Anglo-Saxon Pagan Gods
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- čas přidán 7. 02. 2023
- When the Western Roman Empire crumbled, the Anglo-Saxon peoples who occupied Britain brought their own paganism with them. This was Germanic, with a pantheon of deities that included Woden, Thunor, Tiw and Frig. Its temples were wooden structures that leave scant traces in the landscape, but you can find evidence for their beliefs in cemeteries like Sutton Hoo.
This lecture looks at such evidence and at literature such as Beowulf and the history written by the Christian scholar Bede.
A lecture by Ronald Hutton recorded on 1 February 2023 at David Game College, London.
The transcript and downloadable versions of the lecture are available from the Gresham College website:
www.gresham.ac.uk/watch-now/a...
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The dry British academic humour is the cherry on top of the quality education cake. Thank you ! I hope to see more from him.
Ditto!
English! These are English claiming everything British is Germanic Anglo. Well done for believing it.
Prior to the Anglo Saxon invasion, there was no such person as English. Briton had no such male/female as English. Occupants of these islands were members of various Celtic Tribes.
There were also various people of other tribal and ethnic groups settled here from other parts of the Roman Empire - retired soldiers, merchants, slaves, contacts and family from the Continent.
are you related to shakes spears/
By FAR my favourite Gresham Professor: A brilliant mind, encyclopedic memory, gentle humour-and an artist’s sensitivity to his subject….❤
The Wanderer was Tolkien’s inspiration for Theodon’s musing in The Two Towers, when he is contemplating what he sees as the imminent fall of his kingdom of Rohan.
I didn't know this, thank you.
I thought it sounded like something he would write. Thank you.
It’s word for word. I recognised it right away. (Because of a video game level I was stuck on for ages)
I knew he took a lot of inspiration from Anglo-Saxon literature but I didn’t realise it was word for word like that.
I don’t blame him either, it’s very powerful and emotive wording.
I remember theoden asking "where goes now the horse and his rider". Dang
Yes, Dr. Hutto's translation here seems to be a nod to Tolkien, as most other translations are a bit different, from what I've found, but I would love to know if this one is available too.
I appreciate Ronald Hutton's lectures; they always make me think more. He also says (in another Gresham lecture) that: "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.".
On the other hand he repeatedly says that there is no evidence of pagan presence under English churches. No active English church could be excavated; without massive bureaucratic effort; since before archaeology was invented.
That's an interesting point - how much archaeological works have been done in churchyards ?
Never a dull moment with Professor Hutton.
Always a dull moment
@@alexthefan68 I'd suspect then that the dullness originates in the listener, rather than the orator.
@@ShaunCheah He is delivering a lecture not an oration,
But it is quite brave to admit you are dull for listening to this
@@alexthefan68 bahahahahaha at you trolling Gresham College yt channel saying other people are dull 😆😆 and then coming back a month later to reply.
You literally can't make it up!
That poem he reads in the beginning, "The Wanderer", is what JRR Tolkien used to base Theodin's speech off of in The Two Towers "Where now are the horse and the rider?"
Yes, it is beautiful and moving
Seems quite likely
Ahhh I used to know that one by heart! Sadly I've forgotten it and will have to look it up
Hail to the Anglo-Saxon Gods!
I could hear this man for hours on end he make his conferences are so meaningful and easy to understand for people who aren't even UKnian
A really good lecture, and also a very nice suit, if I might add.
What a mine of knowledge this man is. A true British elder.
Thank you so much. I would never otherwise get to listen to Dr. Hutton. This is very appreciated.
I'm from the US (West Virginia specifically) and have a history degree. Anglo-Saxon history was always a favorite and even more so after 30 years of further study and some linguistics thrown in. So fascinating, and the professor even made me giggle-snort several times with his jokes. Can't beat that with a stick.
What do you understand by the Nordic/Germanic people thinking that the Roman buildings must of been built by giants?
@James Quinn There is no evidence for such a belief to have ever existed.
The only "evidence" put forward are poems, which are, well, poems and as such prone to metaphorical language and hyperbolic language.
The metaphor of the "giant" is pretty common in medieval times, and serves to refer to ancient ancestors. Does it mean they thought their forefathers were literal giants ?
Of course not… unless they also thought that in the story of David vs Goliath, David was only a slightly smaller giant.
Such metaphors only referred to the extent of the genius behind the building of these ancient ruins.
@@remilenoir1271 Yes, my thoughts exactly, I just wanted to know what that person might think.
