| While we were passing a junction, the driver told, he | | | | European and West-Asian pagan traditions, such as |
| wanted to visit a deity, because he had made a vow | | | | Finnish paganism, Sami religion, Slavic paganism, Baltic |
| some time back and turned the vehicle towards a | | | | paganism, Roman paganism, Greek paganism and |
| more isolated passage.Though he was Catholic by | | | | Vedic religion. The principal gods are known as Odin, |
| religion his faith in deity worship is not strange in Sri | | | | Thor and Tyr.The surviving accounts indicate |
| Lanka. | | | | spectacular human sacrifices. A unique eye-witness |
| Ancient nature worship and Hindu traditions are | | | | account of Germanic human sacrifice survives in Ibn |
| deeply rooted in the daily life of many | | | | Fadlan's account of a Rus ship burial, where a |
| people.Steffani, a German Praktikum (Internship) | | | | slave-girl had volunteered to accompany her master |
| student and Romy were watching intently what was | | | | with his burial.The Heimskringla tells of Swedish King |
| happening in that small temple of deity worship. But | | | | Aun who sacrificed nine of his sons in an effort to |
| the deity and nature worship is not strange to | | | | prolong his life until his subjects stopped him from |
| Europe. Before Christianity was introduced into | | | | killing his last son Egil. According to Adam of Bremen, |
| Europe, there were deities and also everywhere a | | | | the Swedish kings sacrificed male slaves every ninth |
| variety of Pagan religious practices.Pagan practices | | | | year during the Yule sacrifices at the Temple at |
| were only abolished when the Pagan temples were | | | | Uppsala.The Swedes had the right not only to elect |
| demolished by the later emperors of the Roman | | | | kings but also to depose them, and both King |
| Empire and others in the Europe. Germanic Pagan | | | | Domalde and King Olof Tratalja are said to have been |
| religion played its own part in ancient | | | | sacrificed after years of famine. |
| Germany.Germanic paganism refers to the religious | | | | Odin was associated with death by hanging, and a |
| practices of the Germanic nations preceding | | | | possible practice of Odinic sacrifice by strangling has |
| Christianization. The well documented form of | | | | some archeological support in the existence of bodies |
| Germanic paganism is 10th and 11th century Norse | | | | perfectly preserved by the acid of the Jutland peat |
| paganism. There are various references found in the | | | | bogs in Denmark, into which they were cast after |
| ancient writings of Germanic peoples and in Roman | | | | having been strangled. |
| descriptions. The information can be supplemented | | | | An example is Tollund Man. However, there were no |
| with archaeological findings and from the remnants of | | | | written accounts that explicitly interpret the cause of |
| pre-Christian beliefs in later folklore.Germanic paganism | | | | these strangling, which could obviously have other |
| was a polytheistic religion with similarities to other | | | | explanations. |