Hretha

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English

Etymology

Learned borrowing from Old English *Hrēþe.

Proper noun

Hretha

  1. An Anglo-Saxon goddess.
    • 1993, C. P. R. Tisdale, Month of Swallows: Northumbria, England, A.D. 626–633, Edinburgh: The Pentland Press Limited, →ISBN, page 137:
      And now I stand before you as a man who would wish to serve you as warrior at the sword-play. For I have no other use. The words of the goddess Hretha I can hear no more.
    • 2009, Marilyn Dunn, The Christianization of the Anglo-Saxons c.597–c.700: Discourses of Life, Death and Afterlife, Continuum, published 2010, →ISBN, page 63:
      Alternatively, this group might consist of the goddess Frig, associated with two other female deities (possibly Eostre and Hretha?) – but we cannot be certain that the Anglo-Saxons worshipped Frig.
    • 2011, Linda Windsor, Thief (The Brides of Alba), Colorado Springs, Colo.: David C Cook, →ISBN, page 27:
      The name and image of the Saxon pagan goddess Hretha on Caden’s own shield had been beaten nearly into oblivion.
    • 2013, Yanina Stachura, “Northern Britain, AD 495”, in The Sword and the Passion, North Charleston, S.C.: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, →ISBN, page 1:
      “We ought to build a shrine to the Goddess Hretha in this place.”
    • 2017, Lucya Starza, editor, Every Day Magic – A Pagan Book of Days: 366 Magical Ways to Observe the Cycle of the Year, Winchester: Moon Books, →ISBN, page 29:
      In De Temporum Ratione, Bede states that March was called Hrethmonath by the Anglo-Saxons because they made sacrifices to the Goddess Hretha then. Hretha means fame or honour, which suggests Hretha was a warrior like Mars, who gives us the modern name March. Hrethmonath marks the end of winter, so Hretha could be seen as the Goddess who battles and defeats winter.

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