What do we know about the West Germanic/Non-North Germanic pantheon from before the christianisation of those people and how well does it line up with the Norse pantheon?

by Boccard

Are parallels such as Donnar - Thor and Wotan - Odin mythologically equal or is there simply a dominant linguistic connection?

BishopOdo

Those societies were non-literate before being Christianised thus we have no firsthand record of their cosmological beliefs. Scandinavia is a unique example because, even though it too was largely non-literate during the pagan era, strong skaldic (oral poetic) traditions preserved memory of the mythology of the region for long enough that it could be written down during the Christian Era. Most of what we think we know about Norse mythology actually derives from just one codex, written down by an Icelander called Snorri Sturluson in the 13th century. Why men such as Snorri should have wanted to preserve memory of their heathen past in comparison to, say, the Anglo-saxons, who were much less forthcoming, is up for debate.

All this being said, scholars see the deities you mentioned, as well as the Anglo-Saxon ones such as Woden and Thunor as cognate to Norse Odin/Thor etc. The available evidence suggests all the pre-Christian Germanic cultures shared a broadly similar cosmology.

I think we need to be careful however to avoid the assumption that Norse mythology (and consequently all Germanic belief systems) was uniform and coherent across time and area. I think we have a tendency to think this way because of our familiarity with Greco-Roman mythology, and also because most of our knowledge is derived from only one or two sources. Belief and practice no doubt varied widely from region to region across the several hundred years preceding the coming of Christianity.