precursor to Modern English rune. The second element in the Gothic haliurunnae may however instead be an agent noun from the verb rinnan ("to run, go"), which would make its literal meaning "one who travels to the netherworld". Proto-Germanic *xalja-wītjan (or *halja-wītjan) is reconstructed from Old Norse hel-víti 'hell', Old English helle-wíte 'hell-torment, hell', Old Saxon helli-wīti 'hell', and the Middle High German feminine noun helle-wīze. The compound is a compound of *xaljō (discussed above) and *wītjan (reconstructed from forms such as Old English witt 'right mind, wits', Old Saxon gewit 'understanding', and Gothic un-witi 'foolishness, understanding'). Religion, mythology, and folklore Hell appears in several mythologies and religions. It is commonly inhabited by demons and the souls of dead people. A fable about hell which recurs in folklore across several cultures is the allegory of the long spoons. Punishment Punishment in hell typically corresponds to sins committed during life. Sometimes these distinctions are specific, with damned souls suffering for each sin committed, such as in Plato's myth of Er or Dante's The Divine Comedy, but sometimes they are general, with condemned sinners relegated to one or more chamber of hell or to a level of suffering. In many religious cultures, including Christianity and Islam, hell is often depicted as fiery, painful, and harsh, inflicting suffering on the guilty. Despite these common depictions of hell as a place of fire, some other traditions portray hell as cold. Buddhistand particularly Tibetan Buddhistdescriptions of hell feature an equal number of hot and cold hells. Among Christian descriptions Dante's Inferno portrays the innermost (9th) circle of hell as a frozen lake of blood and guilt. But cold also played a part in earlier Christian depictions of hell or purgatory, beginning with the Apocalypse of Paul, originally from the early third century; the "Vision of Dryhthelm" by the Venerable Bede from the seventh century; "St Patrick's Purgatory", "The Vision of Tundale" or "Visio Tnugdali", and the "Vision of the Monk of Eynsham", all from the twelfth century; and the "Vision of Thurkill" from the early thirteenth century. Polytheism Africa The hell of Swahili mythology is called kuzimu, and belief in it developed in the 7th and 8th century under the influence of Muslim merchants at the East African coast. It is imagined as a very cold place. Serer religion rejects the general notion of heaven and hell. In Serer religion, acceptance by the ancestors who