This is a common arguement that I here though, it's quite strange, obviously only well read people have heard this idea, but I've heard it used as 2 fold, 1 as an example of how primitive the Germanic "barbarians" were not just in civilisation but mind and soul, that they thought large stone buildings were made my gods/giants, that it was unthinkable to them that Romans could of built them, and 2, that its an example of religion making people think in primitive ways, in essence I've heard this as an atheist arguement too, painting them as generally primitive because of religion (despite the same Romans being equally as religous and sharing practically the same beliefs) or denigrating their theological ancestor whorship and penchant for explaining and expressing ideas in traditional terminology.
@James Quinn Oh I'm sorry, I hadn't guessed that you made a rhetorical question 😅
Yes, it is a common argument, due in no small part to the roman bias that permeates our knowledge of ancient history.
@@Alfred5555 The Israelites who invaded Canaan in the Old Testament from the mountains to the East said that the cities of the plains had been inhabited by giants. The odd thing is that they would have actually seen the people they were slaughtering, and not just inferred their height from the buildings: except of course that some modern scholars say there was no such invasion or slaughter, and the whole thing was made up by priests in exile in Babylon.
Love these lectures by Professor Hutton
Professor Ronald Hutton is a national treasure
Love that these religions were not just carbon copies of the Germanic religions. Thanks for reminding me that ASJs are coming to Britain in a post Roman chaos. I am always amused by my fellow Americans who are on the pagan side who seem to think that before the Christians came Britain was a place with pure and ancient religious tradition instead of a place of constant change and syncretism.
before the British Christians in around zero; or before the false Roman Christians of Augustine in 379 AD?
I've been hunting Ronald Hutton lectures all afternoon after stumbling on one this morning. I can listen to him all day and hopefully will.
Prof. Hutton's lectures are always top. Thank you! Please have more of his lectures!
You can find more of Professor Hutton's lectures and upcoming events at www.gresham.ac.uk/speakers/professor-ronald-hutton
This is lovely. I opened it by accident and was gripped at once. What a delight to listen to an erudite English voice when most voices on CZcams are rather shrill (and the opposite of educated, alas)
Good old Anglo Saxons! We know so little about them - but who cares! This is a super lecture. Thank you!
The modern Germanic countries are fairly consistent in using Germanic deity names for Tues-Fri suggesting the names of the week were locked in fairly early on, even during the time of the Roman Empire as a large chunk of Northern Gaul was Germanic.
During my short time at Oxford reading law some twenty years ago now, I would see Professor Hutton about. Elucidation of the very highest order. I dote on every word.
Professor Hutton is a gem. Thanks for sharing his work on your channel!
Thankyou for the privilege of hearing Professor Hutton speak!
Really facinating lecture, thankyou.
I wished my history (and other) profs at uni would have been just half as effetely informativ and entertaining. Wonderfull!
Another excellent lecture by Prof Hutton. My thanks to Gresham College yet again for making this publicly available.
Thank you for another wonderful lecture from Professor Hutton
Professor Hutton is fascinating to listen to.
I haven't had the opportunity to hear Professor Hutton speak. It was an absolute pleasure and very informative. Thank you 👍
We have English records in which monks noted birds. One, for example, has exactly one entry for a certain year and it is only that the birds were behaving oddly. I wonder whether this is a carry-over from the tradition of divination from bird flight which the professor mentioned.
Maybe also being much closer to the natural world and so more observant of subtleties
I love how he worked in literature enough to keep us feeling connected to the peoples whose history he's discussing.
We are the peoples whose history he is discussing.
@@Alfred5555Yay for you, but likely not everyone listening to this lecture is of European origin.
Prof Hutton made me fell the presence of the old Gods in my room 💗 it was not a lecture but a seance section 😄
Thank you Ronald Hutton! Your lecture is most informative and entertaining! :)
Thank you Gresham College and David Game College. (Great channel, subscribed)
Glad you enjoyed it!
Some one needs to put in touch with his stylist
I want that look ❤
Genius of a man. Amazing to listen to.
What classes did he take I wonder? Being like him has Been a dream of mine.
Professor Hutton always has such wonderful lectures. His signature ascots are truly British.
I am watching this at my home in Faversham, Kent, on the edge of the Jutish burial ground later known as King's Field. This was a major source of grave goods from the period, excavated (or looted) in Victoria Times.
Thank you. Prof Hutton is always a new learning experience. Glad to see him at Gresham.
If I see Professor Hutton, then I click.
Professor Hutton always delivers the most interesting talks. Thank you ever so much, listening to this made my day!
