À la guerre comme à la guerre but with caution: Protection charms and blessings in the Germanic tradition

Even though bravery in combat represents a key value in both the Germanic heroic tradition and in the medieval courtly literature, the possibility of a struggle certainly constituted a cause of concern for medieval and early modern people. This preoccupation is seen in a series of charms, blessings and amulets aimed at averting a physical confrontation or, if this were not possible, at obtaining magical help and protection against enemies and their weapons. This wide corpus of medieval and early modern Germanic formulas will be dealt with, classified and analyzed in this study.