Talk:List of Slavic deities

Merge proposal

I think this list is complete enough to stand as a separate page from Slavic mythology, especially as that article is currently under the proposal of being split into Slavic paganism and Slavic folklore. Being that the merge proposal has stood since November 2007 with no discussion, I will assume that there will be no controversy in my removal of the merger tag. Tea with toast (talk) 22:18, 24 December 2009 (UTC)

Modern symbol of Veles

It is taken from slawoslaw.pl website.

Lem wrote: (Reverted good faith edits by Wojsław Brożyna: Sorry, the article you cited has no author hence authority unknown; also it does not support the claim in signature that it is "modern".)

WB wrote: (Reverted good faith edits by Staszek Lem: Authors of site are said in https://www.slawoslaw.pl/redakcja/redaktorzy/. Modernity of this symbol is obviously; there is no historical object with this sign. (TW))

Authors: yes, it is a reasonable guess. Unfortunately editors have no confirmed authority. Modernity: No obvious. "There is no historical record" is your opinion. Worst is that there is no evidence this symbol is used by anyone but slawoslaw and who is slawoslaw but a handful of cosplayers? Please see WP:UNDUE: wikiepdia does not include ideas of random people. Wikipedia presents commonly accepted knowledge and opinions of experts. Staszek Lem (talk) 21:30, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

Descriptions in this list

If a deity has a wikipedia article, the description in this list must match the introduction of this article. Otherwise we have various problems coming from WP:CFORKking of the text. Staszek Lem (talk) 21:48, 5 September 2017 (UTC)

ancient vs modern paganism

There needs to be distinction between modern neo-paganism and ancient polytheism. The concept of Rod is entirely modern and there is no historical evidence of it. The kolovrat symbol was created by Stanisław Jakubowski in 1920s. There is no archaeological evidence of this symbol.--185.136.199.224 (talk) 09:36, 19 February 2018 (UTC)

The concept of Rod is attested in medieval sources and was studied by Rybakov. This is what academic sources say, and we must rely on them, not on the personal opinions of users.--Eckhardt Etheling (talk) 18:20, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

Marek Hapon's artwork is notable enough to be used for Wikipedia

I noted that all the illustrations of the gods made by the artist Marek Hapon have been removed because of their "modernity". However, this article is not necessarily restricted to the ancient interpretation of the deities; modern interpretations and artworks may be included if properly (academically) supported. In the case of Marek Hapon, we have the opportunity to use artworks made by an artist who has been active for decades and who has been treated in academic publications. His artworks were featured in 2b: Polish American Academic Quarterly, 13–14, 1998.--Eckhardt Etheling (talk) 18:18, 30 March 2018 (UTC)

@Staszek Lem:, please write your comments here and stop reverting editions basing on your whims. --Wojsław Brożyna (talk) 23:13, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

@Lem: Surely not in all articles, but I think that we could keep Hapon's artworks at least in this list for general illustration. He is not completely unnoticed, though. As I wrote above, he was featured in 2b: Polish American Academic Quarterly, 13–14, 1998 in an article about modern religious developments. More recently, the Urthona Journal of Buddhism & the Arts has dedicated an article to him. Likely there is more information published in Polish.--Eckhardt Etheling (talk) 23:31, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

How is that Marek Hapon notable enough? Until there is no Wikipedia article, I say he is nonnotable, and this is not a whim, but wikipedia rules of WP:UNDUE and WP:RS.

Illustrations in Wikipedia must come from respectable sources. Either they are faithfully depict the subject or they are works of art by famous artists. Marek Hapon is a nobody, and Wikipedia should not promote his visions in numerous articles. Staszek Lem (talk) 00:27, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

There is plenty of academic authors who do not have a Wikipedia article. Anyway, Marek Hapon is an illustrator who was featured on one academic publication, and this should be enough. Surely, it would be WP:UNDUE to show his artworks on all articles, and individual articles such as Perun etc. should give preference to the works of widely known artists. However, in a general list like this one, in which he is not even mentioned by name and his works are alternated with pictures of natural elements, I think he can stay.--Eckhardt Etheling (talk) 14:45, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Wikipedia has a huge drawback: it is very difficult to establish notability of academics (and their articles are routinely deleted by deletionists) because Wikipedia notability criteria are based on the amount of noise a person generates in "reliable sources". This is not so for artists, musicians, etc., whose livelihood actually depends on the amount of buzz, and they work hard on it. That said, if you vouch for Marek Hapon, then let him be. But I would heavily insist that his illustrations must be used only in cases there is no well-known ones, because, to my tastes, his depictions are sometimes really weird non-traditional. Staszek Lem (talk) 18:16, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Hors