Highly interesting lecture. Thanks for posting! 💐
Really enjoying this series from the other side of the world. I made a button with the Gresham College's logo so people will ask me about it so I can spread the word. I think Thomas Gresham would be thrilled his college is now reaching a world-wide audience.
@coyoteroadkill,
That’s *so cute, supportive and smart!* 🧠
I *love* that you did that!🤓
Have you received much interest so far, in Africa, Australia, New Zealand...?
@@OakleyANDSittingBull I'm not selling them. I think that would be stepping on copyright laws. I just have a Badge-a-Minit button maker and make buttons for myself.
Fascinating lecture, really liked the questions too, especially the reply about Aldwych and London as a Roman ghost town. Privilege to be able to listen to Professor Hutton.
Thank you for a very interesting lecture! This is one of my two favorite lecturers at Gresham :D
The fact that few inscriptions have gone done to us doesn't mean pagan anglo-saxons were "illiterate", as they wrote with the runic alphabet, mainly on perishable materials, but also on weapons, jewellery as the presentator mentions himself the "T" rune. Ronald Hutton (one of my favourite presentators) is certainly aware of this, it has become just such a habit to say that they weren't, because we don't have any pagan Germanic Cicero's treatise. But strictly speaking, they knew how to write and even had their own alphabet for it. "Franks Casket" is a rare example of these runic inscriptions, although quite late and christianized, but with some Germanic mythical stories represented on it.
It's an interesting point. 'Literate' can mean 'able to read and write' but it can also mean 'well educated in culture, especially literature and the arts'. I suspect that Prof. Hutton is using illiterate as the antonym of the latter definition rather than casually giving the impression that they were generally unable to read and write. English is such an interesting language like that. 🙂
What evidence do you have that the general populace were literate? That they did write in any substantial amount on materials that haven’t survived? That they didn’t just use them on weapons etc as magic and nowhere else? You can’t claim they were literate without citing evidence.
@@stufour Even if they only used them on weapons and nowhere else that would still imply some level of literacy. But, as my previous post in this thread suggests, it depends of your definition of 'literate'. Incidentally I'm neither disagreeing nor agreeing with you here as it's an interesting question that warrants answering. However we need to be careful when we use the term 'literate' to describe people in the modern world let alone in eras when records are sparse and evidence scant.
@@stufour Well, I don't think they were writing on computors or cellphones. Who said that the general populace was literate? The Anglo-Saxons were not living in the late industrial period, didn't have schools. They knew how to write with their own script which was adapted for use on wood, as all characters avoid the horizontal lines of the wood's grain. Our word "book" comes from "beech" on which they probaly wrote, just like in most of the Germanic languages. Knowing how to write meaningful magical spells or the ownership of different valuables is litteracy enough for the Antique world...
Came here to say this, frankly stopped watching after that point was made. Shame academia is so ignorant.
My favourite historian by far, I will be watching this over a few times as to soak it all in.
I had a wonderfull history teacher his name was anton bantock mbe he was cut from the same cloth as Proffessor Hutton, Anton came to our secondary school from Oxford and taught generations of us in a way that captured many
I was wating for this for weeks great thenk you
An enjoyable hour. Liked and shared. Thanks for posting, Gresham!
Fantastic lecture 🌊🏄♂️🌵☀️
Excellent lecture, so well gauged and presented, thank you.
Glad you enjoyed it!
A brilliant and fascinating presentation by Professor Hutton - astonishingly knowledgeable yet marvelously modest - top shelf in every way, thank you :)
Its a dishonest trope elitist historians use to say that "the Germanic barbarians thought it must of been giants who built the Roman building", implying how primitive the Germanics must of been. This is entirely disingenuous and purposely ignores the meaning of "giants" in Germanic mythology, they aren't literally giants as in ,big people, they use the word, Jotun or Jotnar, when used to refer to buildings it is surely metaphorical referring to what they culturally mean by the term "Jotnar", a people who are intelligent and power i.e. Romans.
a thoroughly enjoyable and informative episode, as always. thank you prof hutton and gresham college.
I quite like this professor: just a bit of the eccentric about him (a shared trait!), but very knowledgeable and enthusiastic about his subject.
I subscribed in the hope that he, or others similar, characterize the channel.
The Anglo-Saxons were not only Germanics, they were early lower Germans, like the other Saxons and the Franconians of that time. Many words in today`s lower German dialects are more similar to English words than to the today`s standard German words.
