William Tell

: Curious Myths Of The Middle Ages

I suppose that most people regard William Tell, the hero of

Switzerland, as an historical character, and visit the scenes made

memorable by his exploits, with corresponding interest, when they

undertake the regular Swiss round.



It is one of the painful duties of the antiquarian to dispel many a

popular belief, and to probe the groundlessness of many an historical

statement. The antiquarian is sometimes di posed to ask with Pilate,

"What is truth?" when he finds historical facts crumbling beneath his

touch into mythological fables; and he soon learns to doubt and

question the most emphatic declarations of, and claims to,

reliability.



Sir Walter Raleigh, in his prison, was composing the second volume of

his History of the World. Leaning on the sill of his window, he

meditated on the duties of the historian to mankind, when suddenly

his attention was attracted by a disturbance in the court-yard before

his cell. He saw one man strike another whom he supposed by his dress

to be an officer; the latter at once drew his sword, and ran the

former through the body. The wounded man felled his adversary with a

stick, and then sank upon the pavement. At this juncture the guard

came up, and carried off the officer insensible, and then the corpse

of the man who had been run through.



Next day Raleigh was visited by an intimate friend, to whom he related

the circumstances of the quarrel and its issue. To his astonishment,

his friend unhesitatingly declared that the prisoner had mistaken the

whole series of incidents which had passed before his eyes.



The supposed officer was not an officer at all, but the servant of a

foreign ambassador; it was he who had dealt the first blow; he had not

drawn his sword, but the other had snatched it from his side, and had

run him through the body before any one could interfere; whereupon a

stranger from among the crowd knocked the murderer down with his

stick, and some of the foreigners belonging to the ambassador's

retinue carried off the corpse. The friend of Raleigh added that

government had ordered the arrest and immediate trial of the murderer,

as the man assassinated was one of the principal servants of the

Spanish ambassador.



"Excuse me," said Raleigh, "but I cannot have been deceived as you

suppose, for I was eye-witness to the events which took place under my

own window, and the man fell there on that spot where you see a

paving-stone standing up above the rest."



"My dear Raleigh," replied his friend, "I was sitting on that stone

when the fray took place, and I received this slight scratch on my

cheek in snatching the sword from the murderer; and upon my word of

honor, you have been deceived upon every particular."



Sir Walter, when alone, took up the second volume of his History,

which was in MS., and contemplating it, thought--"If I cannot believe

my own eyes, how can I be assured of the truth of a tithe of the

events which happened ages before I was born?" and he flung the

manuscript into the fire.[26]



Now, I think that I can show that the story of William Tell is as

fabulous as--what shall I say? any other historical event.



It is almost too well known to need repetition.



In the year 1307, Gessler, Vogt of the Emperor Albert of Hapsburg, set

a hat on a pole, as symbol of imperial power, and ordered every one

who passed by to do obeisance towards it. A mountaineer of the name of

Tell boldly traversed the space before it without saluting the

abhorred symbol. By Gessler's command he was at once seized and

brought before him. As Tell was known to be an expert archer, he was

ordered, by way of punishment, to shoot an apple off the head of his

own son. Finding remonstrance vain, he submitted. The apple was placed

on the child's head, Tell bent his bow, the arrow sped, and apple and

arrow fell together to the ground. But the Vogt noticed that Tell,

before shooting, had stuck another arrow into his belt, and he

inquired the reason.



"It was for you," replied the sturdy archer. "Had I shot my child,

know that it would not have missed your heart."



