The Order of Odin

At that time all members of the assembly, along with the arrogant usurper Vortigern, are blinded; such is the protection they find for their country (it was, in fact, its destruction) that those wild Saxons, of accursed name, hated by God and men, should be admitted into the island, like wolves into folds, in order to repel the northern nations. . . . Then there breaks forth a brood of whelps from the lair of the savage lioness, in three cyulae, as it is expressed in their language, but in ours, in ships of war under full sail, with omens and divinations. In these it was foretold, there being a prophecy firmly relied upon among them, that they should occupy the country to which the bows of their ships were turned, for three hundred years; for one hundred and fifty — that is for half the time — they should make frequent devastations. They sailed out, and at the directions of the unlucky tyrant, first fixed their dreadful talons in the eastern part of the island, as men intending to fight for the country, but more truly to assail it. To these the mother of the brood, finding that success had attended the first contingent, sends out also a larger raft-full of accomplices and curs, which sails over and joins itself to their bastard comrades. From that source, the seed of iniquity, the root of bitterness, grows as a poisonous plant, worthy of our deserts, in our own soil, furnished with rugged branches and leaves.

— The Ruin and Conquest of Britain, Gildas (516?-570?)

The first rune wizards are said to have been followers of Odin, a god the peoples of the North called the All-father, whom legend tells learned magic through a great ritual of sacrifice, and who taught this knowledge to his followers. Like the wizards in the lands further south, those with his Gift of power inspired supernatural feelings of envy and dislike in the common people, but as priests of Odin they were also respected and feared by them, and had strong ties to both the ruling class and the leaders of the pagan faith. Unlike the Roman Mercurians or the Celtic druids, the early rune wizards were much more integrated into their primitive communities, often holding positions of absolute authority over them.

Very little is known about these early chieftain-priests. They were said to have been recognized for their prowess in battle, dressing in bear skins (they were sometimes called bersarkrs for this reason) and supposedly never tiring, fighting until all of their enemies were slain. Some of their earliest rune carvings may still be found in the remote places where these proto-Vikings dwelled, on gravesites and ancient monuments called runestones, in the rock of magical caves deep beneath the mountains, and in the stones of the buildings in their oldest cities.

These early people were also exceptional shipbuilders and sailors, and in the fifth and sixth centuries they spread throughout much of Scandinavia and all of eastern Britannia. Many of them came from Saxony and a part of Denmark called Engle, eventually developing into what modern historians call Anglo-Saxons. Chronicling the events of this period, a monk named Gildas wrote in his history of Britain that this invasion succeeded as God's punishment

for the Britons' many sins. By the end of the eighth century the rune wizards had managed to seize and settle all of what would become England, ruthlessly fighting back the Welsh in the west and driving off the Celtic peoples in the south, though they also suffered great losses in these battles. It was primarily these wizards who ruled the island during these years, who drove the people to conquest and victory, and it is said that in those days every village had its own rune master instead of a lord.

Over the next 100 years, through wars and trade with the many other peoples of England, the Anglo-Saxon people began to be assimilated into the Christian culture, and their model of a community ruled by a rune wizard as chieftain began to break down. Surviving descriptions of these followers of Odin make them sound like crazed fanatics, with such a pow-

The ancient magic of the rune wizards is much less ancient than the other traditions in this book, having been practiced within the living memory of the oldest magi in the Order. It is even conceivable that some of these rune wizards still live in the wild lands north of Mythic Europe, or hide in the lands once settled by their ancestors, practicing their traditional rune magic as a type of pagan hedge wizardry. Most magi believe the Order of Odin is dead and buried, however, and consider them a magical tradition from an earlier time and a distant culture. From this perspective, the magic of the Vikings and Anglo-Saxons is ancient magic, since they no longer live in the lands where it might be found. Thus, discovering their secrets is seen as a task for Seekers of ancient lore, not magi who integrate hedge traditions into Hermetic theory.

erfully negative air of magic about them that none could bear to remain in their presence. Similar to what would later happen in Scandinavia during the ninth and tenth centuries, the rune wizards began to lose the respect and obedience of the general populace, and soon came to be considered closer kin to madmen and devil-worshipers than lords and leaders, while the Dominion began to spread throughout the land and take hold of the people's hearts.

By the late 700s, Viking raiders had begun attacking sea-towns and settlements, and these war parties were often accompanied by Norse rune wizards acting as lords and generals. Their lands further north and east were becoming overpopulated, and so the most enterprising of them had set sail for Christian shores, believing that their magic and battle-prowess would bring them great wealth and power if they struck swiftly. They pillaged the coastlines and demolished villages and monasteries, taking anything of value: silver, vis, food, weapons, and slaves. What they did not value, they burned. These enterprising Vikings often attacked the Anglo-Saxon settlements in addition to those belonging to the Welsh and Britons.

And so, in about 800 AD, the most powerful rune wizards in Britain allied themselves with a Pictish sorcerer known as Damhan-Allaidh, or "the Spider." Together they proposed to eliminate all of their rivals from across the sea, the Vikings of the north as well as the Hermetic magi from the south. Many have speculated that Damhan-Allaidh belonged to their magical tradition, or at least a similar branch that used writing to produce magical effects, and that from their alliance a new form of rune magic was developed. In any case, their combined magical powers drove the Scandinavian raiders away, forcing them to strike at easier shores, but also drew the notice of Pralix and the Order of Hermes.

