The
herdsman bore it to Attila, who thenceforth was believed by the Huns to
wield the Spirit of Death in battle, and their seers prophesied that
that sword was to destroy the world. A Roman, who was on an embassy to
the Hunnish camp, recorded in his memoirs Attila's acquisition of this
supernatural weapon, and the immense influence over the minds of the
barbaric tribes which its possession gave him. In the title which he
assumed we shall see the skill with which he availed himself of the
legends and creeds of other nations as well as of his own. He designated
himself "ATTILA, Descendant of the Great Nimrod. Nurtured in Engaddi. By
the grace of God, King of the Huns, the Goths, the Danes, and the Medes.
The Dread of the World."
Herbert states that Attila is represented on an old medallion with a
teraph, or a head, on his breast; and the same writer adds: "We know,
from the _Hamartigenea_ of Prudentius, that Nimrod, with a snaky-haired
head, was the object of adoration of the heretical followers of Marcion;
and the same head was the palladium set up by Antiochus Epiphanes over
the gates of Antioch, though it has been called the visage of Charon.
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