The Culture of the Teutons Quotes

“Familial history is not sensed merely as a series of events following one on the heels of another; nay, the living are filled by their ancestors. All history lay unfolded in its breadth, so that all that had once happened was happening again and again. Every kinsman felt himself as living all that one of his kin had once lived into the world, and he did not merely feel himself as possessing the deeds of old: he actually renewed them in his own doings. Any interference with what had been acquired and handed down, even if acquired from raiding or robbery, had to be met with vengeance, because a field of the picture of honour was crushed by the blow. But an openly expressed doubt as to whether that old grandfather really had done what he was said to have done is just as fatal to life, because it tears something out of his living kin; the taunt touches not only the dead man of old, but still more him who now lives through the former's achievements. The insult is a cut into the man himself; it tears a piece out of his brain, making a hole which is gradually filled with ideas of madness.”
― Vilhelm Grønbech, The Culture of the Teutons: Volume One

“The Germanic prince must be glad-minded, cheerful, and gentle, whatever the actual circumstances. When Grendel harries Heorot, Hrothgar is all the same the glad-minded Hrothgar—the good king, who in all his sorrow had nothing to reproach himself. A man must be eadig (steadfast in his luck).”
― Vilhelm Grønbech, The Culture of the Teutons: Volume One