![Steinrelief Pfarrkirche Altenkirchen](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6e/Steinrelief_Pfarrkirche_Altenkirchen.jpg)
Slavic mythology or Slavic religion is the
religious
Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatur ...
beliefs,
myths, and
ritual
A ritual is a sequence of activities involving gestures, words, actions, or objects, performed according to a set sequence. Rituals may be prescribed by the traditions of a community, including a religious community. Rituals are characterized ...
practices of the
Slavs before
Christianisation
Christianization ( or Christianisation) is to make Christian; to imbue with Christian principles; to become Christian. It can apply to the conversion of an individual, a practice, a place or a whole society. It began in the Roman Empire, conti ...
, which occurred at various stages between the 8th and the 13th century. The
South Slavs
South Slavs are Slavic peoples who speak South Slavic languages and inhabit a contiguous region of Southeast Europe comprising the eastern Alps and the Balkan Peninsula. Geographically separated from the West Slavs and East Slavs by Austria, ...
, who likely settled in the
Balkan Peninsula during the 6th–7th centuries AD, bordering with the
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
to the south, came under the sphere of influence of
Eastern Christianity, beginning with the creation of writing systems for Slavic languages (first
Glagolitic
The Glagolitic script (, , ''glagolitsa'') is the oldest known Slavic alphabet. It is generally agreed to have been created in the 9th century by Saint Cyril, a monk from Thessalonica. He and his brother Saint Methodius were sent by the Byzan ...
, and then
Cyrillic script
The Cyrillic script ( ), Slavonic script or the Slavic script, is a writing system used for various languages across Eurasia. It is the designated national script in various Slavic, Turkic, Mongolic, Uralic, Caucasian and Iranic-speaking co ...
) in 855 by the brothers
Saints Cyril and Methodius
Cyril (born Constantine, 826–869) and Methodius (815–885) were two brothers and Byzantine Christian theologians and missionaries. For their work evangelizing the Slavs, they are known as the "Apostles to the Slavs".
They are credited wi ...
and the adoption of Christianity in Bulgaria in 863. The
East Slavs
The East Slavs are the most populous subgroup of the Slavs. They speak the East Slavic languages, and formed the majority of the population of the medieval state Kievan Rus', which they claim as their cultural ancestor.John Channon & Robert H ...
followed with the official adoption in 988 by
Vladimir the Great
Vladimir I Sviatoslavich or Volodymyr I Sviatoslavych ( orv, Володимѣръ Свѧтославичь, ''Volodiměrъ Svętoslavičь'';, ''Uladzimir'', russian: Владимир, ''Vladimir'', uk, Володимир, ''Volodymyr''. Se ...
of
Kievan Rus'
Kievan Rusʹ, also known as Kyivan Rusʹ ( orv, , Rusĭ, or , , ; Old Norse: ''Garðaríki''), was a state in Eastern and Northern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century.John Channon & Robert Hudson, ''Penguin Historical Atlas of ...
.
The
West Slavs' process of Christianization was more gradual and complicated. The Moravians accepted Christianity as early as 831, the Bohemian dukes followed in 845, Slovaks accepted Christianity somewhere between the years 828 and 863, but the Poles accepted it much later, in 966, around the same time as the
Sorbs
Sorbs ( hsb, Serbja, dsb, Serby, german: Sorben; also known as Lusatians, Lusatian Serbs and Wends) are a indigenous West Slavic ethnic group predominantly inhabiting the parts of Lusatia located in the German states of Saxony and Branden ...
, and the Polabian Slavs only came under the significant influence of the
Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
from the 12th century onwards. For the Polabian Slavs and the Sorbs,
Christianisation
Christianization ( or Christianisation) is to make Christian; to imbue with Christian principles; to become Christian. It can apply to the conversion of an individual, a practice, a place or a whole society. It began in the Roman Empire, conti ...
went hand in hand with full or partial
Germanisation.
The Christianisation of the Slavic peoples was, however, a slow and—in many cases—superficial phenomenon, especially in what is today Russia. Christianisation was vigorous in western and central parts of what is today Ukraine, since they were closer to the capital,
Kyiv
Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the seventh-most populous city in Europe.
Kyi ...
. Even there, however, popular resistance led by
''volkhv''s, pagan priests or shamans, recurred periodically for centuries.
The West Slavs of the
Baltic
Baltic may refer to:
Peoples and languages
* Baltic languages, a subfamily of Indo-European languages, including Lithuanian, Latvian and extinct Old Prussian
*Balts (or Baltic peoples), ethnic groups speaking the Baltic languages and/or originati ...
tenaciously withstood Christianity until it was violently imposed on them through the
Northern Crusades
The Northern Crusades or Baltic Crusades were Christian colonization and Christianization campaigns undertaken by Catholic Christian military orders and kingdoms, primarily against the pagan Baltic, Finnic and West Slavic peoples around th ...
. Among
Poles
Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, who share a common history, culture, the Polish language and are identified with the country of Poland in C ...
and East Slavs, rebellions broke out throughout the 11th century. Christian chroniclers reported that the Slavs regularly re-embraced their original religion (''relapsi sunt denuo ad paganismus'').
Many elements of the Slavic
indigenous religion were officially incorporated into
Slavic Christianity
The Slavs were Christianized in waves from the 7th to 12th century, though the process of replacing old Slavic religious practices began as early as the 6th century. Generally speaking, the monarchs of the South Slavs adopted Christianity in t ...
(which manifested itself in the architecture of the Russian Church, icon painting, etc.), and, besides this, the worship of Slavic gods has persisted in unofficial folk religion until modern times. The Slavs' resistance to Christianity gave rise to a "whimsical syncretism" which in
Old Church Slavonic vocabulary was defined as ''dvoeverie'', "double faith". Since the early 20th century, Slavic folk religion has undergone an organised reinvention and reincorporation in the movement of
Slavic Native Faith
The Slavic Native Faith, commonly known as Rodnovery
* bg, Родноверие, translit=Rоdnoverie
* bs, Rodnovjerje
* mk, Родноверие, translit=Rodnoverie
* cz, Rodnověří
* hr, Rodnovjerje
* pl, Rodzimowierstwo; Rodzima ...
(Rodnovery).
Sources
Foreign sources
One of the first written sources on the religion of the ancient Slavs is the description of the Byzantine historian
Procopius of Caesarea
Procopius of Caesarea ( grc-gre, Προκόπιος ὁ Καισαρεύς ''Prokópios ho Kaisareús''; la, Procopius Caesariensis; – after 565) was a prominent late antique Greek scholar from Caesarea Maritima. Accompanying the Roman gen ...
(6th century), who mentioned
sacrifices
Sacrifice is the offering of material possessions or the lives of animals or humans to a deity as an act of propitiation or worship. Evidence of ritual animal sacrifice has been seen at least since ancient Hebrews and Greeks, and possibly exis ...
to the supreme god-the thunderer of the Slavs, river spirits ("nymphs") and others:
Al-Masudi
Al-Mas'udi ( ar, أَبُو ٱلْحَسَن عَلِيّ ٱبْن ٱلْحُسَيْن ٱبْن عَلِيّ ٱلْمَسْعُودِيّ, '; –956) was an Arab historian, geographer and traveler. He is sometimes referred to as the "Herodotus ...
, an Arab historian, geographer and traveler, equates the paganism of the Slavs and
rus' with
reason
Reason is the capacity of consciously applying logic by drawing conclusions from new or existing information, with the aim of seeking the truth. It is closely associated with such characteristically human activities as philosophy, science, ...
:
Western European authors of the 11th and 12th centuries gave detailed descriptions of the sanctuaries and cults of Redigost (
Radegast,
Svarozhich) in
Rethra
Rethra (also known as ''Radagoszcz'', ''Radegost'', ''Radigast'', ''Redigast'', ''Radgosc'' and other forms like ''Ruthengost'') was, in the 10th to the 12th centuries, the main town and political center of the Slavic Redarians, one of the four m ...
,
Svyatovit (Svetovid) in Arkon (
Jaromarsburg),
Triglav in
Szczecin,
Chernobog
Chernobog ( "Black God") and Belobog ( "White God") are an alleged pair of Polabian deities. Chernobog appears in the Helmold's '' Chronicle'' as a god of misfortune worshipped by the Wagri and Obodrites, while Belobog is not mentioned – he wa ...
, the sanctuary in
Volyně, etc. The identification of a number of Eastern European monuments with Slavic sanctuaries is a matter of dispute (
Peryn
Peryn ( rus, Перынь, p=pʲɪˈrɨnʲ) is a peninsula near Veliky Novgorod (Russia), noted for its medieval pagan shrine complex, and for its later well-preserved monastery.
Location
The Peryn peninsula is at the confluence of Lake Ilmen ...
, a complex near the site of the
Zbruch idol
The Zbruch Idol, Sviatovid (''Worldseer'', pl, Światowid ze Zbrucza, uk, Збручанський ідол) is a 9th-century sculpture, more precisely an example of a bałwan, and one of the few monuments of pre-Christian Slavic beliefs (acco ...
).
Slavic sources
The main idea of paganism and mythology of the Slavs is given primarily by historical and documentary sources (
letopises and
chronicles). The
Tale of Bygone Years under the year 980 contains a story about the sanctuary in
Kiev, built by Vladimir Svyatoslavich, and the idols of pagan gods installed there are mentioned:
The text mentions the deities
Svarog
Svarog is a Slavic god of fire and blacksmithing, who was once interpreted as a sky god on the basis of an etymology rejected by modern scholarship. He is mentioned in only one source, the ''Primary Chronicle'', which is problematic in interpret ...