Old English is believe to of evolved from middle English after arriving into Britain that given time become modern English that may of already absorbed some aspects of the old Britain tongues of Britain with the original tongues being the tongues of the welsh natives who are the original peoples of Britain who existed in Britain before the coming of the angle-Saxon or the Irish. Welsh is the best surviving of the old tongues with Irish tongues like Gaelic being spoking by a small minority of the population, Cornish is pretty much dead.
What do you mean the welsh are the original people of Britain?, the original native English people of Britain didn't just disappear or wasnt there no longer when the saxons arrived? their ancient Britonish DNA carries on to this day in Hundreds of thousands of indigenous English ! , why do people think this way?, it makes it sound like that English are not native and have no rights to their lands compared to the welsh, which is an absolutely absurd way of thinking...
@@wor53lg50 English comes from the angle-Saxon invaders that become known as the British. English comes from middle-English and old English or old Saxon. One of the many Germanic tribes. The welsh existed in Britain before the Irish , Scottish or the angle-Saxon. The race that the roman empire tried to exterminate.
@@masterlee9822 i was referring to the other posted comment about the Welsh being the true British natives only?, who do you think the saxons married and started families with at the beginning🤔, also the pict line of east lowland scots did this also... Can you see why the English wont and shouldn't except that sort of comment..the few saxons that did come over already had ties to Britain through trade, maybe already had family there! , they more than likely was called for by some British tribal cheiftains themselves after romans left as some sort of police force to keep the peace and order and to reform a coherent army due to there known military organising skills and also being neutral, the anglo saxon army that was formed was in fact the ancient English/British themselves mostly that it consisited of..that ancient celt DNA which has a large percentage in hundreds of thousands of indigenous English that is also twinned with the welsh peoples DNA markers dos'nt lie im affraid..
@@wor53lg50 The welsh where shoved into Wales while the Saxons imported their woman and children from Germany and the surrendering nations and recolonized much of the British island. Genetic studies results are their are little to no movement of genetic material between the Saxon and Celts in that period with the greater amount being after the Saxons converted to Christianity.
This was an excellent lecture. I really enjoyed it. I know so little about the Anglo-Saxons, but that may be because there is such a dearth of information about them. I know more about them now.
A great introduction, but there’s so much more to be covered here, especially with regards to the practices heathen religion. Place names are vast in GB and let’s not forget the days of the week.
You can find more of Professor Hutton's lectures and upcoming events at www.gresham.ac.uk/speakers/professor-ronald-hutton
Wonderful lecture (another) from Professor Hutton. Onto the next one from him!
You'd think that Norse and Germanic god's would be very much similar, but apparently this is not the case. The prime example being the Valkyries who in Norse mythology are heroic shield maidens who take the fallen to Valhalla. However the Germanic equivalents are viewed as dark malevolent furies, and far removed from their Norse counterparts.
You have to remember, the written Norse records are hundreds of years older. Anglo Saxon paganism died around 650, but Norse paganism continued until about 1200. The norse variant likely changed a bit since the anglo saxon paganism died
@@0x00a yes but continental Germanic tribes even the Saxons who remained in North Germany were pagan for 200 more years until the wars against the Franks. Ironically the Saxon Bible the Heliand preserves some beliefs by listing them as forbidden. Cheers from Mercia
So hard to find info like this ❤️
Likely the Anglo-Saxon temples were made of wood......or were more 'places' than things built by men.... we take for granted stone buildings because of the Romans and later Normans.... but it is most unlikely that Anglo-Saxons were predominantly stone workers.. The few charming Anglo-Saxon churches are usually made of flint stones and such and are rather rustic.
Anglo-Saxon Pagan Gods 1417pm 8.2.23 alleged norman and roman use and abuse of native labour would suggest the angles and the saxons and whoever else littered the country prior to the various invasions and post invasion scenarios would be well versed in such materials where building their structures are concerned.... tudors, and the like, enjoyed utilizing wood in their buildings... most of london prior to the great fire would have been built in wood - as would most church alters be carved in timber etc etc... perhaps another case of treating the Uk's past as a savage blip in the alleged far sighted civilized past? the poem - another melding of old legend refert of Odysseus and his travails...?
