FROM GODDESS TO KING
A History of Ancient Europe from the
OERA LINDA BOOK
By Anthony Radford
CHAPTER 20
A ROYAL KING AT THE END OF AN AGE
Friesland is now divided between the Netherlands, Denmark and Germany with about 500,000 people in North Holland. The language, recognized as being the closest to English of the Germanic tongues, is giving way to Dutch and German. History recalls them as being settled by a nomadic Germanic tribe with many subsequent occupations including one by the Holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne who converted them to Christianity.
Local tradition recalls some early kings including Friso, Ubbo (Adel) and Askar but except for some anecdotes, little is known. Here the Book begins to enter pages of western history, giving details of how elected leaders, that is, task performers, continued their efforts at making their positions and privileges permanent and hereditary.
The beginning of the next entry has been lost. The author is not known but may have been a family member of Beeden, the previous writer. He tells the story of Black Adel, the fourth king after Friso, who cemented on the royal yoke ever more firmly. He did it in an amicable way by appealing to the poor for support, putting the blame for their hardships on the rich, and also placing the burden of state expenses on those who could most easily afford it. The poor rallied to him, as he grew richer. He was the first king to keep the lucrative position of chief count, or Askar, thus consolidating the government even further.
Black Adel or King Askar as he was called, appealed to nationalistic pride to promote military might at the expense of education. Addressing a general assembly of the burgers in a town he visited, he went out of his way to placate them in the presence of the powerful poor. It is beginning to sound like Rome with its plebeians and patricians but was by no means as stratified as it was in the Roman State where wealth grew wealth and poverty grew poverty.
It does sound familiar, as our own present day politics appears to have nothing new in it. Even the fact that the tall man usually wins a modern election was an advantage in Askar’s time; he was seven feet tall and well liked by the community.
That these westerners had a reputation for being tall, even giants in old myths has often been stated but was a foot equal to twelve modern inches or 30.48 centimeters? We know that the Egyptians had a royal cubit that was standardized in stone at 20.62 inches long and divided into 28 digits. For a thousand years of Mediterranean commerce, the Greeks used a foot of 30.88 centimeters was that was divided into 12 fingers, one being about three percent larger than the Egyptian digit or only two percent larger than the same proportion of the Babylonian cubit. The Romans adapted the Greek system but divided the foot into 12 unciae or inches. These measures were more accurate than the attempts made in the Middle Ages to standardize the royal foot or arm with grains of barley made necessary because of commercial cheating. It has also been found that a Roman foot shrank to about eleven inches, no doubt for the same reason, but it can be assumed that the ancient measure of these tall peoples was apparently not a small foot, but very close to the foot of today.
King Asker started the games that became the sport of jousting as training for the youth. His military ambitions were directed to recovering the whole of Gaul, those old southern lands lost to their "degenerate brothers", the Celts. But his plans which would soon founder in the rising tide of Roman power were taken up by the Cimbri, a German nation that was to give much trouble to Rome.
Of interest is the fitting of naval ships with twin prows to support steel crossbows. Iron weapons had already been in use for two thousand years by the Frisians, but spring steel requires very high temperatures and a skill in tempering. Carbon was added directly to wrought iron, which is essentially pure iron, by successive hammering while red hot and folding until it looks like flaky pastry. Charcoal furnaces and bellows-driven air were necessary to achieve the critical temperature. The manuscript continues with copying errors and water damage from previous versions.
...therefore, I will first write about Black Adel. Black Adel was the fourth king after Friso. In his youth he studied first at Texland, and then at Stavern, and afterwards traveled through all the states. When he was twenty-four years old his father had him elected Askar. As soon as he became Askar he always took the part of the poor.
"The rich", he said, "do enough of wrong by means of their wealth, therefore we ought to take care that the poor look up to us." By arguments of this kind he became the friend of the poor and the terror of the rich. It was carried so far that his father looked up to him.
When his father died he succeeded, and then he wished to retain his office as well, as the kings of the East used to do. The rich would not suffer this, so all the people rose up, and the rich were glad to get out of the assembly with whole skins. From that time there was no more talk of equality. He oppressed the rich and flattered the poor, by whose assistance he succeeded in all his wishes.