This event, observe, took place in the beginning of the fourteenth

century. But Saxo Grammaticus, a Danish writer of the twelfth century,

tells the story of a hero of his own country, who lived in the tenth

century. He relates the incident in horrible style as follows:--



"Nor ought what follows to be enveloped in silence. Toki, who had for

some time been in the king's service, had, by his deeds, surpassing

those of his comrades, made enemies of his virtues. One day, when he

had drunk too much, he boasted to those who sat at table with him,

that his skill in archery was such, that with the first shot of an

arrow he could hit the smallest apple set on the top of a stick at a

considerable distance. His detractors, hearing this, lost no time in

conveying what he had said to the king (Harald Bluetooth). But the

wickedness of this monarch soon transformed the confidence of the

father to the jeopardy of the son, for he ordered the dearest pledge

of his life to stand in place of the stick, from whom, if the utterer

of the boast did not at his first shot strike down the apple, he

should with his head pay the penalty of having made an idle boast. The

command of the king urged the soldier to do this, which was so much

more than he had undertaken, the detracting artifices of the others

having taken advantage of words spoken when he was hardly sober. As

soon as the boy was led forth, Toki carefully admonished him to

receive the whir of the arrow as calmly as possible, with attentive

ears, and without moving his head, lest by a slight motion of the body

he should frustrate the experience of his well-tried skill. He also

made him stand with his back towards him, lest he should be frightened

at the sight of the arrow. Then he drew three arrows from his quiver,

and the very first he shot struck the proposed mark. Toki being asked

by the king why he had taken so many more arrows out of his quiver,

when he was to make but one trial with his bow, 'That I might avenge

on thee,' he replied, 'the error of the first, by the points of the

others, lest my innocence might happen to be afflicted, and thy

injustice go unpunished.'"



The same incident is told of Egil, brother of the mythical Velundr,

in the Saga of Thidrik.



In Norwegian history also it appears with variations again and again.

It is told of King Olaf the Saint (d. 1030), that, desiring the

conversion of a brave heathen named Eindridi, he competed with him in

various athletic sports; he swam with him, wrestled, and then shot

with him. The king dared Eindridi to strike a writing-tablet from off

his son's head with an arrow. Eindridi prepared to attempt the

difficult shot. The king bade two men bind the eyes of the child and

hold the napkin, so that he might not move when he heard the whistle

of the arrow. The king aimed first, and the arrow grazed the lad's

head. Eindridi then prepared to shoot; but the mother of the boy

interfered, and persuaded the king to abandon this dangerous test of

skill. In this version, also, Eindridi is prepared to revenge himself

on the king, should the child be injured.



But a closer approximation still to the Tell myth is found in the life

of Hemingr, another Norse archer, who was challenged by King Harald,

Sigurd's son (d. 1066). The story is thus told:--



"The island was densely overgrown with wood, and the people went into

the forest. The king took a spear and set it with its point in the

soil, then he laid an arrow on the string and shot up into the air.

The arrow turned in the air and came down upon the spear-shaft and

stood up in it. Hemingr took another arrow and shot up; his was lost

to sight for some while, but it came back and pierced the nick of the

king's arrow.... Then the king took a knife and stuck it into an oak;

he next drew his bow and planted an arrow in the haft of the knife.

Thereupon Hemingr took his arrows. The king stood by him and said,

'They are all inlaid with gold; you are a capital workman.' Hemingr

answered, 'They are not my manufacture, but are presents.' He shot,

and his arrow cleft the haft, and the point entered the socket of the

blade.



"'We must have a keener contest,' said the king, taking an arrow and

flushing with anger; then he laid the arrow on the string and drew his

bow to the farthest, so that the horns were nearly brought to meet.

Away flashed the arrow, and pierced a tender twig. All said that this

was a most astonishing feat of dexterity. But Hemingr shot from a

greater distance, and split a hazel nut. All were astonished to see

this. Then said the king, 'Take a nut and set it on the head of your

brother Bjorn, and aim at it from precisely the same distance. If you

miss the mark, then your life goes.'



"Hemingr answered, 'Sire, my life is at your disposal, but I will not

adventure that shot.' Then out spake Bjorn--'Shoot, brother, rather

than die yourself.' Hemingr said, 'Have you the pluck to stand quite

still without shrinking?' 'I will do my best,' said Bjorn. 'Then let

the king stand by,' said Hemingr, 'and let him see whether I touch the

nut.'



"The king agreed, and bade Oddr Ufeigs' son stand by Bjorn, and see

that the shot was fair. Hemingr then went to the spot fixed for him by

the king, and signed himself with the cross, saying, 'God be my

witness that I had rather die myself than injure my brother Bjorn; let

all the blame rest on King Harald.'



"Then Hemingr flung his spear. The spear went straight to the mark,

and passed between the nut and the crown of the lad, who was not in

the least injured. It flew farther, and stopped not till it fell.



"Then the king came up and asked Oddr what he thought about the

shot."



