During the early 20th-century the term Männerbund gained foothold, most notably in Heinrich Schurtz’s Altersklassen und Männerbünde (1902), later developed by Lily Weiser (1927) and popularized by Otto Höfler (1934). These youth war bands were an oath-bound brotherhood structured around initiation rites and rituals that those like Höfler believed were linked to the cult of Odin.
Following theories initially proposed by Lily Weiser, in the book One eyed God: Odin and the (Indo) Germanic Männerbünde (2000) the author Kris Kershaw argues that initiation into these warrior bands involved a symbolic death & rebirth: the youth underwent a ritual death, regarding as the only “real” death, and rebirth emerging as the ancestral dead. One of the ways to become the dead would be by masks, but "mask" is not always something that covers the face, it could also be painting the body. An example cited was 1st century Roman historian Tacitus description of the Harii as a terrifying nocturnal war band who, “with black shields and painted bodies they choose dark nights to fight,” overwhelming enemies “by means of terror and shadow of a ghostly army… since no enemy can bear a sight so unexpected and hellish.” (Germania 43).
Höfler suggested the Harii were the basis for stories such as the einherjar. Additionally, he even argued that the later Perchten run and the Wild Hunt were vestiges of these pre-Christian war-bands.
In contemporary scholarship the term Männerbund is often avoided, most largely using the Proto Indo-European reconstruction kóryos. Höfler remains a controversial figure, however his research has not been dismissed. Scholars today, such as Neil Price and Jens Peter Schjødt continue to engage with his ideas; Schjødt, for instance, stresses the importance of conceptions of the dead in understanding the religious role of living warriors. Michael Speidel states “the Harii did indeed body forth Woden’s Wild Host”. Kris Kershaw has additionally stated many other scholars have come to the same conclusions as Höfler through comparative religion and analysis.
