The Goddess Hulda

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Hulda, The-Benignant.
HULD*
Alternate meanings: Hill- Lady; {Gracious-and-Beloved-Hill-Lady}.
[To Whom the tenth day of May, day 130, is dedicated.]

Geography/Culture: Teutonic: especially Suevi, Hessians, and Thuringians.
Linguistic Note: Austrian: hulda, `gracious, beloved'. The same name used in Israel comes from the Hebrew for weasel. See also Hel, linguistic note. {I think not much is known of the Hattites, or their language so no meaning is found for Hulla, Daughter of Wurusemu, and though the name is a transliteration its apparent similarity to Hulle, (below), is suggestive. Were the Teutons ever in those geographic parts?}
Description: Originally beautiful White Goddess of the sky, fertility, lakes, streams and wells; She Who is often to be seen riding on the wind accompanied by the Furious Host (the fields over which this procession passes will bear double yield in the coming year); She Who may occasionally be seen at noon bathing in a lake; She Who takes the souls of unbaptized babies to Her realm in the sky (where they become part of the Furious Host); She Who presides over the hearth, spinning and the cultiva tion of flax. Women suspected of witchcraft were said to: "ride with Holde".
Or She is described as the beneficent hollow-backed Queen of the Huldra-folk, Hill-Fairies; Goddess of mountains and hills, dance and music-making, women fecundity and marriage; Guardian of maidens.
Over the Christian years She has degenerated into a long-nosed, ugly old Hag with thick hair, sometimes seen in a forest leading a flock of sheep or goats.
To Whom Sacred: sheep; goats; snow ("Hulda is making Her bed" refers to the feathers that fly when Her bed is shaken); Hörselberg (known as Her court -- where the wild rides terminate); the Kyffhäuser mountain; harp; hypnotic songs.
Male Associates: Eckehart (who was caught up in Her ride and carried to Her court there to abide till Judgment day); Barbarossa, the sleeping king in the Kyffhäuser mountain, Thuringia.

Titles/Variants, etc:

Regarding Her association with witchcraft see Aradia, linked under Diana.
Counterpart, of South German, Berchta, Shining-One, linked under Percha.
Connected by some with Roman Bona-Dea, linked under Fauna, as a chthonic divinity.
With reference to Hulda's linguistic notes, Galanthis, (linked under Alcmene), is a Theban Goddess Whose name means weasel.
Some variants of Her name are sometimes forenamed Dame, as in Dame-Holde.
Identified with Dame-Gauden, Dame----, also the leader of a furious host.
She may have originated as Norse Hel.
Perhaps a variant: Holda, but see below..
Variant: Holde.
Variant: Holl.
Variant: Holle.
Compare with Horsel, linked under Ursel, Who is the eponym of Horselberg.
Variant: Huldra.
Variant: Hulle.
Identified by some with Percha, Who is also the leader of a furious host.
Connected by some with Persephoneia, as a chthonic divinity.

Source: Encyclopedia Britannica 13th 869b; Evans BDPF 575; Funk & Wagnall SDFML 115, 500; Graves WG 404; Monaghan BGH 144; Walker WEMS.

Holda
Description: She Who She represents black earth and love (in contrast to Hel).

Titles/Variants, etc:

Perhaps a variant of Hulda
Equated with Roman Venus.

worked on: June 27, 1990; July 9, 1990; August 6, 1991; April 11, August 23, 1993; May 1995
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