King Askar, as he was always called, was seven feet high, and his strength was as remarkable as his height. He had a clear intellect, so that he understood all that was talked about, but in his actions he did not display much wisdom. He had a handsome countenance and a smooth tongue, but his soul was blacker than his hair.
When he had been king for a year, he obliged all the young men in the state to come once a year to the camp to have a sham fight. At first he had some trouble with it, but at last it became such a habit that old and young came from all sides to ask if they might take part in it. When he had brought it to this point, he established military schools. The rich complained that their children no longer learned to read and write.
Askar paid no attention to it; but shortly afterwards when a sham fight was held, he mounted a throne and spoke aloud:
"The rich have come to complain to me that their boys do not learn to read and write. I answered nothing; but I will now declare my opinion, and let the general assembly decide."
While they all regarded him with curiosity, he said further: "According to my idea, we ought to leave reading and writing at present to the maidens and wise people. I do not wish to speak ill of our forefathers; I will only say that in the times so vaunted by some, the burgtmaidens introduced disputes into our country, which the Mothers were unable, either first or last, to put an end to.
"Worse still, while they talked and chattered about useless customs the Gauls came and seized all our beautiful southern country. Even at this very time our degenerate brothers and their soldiers have already come over the Scheldt. It therefore remains for us to choose whether we will carry a yoke or a sword. If we wish to be and to remain free, it behooves our young men to leave reading and writing alone for a time; and instead of playing games of swinging and wrestling, they must learn to play with sword and spear.
"When we are completely prepared, and the boys are big enough to carry helmet and shield and to use their weapons, then, with your help, I will attack the enemy. The Gauls may then record the defeat of their helpers and soldiers upon our fields with the blood that flows from their wounds. When we have once expelled the enemy, then we must follow it up till there are no more Gauls, Slaves or Tartars to be driven out of Frya’s inheritance."
"That is right," the majority shouted, and the rich did not dare to open their mouths. He must certainly have thought over this address and had it written out, for on the evening of the same day there were copies in at least twenty different hands, and they all sounded the same. Afterwards he ordered the ship people to make double prows, upon which steel crossbows could be fixed. Those who were backward in doing this were fined, and if they swore that they had no means, the rich men of the village were obliged to pay.
The ancient and unknown author next tells about the peoples of Scotland who were under the dominion of the Gauls. They were poorly armed but did have some surviving iron pieces, and the importance of iron weapons in ancient times has been repeatedly stated. The Frisians had the secret of iron smelting from charcoal. Iron was produced in the forested mountains where the ore was found but weapon forging and steel making was a classified citadel industry and is perhaps the hitherto unknown source of such stories in our own mythology as the tale of Vulcan’s forge. Remember his wife was the beautiful Venus.
The storyteller uses the terms "Far Cretans" for Greeks and "Near Cretans" for Italians. The story of the Greek sacking of Troy is related and also of the Trojan settlement of Rome. He then delineates the expansion of Rome over the Phoenicians and Carthage as well as over the Gauls as far north as Southern Britain. This lets us date these writings to the time of the Julian Emperors (first century AD) but an estimate of the time of king Askar would be before the turn of the millennium when "barbarians" were causing Italy problems. The Romans campaigned in Gaul and eventually Caesar annexed Gaul as a province between 59 and 52 BC. He stopped at the Rhine and neither he nor Augustus was able to occupy the Frisian held lands north of the river.
The Roman occupation drove the head priest of the Gauls into Scotland where Kerenak is clearly defined on a cape near some islands. Kerenak meaning "chosen corner" was known as Kaltasburgh, or the citadel of the renegade mother, Kalta, who gave her name to the Celtics some 1500 years earlier. King Askar who had traveled there before with trading ships took the castle with Saxon mercenaries and plundered the Gauls’ horde of gold. That this was a place from where raids on Phoenician ships and towns could be made is confusing. It does show however that the Phoenician or perhaps more accurately, the Carthaginian navy was very active on the side of the Celts and in opposition to Rome until its destruction in 146 BC. After the fall of Carthage surviving ships found an ally with the remaining Gauls in the north. Some hundreds of years later in Britain the Romans were to build two long walls to help defend the north of Britain from what must have been an intractable enemy.
