Trees of the Gods
Even in the 18th and 19th centuries, there was no doubt that the roots of many giant oaks were anchored in the ancient times of the Germanic peoples. The Chatten Oak of Dagobertshausen is a good example of this.
The oak is dedicated to the thunder gods Donar and Thor and is worshipped in a sacred grove. The mighty trees stand like giant pillars, or, as Friedrich Hölderlin (1771–1843) wrote, like "a race of Titans" on the sacred site. For example, they serve the Alemanni as altars and temples. Since time immemorial, humans have sought the divine and the eternal—and in these oaks, which, as Pliny Secundus (23–79) believes, "came into being with the world," the Germanic peoples found their deity.
The Roman philosopher Seneca (c. 1–65) reports that ancient peoples still possessed an instinctive connection to the divine, which can only be found in nature. Anyone who approached a sacred grove composed of large, old trees established a connection with the deity in such a wide, densely shaded space. The temples of the Greeks and Romans, with their columns, are, like the later towers of our churches and cathedrals, a petrified image of the former sacred groves.
In addition to sacred groves as groups of special trees at a location associated with the gods, solitary oaks are also venerated. Examples of "divine oaks" include the hollow oak of Oppen near Wehlau or, located east of the Vistula near Romowe, the most powerful sanctuary of pagan Prussia. There stood an oak tree on which images of the gods Pikullos, Perkunos, and Potrimpos were attached. In the forest near Albertshofen, not far from Kitzingen in Lower Franconia, there once stood three ancient oaks called the Bils Oaks. Our pagan, nature-loving ancestors may have held large gatherings there and offered sacrifices. Such oaks also existed in ancient times near Heiligenheil, Thorn, Grünhain in Saxony, and Großbuch near Grimma. The best-known example is the Danube Oak near Geismar. The Catholic monk Boniface felled the tree, venerated by the Chatti and dedicated to Donar, in 723. Linden trees are often planted next to churches as a replacement. In France, there are also examples of oak trees being used as chapels, and the pagan symbols have given way to Christian ones.
Even after Christianity had long since become established religiously, the pagan tree sanctuaries continued to fulfill their former role. They continue to serve as court trees at former Germanic Thing sites. Various examples known from literature are mostly successors, so to speak, replacement trees for their felled predecessors.