The Spider and his allies seem to have wanted to lure their Hermetic enemies to England to attack them directly, for their power was far greater when defending themselves and laying traps than when attacking. At first, this plan was successful, and many magi fell trying to confront Damhan-Allaidh and his army, but when Pralix managed to gain a foothold among other hedge wizards on the island, the Spider and his allies were forced to take up the offensive against them. This proved to be the downfall of the Anglo-Saxon rune wizards, for while they were fearsome in battle, they were much more vulnerable to magical counter-attacks, and the war soon took its toll on their ranks. According to the members of the Ordo Miscellany, all of the rune wizards were either defeated in the final battle or later hunted down and destroyed, completely driven from the shores of England in the years that followed.

Independent of the war against Damhan-Allaidh, the rune wizards and warriors from Scandinavia and other places to the north continued their attacks on central Europe and other parts of Britannia. Starting in about 830, the Vikings led a major assault against Ireland, sending over an army of raiders on a great fleet of ships. They landed on the eastern shore of the island and built fortifications from which they could attack the entire country. From their main stronghold in Dublin, they ravaged the whole of the Emerald Isle, and it was said that no village was safe from them.

It was there that the Scandinavian rune wizards first encountered representatives of the Order of Hermes, in the form of a group of Diedne magi from a covenant several miles northwest of their camp. The two groups clashed on the Diedne covenant grounds, unable to communicate anything more than threats to each other, each assessing the other's magical strengths and weaknesses. Although much of the rune wizards' magic was unhindered by the Parma Magica, they were generally unable to affect the magi directly, and the Vikings

were eventually routed. However, the magi realized that they were unusually vulnerable to these attackers, and they were troubled. They brought word of these strange northern wizards to the Grand Tribunal of 832, where those who had heard of their pagan faith and their Anglo-Saxon kin dubbed them members of "The Order of Odin."

In 837 a delegation of primarily Irish magi from many different Houses, led by Máel-tuili of Merinita, sought out the rune wizards and attempted to parley with them. At first, the Viking leaders were abusive and demanded to know their secrets, but after hours of negotiation the rune wizards eventually agreed that they would leave in peace if the magi paid to them a tribute of 3,000 pounds of silver and forty pawns of vis. This price was arranged, but soon after they had it in hand the Vikings reneged on the deal and attacked. The leaders of both parties fell in the subsequent battle, and many other magi and wizards were killed. The news of this betrayal stirred equal parts of outrage and horror in the local magi and throughout the Order, but no immediate action was taken.

Soon more Vikings arrived in Ireland and reinforced their camps, and the frequency and range of the periodic attacks increased as the Norsemen realized just how much wealth there was to be had. The invaders came in even greater numbers, and other bands landed in Scotland, England, France, Germany, and Russia. A substantial raiding party nearly captured Paris in 845, and in 865 a great army of Vikings landed in East Anglia and proceeded through kingdom after kingdom, subduing or killing everyone who opposed them. For most of the latter part of the ninth century, the Vikings were a terrifying menace to all of northern Europe, and the so-called Order of Odin seemed a very real threat.

Many of the magi in the northern Tribunals felt that it was the interference of Máel-tuili that had endangered them all and brought ruin upon their lands. Instead of joining in war against the rune wizards, most of these magi went into hiding, especially the magi of House Diedne. At the Britannian Tribunal of 851, the Diedne Primus Obregon declared that the magi of his House would "no longer protect our undeserving sodales from the enemy," but instead would "respect the Code from within the safety of our secret mounds and hidden dales." Nearly all interaction between covenants and magi in the region broke down for about 20 years, and remained sporadic for much of the following century, but forever after the Irish Diedne remained apart from their sodales and never participated in the local Tribunals again.

The rune wizards may have seemed to the magi of the Order of Hermes to have been united as part of a great organization with plans to invade Christendom, but it is more likely that they were simply opportunists who had allied themselves with bands of warriors in search of adventure, property, and status. However, the idea of the "Order of Odin" became so well-known that some of the rune wizards proudly took the name during this era, as a sort of battle-cry or badge of honor. A great many magi distinguished themselves in retaliatory strikes against the enemy's camps and ships, and made forays into the North to wreak havoc in their homeland. Though war was never declared, nonetheless a great many Hermetic war heroes emerged from these conflicts.

As both rune wizards and magi were killed off in these skirmishes, the invaders' non-magical kin began to settle the lands they had captured, and by about 950 the raids had almost entirely ceased. The attention of the Order of Hermes soon turned to other matters, including the Schism War, and over time the Christian faith spread among the Norse peoples in their homelands and the lands they had conquered, bringing with it the Dominion and a disdain for the old, warlike ways of their pagan ancestors. Most of the rune wizards that remained in European lands are believed to have either joined the Order or retreated into the wilderness, to hide from their own civilization and culture, and soon they became nothing more than a legend, even among their own people.