Now we shall see what resulted from all this bustle. In the north part of Britain there exists a Scotch people - the most of them spring from Frya’s blood - some of them are descended from the followers of Kalta, and for the rest, from Britons and fugitives who gradually, in the course of time, took refuge there from the tin mines. Those who come from the tin mines have wives, either altogether foreign or of foreign descent.
They are all under the dominion of the Gauls. Their arms are wooden bows and arrows pointed with stag’s horn or flint. Their houses are of turf and straw, and some of them live in caves in the mountains. Sheep that they have stolen form their only wealth. Some of the descendants of Kalta’s followers still have iron weapons, which they have inherited from their forefathers.
In order to make myself well understood, I must let alone for a while my account of the Scotch people, and write something about the near Cretans. The Cretans formerly belonged to us only, but from time immemorial descendants of Lyda and Finda have established themselves there. Of these last there came in the end a whole troop from Troy. Troy is the name of a town that the far Cretans had taken and destroyed.
When the Trojans had nestled themselves among the near Cretans, with time and industry they built a strong town with walls and citadels named Rome, that is, Spacious. When this was done, the people by craft and force made themselves masters of the whole land.
The people who live on the south side of the Mediterranean Sea, come for the most part from Phoenicia. The Phoenicians (Puniers or Carthaginians) are a bastard race of the Blood of Frya, Finda, and Lyda. The Lyda people were there as slaves, but by the unchastity of the women these black people have degenerated the other people and dyed them brown.
These people and the Romans are constantly struggling for the supremacy over the Mediterranean Sea. The Romans, moreover, live at enmity with the Phoenicians; and their priests, who wish to assume the sole government of the world, cannot bear the sight of the Gauls. First they took from the Phoenicians Marseilles - then all the countries lying to the south, the west, and the north, as well as the southern part of Britain - and they have always driven away the Phoenician priests, that is the Gauls, of whom thousands have sought refuge in North Britain.
A short time ago the chief of the Gauls was established in the citadel, which is called Kerenak, that is the corner, whence he issued his commands to the Gauls. All their gold was likewise collected there. Keeren Herne (chosen corner), or Kerenak, is a stone citadel which did belong to Kalta. Therefore the maidens of the descendants of Kalta’s followers wished to have the citadel again. Thus through the enmity of the maidens and the Gauls, hatred and quarreling spread over the mountain country with fire and sword.
Our sea people often came there to get wool, which they paid for with prepared hides and linen. Askar had often gone with them, and had secretly made friendship with the maidens and some princes, and bound himself to drive the Gauls out of Kerenak. When he came back there again he gave to the princes and the fighting men iron helmets and steel bows.
War had come with him, and soon blood was streaming down the slopes of the mountains. When Askar thought a favorable opportunity occurred, he went with forty ships and took Kerenak and the chief of the Gauls, with all his gold. The people with whom he fought against the soldiers of the Gauls, he had enticed out of Saxony by promises of much booty and plunder. Thus nothing was left to the Gauls. After that he took two islands for stations for his ships, from which he used later to sally forth and plunder all the Phoenician ships and towns that he could reach.
When he returned he brought nearly six hundred of the finest youths of the Scotch mountaineers with him. He said that they had been given him as hostages, that he might be sure that the parents would remain faithful to him; but this was untrue. He kept them as a bodyguard at his court, where they had daily lessons in riding and in the use of all kinds of arms. The Denmarkers, who proudly considered themselves sea-warriors above all the other sea-people, no sooner heard of the glorious deeds of Askar, than they became jealous of him to such a degree, that they would bring war over the sea and over his lands. See here, then, how he was able to avoid a war.
Maidens still aspired to be Mothers and one such was the Burgtmaid of Stavia. She wanted Askar to rebuild her citadel and offered him her assistance in uniting the peoples on both sides of the Rhine. To this end she devoted two years on a grand tour, campaigning at every stop. Her propaganda was not much different from that previously employed by the Magy in taking the land and previously related in the Book.