@@jamesedgewood4643 Anglo-Saxon Pagan Gods 8.2.23 1557pm i am not offended by the "plausible facts" - at all!!! i welcome anyone who has something to impart... it's all hypothetical discourse, anyway. i am very much enamoured of the anglo-saxon (and/or any other tribe native to this soil). such folk were milling about these plains way before anyone decided to add monikers to their lineage etc etc... you know what i am going to impart, anyway - such is the tediousness of such matters - it being a vast merry-go-round of claim counter claim and such like... so there is no need for you to be defensive - at all!! mass forest clearances of UK and Europe as a whole will be the deciding factor re: what materials were used to build with. the material wood was ready to hand - therefore it is posited that the vast majority of buildings would be constructed with such a material. rather than most folk wandering around suggesting themselves to be such clever little boys and gals - i have no particular axe to grind. nor any particular issue with the past. our mindsets haven't altered that much in all that time... and we see the incessant b.s of today would certainly be applicable to the incessant b.s of yesteryear.
Wow, how much like Tolkien's words for Théoden in that poem. One has to imagine that Tolkien had read this poem.
That's why it seemed so familiar.
The 13th Warrior was also Beowulf-inspired, through a book called Eaters of the Dead, by Michael Crichton. Decent-ish movie, great book!
I loved that movie.
"I cannot lift this."
"Grow stronger!"
I always find it laughable when the Romans denigrate other cultures because they did some human sacrifices. How many thousands died in Roman arenas for the entertainment of those 'civilised' Romans? Were they not indeed the people who practised human sacrifice on an industrial scale? I take Roman opinions on other peoples with a huge pinch of salt.
This is incredible. On the last question, the germanic undead were called Draugr, there are many of those in the icelandic sagas
I couldn’t stop to listen to it
Wow
Highly interesting
I really enjoy his content and delivery
Just put the kettle on. This seems really interesting. I saw the Sutton Hoo helmet this past autumn.
A majority of Anglo Saxons were of course illiterate, but they still had a runic system to which could write short poems and stories.
11:45 I think the Norse word for the usual Viking sacrificial places is "Hov." Not exactly the same similarity, but compared to Odin and Woden it might in the same way be similar to Hearg or Harrow. I'd assume it's not mandatory for a Hov to be located near or on top of a hill.
Edit, copy paste from one of my later comments further below: "The Norwegian encyclopedia called Store Norske Leksikon states that a hov, was a building used for religious worship during the Viking age before Christianity. Meanwhile horg was more commonly used for when it was just a religious place without any specific building. Apparently hov in Norse was pronounced like hof, originated from the word for farm hoff."
You also have "harg" in Old Norse.
Oh, and you also have "vi" in places like Ullevi and so on.
I'd be more inclined to suspect “hov” is cognate with place name elements “how” and/or “hoo”.
@@laamonftiboren4236 The Norwegian encyclopedia called Store Norske Leksikon states that a hov, was a building used for religious worship during the Viking age before Christianity. Meanwhile horg was more commonly used for when it was just a religious place without any specific building. Apparently hov in Norse was pronounced like hof, originated from the word for farm hoff.
Most informative lecture.
Anyone interested in the fall of Roman Britain should read Robin Fleming's books. They are excellent.
Where does this guy teach, and how do I get into his class? Amazing lecture.
Bristol University and Gresham College, London.
Oh man. I've watched the Tudor Monastery series a bunch and when I started this video I immediately perked up. "I know that voice!"
Really neat learning well... what little can be learned about this culture.
5:43 "The pagan Anglo-Saxons were illiterate". But what about the Futhorc runic writing system that existed at the time? The oldest example probably being the Undley bracteate which is from the 5th century.
Anglo Saxon pride
Good lecture
Brilliant.
I think the burial goods might be explained by our own attitudes about our dead loved ones. Maybe this even explains ghosts. Have you lost someone, then suffered tremendous pain every time you encountered something you associate closely with that person? "This was his favorite chair," and, "She'd brush her hair with this for hours." You don't want to keep that stuff around. We tend to thrift the things, let someone without memories be unbothered by the ghost. What do you do when the only people in your entire world share the memories? You give the item away to a visitor who thinks it nothing but a treasure, or you bury it with the body, locking the ghost of the person's memory deep underground, so you can move on with life.
I like to keep the most personal things
we're all different
my husband kept his mother's inhaler
very personal
@@rebeccabedford9855 Yes, I probably shouldn't have made it such a blanket statement. I'm sure back in prehistory, people were inclined to want to hold into keepsakes and belongings of beloved people. But those don't end up in burial tombs, so I guess that's why we don't have any evidence of 4th century inhalers being used.
@@BillWiltfongit certainly may have played a role together with hopes of an afterlife.