Years after, this risk was revenged upon the hard-hearted monarch. In

the battle of Stamfordbridge an arrow from a skilled archer penetrated

the windpipe of the king, and it is supposed to have sped, observes

the Saga writer, from the bow of Hemingr, then in the service of the

English monarch.



The story is related somewhat differently in the Faroe Isles, and is

told of Geyti, Aslak's son. The same Harald asks his men if they know

who is his match in strength. "Yes," they reply; "there is a peasant's

son in the uplands, Geyti, son of Aslak, who is the strongest of men."

Forth goes the king, and at last rides up to the house of Aslak. "And

where is your youngest son?"



"Alas! alas! he lies under the green sod of Kolrin kirkgarth." "Come,

then, and show me his corpse, old man, that I may judge whether he was

as stout of limb as men say."



The father puts the king off with the excuse that among so many dead

it would be hard to find his boy. So the king rides away over the

heath. He meets a stately man returning from the chase, with a bow

over his shoulder. "And who art thou, friend?" "Geyti, Aslak's son."

The dead man, in short, alive and well. The king tells him he has

heard of his prowess, and is come to match his strength with him. So

Geyti and the king try a swimming-match.



The king swims well; but Geyti swims better, and in the end gives the

monarch such a ducking, that he is borne to his house devoid of sense

and motion. Harald swallows his anger, as he had swallowed the water,

and bids Geyti shoot a hazel nut from off his brother's head. Aslak's

son consents, and invites the king into the forest to witness his

dexterity.



"On the string the shaft he laid,

And God hath heard his prayer;

He shot the little nut away,

Nor hurt the lad a hair."



Next day the king sends for the skilful bowman:--



"List thee, Geyti, Aslak's son,

And truly tell to me,

Wherefore hadst thou arrows twain

In the wood yestreen with thee?"



The bowman replies,--



"Therefore had I arrows twain

Yestreen in the wood with me,

Had I but hurt my brother dear,

The other had piercA(C)d thee."



A very similar tale is told also in the celebrated Malleus Maleficarum

of a man named Puncher, with this difference, that a coin is placed on

the lad's head instead of an apple or a nut. The person who had dared

Puncher to the test of skill, inquires the use of the second arrow in

his belt, and receives the usual answer, that if the first arrow had

missed the coin, the second would have transfixed a certain heart

which was destitute of natural feeling.



We have, moreover, our English version of the same story in the

venerable ballad of William of Cloudsley.



The Finn ethnologist CastrA(C)n obtained the following tale in the

Finnish village of Uhtuwa:--



A fight took place between some freebooters and the inhabitants of the

village of AlajA¤wi. The robbers plundered every house, and carried off

amongst their captives an old man. As they proceeded with their spoils

along the strand of the lake, a lad of twelve years old appeared from

among the reeds on the opposite bank, armed with a bow, and amply

provided with arrows; he threatened to shoot down the captors unless

the old man, his father, were restored to him. The robbers mockingly

replied that the aged man would be given to him if he could shoot an

apple off his head. The boy accepted the challenge, and on

successfully accomplishing it, the surrender of the venerable captive

was made.



Farid-Uddin A,ttar was a Persian dealer in perfumes, born in the year

1119. He one day was so impressed with the sight of a dervish, that he

sold his possessions, and followed righteousness. He composed the poem

Mantic UttaA-r, or the language of birds. Observe, the Persian A,ttar

lived at the same time as the Danish Saxo, and long before the birth

of Tell. Curiously enough, we find a trace of the Tell myth in the

pages of his poem. According to him, however, the king shoots the

apple from the head of a beloved page, and the lad dies from sheer

fright, though the arrow does not even graze his skin.



The coincidence of finding so many versions of the same story

scattered through countries as remote as Persia and Iceland,

Switzerland and Denmark, proves, I think, that it can in no way be

regarded as history, but is rather one of the numerous household myths

common to the whole stock of Aryan nations. Probably, some one more

acquainted with Sanskrit literature than myself, and with better

access to its unpublished stores of fable and legend, will some day

light on an early Indian tale corresponding to that so prevalent among

other branches of the same family. The coincidence of the Tell myth

being discovered among the Finns is attributable to Russian or Swedish

influence. I do not regard it as a primeval Turanian, but as an Aryan

story, which, like an erratic block, is found deposited on foreign

soil far from the mountain whence it was torn.



