A heathen hof or Germanic pagan temple is a temple building of the Germanic religion. The term hof is taken from Old Norse.
Background
Etymologically, the Old Norse word hof is the same as the Dutch and German word hof, which originally meant a hall and later came to refer to a court (originally in the meaning of a royal or aristocratic court) and then also to a farm. In medieval Scandinavian sources, it occurs once as a hall, in the Eddic poem Hymiskviða, and beginning in the fourteenth century, in the "court" meaning. Otherwise, it occurs only as a word for a temple."Hof", Richard Cleasby and Guðbrandur Vigfússon, An Icelandic-English Dictionary, 2nd ed. with supplement by William A. Craigie, Oxford: Clarendon-Oxford University, 1957, repr. 1975, , pp. 277–78. Hof also occasionally occurs with the meaning "temple" in Old High German and is cognate with the Old English .Jacob Grimm tr. James Steven Stallybrass, Teutonic Mythology, London: Bell, 1883, repr. New York: Dover, 1966, 2004, , p. 1308. In Scandinavia during the Viking Age, it appears to have displaced older terms for a sacred place, vé, hörgr, lundr, vangr, and vin, particularly in the West Norse linguistic area, namely Norway and Iceland. It is the dominant word for a temple in the Icelandic sagas, but is rare in skaldic poetry.E.O.G. Turville-Petre, Myth and Religion of the North: The Religion of Ancient Scandinavia, London: Weidenfeld, 1964, , pp. 237, 243, 240.
Many places in Scandinavia, but especially in West Norse regions,Terry Gunnell, "Hof, Halls, Goðar and Dwarves: An Examination of the Ritual Space in the Pagan Icelandic Hall," Cosmos 17 (2001) 3-36, p. 26, note 8 counts over 80 simple Hof placenames in Iceland and 23 in Norway, in addition to those where the word is combined. are named hof or hov, either alone or in combination. These include: Hov on Suðuroy, Faroe Islands Hof in Vestfold, Norway Hof, a village in Iceland , part of Båstad Municipality in Scania, Sweden Some placenames, often names of farms, combine the word, such as: Several places in Iceland named Hofstaðir, one the site of a hof excavation. Hofsós, village in Iceland. Norderhov, a former municipality in Norway - dedicated to Njörðr. Torshov, a neighborhood in Oslo and Thorsø, a farm in Torsnes, Norway - dedicated to Thor.
There is also one in England: the village of Hoff in Cumbria, with an associated Hoff Lund, "temple grove."Robert Ferguson, The Northmen in Cumberland & Westmoreland, London: Longman, 1833, , pp. 29–30.Christina Blackie, Geographical Etymology: A Dictionary of Place-Names Giving their Derivations, 3rd ed. London: Blackie, 1887, , p. 106.William Gershom Collingwood, The Lake Counties, Dent's country guides, London: Dent, 1902, , p. 340.
Changing scholarly views The nature of Germanic places of worship has long been a subject of scholarly debate. Tacitus wrote in Germania:The Germans do not think it in keeping with the divine majesty to confine gods within walls or to portray them in the likeness of any human countenance. Their holy places are woods and groves, and they apply the names of deities to that hidden presence which is seen only by the eye of reverence.Tacitus, Germania ch. 9 in The Agricola and the Germania, tr. H. Mattingly, Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1948, rev. S. A. Handford 1970, , p. 109. There are several sites in the historical period at which heathen rites apparently took place in the open, including Hove in Trøndelag, Norway, where offerings were apparently brought to images of the gods on a row of ten posts, but no trace of buildings was found.Nora Berend, Christianization and the Rise of Christian Monarchy: Scandinavia, Central Europe and Rus' c. 900-1200, Cambridge University Press, 2007, , p. 124.Gunnell, p. 5, points out that outdoor offerings in bogs fall off sharply during the Migration Age, in the 5th and 6th centuries, coinciding with the rise of the institution of the chieftain's hall. Yet Tacitus himself wrote of an image of Nerthus.Tacitus, Germania ch. 40, pp. 134-35. And in his Annals he refers to a temple of Tanfana.Tacitus, The Annals & the Histories, tr. Alfred John Church and William Jackson Brodribb, ed. Moses Hadas, New York: Modern Library, 2003, , Annals Book 1, chapter 51, p. 30. Most older scholars considered that a hof would be a dedicated temple: an independent sacred place, built specifically for ritual proceedings, comparable to a Christian church. By extension, it was also commonly believed that the hofs had been located on the same sites as the churches that had superseded them.
This was the dominant theory until in 1966 the Danish archeologist Olaf Olsen published the results of a comprehensive study of archeological investigations in Iceland and Sweden and of a large number of the oldest Danish churches. He was not able to confirm a single case of a heathen hof underlying a Christian church, and concluded in light of this that a hof could not have been an independent building. Particularly in reference to the Hofstaðir building in Iceland (see below), he suggested the model of the temple-farm: that rather than being dedicated exclusively to religious use, the hofs were also dwellings, and that the word hof referred to the great farm in a rural settlement, at which the most powerful man also held sacrifices (blótar) and feasts.Olaf Olsen, Hørg, Hov og Kirke: Historiske og Arkæologiske Vikingetidsstudier, Copenhagen: Gad, 1966, , English summary p. 285: "[I] suggest that the building of the pagan hof in Iceland was identical with the veizluskáli [feasthall] of the large farm: a building in everyday use which on special occasions became the setting for the ritual gatherings of a large number of people."Hilda Roderick Ellis Davidson, Myths and Symbols in Pagan Europe: Early Scandinavian and Celtic Religions, Manchester University Press, 1988, , p. 32 (referring specifically to Hofstaðir): "the hall of a farmhouse used for communal religious feasts, perhaps that of the goði or leading man of the district who would preside over such gatherings."