,
Yarilo and
Veles. It is known that the idol of Veles stood in
Kiev "under the mountain", probably on the
Kiev Podol, in the lower part of the city, that is, in the trade and craft part of Kiev at the pier on the Pochain River. In the "Life of
Vladimir
Vladimir may refer to:
Names
* Vladimir (name) for the Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Macedonian, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak and Slovenian spellings of a Slavic name
* Uladzimir for the Belarusian version of the name
* Volodymyr for the Ukr ...
" it is said that this idol was overthrown during the baptism of Kievan Rus in 988: "And Veles idol ... ordered to throw off the river in Pochaina".
Ancient Russian teachings against paganism can also serve as sources. In this genre, three of the most famous monuments are known: ''The Word of St. Gregory about idols'', ''The word of a certain Christ-lover and the punishment of the spiritual father (about submission and obedience)'' and ''The Walking of the Virgin in torment''.
Modern sources
In the absence of original mythological texts, it is possible to judge the paganism of the Slavs as a historical stage of the general Slavic culture only by secondary data-archaeological and book-written sources, by comparing them and reconstructing what historians
Evgeny Anichkov,
Dmitry Zelenin,
Lubor Niederle
Lubor Niederle (September 20, 1865 – June 14, 1944) was a Czech archeologist, anthropologist and ethnographer. He is seen as one of the founders of modern archeology in Czech lands.
He was born in Klatovy. He studied at the Charles University ...
,
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 ...
,
Aleksander Gieysztor
Aleksander Gieysztor (17 July 1916 – 9 February 1999) was a Polish medievalist historian.
Life
Aleksander Gieysztor was born to a Polish family in Moscow, Russia, where his father worked as a railwayman. In 1921, the family relocated to Po ...
,
Stanisław Urbańczyk and many others did.
It was only at the beginning of the 20th century that reconstruction became widespread by comparing Slavic data with data from other Indo-European (Baltic, Iranian, German, etc.) cultural traditions (first of all, the works of
Vechaslav Ivanov and
Vladimir Toporov
Vladimir Nikolayevich Toporov (russian: Влади́мир Никола́евич Топоро́в; 5 July 1928 in Moscow5 December 2005 in Moscow) was a leading Russian philologist associated with the Tartu-Moscow semiotic school. His wife was ...
are distinguished).
The richest sources for the study of Slavic paganism as a cultural model and the reconstruction of Ancient Slavic ideas remain modern (dating back to the 19th—20th centuries) linguistic, ethnographic and folklore evidence of Slavic traditions. Many traces of slavic paganism are left in Western European toponymy, including the names of settlements, rivers, mountains, and villages.
Overview and common features
![Slavnost svatovitova na rujane](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/59/Slavnost_svatovitova_na_rujane.jpg)
Twentieth-century scholars who pursued the study of ancient Slavic religion include
Vyacheslav Ivanov,
Vladimir Toporov
Vladimir Nikolayevich Toporov (russian: Влади́мир Никола́евич Топоро́в; 5 July 1928 in Moscow5 December 2005 in Moscow) was a leading Russian philologist associated with the Tartu-Moscow semiotic school. His wife was ...
,
Marija Gimbutas
Marija Gimbutas ( lt, Marija Gimbutienė, ; January 23, 1921 – February 2, 1994) was a Lithuanian archaeologist and anthropologist known for her research into the Neolithic and Bronze Age cultures of " Old Europe" and for her Kurgan hypothesis ...
,
Boris Rybakov
Boris Alexandrovich Rybakov (Russian: Бори́с Алекса́ндрович Рыбако́в, 3 June 1908, Moscow – 27 December 2001) was a Soviet and Russian historian who personified the anti- Normanist vision of Russian history. He is ...
, and
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,[Bernhard Severin Ingemann
Bernhard Severin Ingemann (28 May 1789 – 24 February 1862) was a Danish novelist and poet.
Biography
Ingemann was born in Torkilstrup, on the island of Falster, Denmark. The son of a vicar, he was left fatherless in his youth. While a st ...]
, known for his study of ''Fundamentals of a North Slavic and Wendish mythology''.
Historical documents about Slavic religion include the ''
Primary Chronicle'', compiled in
Kyiv
Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the seventh-most populous city in Europe.
Kyi ...
around 1111, and the ''
Novgorod First Chronicle
The Novgorod First Chronicle (russian: Новгородская первая летопись) or The Chronicle of Novgorod, 1016–1471 is the most ancient extant Old Russian chronicle of the Novgorodian Rus'. It reflects a tradition different ...
'' compiled in the
Novgorod Republic
The Novgorod Republic was a medieval state that existed from the 12th to 15th centuries, stretching from the Gulf of Finland in the west to the northern Ural Mountains in the east, including the city of Novgorod and the Lake Ladoga regions of mod ...
. They contain detailed reports of the annihilation of the official Slavic religion of Kyiv and Novgorod, and the subsequent "double faith". The ''Primary Chronicle'' also contains the authentic text of Rus-Greek treatises (dated 945 and 971) with native pre-Christian oaths. From the eleventh century onwards, various Rus writings were produced against the survival of Slavic religion, and Slavic gods were interpolated in the translations of foreign literary works, such as the ''Malalas Chronicle'' and the ''
Alexandreis
The ''Alexandreis'' (or ''Alexandreid'') is a medieval Latin epic poem by Walter of Châtillon, a 12th-century French writer and theologian. It gives an account of the life of Alexander the Great, based on Quintus Curtius Rufus' ''Historia Alexan ...
''.
The West Slavs who dwelt in the area between the
Vistula
The Vistula (; pl, Wisła, ) is the longest river in Poland and the ninth-longest river in Europe, at in length. The drainage basin, reaching into three other nations, covers , of which is in Poland.
The Vistula rises at Barania Góra in ...
and the
Elbe
The Elbe (; cs, Labe ; nds, Ilv or ''Elv''; Upper and dsb, Łobjo) is one of the major rivers of Central Europe. It rises in the Giant Mountains of the northern Czech Republic before traversing much of Bohemia (western half of the Czech Re ...
stubbornly resisted the
Northern Crusades
The Northern Crusades or Baltic Crusades were Christian colonization and Christianization campaigns undertaken by Catholic Christian military orders and kingdoms, primarily against the pagan Baltic, Finnic and West Slavic peoples around th ...
, and the history of their resistance is written down in the ''Latin Chronicles'' of three German clergymen—
Thietmar of Merseburg
Thietmar (also Dietmar or Dithmar; 25 July 9751 December 1018), Prince-Bishop of Merseburg from 1009 until his death, was an important chronicler recording the reigns of German kings and Holy Roman Emperors of the Ottonian (Saxon) dynasty. Two ...
and
Adam of Bremen
Adam of Bremen ( la, Adamus Bremensis; german: Adam von Bremen) (before 1050 – 12 October 1081/1085) was a German medieval chronicler. He lived and worked in the second half of the eleventh century. Adam is most famous for his chronicle ''Gesta ...
in the eleventh century, and
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 ...
in the twelfth—, in the twelfth-century biographies of
Otto of Bamberg, and in
Saxo Grammaticus
Saxo Grammaticus (c. 1150 – c. 1220), also known as Saxo cognomine Longus, was a Danish historian, theologian and author. He is thought to have been a clerk or secretary to Absalon, Archbishop of Lund, the main advisor to Valdemar I of Denmark ...
' thirteenth-century ''
Gesta Danorum
''Gesta Danorum'' ("Deeds of the Danes") is a patriotic work of Danish history, by the 12th-century author Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Literate", literally "the Grammarian"). It is the most ambitious literary undertaking of medieval Denmark an ...
''. These documents, together with minor German documents and the Icelandic ''
Knýtlinga saga
''Knýtlinga saga'' (''The Saga of Cnut's Descendants'') is an Icelandic kings' saga written in the 1250s, which deals with the kings who ruled Denmark since the early 10th century.Ármann Jakobsson, "Royal biography", p. 397-8
There are good rea ...
'', provide an accurate description of northwestern Slavic religion.
The religions of other Slavic populations are less documented, because writings about the theme were produced late in time after Christianisation, such as the fifteenth-century ''
Polish Chronicle'', and contain a lot of sheer inventions. In the times preceding Christianisation, some Greek and Roman chroniclers, such as
Procopius
Procopius of Caesarea ( grc-gre, Προκόπιος ὁ Καισαρεύς ''Prokópios ho Kaisareús''; la, Procopius Caesariensis; – after 565) was a prominent late antique Greek scholar from Caesarea Maritima. Accompanying the Roman gen ...
and
Jordanes
Jordanes (), also written as Jordanis or Jornandes, was a 6th-century Eastern Roman bureaucrat widely believed to be of Gothic descent who became a historian later in life. Late in life he wrote two works, one on Roman history ('' Romana'') a ...
in the sixth century, sparsely documented some Slavic concepts and practices. Slavic paganism survived, in more or less pure forms, among the
Slovenes
The Slovenes, also known as Slovenians ( sl, Slovenci ), are a South Slavic ethnic group native to Slovenia, and adjacent regions in Italy, Austria and Hungary. Slovenes share a common ancestry, culture, history and speak Slovene as their na ...
along the
Soča
The Soča ( in Slovene) or Isonzo ( in Italian; other names fur, Lusinç, german: Sontig, la, Aesontius or ') is a long river that flows through western Slovenia () and northeastern Italy ().
An Alpine river in character, its source lies i ...
river up to the 1330s.
Origins and other influences
The linguistic unity, and negligible dialectal differentiation, of the Slavs until the end of the first millennium CE, and the lexical uniformity of religious vocabulary, witness a uniformity of early Slavic religion. It has been argued that the essence of early Slavdom was ethnoreligious before being ethnonational; that is to say, belonging to the Slavs was chiefly determined by conforming to certain beliefs and practices rather than by having a certain racial ancestry or being born in a certain place. Ivanov and Toporov identified Slavic religion as an outgrowth of a purported common
Proto-Indo-European religion
Proto-Indo-European mythology is the body of myths and deities associated with the Proto-Indo-Europeans, the hypothetical speakers of the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language. Although the mythological motifs are not directly attested ...
, sharing strong similarities with other neighbouring belief systems such as those of
Balts
The Balts or Baltic peoples ( lt, baltai, lv, balti) are an ethno-linguistic group of peoples who speak the Baltic languages of the Balto-Slavic branch of the Indo-European languages.
One of the features of Baltic languages is the number ...
,
Thracians
The Thracians (; grc, Θρᾷκες ''Thrāikes''; la, Thraci) were an Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Eastern and Southeastern Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied t ...
and
Phrygians.
Although, especially in places like Russia, the local development of the ancient Slavic religion likely also included several influences from neighbouring
Finnic peoples
The Finnic or Fennic peoples, sometimes simply called Finns, are the nations who speak languages traditionally classified in the Finnic (now commonly '' Finno-Permic'') language family, and which are thought to have originated in the region of ...
, which contributed to the local ethnogenesis. Slavic (and Baltic) religion and mythology is considered more conservative and closer to the purported original Proto-Indo-European religion—and thus precious for the latter's understanding—than other Indo-European derived traditions, due to the fact that, throughout the history of the Slavs, it remained a popular religion rather than being reworked and sophisticated by intellectual elites as happened to other Indo-European derived religious cultures.
The affinity with
Proto-Indo-Iranian religion
Indo-Iranian peoples, also known as Indo-Iranic peoples by scholars, and sometimes as Arya or Aryans from their self-designation, were a group of Indo-European peoples who brought the Indo-Iranian languages, a major branch of the Indo-European ...
is evident in shared developments, including the elimination of the term for the supreme God of Heaven, *''
Dyeus'', and its substitution by the term for "sky" (Slavic ''Nebo''), the shift of the Indo-European descriptor of heavenly deities (
Avestan ''
daeva
A daeva (Avestan: 𐬛𐬀𐬉𐬎𐬎𐬀 ''daēuua'') is a Zoroastrian supernatural entity with disagreeable characteristics. In the Gathas, the oldest texts of the Zoroastrian canon, the ''daeva''s are "gods that are (to be) rejected". This ...
'',
Old Church Slavonic ''div'';
Proto-Indo-European
Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo- ...
*''deiwos'', "celestial", similar to ''Dyeus'') to the designation of evil entities, and the parallel designation of gods by the term meaning both "wealth" and its "giver" (Avestan ''
baga'', Slavic ''bog''). Much of the religious vocabulary of the Slavs, including ''vera'' (loosely translated as "faith", meaning "radiation of knowledge"), ''svet'' ("light"), ''mir'' ("peace", "agreement of parts", also meaning "world") and ''rai'' ("paradise"), is shared with
Iranian
Iranian may refer to:
* Iran, a sovereign state
* Iranian peoples, the speakers of the Iranian languages. The term Iranic peoples is also used for this term to distinguish the pan ethnic term from Iranian, used for the people of Iran
* Iranian lan ...
.
According to Adrian Ivakhiv, the Indo-European element of Slavic religion may have included what
Georges Dumézil studied as the "
trifunctional hypothesis
The trifunctional hypothesis of prehistoric Proto-Indo-European society postulates a tripartite ideology ("''idéologie tripartite''") reflected in the existence of three classes or castes— priests, warriors, and commoners (farmers or trades ...
", that is to say a threefold conception of the social order, represented by the three castes of priests, warriors and farmers. According to Gimbutas, Slavic religion represented an unmistakable overlapping of any purported Indo-European originated themes with ancient religious themes dating back to time immemorial. The latter were particularly hardwearing in Slavic religion, represented by the widespread devotion to ''
Mat Syra Zemlya'', the "Damp Mother Earth". Rybakov said the continuity and gradual complexification of Slavic religion started from devotion to life-giving forces (''bereginy''), ancestors and the supreme
God
In monotheistic thought, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator, and principal object of faith. Swinburne, R.G. "God" in Honderich, Ted. (ed)''The Oxford Companion to Philosophy'', Oxford University Press, 1995. God is typically ...
, ''
Rod'' ("Generation" itself), and developed into the "high mythology" of the official religion of the early
Kievan Rus'
Kievan Rusʹ, also known as Kyivan Rusʹ ( orv, , Rusĭ, or , , ; Old Norse: ''Garðaríki''), was a state in Eastern and Northern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century.John Channon & Robert Hudson, ''Penguin Historical Atlas of ...
.
God and spirits
As attested by
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 ...
( 1120–1177) in his ''
Chronica Slavorum
The ''Chronica Sclavorum'' or ''Chronicle of the Slavs'' is a medieval chronicle which recounts the pre-Christian culture and religion of the Polabian Slavs, written by Helmold (ca. 1120 – after 1177), a Saxon priest and historian. It describe ...
'', the Slavs believed in a single heavenly God begetting all the lesser spirits governing nature, and worshipped it by their means. According to Helmold, "obeying the duties assigned to them,
he deities
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
have sprung from his
he supreme God's
He or HE may refer to:
Language
* He (pronoun), an English pronoun
* He (kana), the romanization of the Japanese kana へ
* He (letter), the fifth letter of many Semitic alphabets
* He (Cyrillic), a letter of the Cyrillic script called ''He'' ...
blood and enjoy distinction in proportion to their nearness to the god of the gods". According to Rybakov's studies, wheel symbols such as the "thunder marks" (''gromovoi znak'') and the "six-petaled rose inside a circle" (e.g.
![RozetaSolarSymbol](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/e/e9/RozetaSymbol.svg)
), which are so common in Slavic folk crafts, and which were still carved on edges and peaks of roofs in northern Russia in the nineteenth century, were symbols of the supreme life-giver Rod. Before its conceptualisation as Rod as studied by Rybakov, this supreme God was known as ''Deivos'' (cognate with
Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...
''
Deva'',
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
''
Deus'',
Old High German
Old High German (OHG; german: Althochdeutsch (Ahd.)) is the earliest stage of the German language, conventionally covering the period from around 750 to 1050.
There is no standardised or supra-regional form of German at this period, and Old High ...
''
Ziu'' and
Lithuanian ''
Dievas
Lithuanian Dievas, Latvian Dievs, Latgalian Dīvs, Old Prussian Dìews, Yotvingian Deivas was the primordial supreme god in the Baltic mythology and one of the most important deities together with Perkūnas and he was brother of Potrimpo. H ...
''). The Slavs believed that from this God proceeded a cosmic duality, represented by ''
Belobog
Chernobog ( "Black God") and Belobog ( "White God") are an alleged pair of Polabian deities. Chernobog appears in the Helmold's '' Chronicle'' as a god of misfortune worshipped by the Wagri and Obodrites, while Belobog is not mentioned – he wa ...
'' ("White God") and ''
Chernobog
Chernobog ( "Black God") and Belobog ( "White God") are an alleged pair of Polabian deities. Chernobog appears in the Helmold's '' Chronicle'' as a god of misfortune worshipped by the Wagri and Obodrites, while Belobog is not mentioned – he wa ...
'' ("Black God", also named ''Tiarnoglofi'', "Black Head/Mind"), representing the root of all the heavenly-masculine and the earthly-feminine deities, or the waxing light and waning light gods, respectively. In both categories, deities might be either ''Razi'', "rede-givers", or ''Zirnitra'', "wizards".
The Slavs perceived the world as enlivened by a variety of spirits, which they represented as persons and worshipped. These spirits included those of waters (''mavka'' and ''
rusalka''), forests (''lisovyk''), fields (''polyovyk''), those of households (''domovoy''), those of illnesses, luck and human ancestors. For instance, ''
Leshy'' is an important woodland spirit, believed to distribute food assigning preys to hunters, later regarded as a god of flocks and herds, and still worshipped in this function in early twentieth-century Russia. Many gods were regarded by kins (''rod'' or ''pleme'') as their ancestors, and the idea of ancestrality was so important that Slavic religion may be epitomised as a "manism" (i.e. worship of ancestors), though the Slavs did not keep genealogical records.
The Slavs also worshipped star-gods, including the moon (
Russian
Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including:
*Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries
*Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...
: ''Mesyats'') and the sun (''Solntse''), the former regarded as male and the latter as female. The moon-god was particularly important, regarded as the dispenser of abundance and health, worshipped through round dances, and in some traditions considered the progenitor of humanity. The belief in the moon-god was still very much alive in the nineteenth century, and peasants in the Ukrainian Carpathians openly affirm that the moon is their god.
Some Slavic deities are related to Baltic mythology:
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 ...
/
Perkūnas
Perkūnas ( lt, Perkūnas, lv, Pērkons, Old Prussian: ''Perkūns'', ''Perkunos'', Yotvingian: ''Parkuns'', Latgalian: ''Pārkiuņs'') was the common Baltic god of thunder, and the second most important deity in the Baltic pantheon after Di ...
,
Veles/
Velnias
Veles,; Serbo-Croatian, Czech, Slovak, Russian, Slovenian: ''Veles''; Ruthenian and Old Church Slavonic: Велесъ; be, Вялес, translit=Vialies also known as Volos, is a major god of earth, waters, livestock, and the underworld ...
,
Rod/
Dievas
Lithuanian Dievas, Latvian Dievs, Latgalian Dīvs, Old Prussian Dìews, Yotvingian Deivas was the primordial supreme god in the Baltic mythology and one of the most important deities together with Perkūnas and he was brother of Potrimpo. H ...
,
Yarilo/
Saulė
Saulė ( lt, Saulė, lv, Saule) is a solar goddess, the common Baltic solar deity in the Lithuanian and Latvian mythologies. The noun ''Saulė''/''Saule'' in the Lithuanian and Latvian languages is also the conventional name for the Sun an ...
.
[Mikhail Theobald]
Lithuanian-pagan essays
- Ladoga-100, 1890. P.38 There was an evident continuity between the beliefs of the
East Slavs
The East Slavs are the most populous subgroup of the Slavs. They speak the East Slavic languages, and formed the majority of the population of the medieval state Kievan Rus', which they claim as their cultural ancestor.John Channon & Robert H ...
,
West Slavs
The West Slavs are Slavic peoples who speak the West Slavic languages. They separated from the common Slavic group around the 7th century, and established independent polities in Central Europe by the 8th to 9th centuries. The West Slavic lan ...
and
South Slavs
South Slavs are Slavic peoples who speak South Slavic languages and inhabit a contiguous region of Southeast Europe comprising the eastern Alps and the Balkan Peninsula. Geographically separated from the West Slavs and East Slavs by Austria, ...
. They shared the same traditional deities, as attested, for instance, by the worship of ''Zuarasiz'' among the West Slavs, corresponding to ''Svarožič'' among the East Slavs. All the bright male deities were regarded as the hypostases, forms or phases in the year, of the active, masculine divine force personified by ''
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 ...
'' ("Thunder").
His name, from the Indo-European root *''per'' or *''perk
w'' ("to strike", "splinter"), signified both the splintering thunder and the splintered tree (especially the
oak
An oak is a tree or shrub in the genus ''Quercus'' (; Latin "oak tree") of the beech family, Fagaceae. There are approximately 500 extant species of oaks. The common name "oak" also appears in the names of species in related genera, notably ''L ...
; the
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
name of this tree, ''quercus'', comes from the same root), regarded as symbols of the irradiation of the force. This root also gave rise to the
Vedic
upright=1.2, The Vedas are ancient Sanskrit texts of Hinduism. Above: A page from the '' Atharvaveda''.
The Vedas (, , ) are a large body of religious texts originating in ancient India. Composed in Vedic Sanskrit, the texts constitute the ...
''
Parjanya Parjanya ( sa, पर्जन्य ) according to the Vedas is a deity of rain, thunder, lightning, and the one who fertilizes the earth. It is another epithet of Indra, the Vedic deity of the sky and heaven.
Description
It is assumed Parjanya is ...
'', the Baltic ''
Perkūnas
Perkūnas ( lt, Perkūnas, lv, Pērkons, Old Prussian: ''Perkūns'', ''Perkunos'', Yotvingian: ''Parkuns'', Latgalian: ''Pārkiuņs'') was the common Baltic god of thunder, and the second most important deity in the Baltic pantheon after Di ...
'', the Albanian (now denoting "God" and "sky"), the Germanic ''Fjörgynn'' and the Greek ''Keraunós'' ("thunderbolt", rhymic form of *''Peraunós'', used as an epithet of
Zeus
Zeus or , , ; grc, Δῐός, ''Diós'', label= genitive Boeotian Aeolic and Laconian grc-dor, Δεύς, Deús ; grc, Δέος, ''Déos'', label= genitive el, Δίας, ''Días'' () is the sky and thunder god in ancient Greek reli ...
).
From this root comes the name of the Finnish deity
Ukko
Ukko (), Äijä or Äijö ( Finnish for 'male grandparent', 'grandfather', 'old man'), parallel to Uku in Estonian mythology, is the god of the sky, weather, harvest and thunder in Finnish mythology.
Ukkonen, the Finnish word for thunder, ...
, which has a Balto-Slavic origin. or , in modern Russian folklore rendered or (from ''breg'', ''bereg'', meaning "shore") and reinterpreted as female water spirits, were rather—as attested by chronicles and highlighted by the root *''per''—spirits of trees and rivers related to Perun.
Slavic traditions preserved very ancient elements and intermingled with those of neighbouring European peoples. An exemplary case are the South Slavic still-living rain rituals of the couple ''Perun''–''
Perperuna
Dodola (also spelled ''Dodole'', ''Dudola'', ''Dudula'' etc.) and Perperuna (also spelled ''Peperuda'', ''Preperuda'', ''Preperuša'', ''Prporuša'', ''Papaluga'' etc.), are Balkans, Balkan Rainmaking (ritual), rainmaking pagan customs practiced ...
'', Lord and Lady Thunder, shared with the neighbouring
Albanians,
Greeks
The Greeks or Hellenes (; el, Έλληνες, ''Éllines'' ) are an ethnic group and nation indigenous to the Eastern Mediterranean and the Black Sea regions, namely Greece, Cyprus, Albania, Italy, Turkey, Egypt, and, to a lesser extent, oth ...
and
Arumanians
The Aromanians ( rup, Armãnji, Rrãmãnji) are an ethnic group native to the southern Balkans who speak Aromanian, an Eastern Romance language. They traditionally live in central and southern Albania, south-western Bulgaria, northern and c ...
, corresponding to the Germanic
''Fjörgynn''–''Fjörgyn'', the Lithuanian ''Perkūnas''–''Perkūna'', and finding similarities in the Vedic hymns to ''Parjanya''.
The West Slavs, especially those of the Baltic, worshipped prominently ''
Svetovid'' ("Lord of Power"), while the East Slavs worshipped prominently Perun himself, especially after Volodymyr's 970s–980s reforms. The various spirits were believed to manifest in certain places, which were revered as numinous and holy; they included springs, rivers, groves, rounded tops of hills and flat cliffs overlooking rivers. Calendrical rituals were attuned with the spirits, which were believed to have periods of waxing and waning throughout the year, determining the agrarian fertility cycle.
Cosmology, iconography, temples and rites
The
cosmology
Cosmology () is a branch of physics and metaphysics dealing with the nature of the universe. The term ''cosmology'' was first used in English in 1656 in Thomas Blount's ''Glossographia'', and in 1731 taken up in Latin by German philosopher ...
of ancient Slavic religion, which is preserved in contemporary Slavic folk religion, is visualised as a three-tiered vertical structure, or "
world tree", as common in other religions. At the top there is the heavenly plane, symbolised by birds, the sun and the moon; the middle plane is that of earthly humanity, symbolised by bees and men; at the bottom of the structure there is the netherworld, symbolised by snakes and beavers, and by the chthonic god ''
Veles''. The
Zbruch Idol
The Zbruch Idol, Sviatovid (''Worldseer'', pl, Światowid ze Zbrucza, uk, Збручанський ідол) is a 9th-century sculpture, more precisely an example of a bałwan, and one of the few monuments of pre-Christian Slavic beliefs (acco ...
(which was identified at first as a representation of Svetovid), found in western Ukraine, represents this theo-cosmology: the three-layered effigy of the four major deities—''Perun'', ''
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 ...
'', ''
Mokosh
Mokosh ( orv, Мóкошь) is a Slavic goddess mentioned in the Primary Chronicle, protector of women's work and women's destiny. She watches over spinning and weaving, shearing of sheep, and protects women in childbirth. Mokosh is the Mother G ...
'' and ''
Lada''—is constituted by a top level with four figures representing them, facing the four cardinal directions; a middle level with representations of a human ritual community (''khorovod''); and a bottom level with the representation of a three-headed chthonic god, Veles, who sustains the entire structure.
The scholar Jiří Dynda studied the figure of ''
Triglav'' (literally the "Three-Headed One") and Svetovid, which are widely attested in archaeological testimonies, as the respectively three-headed and four-headed representations of the same ''
axis mundi'', of the same supreme God. Triglav itself was connected to the symbols of the tree and the mountain, which are other common symbols of the ''axis mundi'', and in this quality he was a ''summus deus'' (a sum of all things), as recorded by
Ebbo ( 775–851).
Triglav represents the vertical interconnection of the three worlds, reflected by the three social functions studied by Dumézil: sacerdotal, martial and economic. Ebbo himself documented that the Triglav was seen as embodying the connection and mediation between Heaven, Earth and the underworld.
Adam of Bremen
Adam of Bremen ( la, Adamus Bremensis; german: Adam von Bremen) (before 1050 – 12 October 1081/1085) was a German medieval chronicler. He lived and worked in the second half of the eleventh century. Adam is most famous for his chronicle ''Gesta ...
( 1040s–1080s) described the Triglav of
Wolin
Wolin (; formerly german: Wollin ) is the name both of a Polish island in the Baltic Sea, just off the Polish coast, and a town on that island. Administratively, the island belongs to the West Pomeranian Voivodeship. Wolin is separated from th ...
as ''Neptunus triplicis naturae'' (that is to say, "
Neptune of the three natures/generations") attesting the colours that were associated to the three worlds, also studied by
Karel Jaromír Erben
Karel Jaromír Erben (; 7 November 1811 – 21 November 1870) was a Czech folklorist and poet of the mid-19th century, best known for his collection '' Kytice'', which contains poems based on traditional and folkloric themes.
He also wrote ''P ...
(1811–1870): white for Heaven, green for Earth and black for the underworld.
It also represents the three dimensions of time, mythologically rendered in the figure of a three-threaded rope. Triglav is Perun in the heavenly plane, Svetovid in the centre from which the horizontal four directions unfold, and Veles the
psychopomp
Psychopomps (from the Greek word , , literally meaning the 'guide of souls') are supernatural creatures, spirits, entities, angels, demons or deities in many religions whose responsibility is to escort newly deceased souls from Earth to the afte ...
in the underworld. Svetovid is interpreted by Dynda as the incarnation of the ''axis mundi'' in the four dimensions of space.
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 ...
defined Svetovid as ''deus deorum'' ("god of all gods").
Besides Triglav and Svetovid, other deities were represented with many heads. This is attested by chroniclers who wrote about West Slavs, including
Saxo Grammaticus
Saxo Grammaticus (c. 1150 – c. 1220), also known as Saxo cognomine Longus, was a Danish historian, theologian and author. He is thought to have been a clerk or secretary to Absalon, Archbishop of Lund, the main advisor to Valdemar I of Denmark ...
( 1160–1220). According to him, ''Rugievit'' in
Charenza was represented with seven faces, which converged at the top in a single crown. These three-, four- or many-headed images, wooden or carved in stone, some covered in metal, which held drinking horns and were decorated with solar symbols and horses, were kept in temples, of which numerous archaeological remains have been found.
They were built on upraised platforms, frequently on hills, but also at the confluences of rivers. The biographers of
Otto of Bamberg (1060/1061–1139) inform that these temples were known as , "dwellings", among West Slavs, testifying that they were regarded as the houses of the gods. They were wooden buildings with an inner cell with the god's statue, located in wider walled enclosures or fortifications; such fortifications might contain up to four .
Different were owned by different kins, and used for the ritual banquets in honour of their own ancestor-gods. These ritual banquets are known variously, across Slavic countries, as ''bratchina'' (from ''brat'', "brother"), ''mol'ba'' ("entreaty", "supplication") and ''kanun'' (short religious service) in Russia; ''slava'' ("glorification") in Serbia; ''sobor'' ("assembly") and ''kurban'' ("sacrifice") in Bulgaria. With Christianisation, the ancestor-gods were replaced with Christian patron saints.
There were also holy places with no buildings, where the deity was believed to manifest in nature itself. Such locations were characterised by the combined presence of trees and springs, according to the description of one such sites in
Szczecin by Otto of Bamberg. A shrine of the same type in
Kobarid
Kobarid (; it, Caporetto, fur, Cjaurêt, german: Karfreit) is a settlement in Slovenia, the administrative centre of the Municipality of Kobarid.
Kobarid is known for the 1917 Battle of Caporetto, where the Italian retreat was documented by Erne ...
, contemporary
Slovenia
Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...
, was stamped out in a "crusade" as recently as 1331.
Usually, common people were not allowed into the presence of the images of their gods, the sight of which was a privilege of the priests. Many of these images were seen and described only in the moment of their violent destruction at the hands of the Christian missionaries. The priests (
''volkhv''s), who kept the temples and led rituals and festivals, enjoyed a great degree of prestige; they received tributes and shares of military booties by the kins' chiefs.
The stone idols of the northeastern Slavs in some cases looked like mushrooms, without a face, with a clearly distinguished hat. Moreover, such idols were made by hand by turning a boulder and giving it the shape of a mushroom. The medieval manuscript of the 11th-14th centuries "The Word of St. Gregory, Invented in Toltsekh" contains a direct indication that the Slavs worshiped such phallic idols. According to some researchers, such idols were dedicated to the
god Rod or the god Veles (according to local old folklore, stone mushrooms are dedicated to Veles).
Due to the fact that these idols had no face, they were not destroyed. According to the beliefs of the local population, such stone idols were healing, so they were regularly visited. On certain days, people brought gifts to them, and in order to receive healing from an illness, they had to sit on an idol. The stone mushroom was respected and protected. Disrespectful attitude towards this idol was not allowed. The keepers of traditions and rituals performed around the idol were very old women; the tradition was passed down through generations.
There are also beliefs that such stone mushrooms provided fertility for the soil and people. Therefore, in some places, the worship of these idols persisted for centuries until the end of the 20th century (and even after being transferred to a museum, elements of the rituals are still performed). The dating of stone mushrooms is approximate; they date back to about 1000 AD. These stone mushroom idols are very similar to two Slavic stone idols from northeast lands: Sheksna idol (in Novgorod museum, Novgorod region, Russia) and Sebej idol (Sebej museum, Pskov region, Russia). These Slavic idols have a face and a phallic shape. Their characteristic feature is a hat.
An ancient Slavic stone idol was discovered on the territory of the Nikolo-Babaevsky monastery (Nekrasovsky district) in 2020. An ancient pagan place that existed before the monastery and churches is mentioned in the ethnographic materials of Bogdanovich. In that place, on Babayki, the idol of the supreme heavenly god was worshiped. The discovered Babaevsky idol has a clear shape of a large mushroom, completely carved from a boulder. It is very similar to mushroom idols from the local cities of Ples and Myshkin. Based on morphological details, the multifaceted cult function of this idol is assumed—fertility not only for the land and forest, but also fertility for humans.
History
Kievan Rus' official religion and popular cults
![Czeko potocka ofiarawelesowi](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/59/Czeko_potocka_ofiarawelesowi.jpg)
In 980 CE, in
Kievan Rus'
Kievan Rusʹ, also known as Kyivan Rusʹ ( orv, , Rusĭ, or , , ; Old Norse: ''Garðaríki''), was a state in Eastern and Northern Europe from the late 9th to the mid-13th century.John Channon & Robert Hudson, ''Penguin Historical Atlas of ...
, led by the Great Prince
Vladimir
Vladimir may refer to:
Names
* Vladimir (name) for the Bulgarian, Croatian, Czech, Macedonian, Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak and Slovenian spellings of a Slavic name
* Uladzimir for the Belarusian version of the name
* Volodymyr for the Ukr ...
, there was an attempt to unify the various beliefs and priestly practices of Slavic religion in order to bind together the Slavic peoples in the growing centralised state. Volodymyr canonised a number of deities, to whom he erected a temple on the hills of the capital
Kyiv
Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the seventh-most populous city in Europe.
Kyi ...
. These deities, recorded in the ''
Primary Chronicle'', were five: ''Perun'', ''Xors Dazhbog'', ''Stribog'', ''
Simargl
Simargl (also Sěmargl, Semargl) or Sěm and Rgel is an East Slavic god or gods, mentioned in two sources. The origin and etymology of this/these figure(s) is the subject of considerable debate. The dominant view is to interpret Simargl as a singl ...
'' and ''Mokosh''. Various other deities were worshipped by the common people, notably Veles who had a temple in the merchant's district of
Podil
Podil ( uk, Поділ) or the Lower cityIvankin, H., Vortman, D. Podil (ПОДІЛ)'. Encyclopedia of History of Ukraine. is a historic neighborhood in Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine. It is located on a floodplain terrace over the Dnieper betwe ...
of the capital itself. According to scholars, Volodymyr's project consisted of a number of reforms that he had already started by the 970s, and which were aimed at preserving the traditions of the kins and making Kyiv the spiritual centre of
East Slavdom.
Perun was the god of thunder, law and war, symbolised by the oak and the
mallet (or throwing stones), and identified with the Baltic ''Perkunas'', the Germanic ''
Thor
Thor (; from non, Þórr ) is a prominent god in Germanic paganism. In Norse mythology, he is a hammer-wielding god associated with lightning, thunder, storms, sacred groves and trees, strength, the protection of humankind, hallowing, an ...
'' and the Vedic ''
Indra'' among others; his cult was practised not so much by commoners but mainly by the aristocracy. Veles was the god of horned livestock (''Skotibog''), of wealth and of the underworld. Perun and Veles symbolised an oppositional and yet complementary duality similar to that of the Vedic ''
Mitra'' and ''
Varuna
Varuna (; sa, वरुण, , Malay: ''Baruna'') is a Vedic deity associated initially with the sky, later also with the seas as well as Ṛta (justice) and Satya (truth). He is found in the oldest layer of Vedic literature of Hinduism, such ...
'', an eternal struggle between heavenly and chthonic forces. Roman Jakobson himself identified Veles as the Vedic Varuna, god of oaths and of the world order. This belief in a cosmic duality was likely the reason that led to the exclusion of Veles from Volodymyr's official temple in Kyiv. Xors Dazhbog ("Radiant Giving-God") was the god of the life-bringing power of the sun. Stribog was identified by E. G. Kagarov as the god of wind, storm and dissension. Mokosh, the only female deity in Volodymyr's pantheon, is interpreted as meaning the "Wet" or "Moist" by Jakobson, identifying her with the Mat Syra Zemlya ("Damp Mother Earth") of later folk religion.
According to Ivanits, written sources from the Middle Ages "leave no doubt whatsoever" that the common Slavic peoples continued to worship their indigenous deities and hold their rituals for centuries after Kievan Rus' official baptism into Christianity, and the lower clergy of the newly formed Orthodox Christian church often joined the celebrations. The high clergy repeatedly condemned, through official admonitions, the worship of ''Rod'' and the ''Rozhanitsy'' ("God and the Goddesses", or "Generation and the generatrixes") with offerings of bread, porridge, cheese and mead. Scholars of Russian religion define ''Rod'' as the "general power of birth and reproduction" and the ''Rozhanitsy'' as the "mistresses of individual destiny". Kagarov identified the later ''
Domovoi
In the Slavic religious tradition, Domovoy ( Russian: Домово́й, literally "he oneof the household"; also spelled ''Domovoi'', ''Domovoj'', and known as pl, Domowik or Serbian and ua, Домовик, translit=domovyk) is the household ...
'', the god of the household and kinship ancestry, as a specific manifestation of Rod. Other gods attested in medieval documents remain largely mysterious, for instance ''Lada'' and her sons ''Lel'' and ''Polel'', who are often identified by scholars with the Greek gods ''
Leda'' or ''
Leto
In ancient Greek mythology and religion, Leto (; grc-gre, Λητώ , ''Lētṓ'', or , ''Lātṓ'' in Doric Greek) is a goddess and the mother of Apollo, the god of music, and Artemis, the goddess of the hunt.Hesiod, ''Theogony'404–409/ref> ...
'' and her twin sons
''Castor'' and ''Pollux''. Other figures who in medieval documents are often presented as deities, such as ''Kupala'' and ''Koliada'', were rather the personifications of the spirits of agrarian holidays.
Christianisation of the East Slavs
Vladimir's baptism, popular resistance and syncretism
In 988, Vladimir of Kyivan Rus' rejected Slavic religion and
he and his subjects were officially baptised into the
Eastern Orthodox Church
The Eastern Orthodox Church, also called the Orthodox Church, is the second-largest Christian church, with approximately 220 million baptized members. It operates as a communion of autocephalous churches, each governed by its bishops vi ...
, then the
state religion of the
Byzantine Empire
The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...
. According to legend, Vladimir sent delegates to foreign states to determine what was the most convincing religion to be adopted by Kyiv. Joyfulness and beauty were the primary characteristics of pre-Christian Slavic ceremonies, and the delegates sought something capable of matching these qualities. They were crestfallen by the
Islamic religion of
Volga Bulgaria
Volga Bulgaria or Volga–Kama Bulgaria, was a historic Bulgar state that existed between the 7th and 13th centuries around the confluence of the Volga and Kama River, in what is now European Russia. Volga Bulgaria was a multi-ethnic state wi ...
, where they found "no joy ... but sorrow and great stench", and by
Western Christianity
Western Christianity is one of two sub-divisions of Christianity ( Eastern Christianity being the other). Western Christianity is composed of the Latin Church and Western Protestantism, together with their offshoots such as the Old Catholic ...
(then the
Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
) where they found "many worship services, but nowhere ... beauty". Those who visited
Constantinople
la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه
, alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya ( Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis ( ...
were instead impressed by the arts and rituals of Byzantine Christianity. According to the ''Primary Chronicle'', after the choice was made Vladimir commanded that the Slavic temple on the Kyivan hills be destroyed and the effigies of the gods be burned or thrown into the
Dnieper
}
The Dnieper () or Dnipro (); , ; . is one of the major transboundary rivers of Europe, rising in the Valdai Hills near Smolensk, Russia, before flowing through Belarus and Ukraine to the Black Sea. It is the longest river of Ukraine and ...
. Slavic temples were destroyed throughout the lands of Kievan Rus' and Christian churches were built in their places.
According to Ivakhiv, Christianisation was stronger in what is today western and central Ukraine, lands close to the capital Kyiv. Slavic religion persisted, however, especially in northernmost regions of Slavic settlement, in what is today the central part of
European Russia, such as the areas of
Novgorod,
Suzdal and
Belozersk
Belozersk (russian: Белозе́рск), known as Beloozero (russian: Белоозеро, label=none) until 1777, is a town and the administrative center of Belozersky District in Vologda Oblast, Russia, located on the southern bank of Lake Be ...
. In the core regions of Christianisation themselves the common population remained attached to the
''volkhv''s, the priests, who periodically, over centuries, led popular rebellions against the central power and the Christian church. Christianisation was a very slow process among the Slavs, and the official Christian church adopted a policy of co-opting pre-Christian elements into Slavic Christianity. Christian saints were identified with Slavic gods—for instance, the figure of Perun was overlapped with that of
Saint Elias, Veles was identified with
Saint Blasius, and
Yarilo became
Saint George
Saint George (Greek: Γεώργιος (Geórgios), Latin: Georgius, Arabic: القديس جرجس; died 23 April 303), also George of Lydda, was a Christian who is venerated as a saint in Christianity. According to tradition he was a soldie ...
—and Christian festivals were set on the same dates as pagan ones.
Another feature of early Slavic Christianity was the strong influence of
apocrypha
Apocrypha are works, usually written, of unknown authorship or of doubtful origin. The word ''apocryphal'' (ἀπόκρυφος) was first applied to writings which were kept secret because they were the vehicles of esoteric knowledge considered ...
l literature, which became evident by the thirteenth century with the rise of
Bogomilism
Bogomilism ( Bulgarian and Macedonian: ; sh-Latn-Cyrl, separator=" / ", bogumilstvo, богумилство) was a Christian neo-Gnostic or dualist sect founded in the First Bulgarian Empire by the priest Bogomil during the reign of Tsar P ...
among the
South Slavs
South Slavs are Slavic peoples who speak South Slavic languages and inhabit a contiguous region of Southeast Europe comprising the eastern Alps and the Balkan Peninsula. Geographically separated from the West Slavs and East Slavs by Austria, ...
. South Slavic Bogomilism produced a large amount of apocryphal texts and their teachings later penetrated into Russia, and would have influenced later Slavic folk religion. Bernshtam tells of a "flood" of apocryphal literature in eleventh- to fifteenth-century Russia, which might not have been controlled by the still-weak Russian Orthodox Church.
Continuity of Slavic religion in Russia up to the 15th century
Some scholars have highlighted how the "conversion of Rus" took place no more than eight years after Volodymyr's reform of Slavic religion in 980; according to them, Christianity in general did not have "any deep influence ... in the formation of the ideology, culture and social psychology of archaic societies" and the introduction of Christianity in Kyiv "did not bring about a radical change in the consciousness of the society during the entire course of early Russian history". It was portrayed as a mass and conscious conversion only by half a century later, by the scribes of the Christian establishment. According to some scholars, the replacement of Slavic temples with Christian churches and the "baptism of Rus" has to be understood in continuity with the foregoing chain of reforms of Slavic religion launched by Volodymyr, rather than as a breaking point.
V. G. Vlasov quotes the respected scholar of Slavic religion E. V. Anichkov, who, regarding Russia's Christianisation, said:
According to Vlasov the ritual of baptism and mass conversion undergone by Volodymyr in 988 was never repeated in the centuries to follow, and mastery of Christian teachings was never accomplished on the popular level even by the start of the twentieth century. According to him, a nominal, superficial identification with Christianity was possible with the superimposition of a Christianised agrarian calendar ("Christian–Easter–Whitsunday") over the indigenous complex of festivals, "Koliada–Yarilo–Kupala". The analysis of the Christianised agrarian and ritual calendar, combined with data from popular astronomy, leads to determine that the
Julian calendar
The Julian calendar, proposed by Roman consul Julius Caesar in 46 BC, was a reform of the Roman calendar. It took effect on , by edict. It was designed with the aid of Greek mathematicians and astronomers such as Sosigenes of Alexandr ...
associated with the Orthodox Church was adopted by Russian peasants between the sixteenth and seventeenth century. It was by this period that much of the Russian population became officially part of the Orthodox Church and therefore nominally Christians. This occurred as an effect of a broader complex of phenomena which Russia underwent by the fifteenth century, that is to say radical changes towards a centralisation of state power, which involved urbanisation, bureaucratisation and the consolidation of
serfdom
Serfdom was the status of many peasants under feudalism, specifically relating to manorialism, and similar systems. It was a condition of debt bondage and indentured servitude with similarities to and differences from slavery, which deve ...
of the peasantry.
That the vast majority of the Russian population was not Christian back in the fifteenth century may possibly be evidenced by archaeology: according to Vlasov, mound (''
kurgan
A kurgan is a type of tumulus constructed over a grave, often characterized by containing a single human body along with grave vessels, weapons and horses. Originally in use on the Pontic–Caspian steppe, kurgans spread into much of Central As ...
'') burials, which do not reflect Christian norms, were "a universal phenomenon in Russia up to the fifteenth century", and persisted into the 1530s. Moreover, chronicles from that period, such as the ''Pskov Chronicle'', and archaeological data collected by N. M. Nikolsky, testify that back in the fifteenth century there were still "no rural churches for the general use of the populace; churches existed only at the courts of boyars and princes". It was only by the sixteenth century that the
Russian Orthodox Church
, native_name_lang = ru
, image = Moscow July 2011-7a.jpg
, imagewidth =
, alt =
, caption = Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow, Russia
, abbreviation = ROC
, type ...
grew as a powerful, centralising institution taking the Catholic Church of Rome as a model, and the distinctiveness of a Slavic folk religion became evident. The church condemned "
heresies
Heresy is any belief or theory that is strongly at variance with established beliefs or customs, in particular the accepted beliefs of a church or religious organization. The term is usually used in reference to violations of important religi ...
" and tried to eradicate the "false half-pagan" folk religion of the common people, but these measures coming from the centres of church power were largely ineffective, and on the local level creative syntheses of folk religious rituals and holidays continued to thrive.
Sunwise Slavic religion, withershins Christianity, and Old Belief
![WalRhad](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1a/WalRhad.jpg)
When the incorporation of the Russian population into Christianity became substantial in the middle of the sixteenth century, the Russian Orthodox Church absorbed further elements of pre-Christian and popular tradition and underwent a transformation of its architecture, with the adoption of the hipped roof which was traditionally associated with pre-Christian Slavic temples. The most significant change, however, was the adoption of the
sunwise—or clockwise—direction in Christian ritual procession.
Christianity is characterised by
withershins ritual movement, that is to say, movement against the course of the sun. This was also the case in Slavic Christianity before the sixteenth century. Sunwise movements are instead characteristic of Slavic religion, evident in the ''khorovod'', ritual circle-dance, which magically favours the development of things. Withershins movement was employed in popular rituals, too, though only in those occasions when it was considered worthwhile to act against the course of nature, in order to alter the state of affairs.
When
Patriarch Nikon of Moscow
Nikon ( ru , Ни́кон, Old Russian: ''Нїконъ''), born Nikita Minin (''Никита Минин''; 7 May 1605 – 17 August 1681) was the seventh Patriarch of Moscow and all Rus' of the Russian Orthodox Church, serving officially from ...
launched his reform of the Orthodox Church in 1656, he restored the withershins ritual movement. This was among the changes that led to a schism (''
raskol
The Schism of the Russian Church, also known as Raskol (russian: раскол, , meaning "split" or "schism"), was the splitting of the Russian Orthodox Church into an official church and the Old Believers movement in the mid-17th century. It ...
'') within Russian Orthodoxy, between those who accepted the reforms and the Old Believers, who preserved instead the "ancient piety" derived from indigenous Slavic religion. A large number of Russians and ethnic minorities converted to the movement of the Old Believers, in the broadest meaning of the term—including a variety of folk religions—pointed out by Bernshtam, and these Old Believers were a significant part of the settlers of broader European Russia and
Siberia
Siberia ( ; rus, Сибирь, r=Sibir', p=sʲɪˈbʲirʲ, a=Ru-Сибирь.ogg) is an extensive region, geographical region, constituting all of North Asia, from the Ural Mountains in the west to the Pacific Ocean in the east. It has been a ...
throughout the second half of the seventeenth century, which saw the expansion of the Russian state in these regions. Old Believers were distinguished by their cohesion, literacy and initiative, and constantly emerging new religious sects tended to identify themselves with the movement. This posed a great hitch to the Russian Orthodox Church's project of thorough Christianisation of the masses. Veletskaya highlighted how the Old Believers have preserved
early Slavic
The early Slavs were a diverse group of tribal societies who lived during the Migration Period and the Early Middle Ages (approximately the 5th to the 10th centuries AD) in Central and Eastern Europe and established the foundations for the Slav ...
pagan ideas and practices such as the veneration of fire as a channel to the divine world, the symbolism of the colour red, the search for a "glorious death", and more in general the holistic vision of a divine cosmos.
Christianization of the West Slavs
In the opinion of
Norman Davies, the Christianization of Poland through the Czech–Polish alliance represented a conscious choice on the part of Polish rulers to ally themselves with the Czech state rather than the German one. The Moravian cultural influence played a significant role in the spread of Christianity onto the Polish lands and the subsequent adoption of that religion. Christianity arrived around the late 9th century, most likely around the time when the
Vistulan tribe encountered the Christian rite in dealings with their neighbours, the
Great Moravia
Great Moravia ( la, Regnum Marahensium; el, Μεγάλη Μοραβία, ''Meghálī Moravía''; cz, Velká Morava ; sk, Veľká Morava ; pl, Wielkie Morawy), or simply Moravia, was the first major state that was predominantly West Slavic to ...
(Bohemian) state. The "Baptism of Poland" refers to the ceremony when the first ruler of the Polish state,
Mieszko I and much of his court, converted to Christianity on the
Holy Saturday
Holy Saturday ( la, Sabbatum Sanctum), also known as Great and Holy Saturday (also Holy and Great Saturday), the Great Sabbath, Hallelujah Saturday (in Portugal and Brazil), Saturday of the Glory, Sabado de Gloria, and Black Saturday or Easter ...
of 14 April 966.
In the eleventh century, Slavic pagan culture was "still in full working order" among the
West Slavs
The West Slavs are Slavic peoples who speak the West Slavic languages. They separated from the common Slavic group around the 7th century, and established independent polities in Central Europe by the 8th to 9th centuries. The West Slavic lan ...
. Christianity faced
popular opposition, including an uprising in the 1030s (particularly intense in the years of 1035–1037). By the twelfth century, however, under the pressure of
Germanisation,
Catholicism
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
was forcefully imposed through the
Northern Crusades
The Northern Crusades or Baltic Crusades were Christian colonization and Christianization campaigns undertaken by Catholic Christian military orders and kingdoms, primarily against the pagan Baltic, Finnic and West Slavic peoples around th ...
, and temples and images of Slavic religion were violently destroyed. West Slavic populations held out vigorously against Christianisation. One of the most famous instances of popular resistance occurred at the temple-stronghold of Svetovid at
Cape Arkona
Cape Arkona () is a 45-metre (150-foot) high cape on the island of Rügen in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, Germany. It forms the tip of the Wittow peninsula, just a few kilometres north of the Jasmund National Park. The protected landscape of Cape Arko ...
, in
Rugia. The temple at Arkona had a squared groundplan, with an inner hall sustained by four pillars which contained Svetovid's statue. The latter had four heads, shown beardless and cleanshaven after the Rugian fashion. In its right hand the statue held a horn of precious metal, which was used for divination during the yearly great festival of the god. In 1168, Arkona surrendered to the
Danish
Danish may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to the country of Denmark
People
* A national or citizen of Denmark, also called a "Dane," see Demographics of Denmark
* Culture of Denmark
* Danish people or Danes, people with a Danish a ...
troops of
King Valdemar I, and the bishop
Absalon
Absalon (21 March 1201) was a Danish statesman and prelate of the Catholic Church who served as the bishop of Roskilde from 1158 to 1192 and archbishop of Lund from 1178 until his death. He was the foremost politician and church father of Denm ...
led the destruction of the temple of Svetovid.
Slavic folk religion
![Maslenitsa in Belgorod 2015 28](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4f/Maslenitsa_in_Belgorod_2015_28.JPG)
Ethnography in late-nineteenth-century Ukraine documented a "thorough synthesis of pagan and Christian elements" in Slavic folk religion, a system often called "double belief" (
Russian
Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including:
*Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries
*Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...
: ''dvoeverie'',
Ukrainian
Ukrainian may refer to:
* Something of, from, or related to Ukraine
* Something relating to Ukrainians, an East Slavic people from Eastern Europe
* Something relating to demographics of Ukraine in terms of demography and population of Ukraine
* So ...
: ''dvovirya''). According to Bernshtam, ''dvoeverie'' is still used to this day in scholarly works to define Slavic folk religion, which is seen by certain scholars as having preserved much of pre-Christian Slavic religion, "poorly and transparently" covered by a Christianity that may be easily "stripped away" to reveal more or less "pure" patterns of the original faith. Since the
collapse of the Soviet Union
The dissolution of the Soviet Union, also negatively connoted as rus, Разва́л Сове́тского Сою́за, r=Razvál Sovétskogo Soyúza, ''Ruining of the Soviet Union''. was the process of internal disintegration within the Sov ...
there has been a new wave of scholarly debate on the subjects of Slavic folk religion and ''dvoeverie''. A. E. Musin, an academic and deacon of the Russian Orthodox Church, published an article about the "problem of double belief" as recently as 1991. In this article he divides scholars between those who say that Russian Orthodoxy adapted to entrenched indigenous faith, continuing the Soviet idea of an "undefeated paganism", and those who say that Russian Orthodoxy is an out-and-out syncretic religion. Bernshtam challenges dualistic notions of ''dvoeverie'' and proposes interpreting broader Slavic religiosity as a ''mnogoverie'' ("multifaith") continuum, in which a higher layer of Orthodox Christian officialdom is alternated with a variety of "Old Beliefs" among the various strata of the population.
According to Ivanits, nineteenth- and twentieth-century Slavic folk religion's central concern was fertility, propitiated with rites celebrating death and resurrection. Scholars of Slavic religion who focused on nineteenth-century folk religion were often led to mistakes such as the interpretation of ''Rod'' and ''Rozhanitsy'' as figures of a merely ancestral cult; however, in medieval documents Rod is equated with the ancient Egyptian god
Osiris
Osiris (, from Egyptian ''wsjr'', cop, ⲟⲩⲥⲓⲣⲉ , ; Phoenician: 𐤀𐤎𐤓, romanized: ʾsr) is the god of fertility, agriculture, the afterlife, the dead, resurrection, life, and vegetation in ancient Egyptian religion. He wa ...
, representing a broader concept of natural generativity. Belief in the holiness of ''Mat Syra Zemlya'' ("Damp Mother Earth") is another feature that has persisted into modern Slavic folk religion; up to the twentieth century, Russian peasants practiced a variety of rituals devoted to her and confessed their sins to her in the absence of a priest. Ivanits also reports that in the
region of Volodymyr old people practiced a ritual asking Earth's forgiveness before their death. A number of scholars attributed the Russians' particular devotion to the ''
Theotokos'', the "Mother of God", to this still powerful pre-Christian substratum of devotion to a great
mother goddess.
Ivanits attributes the tenacity of synthetic Slavic folk religion to an exceptionality of Slavs and of Russia in particular, compared to other European countries; "the Russian case is extreme", she says, because Russia—especially the vastness of rural Russia—neither lived the intellectual upheavals of the
Renaissance
The Renaissance ( , ) , from , with the same meanings. is a period in European history
The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (800 BC to AD ...
, nor the
Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
, nor the
Age of Enlightenment
The Age of Enlightenment or the Enlightenment; german: Aufklärung, "Enlightenment"; it, L'Illuminismo, "Enlightenment"; pl, Oświecenie, "Enlightenment"; pt, Iluminismo, "Enlightenment"; es, La Ilustración, "Enlightenment" was an intel ...
, which severely weakened folk spirituality in the rest of Europe.
Slavic folk religious festivals and rites reflect the times of the ancient pagan calendar. For instance, the Christmas period is marked by the rites of ''
Koliada
Koliada or koleda (Cyrillic: коляда, коледа, колада, коледе) is the traditional Slavic name for the period from Christmas to Epiphany or, more generally, to Slavic Christmas-related rituals, some dating to pre-Christian ...
'', characterised by the element of fire, processions and ritual drama, offerings of food and drink to the ancestors. Spring and summer rites are characterised by fire- and water-related imagery spinning around the figures of the gods ''
Yarilo'', ''
Kupala
Slavic pseudo-deities (pseudo-gods, pseudo-goddesses) are Slavic deities that exist in popular or even scientific literature, but their historicity is not recognized by the vast majority of scholars, i.e., that the deity in question was not actua ...
'' and ''
Marzanna
Marzanna (in Polish), Morė (in Lithuanian), Marena (in Russian), Mara (in Ukrainian), Morana (in Czech, Slovene and Serbo-Croatian), Morena (in Slovak and Macedonian) or Mora (in Bulgarian) is a pagan Slavic goddess associated with seasonal r ...
''. The switching of seasonal spirits is celebrated through the interaction of effigies of these spirits and the elements which symbolise the coming season, such as by burning, drowning or setting the effigies onto water, and the "rolling of burning wheels of straw down into rivers".
Modern Rodnovery
Since the early twentieth century there has been a reinvention and reinstitutionalisation of "Slavic religion" in the so-called movement of "Rodnovery", literally "Slavic Native Faith". The movement draws from ancient Slavic folk religion, often combining it with philosophical underpinnings taken from other religions, mainly
Hinduism
Hinduism () is an Indian religion or '' dharma'', a religious and universal order or way of life by which followers abide. As a religion, it is the world's third-largest, with over 1.2–1.35 billion followers, or 15–16% of the global p ...
.
Some Rodnover groups focus almost exclusively on folk religions and the worship of gods at the right times of the year, while others have developed a scriptural core, represented by writings purported to be centuries-old documents such as the ''
Book of Veles
The Book of Veles (also: Veles Book, Vles book, ''Vles kniga'', Vlesbook, Isenbeck's Planks, , , , , , ) is a literary forgery purporting to be a text of ancient Slavic religion and history supposedly written on wooden planks.
It contains reli ...
''; writings which elaborate powerful national mythologemes such as the ''Maha Vira'' of
Sylenkoism; and esoteric writings such as the ''Slavo-Aryan Vedas'' of
Ynglism
Ynglism ( Russian: Инглии́зм; Ynglist runes: ), institutionally the Ancient Russian Ynglist Church of the Orthodox Old Believers–Ynglings (Древнерусская Инглиистическая Церковь Православны ...
.
[
]
Reconstructed calendar of celebrations
Linda J. Ivanits reconstructed a basic calendar of the celebrations of the most important Slavic gods among East Slavs
The East Slavs are the most populous subgroup of the Slavs. They speak the East Slavic languages, and formed the majority of the population of the medieval state Kievan Rus', which they claim as their cultural ancestor.John Channon & Robert H ...
, based on Boris Rybakov
Boris Alexandrovich Rybakov (Russian: Бори́с Алекса́ндрович Рыбако́в, 3 June 1908, Moscow – 27 December 2001) was a Soviet and Russian historian who personified the anti- Normanist vision of Russian history. He is ...
's studies on ancient agricultural calendars, especially a fourth-century one from an area around Kyiv
Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the seventh-most populous city in Europe.
Kyi ...
.
Influence on Christian Art and Architecture
The Old Russian architecture of churches originates from the pre-Christian Slavic "''zodching''" (russian: Зодчество, italic=yes - construction). This pagan style had a great influence on the entire architecture of ancient Russia, including the structure and decoration of churches and the art of icon painting.
On this occasion, the researcher Boris Grekov
Boris Dmitrievich Grekov (; in Mirgorod, Poltava Governorate, Russian Empire – 9 September 1953 in Moscow) was a Russian and Soviet historian noted for his comprehensive studies of Kievan Rus and the Golden Horde. He was a member of the Sov ...
wrote:
The peculiarity of ancient Russian architecture was also manifested in the appearance of the domes themselves, the most famous of which is the onion dome
An onion dome is a dome whose shape resembles an onion. Such domes are often larger in diameter than the tholobate upon which they sit, and their height usually exceeds their width. These bulbous structures taper smoothly to a point.
It is a typ ...
.
The historian Alexander Zamaleev suggests that the orientation of ancient Russian architects on pagan foundations is explained primarily by the difference in building materials: in Byzantium, the construction of temples was carried out from stone and marble, while in ancient Russia wooden architecture prevailed. This choice of material also led to the emergence of many architectural trends, including the so-called " tent architecture". The earliest wooden churches in shape and plan were a square or oblong quadrangle with a tower-shaped dome planted on it, similar to those that were placed in ancient Russian fortresses. Above the dome, under the cross, another chapter was being built, resembling an onion.
Outside and inside the temples were decorated with various carvings, often in the traditions of the pagan style. Later, this tradition was transferred to the stone church architecture.[George Wagner. Sculpture of Ancient Russia. 12th century. Bogolyubovo, Moscow, 1969.]
A distinctive feature of the Old Russian architectural thinking was the attraction to high-rise composition. This was manifested not only in the creation of tower-like churches (moreover, the "polydoming" and pyramidal composition, which was absent in the Byzantine culture, was highly appreciated), but also in the choice of a high place for religious buildings.
Most often, the vaults in the Old Russian churches are represented in the form of " kokoshniks" (semicircular vaults with a protruding sharp middle) and " zakomara" (semicircular protruding end of the outer section of the wall).
Meanwhile, Christianity had an impact on the Old Russian funeral rites: corpse-burning was replaced with burial. However, among the common population, there is a memory of triangular mounds piled up over the burned body of the deceased. Later, this custom developed into the construction of a "roof" over the cross, the so-called "golubets".
This style gained immense popularity in the Russian Empire
The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...
, thereby reviving in the form of Neo-Russian architecture.["Moscow. Monuments of Architecture, 18th - the first third of 19th century", Moscow, Iskusstvo, 1975, p.331]
See also
* Ancestor worship
The veneration of the dead, including one's ancestors, is based on love and respect for the deceased. In some cultures, it is related to beliefs that the dead have a continued existence, and may possess the ability to influence the fortune of t ...
* Proto-Indo-European religion
Proto-Indo-European mythology is the body of myths and deities associated with the Proto-Indo-Europeans, the hypothetical speakers of the reconstructed Proto-Indo-European language. Although the mythological motifs are not directly attested ...
* Proto-Indo-Iranian religion
Indo-Iranian peoples, also known as Indo-Iranic peoples by scholars, and sometimes as Arya or Aryans from their self-designation, were a group of Indo-European peoples who brought the Indo-Iranian languages, a major branch of the Indo-European ...
* Historical Vedic religion
The historical Vedic religion (also known as Vedicism, Vedism or ancient Hinduism and subsequently Brahmanism (also spelled as Brahminism)), constituted the religious ideas and practices among some Indo-Aryan peoples of northwest Indian Subco ...
* Finnish paganism
Finnish paganism is the indigenous pagan religion in Finland and Karelia prior to Christianisation. It was a polytheistic religion, worshipping a number of different deities. The principal god was the god of thunder and the sky, Ukko; other ...
* Zagovory
*Rodnovery
The Slavic Native Faith, commonly known as Rodnovery
* bg, Родноверие, translit=Rоdnoverie
* bs, Rodnovjerje
* mk, Родноверие, translit=Rodnoverie
* cz, Rodnověří
* hr, Rodnovjerje
* pl, Rodzimowierstwo; Rodzima ...
* Outline of Slavic history and culture
Topical outline of articles about Slavic history and culture. This outline is an overview of Slavic topics; for outlines related to specific Slavic groups and topics, see the links in the Other Slavic outlines section below.
Slavs are the large ...
Notes
References
Citations
Sources
*
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*
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*
*
*
*
*
*
Further reading
*
*
*
*
* Patrice Lajoye (ed.), ''New researches on the religion and mythology of the Pagan Slavs'', Lisieux, Lingva, 2019
External links
*
''Studia Mythologica Slavica''
journal of the Institute of Slovenian Ethnology.
* a book about old Slavic mythology - HOSTINSKÝ, Peter Záboj
''Stará vieronauka slovenská : Vek 1:kniha 1''
. vyd.Pešť: Minerva, 1871. 122 p. - available online at ULB's Digital Library
{{Authority control