German mythologists, I suppose, consider the myth to represent the

manifestation of some natural phenomena, and the individuals of the

story to be impersonifications of natural forces. Most primeval

stories were thus constructed, and their origin is traceable enough.

In Thorn-rose, for instance, who can fail to see the earth goddess

represented by the sleeping beauty in her long winter slumber, only

returning to life when kissed by the golden-haired sun-god PhA"bus

or Baldur? But the Tell myth has not its signification thus painted

on the surface; and those who suppose Gessler or Harald to be the

power of evil and darkness,--the bold archer to be the storm-cloud

with his arrow of lightning and his iris bow, bent against the sun,

which is resting like a coin or a golden apple on the edge of the

horizon, are over-straining their theories, and exacting too much from

our credulity.



In these pages and elsewhere I have shown how some of the ancient

myths related by the whole Aryan family of nations are reducible to

allegorical explanations of certain well-known natural phenomena; but

I must protest against the manner in which our German friends fasten

rapaciously upon every atom of history, sacred and profane, and

demonstrate all heroes to represent the sun; all villains to be the

demons of night or winter; all sticks and spears and arrows to be the

lightning; all cows and sheep and dragons and swans to be clouds.



In a work on the superstition of Werewolves, I have entered into this

subject with some fulness, and am quite prepared to admit the premises

upon which mythologists construct their theories; at the same time I

am not disposed to run to the extravagant lengths reached by some of

the most enthusiastic German scholars. A wholesome warning to these

gentlemen was given some years ago by an ingenious French

ecclesiastic, who wrote the following argument to prove that Napoleon

Bonaparte was a mythological character. Archbishop Whately's "Historic

Doubts" was grounded on a totally different line of argument; I

subjoin the other, as a curiosity and as a caution.



Napoleon is, says the writer, an impersonification of the sun.



1. Between the name Napoleon and Apollo, or Apoleon, the god of the

sun, there is but a trifling difference; indeed, the seeming

difference is lessened, if we take the spelling of his name from the

column of the Place VendA'me, where it stands NA(C)apoleA cubed. But this

syllable Ne prefixed to the name of the sun-god is of importance;

like the rest of the name it is of Greek origin, and is I1/2I. or I1/2I+-I¹,

a particle of affirmation, as though indicating Napoleon as the very

true Apollo, or sun.



His other name, Bonaparte, makes this apparent connection between the

French hero and the luminary of the firmament conclusively certain.

The day has its two parts, the good and luminous portion, and that

which is bad and dark. To the sun belongs the good part, to the moon

and stars belongs the bad portion. It is therefore natural that Apollo

or NA(C)-ApoleA cubedn should receive the surname of Bonaparte.



2. Apollo was born in Delos, a Mediterranean island; Napoleon in

Corsica, an island in the same sea. According to Pausanias, Apollo was

an Egyptian deity; and in the mythological history of the fabulous

Napoleon we find the hero in Egypt, regarded by the inhabitants with

veneration, and receiving their homage.



3. The mother of Napoleon was said to be Letitia, which signifies joy,

and is an impersonification of the dawn of light dispensing joy and

gladness to all creation. Letitia is no other than the break of day,

which in a manner brings the sun into the world, and "with rosy

fingers opes the gates of Day." It is significant that the Greek name

for the mother of Apollo was Leto. From this the Romans made the name

Latona, which they gave to his mother. But LAto is the unused form

of the verb lAtor, and signified to inspire joy; it is from this

unused form that the substantive Letitia is derived. The identity,

then, of the mother of Napoleon with the Greek Leto and the Latin

Latona, is established conclusively.



4. According to the popular story, this son of Letitia had three

sisters; and was it not the same with the Greek deity, who had the

three Graces?



5. The modern Gallic Apollo had four brothers. It is impossible not to

discern here the anthropomorphosis of the four seasons. But, it will

be objected, the seasons should be females. Here the French language

interposes; for in French the seasons are masculine, with the

exception of autumn, upon the gender of which grammarians are

undecided, whilst Autumnus in Latin is not more feminine than the

other seasons. This difficulty is therefore trifling, and what follows

removes all shadow of doubt.



