SAGA-BOOK - Viking Society Web Publications

Mimir: Two Myths or One? 45
having oracular powers, as protecting the land where they
were preserved, as presiding at an Otherworld feast, and
as themselves the embodiments or symbols of an
Otherworld god. The material assembled by Dr Ross
contains several further points of considerable interest in
connexion with the study of Mimir. She shows that
a skull or skulls have frequently been found in sacred wells
and pools of the Romano-British period; that there are
Welsh and Irish stories of heads as guardians of holy and
healing wells, and of wells and streams appearing where
a severed head strikes the ground; that there is a belief,
found both in Wales and Scotland, that the waters of
a healing well are only effective if drunk from a particular
skull; that such place-names as 'Well of the Heads' are
common in Scotland and are often explained by stories of
restless or speaking heads of murdered men being washed
in or thrown into the well. In one case, the legend of the
Cornish Saint Melor, it is said that the saint's murderer was
carrying his head away when it spoke to him and ordered
him to strike his staff into the ground, whereupon the staff
changed into a most beautiful tree, "and from its roots an
unfailing fountain began to well forth" The legend of
this saint is thought to contain certain heathen motifs;
for instance, he has a silver hand like that of the Irish
divine king Nuadu.
The similarity of this Celtic material to the story of
Mimir as told by Snorri is pointed out by Dr Ross herself:
The decapitation of the head, its preservation, its association
with a well, and its powers of prophecy and Otherworld
knowledge are all features which recur in Celtic tradition and
belief. All the evidence suggests that this episode in Norse
mythology, if not a direct borrowing from a Celtic source, at
least owes its presence in Norse tradition to a detailed knowledge
on the part of the story-teller of such beliefs among the Celts. l4
The undoubtedly strong resemblance could, however,
also be explained by supposing that both Celtic and
Scandinavian traditions have preserved traces of archaic
UA. Ross, 'Severed Heads in Wells', 41.