page_title: Wayland the Smith
section_title: Earliest evidence
hierarchical_section_title: Wayland the Smith / Attestations / Earliest evidence
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Goldener Solidus, 1948 bei Schweindorf, Ostfriesland gefunden. Datiert 575-625.
context_page_description: In Germanic mythology, Wayland the Smith is a legendary master blacksmith, described by Jessie Weston as "the weird and malicious craftsman, Weyland".
  Wayland's story is most clearly told in the Old Norse sources Völundarkviða and Þiðreks saga. In them, Wayland is a smith who is enslaved by a king. Wayland takes revenge by killing the king's sons and then escapes by crafting a winged cloak and flying away. A number of other visual and textual sources clearly allude to similar stories, most prominently the Old English poem Deor and the Franks Casket.
  Wayland is also mentioned in passing in a wide range of texts, such as the Old English Waldere and Beowulf, as the maker of weapons and armour. He is mentioned in the German poems about Theoderic the Great as the Father of Witige.
context_section_description: The oldest possible reference known to Wayland the Smith is a gold solidus with a Frisian runic inscription ᚹᛖᛚᚩᛞᚢ wela[n]du 'wayland'. It is not certain whether the coin depicts the legendary smith or bears the name of a moneyer who happened to be called Wayland (perhaps because he had taken the name of the legendary smith as an epithet). The coin was found near Schweindorf, in the region Ostfriesland in north-west Germany, and is dated AD 575–625.
caption: Gold solidius dated AD 575−625; wela(n)du in runes of the Elder Futhark. Found near Schweindorf, East Frisia, Germany.
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