Some of the Germans are described here, where after a few hundred years of priestly rule and much intermarriage, matriarchal customs still were observed. There were maidens who taught the young and advised the old. It shows us that the customs of the people can be stronger and more tenacious than those imposed by conquest. While subjugation by ideology or race may upset the temporal power, it may not prevail against many long-standing practices.
This account describes some of the diverse peoples and customs that were then becoming the European mix as we now know it from recorded history, particularly from the Roman campaigns.
Among the ruins of the destroyed citadel of Stavia there was still established a clever Burgtmaid, with a few maidens. Her name was Reintja, and she was famed for her wisdom. This Maiden offered her assistance to Askar, on condition that he should afterwards rebuild the citadel of Stavia. When he had bound himself to do this, Reintja went with three maidens to Hals.
She traveled by night, and by day she made speeches in all the markets and in all the assemblies. Wr-Alda, she said, had told her by his thunder that all the Frya’s people must become friends, and united as brothers and sisters, otherwise Finda’s people would come and sweep them off the face of the earth.
After the thunder Frya’s seven watch-maidens appeared to her in a dream seven nights in succession. They had said, that-
"Disaster hovers over Frya’s land with yoke and chains; therefore all the people who have sprung from Frya’s blood must do away with their surnames, and only call themselves Frya’s children, or Frya’s people. They must all rise up and drive Finda’s people out of Frya’s inheritance. If you will not do that, you will bring the slave-chains around your necks, and the foreign chiefs will ill-treat your children and flog them till the blood streams into your graves. Then shall the spirits of your forefathers appear to you, and reproach your cowardice and thoughtlessness."
The stupid people who, by the acts of the Magyars, were already so much accustomed to folly, believed all that she said, and the mothers clasped their children to their bosoms. When Reintja had brought the king of Hals and the others to an agreement, she sent messengers to Askar, and went herself along the Baltic Sea. From there she went to the Lithauers, so-called because they always strike at their enemy’s face.
The Lithauers are fugitives and banished people of our own race who wander about in Germany. Their wives have been mostly stolen from the Tartars. The Tartars are a branch of Finda’s race, and are thus named by the German landers because they will never be at peace, but provoke people to fight.
She proceeded on beyond Saxony, crossing through the other German lands in order always to repeat the same thing. After two years had passed, she came along the Rhine home. Among the German landers she gave herself out for a Mother, and said that they might return as free and true people; but then they must go over the Rhine and drive the Gauls out of Frya’s south lands. If they did that, then her King Askar would go over the Scheldt and win back the land.
Among the German landers many bad customs of the Tartars and Magyars have crept in, but likewise many of our laws have remained. Therefore they still have maidens, who teach the children and advise the old. In the beginning they were opposed to Reintja, but at last she was followed, obeyed, and praised by them where it was useful or necessary.
The narrative about King Askar continues and is probably the work of a descendent of Beeden who, it appears, was the count of Lindwerd and possibly Grenega, a neighboring state.
Askar allies himself with the King of Hals by marrying his daughter who was following pagan ways. The good husband was subsequently accused of idolatry, by Prontlik, the Mother at Texland. Now Gosa had been named as the last elected Earth Mother so it is likely that the Burgtmaid at Texland, the last surviving citadel, would assume this title in a disunited Friesland. Anyway, Askar did not keep his promise to Reintja, his Burgtmaid, to rebuild the citadel. No doubt he wanted his own castle to be the only authority in his state of Stavia.
Here we have an attitude about the "pagans" that was to be one day used against themselves by Christian monks who in turn used the very methods they condemned. Even the word "propaganda" here used in a translation and implying the tactics of the Magi contains the word "pagan" while the word "barbarian" was a Roman way of distinguishing themselves from foreigners because it was the Roman custom to shave. As so much of our understanding of history has come through the Roman tradition, it has given many adverse connotations to words that simply describe differences.