Of the four brothers of Napoleon, three are said to have been kings,

and these of course are, Spring reigning over the flowers, Summer

reigning over the harvest, Autumn holding sway over the fruits. And as

these three seasons owe all to the powerful influence of the Sun, we

are told in the popular myth that the three brothers of Napoleon drew

their authority from him, and received from him their kingdoms. But if

it be added that, of the four brothers of Napoleon, one was not a

king, that was because he is the impersonification of Winter, which

has no reign over anything. If, however, it be asserted, in

contradiction, that the winter has an empire, he will be given the

principality over snows and frosts, which, in the dreary season of the

year, whiten the face of the earth. Well, the fourth brother of

Napoleon is thus invested by popular tradition, commonly called

history, with a vain principality accorded to him in the decline of

the power of Napoleon. The principality was that of Canino, a name

derived from cani, or the whitened hairs of a frozen old age,--true

emblem of winter. To the eyes of poets, the forests covering the hills

are their hair, and when winter frosts them, they represent the snowy

locks of a decrepit nature in the old age of the year:--



"Cum gelidus crescit canis in montibus humor."



Consequently the Prince of Canino is an impersonification of

winter;--winter whose reign begins when the kingdoms of the three fine

seasons are passed from them, and when the sun is driven from his

power by the children of the North, as the poets call the boreal

winds. This is the origin of the fabulous invasion of France by the

allied armies of the North. The story relates that these invaders--the

northern gales--banished the many-colored flag, and replaced it by a

white standard. This too is a graceful, but, at the same time, purely

fabulous account of the Northern winds driving all the brilliant

colors from the face of the soil, to replace them by the snowy sheet.



6. Napoleon is said to have had two wives. It is well known that the

classic fable gave two also to Apollo. These two were the moon and the

earth. Plutarch asserts that the Greeks gave the moon to Apollo for

wife, whilst the Egyptians attributed to him the earth. By the moon he

had no posterity, but by the other he had one son only, the little

Horus. This is an Egyptian allegory, representing the fruits of

agriculture produced by the earth fertilized by the Sun. The pretended

son of the fabulous Napoleon is said to have been born on the 20th of

March, the season of the spring equinox, when agriculture is assuming

its greatest period of activity.



7. Napoleon is said to have released France from the devastating

scourge which terrorized over the country, the hydra of the

revolution, as it was popularly called. Who cannot see in this a

Gallic version of the Greek legend of Apollo releasing Hellas from the

terrible Python? The very name revolution, derived from the Latin

verb revolvo, is indicative of the coils of a serpent like the

Python.



8. The famous hero of the 19th century had, it is asserted, twelve

Marshals at the head of his armies, and four who were stationary and

inactive. The twelve first, as may be seen at once, are the signs of

the zodiac, marching under the orders of the sun Napoleon, and each

commanding a division of the innumerable host of stars, which are

parted into twelve portions, corresponding to the twelve signs. As for

the four stationary officers, immovable in the midst of general

motion, they are the cardinal points.



9. It is currently reported that the chief of these brilliant armies,

after having gloriously traversed the Southern kingdoms, penetrated

North, and was there unable to maintain his sway. This too represents

the course of the Sun, which assumes its greatest power in the South,

but after the spring equinox seeks to reach the North; and after a

three months' march towards the boreal regions, is driven back upon

his traces following the sign of Cancer, a sign given to represent

the retrogression of the sun in that portion of the sphere. It is on

this that the story of the march of Napoleon towards Moscow, and his

humbling retreat, is founded.



10. Finally, the sun rises in the East and sets in the Western sea.

The poets picture him rising out of the waters in the East, and

setting in the ocean after his twelve hours' reign in the sky. Such is

the history of Napoleon, coming from his Mediterranean isle, holding

the reins of government for twelve years, and finally disappearing in

the mysterious regions of the great Atlantic.



To those who see in Samson, the image of the sun, the correlative of

the classic Hercules, this clever skit of the accomplished French AbbA(C)

may prove of value as a caution.



FOOTNOTE:



[26] This anecdote is taken from the Journal de Paris, May, 1787;

but whence did the Journal obtain it?