#slavic goddess

[bolszaja-miedwedica]

how much parents issues do you need to ask literal ancient gods if theyre proud of you asking for a friend

[jareckiworld]

Karolina Matyjaszkowicz — “Mokosh” The Mother Earth  (acrylic on canvas, 2017)

[mauzeart]

Hiii guys. Today I can show you Dodola - the goddess of rain and light thunderstorms, warm showers and fertility. She is one of the most beautiful and kind goddesses of Iriy (the place where the light gods live). It is very difficult to anger her, but if this happens, then be careful. She is Perun's wife, the mother of Devana and Yarilo (I haven’t drawn him yet).

I didn't think about giving her any important role in the story, but after I drew her I started thinking… Because she turned out so cute and cool wah haha

[d3524]

[hedgewitchgarden]

There are seven primordial gods in Slavic mythology, and only one of them is female: Mokosh. In the pantheon in the Kievan Rus' state, she is the only goddess at all, and so her specific role in Slavic mythology is vast and varied, and, more aptly perhaps, foggy and damp. Mother earth and house spirit, tender of sheep and spinner of fate, Mokosh is the supreme Slavic goddess. 

Key Takeaways: Mokosh

Associated Deities: Tellus, Ziva (Siva), Rusalki (water nixies), Lada 

Equivalents: St. Paraskeva Pianitsa (Christian Orthodox); loosely comparable to the Greek Titan Gaia, Hera (Greek), Juno (Roman), Astarte (Semitic)

Epithets: Goddess Who Spins Wool, Mother Moist Earth, Flax Woman

Culture/Country: Slavonic Culture, Eastern and Central Europe

Primary Sources: Nestor Chronicle (a.k.a. Primary Chronicle), Christian-recorded Slavic tales

Realms and Powers: Power over the earth, water, and death. Protector of spinning, fertility, grain, cattle, sheep, and wool; fisherman and merchants. 

Family: Wife to Perun, lover to Veles and Jarilo

Mokosh in Slavic Mythology

In Slavic mythology, Mokosh, sometimes transliterated as Mokoš and meaning "Friday," is Moist Mother Earth and thus the most important (or sometimes only) goddess in the religion. As a creator, she is said to have been discovered sleeping in a cave by a flowering spring by the spring god Jarilo, with whom she created the fruits of the earth. She is also the protector of spinning, tending sheep, and wool, patron of merchants and fishermen, who protects cattle from plague and people from drought, disease, drowning, and unclean spirits. 

The origins of Mokosh as mother earth may date to pre-Indo-European times (Cuceteni or Tripolye culture, 6th–5th millennia BCE) when a near-global woman-centered religion is thought to have been in place. Some scholars suggest she may be a version of Finno-Ugric sun goddess Jumala.

In 980 CE, Kievan Rus emperor Vladimir I (died 1015) erected six idols to Slavic gods and included Mokosh in 980 CE, although he took them down when he converted to Christianity. Nestor the Chronicler (11th century CE), a monk at the Monastery of the Caves in Kyiv, mentions her as the only female in his list of seven gods of the Slavs. Versions of her are included in the tales of many different Slavic countries. 

Appearance and Reputation 

Surviving images of Mokosh are rare—although there were stone monuments to her beginning at least as long ago as the 7th century. A wooden cult figure in a wooded area in the Czech Republic is said to be a figure of her. Historical references say she had a large head and long arms, a reference to her connection with spiders and spinning. Symbols associated with her include spindles and cloth, the rhombus (a nearly global reference to women's genitals for at least 20,000 years), and the Sacred Tree or Pillar.

There are many goddesses in the various Indo-European pantheons who reference spiders and spinning. Historian Mary Kilbourne Matossian has pointed out that the Latin word for tissue "textere" means "to weave," and in several derivative languages such as Old French, "tissue" means "something woven." 

The act of spinning, suggests Matossian, is to create body tissue. The umbilical cord is the thread of life, transmitting moisture from the mother to the infant, twisted and coiled like the thread around a spindle. The final cloth of life is represented by the shroud or "winding sheet," wrapped around a corpse in a spiral, as thread loops around a spindle.

Role in Mythology

Although the Great Goddess has a variety of consorts, both human and animal, in her role as a primary Slavic goddess, Mokosh is the moist earth goddess and is set against (and married to) Perun as the dry sky god. She is also linked to Veles, in an adulterous manner; and Jarilo, the spring god. 

Some Slavic peasants felt it was wrong to spit on the earth or beat it. During the Spring, practitioners considered the earth pregnant: before March 25 ("Lady Day"), they would neither construct a building or a fence, drive a stake into the ground or sow seed. When peasant women gathered herbs they first lay prone and prayed to Mother Earth to bless any medicinal herbs. 

Mokosh in Modern Usage

With the coming of Christianity into the Slavic countries in the 11th century CE, Mokosh was converted to a saint, St. Paraskeva Pyanitsa (or possibly the Virgin Mary), who is sometimes defined as the personification of the day of Christ's crucifixion, and others a Christian martyr. Described as tall and thin with loose hair, St. Paraskeva Pyanitsa is known as "l'nianisa" (flax woman), connecting her to spinning. She is the patroness of merchants and traders and marriage, and she defends her followers from a range of diseases.

In common with many Indo-European religions (Paraskevi is Friday in modern Greek; Freya = Friday; Venus=Vendredi), Friday is associated with Mokosh and St. Paraskeva Pyanitsa, especially Fridays before important holidays. Her feast day is October 28; and no one may spin, weave, or mend on that day. 

Sources

Detelic, Mirjana. "St. Paraskeve in the Balkan Context." Folklore 121.1 (2010): 94–105. 