There is mistake. Chors isn't a other name of Dazhbog; while the Dazhbog is god of sun, Chors is god of moon. --Wojsław Brożyna (talk) 18:12, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

According to the sources which I have consulted, the latest being Rudy 1985, Hors Dazhbog is the name of the same god and is unmistakeably the sun-god.--Eckhardt Etheling (talk) 20:44, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

Andrzej Szyjewski, the Polish religious studies scholar, in "Religia Słowian" [Religion of Slavs] from 2003 identifies Chors as moon god. --Wojsław Brożyna (talk) 23:28, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

The source you added is good. This makes "Hors" a title rather than a proper name of either Dazhbog or Juthrbog.--Eckhardt Etheling (talk) 00:29, 4 April 2018 (UTC)

Similar to this, it can be mentioned that Svarozhich (which means MacSvarog, Son of Svarog) teonym can be also used as title for Dazhbog and (rarely) Weles. --Wojsław Brożyna (talk) 08:01, 4 April 2018 (UTC)

Independent articles about Slavic deities are disastrous

In Summer 2017 I merged many of them into this article, since they were no more than stubs or unsourced messes and even the short descriptions in this article were better. However, I didn't merge the most substantial ones which are those about the major gods, including Triglav (mythology), Belobog, Chernobog, Perun, Svetovid, Veles, Mokosh etc. Yet, almost all of them are still horrible messes. Some of them even contain unsourced false assumptions such as (from "Chernobog") "...whose name means black god, about whom much has been speculated but little can be said definitively." Actually, there are tons of sources out there, especially in German, which explain Slavic religion and each dvine figure in depth.--Eckhardt Etheling (talk) 22:10, 7 April 2018 (UTC)

---

Why in the world did you merge "Supernatural beings in Slavic religion" to this page? They ARE NOT deities therefore you're wrong to merge. If it is unsourced then re-write or find sources, don't delete all the hard work. Of course there are conflicting descriptions it's FOLKLORE.

173.92.223.131 (talk) 21:43, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

This is becoming really enervating. Wikipedia is not for unsourced content. The reason was given in the summary: "Merging this hodge-podge of unsourced content into 'Deities of Slavic religion'. Many of the beings listed here are already listed there, and many are only name variations of the same entity. I will verify later whether there is salvable content or not".--Eckhardt Etheling (talk) 00:14, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

The factual accuracy of the whole article is being disputed

After reading the article, I was convinced that it is full of inaccuracies and controversy, for several reasons:

