Why then is Wōden linked to our old Kings?

In England there seems to have been alot written to link Wōden to kingship.  Thus Beda Historia Ecclesiastica I, xv wrote:

“...Uoden, de cuius stirpe multarum prouinciarum regium genus originem duxit. ...”
“...Woden; from whose stock the royal race of many provinces deduce their original. ...””  

And Æthelweard, sprung from Wōden himself, notefully etches to this:

“Hi [Hengest and Horsa] nepotes fuerunt Uuoddan regis barbarorum, quem post infanda dignitate ut deum honorantes, sacrificium obtulerunt pagani, victoriae causa sive virtutis.”

“They [Hengest and Horsa] were the kinsmen of ‘Uuoddan’ king of the barbarians, whom after [his death], the pagans honouring as a god with respect not fit to be mentioned, gave sacrifice, for the cause of victory or of manliness.”

And:

“...Denique septimo anno Ida coepit regnum super provinciam quae dicitur Northambymbra, cuius prosapia regni & nobilitatis a Wothen exordium furnit.” 

“Lastly, in the seventh year afterwards, Ida began to reign in the province called Northumberland, whose ancestors derived their power and dominion from Wothen.”

[awend. J. Stevenson]

And the words of Roger of Wendover (died 1236) somewhat later allow us to understand all this as follows:

“ Wodenus igitur ex antiquorum prosapia Germanorum originem ducens, post mortem inter deos translatus est; quem veteres pro deo colentes, dedicaverunt ei quartam feriam, quam de nomine eius Wodenesday, id est diem Wodeni, nunouparunt. Hic habuit uxorem, nomine Fream, cui similiter veteres sextam feriam consecrantes, Freday, id est diem Freae, appellarunt. Genuit autem Wodenus ex uxore Frea septem filios inclytos, ex quorum suocessione septem reges traxerunt originem, qui in Britannia potenter, expulsis Britannis, postea regnaverunt. Ex filio Wodeni primogenito, nomine Wecta, reges Cantuariorum ; ex seoundo, Frehegeath, reges Merciorum ; ex tertio, Baldao, reges Westsaxonum ; ex quarto, Beldago, reges Northanhumbrorum, sive Berniciorum ; ex quinto, Wegdego, reges Deirorum ; ex sexto, Kasero, reges Orientalium Anglorum; ex septimo, Saxnad, reges Orientalium Saxonum originem habere dicuntur; octavus vero, id est, rex Australium Saxonum, ex eadem gente, sed non ex eadem stirpe, originem sumpsit."

“Woden, then, who was sprung from the stock of the ancient Germans, was translated among the gods after his death; and the ancients who worshipped him as a deity dedicated to him the fourth day of the week, which they called from his name "Wodenesday," or the day of Woden. He had a wife named Frea, to whom the ancients in like manner consecrated the sixth day, which they called " Freday," or the day of Frea. Now Woden begat of his wife Frea seven famous sons, from whom were descended seven powerful kings, who afterwards drove out the Britons and reigned in Britain. From Wecta, Woden's eldest son, the kings of Kent are said to have had their origin; from Frehegeath, the second son, the kings of the Mercians; from Balday, the third, the kings of the West-Saxons; from Beldag, the fourth, the kings of the Northumbrians, or the Bernicians; from Wegdag, the fifth, the kings of the Deiri; from Kaser, the sixth, the kings of the East-Angles; from Saxnad, the seventh, the kings of the East-Saxons ; the kings of the South- Saxons were from the same nation, but not of the same stock.”

For the historical worth of all this see [here].  And for what Snorri Sturluson's Óðin owes to this see [here].  Also mark that Roger of Wendover here makes Seaxneat "Saxnad" a son of Wōden, which would make his being the evenworth of the Northern Freyr unlikely, and yet see what follows.

But my understanding of all this claiming to be sprung from Wōden is that  the whole  "English project" if I may call us and all our history thus,  would seem to have been under the god Wōden from the outset.  Thus Robert of Gloucester writing of Hengest and Horsa:


Mi broþer & ich vor we beþ • of dukes kunne ycome • 2422
 Vor þoru ure godes in to þe se • we wende ich vnderstonde•
& mercurius us [h]aþ • ylad in to þin londe •

My brother and I for that we be of dukes' kin come

Fared through our gods, into the sea we went I understand,

and Mercurius [that is, Wōden] us has led into your [Vortigern's] land

This tradition that our kings stem from Wōden is something then that could do with being withmeted to these bits of Greek tradition.

Pausanias, Guide to Greece 10. 17. 5 (awending Jones) :

“The Iberians crossed to Sardinia, under Norax as leader of the expedition, and they founded the city of Nora. The tradition is that this was the first city in the island, and they say that Norax was a son of Erytheia, the daughter of Geryones, with Hermes for his father.”

 And from th'ilk 8. 43. 2 :

“Well, the story is that the wisest man and the best soldier among the Arcadians was one Evander, whose mother was a nymph, a daughter of the Ladon, while his father was Hermes. Sent out to establish a colony at the head of a company of Arcadians from Pallantium, he founded a city  on the banks of the river Tiber.”

Hermes being of course, together with Pan, the god of the Arcadians beyond all other Greeks.  Some of the Greeks  moreover (see Dionysius of Halicarnassus Roman Antiquities 1.61–62) said that the Trojans, and thence the Romans, so, were offshoots of the Arcadian stock.  But here we are dealing with colonies it should be marked, and the god who was thought to have led the colonists.