also Nehalenia, Nehalaenniae, Nehalaenia) is a tutelary goddess who was worshipped in 2nd- and 3rd-centuryLendering (2006). Gallia Belgica by travelers, especially sailors and traders, at the mouth of the Scheldt. Her origin is unclear, perhaps Germanic or Celtic. She is attested on and depicted upon numerous votive deposit altars discovered around what is now the province of Zeeland, the Netherlands, where the Schelde River flowed into the North Sea. Worship of Nehalennia dates back at least to the 2nd century BC and veneration of the goddess continued to flourish in northwestern Europe in the 2nd and 3rd centuries AD.
The worship of Nehalennia was concentrated in temples in Ganventa (north of Colijnsplaat) and Domburg. The temple in Ganventa was dedicated exclusively to the goddess, while other (Roman) gods were also worshipped in Domburg. Statues of the supreme god Jupiter, Neptune and the goddess Victoria have been found there (Domburg).
Other indigenous deities that were locally venerated at that time are: Burorina, Hludana, Hurstrga, Sandraudiga, Seneucaega, Vagdavercustis and Viradecdis.
Dutch archaeologist J.E. Bogaers and Belgian linguist Maurits Gysseling, in their joint publication Over de naam van de godin Nehalennia ("On the name of the goddess Nehalennia"), listed several different forms of the name that appear in inscriptions. While Nehalennia is by far the most common spelling, Nehalenia and Nehalaennia both appear a few times. Gysseling characterizes these two forms as Latinisations of the more archaic Nehalennia. Several sporadic spellings, which are attested once each, were considered by Bogaers as non-standard or rejected as misread, due to the poor state of some of the inscriptions. Gysseling holds that some spellings are a transliteration, an attempt to approximate the pronunciation of her name in Latin script, suggesting that the "h" may have been pronounced as some German ch sound. One of the numerous altars dredged up from the Oosterschelde near Colijnsplaat in 1970 features the spelling Nechalenia. It appears that spellings with đ are intentional and not due to damaged artifacts.Gunivortus Goos, Die RĂŒckkehr der Göttin Nehalennia, p. 137Rijksmuseum van Oudheden, object i 2017/7.2 and its description as well as object i 1970/12.33P. Stuart & J.E. Bogaers, Nehalennia: Römische SteindenkmĂ€ler aus der Oosterschelde bei Colijnsplaat, p. 104â106
The Domburg inscriptions to Nehalennia inspired Marcus Zuerius van Boxhorn to produce a hasty etymology linking the name Nehalennia to an ancient Scythian.Boxhorn, Bediedinge van... Nehalennia, Leiden 1647, and further texts, noted by Cornelis Dekker, The Origins of Old Germanic Studies in the Low Countries 2007:209. With the linguistic tools then available, Van Boxhorn attempted to bridge the already-known connections between European languages and modern Persian language.Boxhorn, Des mots perses enregistrées par Quinte Curce et de leur parenté avec des termes germaniques, noted in Daniel Droixhe, Souvenirs de Babel. La reconstruction de l'histoire des langues de la Renaissance aux LumiÚres Brussels 2007:59.
Her cult is almost certainly older than the period from which the altars originate.
A part of the enormous collection is on display in the National Museum of Antiquities (Netherlands).
Nehalennia, a Germanic goddess worshipped at the point where travellers crossed the North Sea from the Netherlands, is shown on many carved stones holding loaves and apples like a Mother Goddess, sometimes with a prow of a ship beside her, but also frequently with an attendant dog which sits looking up at her (Plate 5). This dog is on thirteen of the twenty-one altars recorded by Ada Hondius-Crone (1955:103), who describes it as a kind of greyhound.Davidson (1998:112 & Plate 5).Davidson further links the motif of the ship associated with Nehalennia with the Germanic Vanir pair of Freyr and Freyja as well as the Germanic goddess Nerthus. She notes that Nehalennia features some of the same attributes as the Matres.Davidson (1998:112 and 134).
The loaves that Nehalennia is depicted with on her altars have been identified as duivekater, "oblong sacrificial loaves in the shape of a shin bone". Davidson says that loaves of this type may take the place of an animal sacrifice or animal victim, such as the boar-shaped loaf baked at Yule in Sweden. In VĂ€rmland, Sweden, "within living memory," there was a custom of grain from the last of the harvest customarily being used to bake a loaf in the shape of a little girl; this is subsequently shared by the whole household. Davidson provides further examples of elaborate harvest loaves in the shape of sheaves, and displayed in churches for the fertility of fields in Anglo-Saxon England, with parallels in Scandinavia and Ireland.Davidson (1998:134).
A depiction of an enthroned goddess with children at her breast, with lap dogs, or with baskets of fruit Miranda Green. "The Celtic Goddess as Healer." In Sandra Billington (ed). 1996. The Concept of the Goddess. Routledge. . is characterized by Lothar Schwinden as a mother goddess (like the Gallo-Roman version of the Celtic Aveta).Lothar Schwinden. "Muttergöttin der Treverer: Ritona". In Sabine Faust et al. (1996) Religio Romana: Wege zu den Göttern im antiken Trier. Rheinisches Landesmuseum Trier.
In 2005, a replica of the temple was built in Colijnsplaat. The design of temple and its sculpture is based on the finds from the nearby area, as well as archaeological study of the type of sanctuaries in the of Gaul and Germania. For the reconstruction, authentic materials and techniques were used as much as possible.
In August 2005, a replica of the Nehalennia temple near the lost town of Ganuenta was opened in Colijnsplaat.Van der Velde (2005:8â9).
(in German)
|
|