Dragnea, Mihai. "Slavic and Greek-Roman Mythology, Comparative Mythology." Brukenthalia: Romanian Cultural History Review 3 (2007): 20–27. 

Marjanic, Suzana. "The Dyadic Goddess and Duotheism in Nodilo’s the Ancient Faith of the Serbs and the Croats." Studia Mythologica Slavica 6 (2003): 181–204. 

Matossian, Mary Kilbourne. "In the Beginning, God Was a Woman." Journal of Social History 6.3 (1973): 325–43. 

Monaghan, Patricia. "Encyclopedia of Goddesses & Heroines." Novato CA: New World Library, 2014. 

Zaroff, Roman. "Organized Pagan Cult in Kievan Rus’. The Invention of Foreign Elite or Evolution of Local Tradition?" Studia Mythologica Slavica (1999). 

[themountainsmoke]

Handcarved pendant Berehynya

Made of mummoth tusk

[neragranic]

COMMISSIONS - KO-FI - CARRD - WEBSITE - REDBUBBLE SHOP - TWITTER - INSTAGRAM - YOUTUBE

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Pasoglavac, keeping watch.  

Finally finished this one, it’s a part of the same series as Vitorog and Lešij! Soft and line-less still.

I’ve had this design of Pasoglavac for a while now - using a Croatian Shepherd as a reference to make the very first drawing of him back in 2014. He remains one of my favorites.

This design is available in my Redbubble Shop

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[stfacat]

This is Morana

Slavic goddess of war and winter

Linocut 30x42 cm format

Work created especially for the exhibition 'Parles moi d'Elle' at the Aérochrome in Blagnac

[stephjacq]

2023.10.03

Trypillian goddess

Prompts

[nous-teleios]

Your offerings to the Gods never have to be over the top. Even a glass of water offered with true devotion and gratitude will get you much closer to the Gods than a diamond offered without them.

[bolszaja-miedwedica]

before i started my deity work with Aphrodite i prayed to her to make me look like my best self and the day after that my hair started to curl randomly (i have no one in the family with curly hair) and i came out as genderfluid and i still was skeptical

then she gave me so many signs

i literally smelled apple chupa chups when i fell asleep (i didnt have anything apple scented in my room and the window was closed)

i was getting angel numbers constantly

i found a literal shell necklace when i went to throw the trash out

and i was still like "nah cus what if its a misunderstanding"

my soulmate was like "bitch youre so oblivious shes literally calling to you about your cars extended warranty"

and so i asked "if Aphrodite is reaching out to me please show me yourself in my dreams"

AND GUESS WHAT

i dreamed about watching a youtube video called "working with Aphrodite: deity work 101" and there was such a beautiful woman in the video she had a dark skin and long black wavy hair and very thick eyebrows and plump lips and i woke up and i was like "wow she was so pretty" and i was STILL skeptical cus i was like "nah maybe its just because i was thinking about her so much" and my soulmate was FED UP with my dumb bitch shit

and so it was time to do a deity spread because you know maybe its okay and if not then well

and i found a deity spread (i now make my own)

i pulled the card

it was nine of pentacles

i checked the deities associated with the card

"oh, thats random"

another deity spread

the strenght

"oh its the same deity"

ok i think somethings not adding up

and then i researched Bastet

"hmm cats yes, oh dancing,hmmm yeah okay"

and i looked at past me crying randomly because i got the urge to get a cat

and i looked at past me smelling incense randomly

and i looked at past me getting literal signs from her for as long as i could and i was like

"oh my god im so sorry i didnt know"

and so i started my deity work with both of them the same night

past me is stupid, oblivious and made mistakes but past me got me to now where i have a happy established relationship with my goddesses and im forever thankful for that

their altars at first were just sitting on my plant shelf

it was messy

Bastet only had my old silver cat statue, my cat tarot deck (which btw shows her character perfectly) and some tigers eye and tourmaline

Aphrodite only had some rose quartz a drawing of her that i made and a pale pink candle

now we're here and their altars are always full of food offerings to the point i had to upgrade their space to the shelf above

they still share an altar but theyre both okay with it

so uh yeah

just wanted to share this weird story of how i started

(then Aphrodite invited Apollo to my space who helped me a lot with my trauma, then i reached out to Dionysus and Marzanna and now we're here 5 ancient gods sitting in my room watching me read gay fanfiction at night)

[allmythologies]

slavic mythology: yarilo

yarilo is the god of fertility and springtime, sometimes regarded as god of lust and passion. his mythical life cycle mirrored that of the wheat crop, from its birth when sown through its flourishing youth to its sacrificial death at harvest time.

[mauzeart]

Helloooooooo! Continuing to make character concepts. This is Devana, the goddess of hunting and forest animals (Greek Artemis). The most willful goddess in slavic mythology.

[pagan-stitches]

Finished sun goddess tapestry

[evermore-grimoire]

The Evermore Grimoire: Slavic Mythology

Vesna was the goddess of spring and youth in Slavic mythology. She was also a very popular goddess amongst people because she replaced Morana (goddess of winter & death). In past times, winter was characterised by a scarcity of food from various diseases caused by the cold, and then associated with death. Vesna on the other hand wore the green fields, the meadows, nice weather, favourable to life and work. With these changes in nature Vesna brought joy into the homes of the Slavs. They celebrated spring because it won winter and announced the summer season. Spring also symbolised the beginning of a beautiful season, when it bloomed, nature awoke, all was reborn and renewed life. It is precisely for this reason in particular the Serbs, had the custom of giving the name Vesna to females. People, who gave this name to a daughter, believed that they would be happy and cheerful just like the goddess Vesna, or, as spring. She was also the goddess of victory as she could overcome death and winter, and governed nature. 

artwork by arsdeis

[wszczebrzyszynie]

mother