Podaga (also , ) is a
Polabian deity who had his statue in a temple in
Plön
Plön (; Holsatian: ''Plöön'') is the district seat of the Plön district in Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, and has about 8,700 inhabitants. It lies right on the shores of Schleswig-Holstein's biggest lake, the Great Plön Lake, as well as o ...
. Mentioned only in
Helmold
Helmold of Bosau (ca. 1120 – after 1177) was a Saxon historian of the 12th century and a priest at Bosau near Plön. He was a friend of the two bishops of Oldenburg in Holstein, Vicelinus (died 1154) and Gerold (died 1163), who did much to ...
's ''
Chronicle
A chronicle ( la, chronica, from Greek ''chroniká'', from , ''chrónos'' – "time") is a historical account of events arranged in chronological order, as in a timeline. Typically, equal weight is given for historically important events and lo ...
'', which does not give a depiction or function of the deity.
According to
Aleksander Brückner
Aleksander Brückner (; 29 January 1856 – 24 May 1939) was a Polish scholar of Slavic languages and literatures (Slavistics), philologist, lexicographer and historian of literature. He is among the most notable Slavicists of the late 19th ...
, it is impossible to read the name ''Podaga''. Grigoriy Il'inskiy concluded that ''Podaga'' is another form of
Dazhbog
Dazhbog (russian: Дажьбо́г, Дажбог), alternatively Daždźbok ( be, Даждзьбог), Dažbog, Dazhdbog, Dajbog, Daybog, Dabog, Dazibogu, or Dadzbóg, was one of the major gods of Slavic mythology, most likely a solar deity and ...
(from ''*Podabog''), while
Roman Jakobson
Roman Osipovich Jakobson (russian: Рома́н О́сипович Якобсо́н; October 11, 1896Kucera, Henry. 1983. "Roman Jakobson." ''Language: Journal of the Linguistic Society of America'' 59(4): 871–883. – July 18,[Dazhbog
Dazhbog (russian: Дажьбо́г, Дажбог), alternatively Daždźbok ( be, Даждзьбог), Dažbog, Dazhdbog, Dajbog, Daybog, Dabog, Dazibogu, or Dadzbóg, was one of the major gods of Slavic mythology, most likely a solar deity and ...]
.
Mikołaj Rudnicki Mikołaj Rudnicki - (born 6 December 1881 in Sokołów Podlaski - died 28 June 1978 in Puszczykowo) was a Polish linguist. He finished his studies in Kraków. In 1911 he became a docent in Indoeuropean linguistics.
In 1919 he became a professor at ...
connected the ''Podaga'' notation with the name ''Dagome'' in ''
Dagome iudex'' referring to
Mieszko I
Mieszko I (; – 25 May 992) was the first ruler of Poland and the founder of the first independent Polish state, the Duchy of Poland. His reign stretched from 960 to his death and he was a member of the Piast dynasty, a son of Siemomysł and ...
. According to him, both words are related to each other. The word was supposed to have come to the
Piast state through Mieszko's unknown wife, who brought with her the cult of the goddess ''Podaga''. He connected both names with the Proto-Slavic ''*dag-'' "to burn", and also with
Długosz's ''
Pogoda'', whose name was supposed to have been distorted.
Leszek Moszyński was the first to link ''Podaga'' with the
Polish
Polish may refer to:
* Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe
* Polish language
* Poles
Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, w ...
word ''potęga'' "power, might". According to him, the stem ''-dag-'' corresponds to the
Proto-Slavic
Proto-Slavic (abbreviated PSl., PS.; also called Common Slavic or Common Slavonic) is the Attested language, unattested, linguistic reconstruction, reconstructed proto-language of all Slavic languages. It represents Slavic speech approximately ...
