... The head of the Aasir was Odin, as we have learned to call him from the North, which worshipped him long after we had forgotten our Wuotan, except in the title of his day of the week.  There are various opinions as to the meaning of his name, some making it come from the word for rage; in the North odhr/oðr; in A.S., wod; and still wuth in German; and the adjective wud in Scottish.  Others make it from O.G. watan, N., vatha, to pervade, the title of the Divinity, as being through all things, in fact, the same as God.
    However this may be, Odin, in the higher myths, is the All-father, standing at the head of Asgard, as Zeus does of Olympus.  He governs all things, and knows all things.  He obtained this mighty influence, says the Edda, by hanging for nine nights on the world-tree, Yggdrasil, without food or drink, transfixed with a spear, as a self-sacrifice.  Then he looked down into the depth, and sank from the tree into it; but in the abyss beneath he drank the costly poet-mead, and learnt powerful songs, obtaining the Runes, the beginning of wisdom, by which he could compel to his will all nature:  wind, sea, and fire, hate and love!  A grand though distorted myth is this of the veritable sacrifice that gained "all power in heaven and earth."
    A vulgarized version made the sun and moon his eyes, and said that the latter was dim, because he had given its sight for a drink, from Mimir, the well of wisdom, under the roots of Yggdrasil...
     In Russian, Odin means the number one, or sole, alone.  The tribes on the Black Sea long adored him; and a heathen tribe on the Siberian border do so still.  He is the chief god of the Tungi; and in Daghistan, where the blood is of the pure Circassian type, Odin means a remarkable man.  Odin was also called Wunsch, wish, probably as meaning the supreme will... (History of Christian Names, Yonge, 1884)