the lowest ring on the larger of the Golden Horns from Gallehus. Since the Lappish sign consisted of three marks made by the fingertips at the same time (which therefore must have come to stand in a triangle), the Scandinavian and Lappish signs with regard to form are the same.
The only one who, so far as I know, has touched upon the history of this sign, is J. A. Worsaae in his famous lecture on the Golden Horns in the Antiquarian Society at Copenhagen in 1880, and in his Nordens Forhistorie, 1881 (p. 156 and 169). He interprets it as a sign of the triune godhead Odin-Thor-Frey. But since a real trinity conception of these gods is quite alien to northern sources, this interpretation must be exceedingly doubtful.
Another point in Worsaae's theory may perhaps be of greater interest. According to his explanation of the Golden Horns the pillars and plates where the three marks appear are the open doors of Helheim. That would indeed coincide remarkably with the Lappish doctrine that the sign signifies the dead. But until this archæological material is taken up and treated in a much more thorough way than hitherto, we can have no sure ground for determining this point. However, the very fact of having established an outward agreement between the Lappish and Scandinavian symbol is of interest.
Let us now turn to the tribe in the northern part of Europe where the worship of the dead has survived with remarkable insistency. Among the Lithuanians there is the following custom at burials: three pieces of bread and three spoonfuls of soup are thrown on the ground in honour of the goddess of the earth, Zemilene, in order that she may receive the dead well. This is also a triple offering to the kingdom of the dead just as in the case of the Lappish custom.[1]
The three marks as a plain symbol in the worship of the dead is found again in another place, but far off. In India, the Pariahs, in the district near Vellore, have small earthern altars with edge-shaped unhewn stones (which, according to later investigation, should be reckoned in the "thunderstone" class). At the ceremony they are smeared over with saffron,
- ↑ Zeitschrift für deutsche philologie XIV 162.
