Editing Solar deity (section)

=== Germanic mythology ===
In [[Germanic mythology]] the Sun is personified as a woman, [[Old Norse]] [[Sól (Sun)|Sól]], [[Old High German]] [[Sól (sun)|Sunna]]. In the Norse tradition, the Sun is driven through the sky on a chariot pulled by two horses named [[Árvakr and Alsviðr]] ("Early-awake" and "All-swift". {{Citation needed|date=May 2022}}

First century historian [[Tacitus]], in his book ''[[Germania (Tacitus)|Germania]]'', mentioned that "beyond the [[Suiones]] [tribe]" a sea was located where the sun maintained its brilliance from its rising to its sunset, and that "[the] popular belief" was that "the sound of its emergence was audible" and "the form of its horses visible".<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.loebclassics.com/view/tacitus-germania/1914/pb_LCL035.207.xml |title=TACITUS, Germania LCL 35: 206-20 |website=www.loebclassics.com}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Beare |first1=W. |title=Tacitus on the Germans |journal=Greece & Rome |date=1964 |volume=11 |issue=1 |pages=64–76 |doi=10.1017/S0017383500012675 |jstor=642633 |s2cid=163536034 |issn=0017-3835}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=O'Gorman |first1=Ellen |title=No Place Like Rome: Identity and Difference in the Germania of Tacitus |journal=Ramus |date=1993 |volume=22 |issue=2 |pages=135–154 |doi=10.1017/S0048671X00002484|s2cid=131482053 }}</ref>

In Norway, Sun worship was common until the last century, usually as a simple ritual of leaving butter in a saucer on a windowsill, so the Sun can melt it, when its light comes into the window. Alternatively, the glass on the window itself could be smeared by butter, or the butter could be put on the roof or wall. Similar rituals are attested among the [[Sámi people|Sami]] people. Usually, the ritual was connected to the day, when the sun shows up from horizon or mountain (or in the eastern window of the main house of the farm) after the period of [[polar night]], when there is no sun at all, or the sun is so low, that it is hidden behind mountains. Because of these reasons, the date of the ritual varied from farm to farm, or wasn’t practiced at all (e.g. in Oslo area, which is flat and has no real polar night).{{sfn|Rise|1947}}{{sfn|Havdal|1968}}{{sfn|Skar|1916}}{{sfn|Matlaus|Olrik|1905}}

A ritual of greating the first sun after the polar night while standing on top of a mountain is mentioned by [[Procopius]] in his description of the Northerners, but is also attested in modern time in area of [[Glomfjord]], and a similar one in southern [[Vest-Agder]]. Another ritual is known from southern Vest-Agder, when small round stones are supposed to be taken up to a mountain top and put in a heap as an offering to the Spring Sun. The stone offering heaps itself are very common in Scandinavia, but only in Vest-Agder they are connected to the Sun worship.{{sfn|Matlaus|Olrik|1905}}

Among famous people, who were practicing the butter-in-saucer ritual were poets [[Ivar Mortensson-Egnund]] and [[w:nn:Astrid Krog Halse|Astrid Krog Halse]].{{sfn|Havdal|1968}}{{sfn|Matlaus|Olrik|1905}}