In Germanic mythology

Germanic mythology

Germanic mythology is a comprehensive term for myths associated with historical Germanic paganism, including Norse mythology, Anglo-Saxon mythology, Continental Germanic mythology, and other versions of the mythologies of the Germanic peoples...

, Seaxnēat or Saxnōt is a god connected with the Saxons

Saxons

The Saxons were a confederation of Germanic tribes originating on the North German plain. The Saxons earliest known area of settlement is Northern Albingia, an area approximately that of modern Holstein...

 and, as recorded in Anglo-Saxons sources, their founder and ancestor. Seaxnēat appears in the genealogies of the kings of Essex. His name does not survive in any English placenames, although the element nēat in isolation may do so. Continental Saxnōt is attested in the Old Saxon Baptismal Vow

Old Saxon Baptismal Vow

The Old Saxon Baptismal Vow is a 9th century Old Saxon baptismal vow found in Vatican Codex pal. 577. The vow mentions three Old Saxon gods; Uuôden , Thunear, and Saxnōt, which the reader is to forsake...

along with the gods Uuoden (Woden) and Thunaer (Thor).

According to William Chaney, Seaxnēat is identified as a son of Woden

Woden

Woden or Wodan is a major deity of Anglo-Saxon and Continental Germanic polytheism. Together with his Norse counterpart Odin, Woden represents a development of the Proto-Germanic god *Wōdanaz....

 and Frige

Frige

*Frijjō is the reconstructed name or epithet of a hypothesized Common Germanic love goddess giving rise to both Frigg and Freyja....

, and, more specifically, as identical with the god Tiw (Zio). Citing Gabriel Turville-Petre

Gabriel Turville-Petre

Edward Oswald Gabriel Turville-Petre F.B.A. was Professor of Ancient Icelandic Literature and Antiquities at the University of Oxford...

 and employing Georges Dumézil

Georges Dumézil

Georges Dumézil was a French comparative philologist best known for his analysis of sovereignty and power in Proto-Indo-European religion and society...

's trifunctional hypothesis

Trifunctional hypothesis

The trifunctional hypothesis of prehistoric Proto-Indo-European society postulates a tripartite ideology reflected in the existence of three classes or castes—priests, warriors, and commoners —corresponding to the three functions of the sacral, the martial and the economic, respectively...

, Rudolf Simek

Rudolf Simek

Rudolf Simek is an Austrian Germanist and Philologian.Simek studied German literature, philosophy and Catholic theology in the University of Vienna, before becoming a librarian and a docent at the institution. He taught among others in the universities of Edinburgh, Tromsø and Sydney...

 says the identification is less likely to be *Tiwaz/Týr than the god Freyr

Freyr

Freyr is one of the most important gods of Norse paganism. Freyr was highly associated with farming, weather and, as a phallic fertility god, Freyr "bestows peace and pleasure on mortals"...

.

Jacob Grimm

Jacob Grimm

Jacob Ludwig Carl Grimm was a German philologist, jurist and mythologist. He is best known as the discoverer of Grimm's Law, the author of the monumental Deutsches Wörterbuch, the author of Deutsche Mythologie and, more popularly, as one of the Brothers Grimm, as the editor of Grimm's Fairy...

 (Teutonic Mythology

Teutonic Mythology

Teutonic Mythology may refer to:*Continental Germanic mythology*Jacob Grimm's Deutsche Mythologie *Viktor Rydberg's Undersökningar i germanisk mythologi I...

) interprets the name as literally gladii consors or ensifer (the -not cognate with German ge-noss "comrade").