Reintja complained of Askar’s non-Frisian habits to Prontlik who sent a message throughout the lands in the manner of the Earth Mother. The result was contrary to what was expected, as hereditary kings were now quick to support their own kind. The King of Hals attacked Texland and burnt the last citadel to the ground.
Prontlik and Reintja with their maidens sought refuge with the narrator. Worried that Askar might attack his state, he devised a ploy whereby they would be safe in a wooded area protected by the rumors of ghosts and magic in the style of the magi.
As soon as Askar heard from Reintja’s messengers how the Jutlanders were disposed, he immediately, on his side, sent messengers to the King of Hals. The ship in which the messengers went was laden with women’s ornaments, and took also a golden shield on which Askar’s portrait was artistically represented.
These messengers were to ask the King’s daughter, Frethogunsta, in marriage for Askar. Frethogunsta came a year after that to Stavern. Among her followers was a Magy, for the Jutlanders had been long ago corrupted. Soon after Askar had married Frethogunsta, a church was built at Stavern. In the church were placed monstrous images bedecked with gold-woven dresses. It is also said that Askar, by night, and at unseasonable times, kneeled to them with Frethogunsta; but one thing is certain, the citadel of Stavia was never rebuilt.
Reintja was already come back, and went angrily to Prontlik the Mother, at Texland, to complain. Prontlik sent out messengers in all directions, who proclaimed that Askar is gone over to Idolatry. Askar took no notice of this, but unexpectedly a fleet arrived from Hals. In the night the maidens were driven out of the citadel, and in the mourning there was nothing to be seen of the citadel but a glowing heap of rubbish. Prontlik and Reintja came to me for shelter.
When I reflected upon it, I thought that it might prove bad for my state. Therefore, we hit upon a plan which might serve us all. This is the way we went to work. In the middle of the Krijlwood, to the east of Liudwert, lies our place of refuge, which can only be reached by a concealed path. A long time ago I had established a garrison of men who all hated Askar, and kept away all other people.
Now it was come to such a pitch among us, that many women, and even men, talked about ghosts, white women and gnomes, just like the Denmarkers. Askar had made use of all of these follies for his own advantage, and we wished to do the same. One dark night I brought the Maiden to the citadel, and afterwards they went with their serving-maids dressed in white along the path, so that nobody dare go there any more.
During this final part of the Oera Linda Book, we are told how King Askar dealt with many foreigners and used their ways whenever it suited him. Also how the fleet was used more for piracy on the Phoenician trading ships of the Gauls than in legitimate trade as before, and what the consequence of this was.
According to the Book, there is always a consequence when the laws of Frya are violated for too long and this particular complaint is about Askar’s non-Frisian habits. The writer of this piece shows his prejudices against foreigners and it is not so different from attitudes still prevalent in today’s society. In the time of Askar, the consequences were a plague. The easy booty of their pirate activities had weakened their own productivity and they were compelled to use slaves, forbidden by Wr-Alda, and continue the spoliation.
Disaster came when they plundered a whole fleet complete with many foreign rowers and infected crewmen. Even the goods carried the infection, probably an early version of the bubonic plague. The last narrator kept foreigners and the pillaged goods out of his country thereby avoiding the plague, which killed a thousand times as many people as the number of slaves, that Askar had brought into his territories.
The plague must have had far reaching effects, for many Germans were freed by it but were not welcomed into Askar’s land. He then describes the origin of the "All-men" tribe and the Franks. In his scheming ways, Askar had the warring Germans elect his nephew as duke or overlord to prevent local conflicts and then invaded them himself, thinking that they would welcome him as their overlord. Instead, the Franks, who did not accept the new duke, captured Askar but not recognizing him, he was traded by the Franks for an important Celtic captive.
Here ends the book with neither Askar nor the remaining burgtmaidens succeeding in any attempt to reunite Frya’s people and taking back their lost lands.
When Askar thought he had his hands free, he let the Magyars travel through his states under all kinds of names, and except in my state, they were not turned away anywhere. After that Askar had become so connected with the Jutlanders and the Denmarkers, they all went roving together; but it produced no real good to them. They brought all sorts of foreign treasures home, and just for that reason the young men would learn no trades, nor work in the fields; so at last he was obliged to take slaves; but that was altogether contrary to Wr-Alda’s wish and to Frya’s counsel.