However, new archeological discoveries in the late 20th century revealed several buildings in various parts of Scandinavia that do appear to have functioned purely as cult sites. Some of them, for example the hall at Tissø, Denmark, were associated with the aristocracy, but others, for example Uppåkra in Scania (formerly in Denmark, now in Sweden) functioned as places of assembly for the local population. The temple found in England, at Yeavering, now appears to be an early example of a hall-associated hof, rather than an anomaly.
Gro Steinsland, a historian of Norse paganism, is of the opinion that in effect it was economic resources as much as local tradition that led to the development of dedicated hofs: in the richest areas, actual temples developed, while in poor areas, the spaces that people had were what they used for blót.
Hofs in the written record
Iceland and Norway In the first chapter, in in heiðnu lǫg, of book four of Landnámabók (Hauksbók) it is stated that Iceland was divided into four courtdistricts all containing three hofs each.
Sagas of the Icelanders Chapter 2 of Kjalnesinga saga contains an extended description of Thorgrim Helgason's temple at Hof: He had a large temple built in his hayfield, a hundred feet long and sixty wide. Everybody had to pay a temple fee. Thor was the god most honoured there. It was rounded on the inside, like a vault, and there were windows and wall-hangings everywhere. The image of Thor stood in the center, with other gods on both sides. In front of them was an altar made with great skill and covered with iron on the top. On this there was to be a fire which would never go out—they called it sacred fire. On the altar was to lie a great armband, made of silver. The temple godi was to wear it on his arm at all gatherings, and everyone was to swear oaths on it whenever a suit was brought. A great copper bowl was to stand on the altar, and into it was to go all the blood which came from animals or men given to Thor. They called this sacrificial blood [hlaut] and the sacrificial blood bowl [hlautbolli]. This blood was to be sprinkled over men and animals, and the animals that were given in sacrifice were to be used for feasting when sacrificial banquets were held. Men whom they sacrificed were to be cast into a pool which was outside by the door; they called it Blótkelda (Well of Sacrifice)."The Saga of the People of Kjalarnes," tr. John Porter, The Complete Sagas of Icelanders, ed. Viðar Hreinsson et al., Reykjavík: Leifur Eiríksson, 1997, , Volume 3, p. 307.
There is a similar passage in Eyrbyggja saga about Thorolf Mostrarskegg's temple at Hofstaðir, which gives more information about the layout of the hof: There he had a temple built, and it was a sizeable building, with a door on the side-wall near the gable. The high-seat pillars were placed inside the door, and nails, that were called holy nails [reginnaglar], were driven into them. Beyond that point, the temple was a sanctuary. At the inner end there was a structure similar to the choir in churches nowadays and there was a raised platform in the middle of the floor like an altar, where a ring weighing twenty ounces and fashioned without a join was placed, and all oaths had to be sworn on this ring. It also had to be worn by the temple priest at all public gatherings. A sacrificial bowl [hlautbolli] was placed on the platform and in it a sacrificial twig [hlautteinn]—like a priest's aspergillum—which was used to sprinkle blood from the bowl. This blood, which was called sacrificial blood [hlaut], was the blood of live animals offered to the gods. The gods were placed around the platform in the choir-like structure within the temple. All farmers had to pay a toll to the temple . . . . The temple godi was responsible for the upkeep of the temple and ensuring it was maintained properly, as well as for holding sacrificial feasts in it."The Saga of the People of Eyri," tr. Judy Quinn, The Complete Sagas of Icelanders, ed. Viðar Hreinsson et al., Reykjavík: Leifur Eiríksson, 1997, , Volume 5, pp. 133-34.
Heimskringla Snorri Sturluson's description in Heimskringla of the process of blót repeats the same information about the blood and the bowl, and continues:. . . and with [the hlautteinar] were to be smeared all over with blood the pedestals of the idols and also the walls of the temple within and without; and likewise the men present were to be sprinkled with blood. But the meat of the animals was to be boiled and to serve as food at the banquet. Fires were to be lighted in the middle of the temple floor, and kettles hung over them. The sacrificial beaker was to be borne around the fire.Tr. Lee M. Hollander, 1964, repr. Austin: University of Texas, 1995, , "The Saga of Hákon the Good," p. 107. Jan de Vries considered the 100 by 60 foot dimensions and the eternal flame exaggerated; the human sacrifices in a pool by the door, not so much.Jan de Vries, Altgermanische Religionsgeschichte Volume 1 Einleitung. Vorgeschichtliche Perioden. Religiöse Grundlagen des Lebens. Seelen- und Geisterglaube. Macht und Kraft. Das Heilige und die Kultformen, Grundriß der germanischen Philologie 12.1, 2nd ed. Berlin: De Gruyter, 1956, repr. as 3rd ed. 1970, , pp. 382, 389, 409-10 .
Several sagas, including Kjalnesinga saga, also mention hofs being surrounded by a fence.A skíðgarðr or stafgarðr; de Vries, pp. 383-84.
Sweden
Gamla Uppsala
A Viking Age heathen hof at Gamla Uppsala ("Old Uppsala") in Sweden was described by Adam of Bremen around 1070: