In the spring of the year 772 Charlemagne led a large army of Franks against the Saxons. He first took the fortress of Eresburg and then went into Saxon territory, destroying everything and obtaining a great booty of gold and silver.
But before leaving the place he had the Irminsul destroyed. . This is what the chronicles say. But what was the Irminsul And why was it so important to kill him?
In the year 865 a Benedictine monk named Rudolf of Fulda described in his introduction to the translation of De miraculis sancti Alexandri (the work of the monk Meginhard) as the Saxons worshiped a large vertically placed trunk, which they called Irminsul (in Latin translated as column universalis ) that held it all. It would be a pillar that, metaphorically, would connect heaven and earth, supporting the entire Universe, and that has many similarities with the Norse Yggdrasil .
It was located, according to the chronicles, near Eresburg (today Obermarsberg). For this reason, it is sometimes located in Externsteine, a megalithic complex of rock formations that resemble towers, located near the Teutoburg Forest, which some consider the main sanctuary of the Saxons, and which is only 45 kilometers from Eresburg. In fact, the Nazis would create a foundation dedicated to the search for the Irminsul and to the study of the place, making it the spiritual center of German nationalism.
Some researchers associate the Irminsul with the Germanic god Irmin , whose name is inferred precisely from the Irminsul without knowing for sure if he was the main god or demi-god of the Saxons, which at the moment is a circle with no way out.
What is known is that Old Norse Irmin translates as Jörmunr , which curiously is one of Odin's names. Some authors believe that Irmin it simply means great god and identify it with the Norse Yggdrasil and with the god Heimdal. Thus, the Irminsul (Yggdrasil ) would be the tree-bridge that would connect heaven and earth, guarded by the guardian Heimdal, who at the same time would be the god of men . Let us remember that in Norse mythology Heimdal is the son of Odin, and the guardian of the abode of the gods and of the Bifrost , the rainbow that acts as a bridge to Asgard.
Why Charlemagne destroyed the Irminsul it was clearly to weaken the old pagan cults and favor the spread of Christianity. Precisely in Externsteine there is a Christian relief of the descent of Jesus from the cross, in which researchers believe that the Irminsul is represented. , like a kind of trunk in the shape of a chair to the right of the cross.
However, today historians do not believe that there is any evidence connecting the Irminsul with Externsteine, and furthermore the excavations have also found no evidence that the site was a Saxon sanctuary, or that it was used for religious purposes before Christianity.
The only thing certain is that the Irminsul it was a column or pillar, made of oak or another type of tree, that the Saxons revered as a spiritual or material connection between heaven and earth. If there were more Irminsul that the one destroyed by Charlemagne, or if this was the main one or the only one, is something we may never know.