InGermanic mythology,Seaxnēat (pronounced[ˈsæɑksnæːɑt]) orSaxnôt was thenational god of theSaxons. He is sometimes identified with eitherTīwaz orFraujaz (Old NorseTýr andFreyr).
TheOld English formSeaxnēat is recorded in the genealogies of thekings of Essex (asSeaxnēt,Saxnēat,Saxnat).[1] Originally he was the first ancestor listed, with the first king of Essex,Æscwine, seven generations later.[2] A later version of the genealogy, preserved in the 12th-centuryChronicon ex chronicis, makes Seaxnēat a son ofWōden (Odin).[3][4]
TheOld Saxon formSaxnôt is attested in the renunciation portion of theOld Saxon Baptismal Vow along with the godsUuôden (Odin) andThunaer (Thor).[1][4][5]
The name is usually derived fromseax, the eponymous long knife or short sword of theSaxons, and(ge)-not,(ge)-nēat as "companion" (cognate with GermanGenosse "comrade"), resulting in a translation of either "sword-companion" (gladii consors,ensifer)[5] or "companion of the Saxons", whichJan de Vries further argued was the original name of the Saxons as a people.[6] The suggestion that the second element means "need", cognate with the Anglo-Saxon verbnēotan, is less widely accepted.[6][7]
Wōden is the divine progenitor in the other surviving Anglo-Saxon royal genealogies, so presumably the earlier form of the Essex genealogy preserves a specifically Saxon tradition of a national god.[8][9] Wōden may have displaced national or regional deities in the other genealogies as part of his rising influence,[6] or use of his name by churchmen.[10]
Since theOld Saxon Baptismal Vow lists three gods, usually interpreted as a Germanicdivine triad,Jacob Grimm argued that Saxnôt must have been a major deity, comparable in stature toUUoden andThunaer. In 1828, he proposed that Saxnôt was another name forFreyr (Old SaxonFroho), whose sword is prominently mentioned in the Eddic poemSkírnismál.[11] InDeutsche Mythologie, he later made the same argument in favour of identifying Saxnôt withTýr ("who else butZio orEor or the GreekAres?"),[5] who inNorse mythology has the sword as his characteristic weapon until he loses his right hand as a pledge in the binding ofFenrir. Seaxnēat/Saxnôt was also identified with Týr byErnst Alfred Philippson[12][13] and de Vries.[6] As pointed out byGabriel Turville-Petre,Georges Dumézil'strifunctional hypothesis would suggest he is Freyr (as a representative of the third "function" alongside Odin, representing the first, and Thor, representing the second);[4] for this reasonRudolf Simek identified him with Freyr.[1]
Through the alternative etymology of the second element of his name, deriving it from a root meaning 'to get, make use of', Seaxnēat/Saxnôt has also been related to the British deityNodens and the Irish deityNuada, byRudolf Much[6][14] and more recently by Swiss linguistHeinrich Wagner [de], who sees parallels in Nuada's role inIrish mythology as progenitor, and his possession of a flashing sword.[15]
æscwine offing, offa bedcing, bedca (sigefugling), sigefugl swæpping, swæppa antsecging, ant(secg) gesecging, gesecg seaxneting.
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