just a small-town witch @whichwitchinbitch - Tumblr Blog

Slavic Polytheism and Magic Notes (1 of 5): Intro/Basics

Welcome to part 1 of 5 in my Slavic polytheism and magic 101 notes!

Disclaimer: I am in no way an expert. I’ve actually been worshipping gods from the Slavic pantheon (Veles mostly) for less than a year, so I’m very very new. However, I’m a researcher at heart, and since it can be very difficult to find reliable Slavic paganism resources in English, I decided to type up my current cited notes to make them available to others.

I will include a works cited at the end of each post, but the two resources I’m drawing from the most are: Slavic Folklore by Natalie Kononenko, and Forests of the Vampire: Slavic Myth by Charles Phillips and Michael Kerrigan.

The former is a more academic book mostly focused on Russian and Ukrainian stories and languages, the second is more of a coffee table book with condensed historical and mythological snippets, mostly Russian. “Slavic” encompasses a lot of cultures beyond these, so given the focus of my sources, these posts will obviously be limited. My posts will also be tailored to my own interests, especially Veles and death work, so if you’re looking for other information, I recommend reading these books on your own if you can.

Who can worship the Slavic pantheon or incorporate these practices into their lives?

Anyone, of any culture, race and ethnicity, sexuality, gender, etc, can respectfully learn, worship, and practice. This is an OPEN culture. I’m a QWoC who was called by Veles. Nazis fuck off.

Along those lines: some English resources for Slavic polytheism (sometimes called Rodnovery) are inaccurate and very scary, in the genocidal white supremacist sense. One such author to avoid is Dmitriy Kushnir. Please be careful.

What constitutes the Slavic ethno-linguistic geographical region?

It’s very broad, ranging from Central, Eastern, Southeastern, and Northeastern Europe, and North and Central Asia. The site of the 1986 Chernobyl disaster may have actually been the original home region of ancient Slavs (Kononenko 3).

What are the historical sources for pre-Christian Slavic beliefs?

In 988, Kievan Rus (under Prince Vladimir) formally accepted Byzantine Christianity conversion (Phillips & Kerrigan 23). The earliest known historical document in the Slavic world was compiled after this, titled the Primary Chronicle: “It covers the period from 850 to 1110 of the common era and was written in a monastery in Kyiv. The original no longer exists and we know of it from copies called the Laurentian Codex and the Hypatian Codex” (Kononenko 182).

Therefore, most beliefs prior to this only survived in writing filtered through this lens, or were passed down through storytelling, family traditions, and references in other historical documents. Piecing together the Primary Chronicle and other documents has resulted in some Slavic gods and practices being attested (182), but without much detail. Pre-Christian beliefs generally ended up merging with Christian beliefs and practices, and survived this way as well (Phillips & Kerrigan 24).

There is probably no known pre-Christian religious document depicting stories or worship of the Slavic gods. Only one “source” like this is known, The Book of Veles, translated by Kachur into English in 1973 (Kononenko 4-5), but this book is generally considered to be a forgery and not an authentic ancient document (186).

What does this mean for modern practitioners of Slavic polytheism?

Extracting lots of possibilities from tiny, incomplete snippets of information, untangling pre-Christian gods from their merging with Christian figures, learning from people’s descriptions of family traditions and magical practices, and lots of UPG!

My next (much longer) posts will be as follows:

2. Slavic Magic and Rituals: General 3. Slavic Magic and Rituals: Death Work 4. Slavic Gods and Entities: General 5. Slavic Gods and Entities: Veles

Thanks for reading! Please feel free to reblog and spread around, add information, ask questions, etc.

Works Cited

Kononenko, Natalie. Slavic Folklore: A Handbook. Greenwood Folklore Handbooks. Greenwood Press: Westport, Connecticut. 2007.

Phillips, Charles, and Kerrigan, Michael. Forests of the Vampire: Slavic Myth. Duncan Baird Publishers (text), Time-Life Books (series). Time-Life Books: BV, Amsterdam. 1999.

scarletravenswood

ALL ABOUT SLAVIC PAGANISM

Recently I’ve been obsessed with The Witcher series on Netflix. While this show is based in a fantasy universe, it is largely inspired by Slavic mythology. In the show we see several fascinating creatures from the Slavic mythos, such as the Striga and the Kikimora. This show has made me realize how little I know about Slavic Paganism and has really inspired me to seek more knowledge about this topic. So, I’ve done some research and in my video linked below you’ll find some introduction information about Slavic Paganism. Early Slavic paganism has been a challenge for historians to study. Unlike Greek & Roman paganism there is no existing original source material because the early Slavs left no records of their gods, prayers, or rituals. The only texts we have is through secondary sources, which were mostly written by monks during the period when the Slavic states were Christianized. However, The Slavic peasants were not Christianized to the extent that other areas of Europe were so a lot of the religious customs from Slavic Paganism were preserved as Folk traditions. There are numerous deities in Slavic Paganism, many of whom have dual aspects. The deity Rod, is a creator God and considered a father god to many other figures in Slavic mythology, such as Perun, a god of thunder and the sky. His opposite is Veles, who is associated with wild animals, the Underworld, and magic. The best known Slavic deity here in America is probably Czernobog who was the incarnation of darkness. In Slavic lore, Czernobog decided he wanted to control the world and universe, so he turned into a great black serpent. Svarog, The God of Celestial Fire, knew that Czernobog was up to no good, so he took up his hammer and forge and created additional gods to help him stop Czernobog. When Svarog finally called for aid, the other gods joined him to defeat Czernobog before he could take over the universe. In the Slavic creation stories there began with only darkness, inhabited by Rod, and an egg that contained Svarog. The egg cracked open, and Svarog climbed out; the dust from the eggshell formed a sacred tree which rose to separate the heavens from the sea and the land. Svarog then used gold powder from the underworld to create a world full of life, and then he created the sun and the moon. The debris from the bottom of the egg was gathered and formed to create humans and animals. While there are many variations of this creation story, they almost always include two deities, one dark and one light, representing the underworld and the heavens. One very popular figure from Slavic Folklore is of course the Baba Yaga. Baba Yaga is a supernatural being who appears as a deformed or ferocious-looking old woman. In Russian fairy tales, Baba Yaga flies around in a small cauldron, and dwells deep in the forest in a hut usually described as standing on chicken legs. Like other Pagan religions, Slavic rituals were based on agricultural celebrations and the movement of the Sun and the Moon. One important celebration is Velja Noc, which falls in March and is considered the Slavic New Year’s Eve since the Pagan Slavs followed the Lunar calendar. On this day shamans wear elaborate masks and coats of sheep wool and roam around the villages to welcome the spirits of the ancestors so that they may celebrate the new year with their living relatives. Today there is a strong resurgence of interest in Slavic Paganism and I’m excited to see that Slavic folklore & deities are still remembered and honored across Eastern Europe and beyond.

#pagan #slavic paganism

awitchybee

Please reblog if you post any of the following:

~ Kemeticism ~ Freyja/Norse gods ~ Slavic paganism ~ Celtic polytheism ~ Spirit work ~ Necromancy ~ Witchcraft ~ Wicca ~ Crystals, spells, curses, herbs…etc. ~ Paganism in general

I’ll check out your blog and most likely follow you! ✴