The Armenian god of thunder, fire and valor, famed as a slayer of dragons (vishaps), whose birth is preserved in a short verse fragment quoted by the fifth century historian Movses Khorenatsi, one of the very few pieces of pre-Christian Armenian pagan poetry to survive word for word: heaven and earth were in labor, and the purple sea was in labor, and labor in the sea seized the small red reed, and from the reed's stalk smoke arose, from the reed's stalk flame arose, and out of the flame a youth ran. He was identified with the Iranian god of victory, Verethragna, and with the Greek Herakles.
Facts
Function
Domain / Function Origins
Origin of the NameVahagn's name descends from the Iranian god of victory, Avestan Verethragna, meaning smiting of resistance, by way of the Parthian form Warahragn, with the Avestan th regularly becoming h as the name passed into Armenian through Arsacid Middle Persian. Both Verethragna and Vahagn are cognate with the Vedic epithet Vrtrahan, dragon smasher, the standard title of the Indian thunder god Indra, tracing the name back through a shared Indo-Iranian root. 1 Attributions
Mythic AssociationVahagn's birth is preserved in a short verse fragment quoted by the fifth century historian Movses Khorenatsi: heaven and earth were in labor, and the purple sea was in labor, and labor in the sea seized the small red reed, and from the reed's stalk smoke and flame arose, and out of the flame a youth ran. 1 Belief
TheologyPolytheistic: many gods 1 The Armenian god of thunder and valor, identified with Verethragna and Herakles, part of the described pre-Christian Armenian pantheon. Attestation
Era of Attestation Veneration TodayHistorically attested; no continuous cult 1 Cult
Attributes and IconographyA youth associated with fire and lightning, born from reed, sea and sky; no cult statue survives, and his imagery is known mainly through the birth hymn and later literary allusion rather than surviving material art. 1 Correspondences & Relations
Connections
Worshipped In
Source Zoroastrianism in Armenia (Russell)James R. Russell
Sources
1. Zoroastrianism in Armenia (Russell)
James R. Russell, Harvard University Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, Harvard Iranian Series vol. 5, 1987Russell's translation and discussion of the Vahagn birth hymn preserved by Movses Khorenatsi
2. Encyclopedia of Religion
Mircea Eliade (ed.); Lindsay Jones (ed., 2nd ed.), Macmillan Reference, 2005Vahagn, recorded by Movses KhorenatsiView the Source Reader Challenges (0)
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