If anything, I think the Roman religion in Britain was more of a 'foreign' importation than the Anglo-Saxon. The Angles and Saxons had a very similar religious mindset to that of their Nordic counterparts across the sea. No doubt, it must also be said that probably since the Bronze Age there were lots of cultural interactions between the inhabitants of Britain and Scandinavia, which obviously predates the Roman influence considerably.
This guy clearly christian and wants to delegitimise our pagan roots in older peoples
@@ladladladlad8863er no prof. Hutton is a practicing neo-pagan
There is possible evidence Woden had one eye. The Sutton Hoo helmet has gold foil around the garnets on one eyebrow and not the other, suggesting a darkening of one eye. Some button brooches also show what appear to be a man with one eye blinded.
I think it's a great mystery that Christianity's most important celebration -- Easter -- has a pagan name in English.
Why have I only just discovered this?!
I love "a mischief of rats" which is perfect.
Joke: the collective noun for bankers should be a wunch.
That story of the sparrow is the entire story of the Ukrainian song Schedrik (the tune having been appropriated by English cultures as “Carol of the Bells”). That’s an incredible parallel as the story still exists in modern Ukrainian folklore.
The days of the week could be something bordering a cultural reverence and euhemerization of the pagan gods. Woden was woven into the family trees of AS regents, so I wouldn't think it impossible for a similar thing to happen with the others. Frigge and Woden as a kind of cultural 'adam and eve', with their relatives being incorporated in some way also, perhaps merely as cultural heroes in a manner similar to characters such as Beowulf or Weland.
I think I may have had a breakthrough on Saxneat, Yngwe & Geata- they are Jotun.
It was kind of based on a long shot, with trying to find a class of being in Norse mythology that sounded similar to the suffix on several of these names (which, I now thing was nonsensical), but there is, at least, one Jotun in Norse mythology which also happens to be the name of a legendary Finnish king & I found two possibilities for Saxnaet & one for Geata. Jarnsaxa or Saurkver for Saxnaet & Geitla for Geata. Maybe there was a practice of kings claiming ancestry from Jotun, or naming mythical ancestors after Jotun in the Nordic-Germanic world?
Love you.....xoxo
He read the poignant poem bewailing the deaths of the warriors and the ruin of the castle, at the end i was in tears 😥, then he said "Cheerful stuff, isn't it?" and i laughed 😂.
Nice use of a British helmet! Found at Sutton hop where Coelbren was also found on a Spoon, Sword and instrument, which is clearly a Welsh instrument. How did Coelbren that supposedly wasn’t invented until 1800 by Iolo Morgannwg get on such items? One can also tell thanks to the clear and distinctive Celtic Mustache.
Are you joking?
Where was Gondor when the West Fold fell??
Grabbing lunch with the Morlocks on the Sheffield downs.
He speaks in that rich, fruity Received British English that BBC announcers all had to acquire at one time, à la John Snagge.
Hutton ? Any relation to the Hutton of geology fame ?
I knew I should have skipped the sinister part!
I wish us English had an established pagan religion like the Japanese do with Shintoism. At least we have a few snippets of pre Christian Anglo Saxon religion than nothing at all
I am a proud Saxon warrior and the Gods are with me,
may all your days been blessed,
And may you live and die free,
as the Gods blessed the days.
and the black raven lays
The Gods will guide us
In true and honest ways.
-me
Coifi is not the ealdormann who gives the example of the sparrow.
A number of Churches in Wales and Rheged and Kernow are sited within ancient British temple-sites. However, since many British Churches were raised before Augustine came, and before the Anglo-Saxon 'invasion', you would hardly find a temple under the Church, if you went down far enough to know you had gone beyond the British Church level. As to place-names, holy names were attached to communal or spiritual edifices, and locations, whereas personal names were used for domestic residence places. There was no need to rename the former, but frequent need to rename the latter, as residence changed hands. This is a great lecture covering so much material and square miles!
"weoh...a holy place on flat groud, esp near roads" -- probably means 'way', then, right? Proto-Germanic *wega- "course of travel, way" (source also of Old Saxon, Dutch weg, Old Norse vegr, Old Frisian wei, Old High German weg, German Weg, Gothic wigs "way"), from PIE root *wegh-.
Captivating lecture, only 12 minutes in, very much enjoying.
The names of the week are 'planets' rather than gods, Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturnus. They seem to have translated those into Germanic by Interpretatio Romana.
Woden had an Odin cognate, in some parts of Olde England.
As for designs in urns, it is very likely an artistic style, one that represents a culture, and much like how tartans represent clans.
Nowadays you can get a DALLAS Cowboys urn.