''*tǫgъ'' "strong, stout", and the whole Latin notation ''Podaga'' corresponds to the Proto-Slavic ''*Potǫga'', and the deity would be a divinized power, might (identical to adjective ''*potǫga'' "power, might"). Krzysztof Tomasz Witczak commented positively on this reading in his article on the reading of the Latin name ''Dagome'' from ''Dagome iudex''. He reads ''Dag-'' in ''Dagome'' also as Polish ''Tęg-'' (PS ''*Tǫg-''), and the whole name as ''Tęgomir'', or the abbreviation from this name, ''Tęgom'' (PS ''*Tǫgomirъ'', ''*Tǫgomъ''). He refers to the examples of transcription of the
nasal o (Polish ''ą'') by the letter ''a'' in German records, e.g. ''Dabe'' ← Polish ''Dąbie'', as well as fluctuations between ''d'' and ''t'' when typing Slavic ⟨d⟩, e.g. the name ''Oda'' in ''Dagome iudex'' is noted as ''Ote''.
This etymology was supported by Michał Łuczyński. He reminds us of Brückner's remark that the theonym given by Helmold must refer to a male deity, not a female one, since otherwise he would have called the deity ''dea'' (Latin "goddess"), and not just ''idolum'', and this means that the final ''-a'' in ''Podaga'' requires explanation. The final vowel ''-a'' sometimes appeared after the preceding consonant ⟨k⟩, e.g., Latin ''Misaca'', ''Misica'', ''Misuka'' ← Polish ''Mieszek'', Latin ''*Licica'' ← Polish ''*Leszek'', from which it can be concluded that ''-a'' may also have appeared after the consonant ⟨g⟩. With this in mind, and taking into account and supporting the reading of the Latin ''-dag-'' as ''-tęg-''/''*-tǫg-'', Łuczyński reads the Proto-Slavic form of theonym as ''*Potǫgъ''. This is supported by the
Old Polish
The Old Polish language ( pl, język staropolski, staropolszczyzna) was a period in the history of the Polish language between the 10th and the 16th centuries. It was followed by the Middle Polish language.
The sources for the study of the Old ...
personal name ''*Potąg'', reconstructed on the basis of the village of ''
Potęgowo'', as well as the personal name ''*Nietąg'' (name with negation) from the 13th century.
According to
Henryk Łowmiański
Henryk Łowmiański (August 22, 1898 near Ukmergė - September 4, 1984 in Poznań) was a Polish historian and academic who was an authority on the early history of the Slavic and Baltic people. A researcher of the ancient history of Poland, Lithu ...
the cult of ''Podaga'' was a cult arranged by prince
Kruto
Kruto the Wende (or Cruto) (died 1093), son of Grin or Grinus, was a prince of Wagria.Joachim Herrmann, ''Die Slawen in Deutschland'' (Berlin: Akademie-Verlag, 1985), 366. James Westfall Thompson believed his family belonged to the Rani of Rugia ...
and not a tribal cult, because the creation of an independent deity, erecting a temple and a statue of him would have exceeded the capabilities of a small territorial unit. According to Łuczyński, the new temple (probably dedicated to a new god) was supposed to raise the authority of the prince's power. According to him, Potag should therefore be considered an epithet of
Perun
In Slavic mythology, Perun (Cyrillic: Перýн) is the highest god of the pantheon and the god of sky, thunder, lightning, storms, rain, law, war, fertility and oak trees. His other attributes were fire, mountains, wind, iris, eagle, f ...
, which would have a
Rus' analogy in the form of the creation of an official state cult established in
Kyiv
Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...
by
Vladimir the Great
Vladimir I Sviatoslavich or Volodymyr I Sviatoslavych ( orv, Володимѣръ Свѧтославичь, ''Volodiměrъ Svętoslavičь'';, ''Uladzimir'', russian: Владимир, ''Vladimir'', uk, Володимир, ''Volodymyr''. Se ...
. Potag would thus originally have been a given name, and as an adjective of the deity it was eventually recognized as a separate theonym, at first as an alternate name for Perun.
References
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{{Slavic mythology
Slavic gods