This page groups deities by the domain or function myth assigns them, the area of life, craft or natural force a god is called on to govern. Wikipedia's overview of deities gives a clear example in the Yoruba god Ogun, described as "the primordial masculine deity as well as the archdivinity and guardian of occupations such as tools making and use, metal working, hunting, war, protection and ascertaining equity and justice." Browsing by domain lets a visitor find every god of, for example, war or the harvest, across many different pantheons at once.
Facts
Overview
What Defines This GroupingThe gods of the pre-Christian Slavs, collected from evidence that is thin and almost entirely external: Byzantine and Latin notices, Christian polemic, the treaty oaths and idol-lists of the Rus chronicles, and much later folklore. There is no Slavic religious text. This is among the most contested reconstructions in the atlas, and several once-standard figures are now doubted or rejected. 2 Peoples and Traditions CoveredThe East Slavs of Rus, whose gods are named in the treaties and idol-lists of the Primary Chronicle 2 Peoples and Traditions CoveredThe South Slavs, for whom the pre-Christian evidence is thinnest of all 2 Peoples and Traditions CoveredThe West Slavs, above all the Polabian and Pomeranian peoples whose temple cults are described by German and Danish chroniclers 2 Attestation
Era of AttestationThe earliest notice is a sixth-century Byzantine report of a Slavic maker of lightning. Named gods appear in the tenth-century Rus treaties and in the idols set up at Kiev in 980, and in the Latin chronicles of the Baltic Slavs to about 1200. 2 Veneration TodayThe pre-Christian cult was suppressed with Christianisation and no continuous worship survives. 2 Veneration TodayVenerated in the modern Slavic reconstructionist movements known collectively as Rodnovery. 3 Status
Standing as a Comparative CategoryA large part of the received Slavic pantheon derives from late, hostile or Romantic-era sources, and some of it from outright nineteenth-century forgery. Recent scholarship has cut the securely attested list down sharply. 2 Learn More
The Gods of the Slavs
This group gathers the deities of the pre-Christian Slavic peoples of eastern and central Europe. The sources are notoriously thin, scattered chronicles, Christian polemics and later folklore, so the Slavic pantheon is among the most contested reconstructions in the atlas, and some once-standard figures are now doubted by scholars.
The browser will find the thunder-god Perun, the cattle-and-underworld god Veles, the sun-related Dazhbog, and the multi-headed Baltic-Slavic idols recorded by medieval writers. The entries are careful to distinguish securely attested gods from figures that rest on late or unreliable evidence, and note the modern Rodnovery revival.
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Sources
1. Divinity Atlas Directory Taxonomy, First Edition Category Tree
2. Slavic Gods and Heroes
Judith Kalik and Alexander Uchitel, Routledge, 2019Introduction
3. Modern Paganism in World Cultures: Comparative Perspectives
Michael F. Strmiska (ed.), ABC-CLIO, 2005chapter on Slavic Paganism
Divinity Atlas Directory Prose, First Edition Category Descriptions
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