Researchers have found that an ancient golden disc present in southern Denmark comprises the earliest written mention of the Norse god Odin, revealing that he was worshiped up to 150 years sooner than previously thought.
The jewellery – dating back to 400 AD – was discovered in Vindelev in central Denmark in 2020 amongst hoards that included Roman coins. According to NBC News, it was on public display at a museum near the site for years before scientists had a likelihood to study it.
A runic inscription referring to Odin, one in all the chief gods of the Norse pantheon in the pre-Christian Germanic world, has turned scientists’ understanding of pagan religion the other way up.
“That is evidence of Odin’s presence in Scandinavia way back to the fifth century” – Simon Nygaard, Assistant Professor of Pre-Christian Norse Religion at Aarhus University in Denmark told NBC News on Wednesday. “In the proper sense of the word, it’s historic.”
![In addition to the reference to Odin, the bracteate also has a swastika inscription.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/NYPICHPDPICT000007873299.jpg?w=1024)
Nygaard said the inscription on the disc – known as bracteat – is solely “spectacular”. The previous oldest mention of Odin was found on a brooch in southern Germany from the second half of the sixth century.
“He’s Odin’s man,” the record reads, according to Krister Vasshus, who helped decipher the runes. He told NBC that it moreover included a reference to a person named “Jaga” or “JagaR”, believed to be king or ruler wherever the bracteat was forged.
Odin was worshiped as a deity for hundreds of years before the disc was made, but the “exciting” discovery “could tell us something about the relationship humans had with their gods, and even perhaps how divine rule was organized in Scandinavia at the moment.” Vasshus said.
“The sculptor knew exactly how to shape the runes to make them perfect, just perfect,” he added. “They’re exquisite.”
The prose Edda, the primary source of Norse mythology developed in Iceland in the thirteenth century, refers to Odin as the “Allfather” who ruled over man and the other Norse gods known as Æsir.
The bracteat also comprises an inscription of a swastika – an ancient religious symbol found throughout Europe and Asia throughout the Iron Age until it was included as a Nazi symbol in the twentieth century, according to NBC.
![Experts Krister Vasshus (left) and Lisbeth Imer hold gold bracteats discovered in Vindelev, Denmark in late 2020.](https://nypost.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2023/03/NYPICHPDPICT000007873310.jpg?w=1024)
The jewellery, together with other gold unearthed in Denmark, could have been buried to hide it from enemies or as a tribute to appease the gods in times of plague and famine, Visshus suggested.
“It’s a really great amount of gold, so it will need to have been a really serious situation that they wanted to correct,” he said.
“We all know that there was an enormous volcanic eruption in 536 and at the very least two more blocked out sunlight. There will need to have been famine in areas that relied on cereals and cereals,” he said. “We also know that in 541 there was a plague similar to the Black Death.”