Table Of ContentTHE OERA LINDA BOOK
Thet Oera Linda Bok
Translated from the Frisian by
Frank H. Pierce IV
Copyright 198) by Frank H. Pierce IV
206 Franklin Ave.
Silver Spring, Md. 20901
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Preface
When THE OERA LINDA BOOK first came to light, around the
middle of the nineteenth century, it was attacked forthwith
from all quarters and denounced as a fraud. These detrac
tors among the scholarly and journalistic establishment
feared the implication of this history, namely that the
Teutonic or Northern nations did not consist of quaint, back
ward savages who so remained until their contact with the so
called high civilizations of the South and East, but rather
an enlightened, seafaring people whose ethical philosophy
and metaphysics show an advanced level of thinking, who were,
moreover, the basis of much classical mythology.
In the year 1848, Cornelius over de Linden, master ship
wright at the Royal Netherlands Dockyards at Helder, near
the West Frisian island of Texel came, through his Aunt
Aafjie Meylhof, into possession of a text or collection of
several writings which had been in the care of his departed
grandfather, Andries over ae Linden. The works were written
in an unusual script and Cornelius may have studied runes in
hopes of understanding it. Not being himself a scholar and
thus unaware of the possible import of his possession, he
waited nineteen years to present it to a Dr. Elco Verwijs,
Archivist of the Province Friesland, who, seeing that it was
written in an ancient Frisian, asked the Frisian Society,
FRIESCH GENOOTSCHAP for support in the translation and pub
lication of the writings; this was not granted. Finally,
the cause of THE OERA LINDA BOOK was taken up by a Dr. J. G.
Ottema who edited, translated the works into Netherlands and
published them in two editions, one in 1872 and another in
1876 which is used in this English translation.
One factor which weighs heavily in favour of the text's
authenticity is that the knowledge that the West Frisian
Islands were once part of the mainland is only 80 to 90
years old; Cornelius over de Linden, therefore, could not
have had access to this information when he first brought
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the writings to public attention.
Moreover, investigation into the amount of C in the
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growth rings of the ancient bristlecone pine has revealed
that the decrease in the amount of the radioactive carbon is
not constant as once thought, for some very old tree rings
show more C than one had expected of them.
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This has caused a revolution in thinking about early
history. The so-called megalithic tombs of Northern and
Western Europe can no longer be understood as imitations of
Mediterranean or Near Eastern designs such as those of
Mycenae or Egypt simply because they are older. Further
more, it has been demonstrated that there was considerable
use of metalurgy on the Danube by at least 4000 B.C. In
other words, the North-West rather than the South-East was
the cradle of civilization, if indeed there were such a
thing.
If, after reading THE OERA LINDA BOOK, one examines the
concentrations of ancient monuments and tombs in Europe, one
shall find that they occur in those lands which are men
tioned as once belonging to Frya, and, indeed, in modern
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Friesland as well. One must also notice the abrupt gaps,
in the continuity, of these most ancient finds, in eastern
Britain and in the Low Countries. It seems highly unlikely
that people mysteriously chose not to build any tombs or
monuments in those areas. It is rather more likely that
there were once tombs and monuments there but that one of
the natural disasters mentioned in THE OERA LINDA BOOK,
such as the sinking of Aldland, overwhelmed the structures
in floods, for these sudden absences of tombs and monuments
are noticeable mainly in coastal lowl~nds near or on the
southern North Sea.
It is clear that there was some connection between the
builders of Stonehenge and the Ring of Brogar in the Orkney
Islands and the people upon whom THE OERA LINDA BOOK is
based. Their age bears witness to the truth of this book,
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but they have yet had little else to tell.
From the time of Martin Luther, it has been the intention
of translators not to produce the greatest possible likeness
of the original text, but rather to create new literature
based on the original work. While this may allow the trans
lator to write better, more readable prose, it keeps one
from a truer understanding of the work at hand. One has in
deed little more than secondary literature.
This is a great fault of the other translation, of THE
OERA LINDA BOOK, by William R. Sandbach, published in 1876.
In an attempt to render the text in good, standard-modern
English, Mr. Sandbach has diluted and well has lost the
character of these writings, and therewith some of their
meaning.
Furthermore, there are a number of mistakes in the
Sandbach rendering which I, though not undertaking a criti
que of his work, have noticed. The following is a list of
some of these mistakes:
Book or Chapter Frisian Sandbach Pierce
-Adela followers storsta cleverest stoutest
How the bad time drivande kwik drift driven animals
came
-Konered manniska creatures people
juttar trawlers beachcombers
throughout the heinde heathenish near
book
Tale of Jon Umb that Kalta missing Because Kalta
hira selva herself trusted
naut to fiil not too many,
bitroada,
-Frethorik and Tha us missing from When our king
Wiliow kening that Wm. Sandbach's understood that,
understande, and Dr. he led us back.
led-er us Ottema's
to bek. translations
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The text speaks of Frisians or FRYAS in both a broad and a
narrow sense. At first, it is a general name for all those
mNorthern European stock or Frya's children, who were con
federated under the authority of the Folksmother at Texalnd.
But then, as they became false to the teaching of Frya and
thus to the ideas of their own race, the definition of FRYAS
shrank until it applied only to those regions which are yet
known as Frisian. When the Frisians themselves became cor
rupt, their name became only a vestige.
So as not to impose my own sense upon the writings, and
thereby risk making the collection a thing of my own creation,
I have not tampered with Dr. Ottema's punctuation and capital
ization save to keep the text from complete obscurity. The
reader might note, for example, that I capitalize "earth"
only when speaking of the Earth Mother. The grammar might
well offend the modern sensibilities with its run-on sen
tences and compound negatives. Such irregularities are
attributed to the fact that, in 1256, when Hiddo oera Linda
produced the last translation of his books, at least the
Northern European languages were in a state of flux. There
was, during the time of Hiddo oera Linda, a confluence of
dialects and even language; there were no hard, fast standards
of grammar and spelling to distinguish proper from improper
usage. This resulted in the quickness of linguistic evolution
which was experienced in those days. This is further com
plicated by the wont of scribes, of that period, to modify
older texts so that they might be better understood by the
public; hence, mixed texts, those which contain elements of
more than one period. Therefore is the relative modernity of
many of the references made in this book no cause to doubt
the antiquity of its sources.
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A Short Glossary
burgh: a citadel or the city associated with a citadel
foddik: the perpetually burning lamp
grave: in this text, a man of high rank in a burgh
Kroder: the point which turns around the yule-wheel
roundeal: a piece of land which completely encircles a
building
thorp. small town, village
wit, wost, have wost, I wot, thou wost, he, she, it wot, we,
you, they wit:
verb to know, properly intransitive but also
used as a transitive verb in this text
yule: the year-cycle as represented by a six spoked wheel
Some Major Events from THE OERA LINDA BOOK
Listed by their Christian Dates
B.C.
2193 the sinking of Aldland
2092 Finns and Magyar in East Skenland
2000 Tunis landed on the Phoenician coast
1630 war of the burghmaids, Kalta and Minerva
1188 records made of Ulysus at Frya's burgh
591 loss of the Denmarks
circa
320 Alexander the Great brought some Fryas back from the
Punjab.
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