Therefore the punishment was sure to follow it. This is the way in which the punishment came. They had all together taken a whole fleet that came out of the Mediterranean Sea. This fleet was laden with purple cloths and other valuables that came from Phoenicia. The weak people of the fleet were put ashore south of the Seine, but the strong people were kept to serve as slaves. The most handsome were retained ashore, and the ugly and black were kept on board ship as rowers.
In the Fly the plunder was divided, but, without their knowing it, they divided the punishment too. Of those who were placed in the foreign ships six died of colic. It was thought that the food and drink were poisoned, so it was all thrown overboard, but the colic remained all the same. Wherever the slaves or the goods came, there it came too. The Saxmen took it over to their marshes. The Jutlanders brought it to Scandinavia and along the coasts of the Baltic Sea, and with Askar’s mariners it was taken to Britain.
We and the people of Grenega did not allow either the people or the goods to come over our boundaries, and therefore we remained free from it. How many people were carried off by this disease I cannot tell; but Prontlik, who heard it afterwards from the maidens, told me that Askar had helped out of his states a thousand times more free-men than he had brought dirty slaves in.
When the pest had ceased, the German landers who had become free came to the Rhine, but Askar would not put himself on an equality with the princes of that vile degenerate race. He would not suffer them to call themselves Frya’s children, as Reintja had offered them, but he forgot then that he himself had black hair. Among the German landers there were two tribes who did not call themselves German landers.
One came from the far southeast, and called themselves Allemannen. They had given themselves this name when they had no women among them, and were wandering as exiles in the forests. Later on they stole women from the slave people like the Lithauers, but they kept their name.
The other tribe, that wandered about in the neighborhood, called themselves Franks, not because they were free, but the name of their first king was Frank, who, by the help of the degenerate maidens, had had himself made hereditary king over his people. The people nearest to him called themselves Thioth - his sons, that is, sons of the people. They had remained free, because they never would acknowledge any king, or prince, or master except those chosen by general consent in a general assembly.
Askar had already learned from Reintja that the German princes were almost always at war with each other. He proposed to them that they should choose a duke from his people, because, as he said, he was afraid that they would quarrel among themselves for the supremacy. He said also that his princes could speak with the Gauls. This, he said, was also the opinion of the Mother.
Then the princes of the German landers came together, and after twenty-one days they chose Alrik as duke. Alrik was Askar’s nephew. He gave him two hundred Scotch and one hundred of the greatest Saxmen to go with him as a bodyguard. The princes were to send twenty-one of their sons as hostages for their fidelity. Thus far all had gone according to his wishes; but when they were to go over the Rhine, the king of the Franks would not be under Alrik’s command. Thereupon all was confusion.
Askar, who thought that all was going on well, landed with his ships on the other side of the Scheldt; but there they were already aware of his coming, and were on their guard. He had to flee as quickly as he had come, and was himself taken prisoner. The Gauls did not know whom they had taken, so he was afterwards exchanged for a noble Gaul whom Askar’s people had taken with them.
While all this was going on, the Magyars went about audaciously over the lands of our neighbors. Near Egmuda, where formerly the citadel Forana had stood, they built a church larger and richer than that which Askar had built at Stavern. They said afterwards that Askar had lost the battle against the Gauls, because the people did not believe that Woden could help them, and therefore they would not pray to him. They went about stealing young children, whom they kept and brought up in the mysteries of their abominable doctrines. Were there people who...
(here abruptly ends the Oera Linda Book)
And so the Oera Linda Book ends in mid-sentence. Are there any pieces of those other books mentioned, anywhere yet to be found? Will we discover a wall of one of the many ancient citadels with inscriptions on it in Ancient Frisian? Will soundings in the North Sea show evidence of man’s occupation of those flooded regions? All these are intriguing questions perhaps never to be answered, but the sole surviving copy brought forward by Cornelius Over de Linden has related a fascinating tale that has to be told.