• The article does not respect history, cultural differences, facts, and saying nonsense, modern and esoteric myths and and does not saying anything about National Slavic Faith.
• The article inappropriately mixing different informations about the deities of East Slavic and West Slavic areas, there are different cultures and traditions, some of them taken from the history of the ancient Slavs, some taken from later folklore and also some from fiction, and complements it with modern myths and implies that it is a unified system of beliefs of Slavs as a "Pan-Slavic pantheon" like Greco-Roman or what, but this concept is overcome and completely wrong. There is no evidence that the all Slavs have the same "pantheon" of gods as Romans.
• And then Svetovid, who had a cult center on the island of Rujana (today Germany), is presented here as the Zbruch Idol found in Ukraine, which has different description and meaning, it seems inaccurate, Svetovid is a polabian god and has nothing to do with East Slavic deities like Svarog or with the Zbruch idol, which depicted four deities (probably two male and two female), it is completely wrong. Also there is mentioned the goddess Lada in connection with Svetovid, but Lada (or male god Lado) is taken from later folklore and nothing indicates the connection with Svetovid, these are only hypotheses, which creates only confusion.
• Perun is there described as a man with "head surrounded by ten beams of light, with two faces—that of a man on the front side, and that of a lion on the back side–, and holding a plough in front of him", but there is no evidence to confirm this, no idol of Perun preserved, but the description perfectly agrees with the portraits of the Prillwitz idols, which are proved to be completely fake. Perun is desribed as one of the Prillwitz idols, which was declared a falsum.
• Several gods were taken from fiction or folklore (Flins, Ipabog, Peklabog, Posvist, Moroz etc.).
• There is no evidence that the ancient Slavs believed in germanic/norse gods and tne Julius Caesar. No medieval source mentions this, so it's pure fiction.
• There is no evidence that the ancient Slavs believed in the reincarnation, especially in the reincarnation of the gods. Connection between the East Slavic Veles with Chernobog ("Black God") and West Slavic god Tjarnaglofi ("Black Head") is completely nonsence, that is only unverified hypothesis. There are no sources to confirm it. The names of the gods can be only nicknames. Of course, there is no evidence that this would apply to Native Slavic Faith.
• Some sources are pretty old (even from 19th century) and do not match the current scientific knowledge of scholars, but are marked by the past of the eras of romanticism, nationalism or ideas of Pan-Slavism and have been abused in politics for national awakenings to opposite foreign domination or other cultures. Most of the information are based on the results of the one modern writer like Mathieu-Colas, Hanuš from 1842 etc., their informations is either overcome or controversial, as I think. The main sources, which most are in Latin, like as the medieval scholars, are completely missing, which is a serious mistake, because they mostly do not agree with their research. Other sources about the Slavic religion are unfortunately not available, so it is striking that there is so much information here. I'm afraid that most of the information here is fiction, taken from fantasy or from fairy tales, fictional or esoteric books about Slavic gods.
• Several images of the gods by Marek Hapon are not appropriate and these are just his artistic imaginations. Some of them are introduced in a way, which is a bit different (orgiastic?), and not typical to the ancient Slavs and also the Native Slavic Faith. Some of them might be considered insulting. For example goddess Mokosh is depicted with attributes of the Virgin Mary, Mokosh is there depicted as the Virgin Mary with revealed genitals. Most of the pictures are fictional and do not agree with history and modern Native Slavic Faith. It would be appropriate to replace them with the images used by current Rodnovery believers, I think, of course on Wikimedia Commons there are far better images than these, which are only free imaginations of one artist and does not respect history.
• Of course, the large collection of modern quasi-slavic symbols does not indicate who created them, who uses them or which communities they use. All were created by one user Eckhardt Etheling and there are no sources about them, it seems to be pure nonsence. Some seem to have been taken over from Tolkien's universe (Lord of the Rings, Hobbit), the symbol of Yarovit looks like the eye of Sauron. There are plenty of swastikas crosses that are only known to represent the sun and it is all. Their assignment to many different deities is pure fiction, pure fantasy.

There is reason to think that the article is rather a presentation of a person's belief as Slavic faith appeared, but not as a presentation of real Slavic faith in general. I repeat, for most of the gods there is no evidence that they have their assigned role, as is the case with the Greco-Roman ones. To write large list of all the gods taken from everywhere tells nothing about the original faith of the Slavs, also the lack of sources from modern Slavic Rodnovery communities can not be applied to them as well. If the authors of the article can not prove the informations and sources for modern symbols, they should be removed or replaced. --Dragovit (talk) 00:41, 23 January 2019 (UTC)

Simzerla, deity of dawn and flowers?

I have come across the mention of a "Simzerla" in a Russian fairy tale, with a footnote that said she was the "Aurora" of the Slavonians.

The name also appears in a Universal Lexicon entry (1863), claiming she was married to a man (deity?) named Pogoda.

Another 19th century publication says she was "Sclavonian" and worshipped by "galos y germanos" (Gaulish and Germanic peoples). It also reiterates her role as "Queen of the Flowers".

In a Russian-French-German dictionary, her name is written in the Cyrillic alphabet as Зимцерла (Zimtserla).

Is she genuine, or a poetical fabrication? 18:20, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

A book by one Georg Liebusch, Skythika (1833), informs she is also akin to the Roman goddess Flora and something of a female deity of love and beauty. 18:20, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

An 1879 publication on Slavic peoples says that Simzerla is associated with a male god named Pogoda, a youthful deity of good weather. 179.218.91.213 (talk) 18:34, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

Some more 19th century literature highlights some common characteristics of Simzerla: alternate spellings (Simsterla, Zimsterla); deity of dawn; beloved of Pogoda (Dagoda, Dogoda), a male god of springtime; association with flowers (roses on her belt, a perfume of lilies she emanates), blond hair. Her companion Pogoda is said to wear a blue robe, a wreath of blue flowers on his hair and to have blue wings. The etymology of her name is so far unknown, but it was once speculated to derive from Slavic Zima, "winter", in the first syllable.

https://archive.org/details/symbolikundmyth07monegoog/page/n154/mode/2up?q=simzerla https://archive.org/details/handwrterbuchde00vulpgoog/page/n311/mode/2up?q=simzerla https://archive.org/details/geschichtedeshe01monegoog/page/n165/mode/2up?q=simzerla https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_zeBPLU1jjnMC/page/n263/mode/2up?q=simzerla https://archive.org/details/lamythologieillu00besc/page/94/mode/2up?q=simzerla https://archive.org/details/versucheinersla00kaisgoog/page/n118/mode/2up?q=simzerla

179.218.91.213 (talk) 19:21, 22 September 2020 (UTC)

A final source: In this book [6], at the end of page 327, it is repeated the cult of Simzerla by the Slavs and, after them, "les Germaines et le Gaulois", and the when she dances in the green plains or "voltigeant" (roughly, "fluttering") in the air, a scent of lilies appears.

Rod/Rodzenica mistranslated

In slavic languages rod means family, and rodzenica, rodjenica means uterus, mother, selebration of birth... — Preceding unsigned comment added by 109.92.4.88 (talk) 09:58, 8 October 2020 (UTC)

Removed 90% of the article?

On May 24/2021 user Sławobóg "Replacing this troll article with a new one. Fakelore and romanticism moved to another new article."

Why would they remove years of hard work? They didn't copy over any of the legends or etymologies and turned each of the lower entries into a single line on a new page. If they dispute the legitimacy of one of the gods/spirits listed, then they should add a footnote to the entry of such god/spirit saying they are likely invented or 'fakelore' with a reference to substantiate this claim. Removing 90% of the article in order to replicate it elsewhere in an incomplete form is a disappointing use of a multi-author platform such as this. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:56A:F711:B600:699B:FF28:3731:24A4 (talk) 21:20, 29 May 2021 (UTC)

This "90%" of the article was removed because it was (1) fakelore, (2) original research, and (3) unreliable sources. There were not years of hard work on this article, there were years of trolling by people who never had a science book in their hands. Since there are no good books on Slavic mythology in English and it is difficult to get any reliable information, this article has done great damage by promoting gods that were never worshipped. When it comes to spirits - there should be separate article for them. Sławobóg (talk) 10:54, 30 May 2021 (UTC)

Another thing I noted about the original text of the article is that it seemed to rely heavily on one source, a paper/listing of Balto-Slavic deities by one Mr. Mathieu-Colas. This paper per se seemed to lack any references to the books he consulted. 189.122.57.144 (talk) 19:10, 30 May 2021 (UTC)

Compound names in crypto-table structure

Regarding this edit by user:Sławobóg: the tables have columns for name (singular) and other names. It is completely misleading to readers to construct the nonexistent compound names “Veles-Volos” and “Jarovit-Jarilo.” If anything, this could be formed like “Veles (or Volos),” but that is still confusing because there’s no indication of why only some other names aren’t put under other name. The table structure is intended for clarity, and this subverts it. —Michael Z. 16:21, 4 June 2021 (UTC)

I made this because Yarilo and Yarovit are interpreted as single god, but they have separate articles and there is no way to state which name should be used as "basic" one. Putting one in other names would be unfair. When it comes Veles-Volos some scholars believe they were 2 separate gods, but I haven't analyzed the topic well enough yet. There is also no agreement on which name is "basic". At the moment, we can move Volos to other names. Sławobóg (talk) 17:56, 4 June 2021 (UTC)