Thread by @djp1974

Been down the rabbit-hole of #Croatian #folklore - here's a #thread of what I found:

'#VAMPIRES IN DALMATIA: THE EXAMPLE OF THE VILLAGE OF ŽRNOVO ON THE ISLAND OF #KORČULA IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY' hrcak.srce.hr/138625

This one is especially close as its my family island.

'From #Folklore to Fiction: Early Literary Manifestations of the #Vampire Motif' hrcak.srce.hr/200179

Fun fact: the term 'vampyr' first appeared in an 11th century Slavic manuscript vilifying #Bogomils, a #Gnostic dualist heresy that was endemic to the #Balkans

'#Witches' Zoopsychonavigations and the Astral Broom in the Worlds of #Croatian Legends as (Possible) Aspects of #Shamanistic Techniques of Ecstasy (and Trance)' researchgate.net/publication/33…

'The island of #Korčula: Illyrians and Greeks' hrcak.srce.hr/193079

'Vilenica and Vilenjak: Bearers of an Extinct #Fairy Cult' hrcak.srce.hr/33230 #Croatian #folklore @seelie_wight

#Funfact: Petar Zoranić, #poet and author of the first #Croatian novel written in 1536, had been instructed by a #fairy.

'A REVIEW OF CONTEMPORARY RESEARCH ON
#CROATIAN MYTHOLOGY IN RELATION TO NATKO
NODILO' doi.org/10.3986/Tradit…

'The #Werewolf as a Religious and Ethnic Other in a #Herzegovinian Legend' folklore.ee/folklore/vol77…

'THE RIDDLE: AN EXAMPLE OF CIRCULATING WATER' hrcak.srce.hr/33478 - egs from #Croatian #Renaissance poems of cosmogonic riddles with the theme of circulating water and the annual cycle, presented through the image of the #WorldTree from older #IndoEuropean mythic structures.

'#Dante in Old #Croatian Poetry' hrcak.srce.hr/149312 #Funfact: #Croatia makes an appearance in #Paradiso XXXI, 103-108 and the poet Dante traveled through the territory with his friend Bishop Augustin Kazotic.

'MULTIPLE FEATURES IN THE #ORION CONSTELLATION AS RECOGNIZED IN #CROATIAN #FOLKLORE' hrcak.srce.hr/43468 @serbiaireland

'#Shamanism on Slovenian Territory? Dilemmas Concerning the Phenomena of Shamanism, Spirit Possession and Ecstasy' hrcak.srce.hr/4950 "folk belief in ... the #vedomec and/or the #kresnik whose souls, be it voluntarily or because of a »higher power«, leave their bodies."

'On "Štrige", "Štriguni" and "Krsnici" on Istrian Peninsula' hrcak.srce.hr/4953 "They are traces of memory of the mythical battle between sunny, celestial, thunder god Perun, and the giant snake from the underworld, coming from the dark part of the year."

"This battle is continual since the beginning of time, and every time the snake abandons its place and starts its journey upwards, up the hill, Perun strikes it with his stone lightning ... This is the eternal battle between good and evil, Perun and Veles, krsnik and štriga."

#BuffyTheVampireSlayer is 'real', if she was actually also Giles: "A #krsnik or #kresnik is a type of #vampire hunter, a #shaman whose spirit wanders ... in the form of an animal ... at night to fight off the kudlak, his evil vampire antithesis ..." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Krsnik_(v…

"The legend evolved from a pre-Christian myth present in Slovenia and #Croatia (mainly Istria and the islands), where the celestial pagan god Perun is locked in eternal combat with the evil snake of the underworld, Veles."

"The #krsnik is taught magic by Vile (#fairies), and in traditional medicine has the ability to heal people and cattle."

"However, due to the undocumented nature of oral tradition, it's difficult to determine with certainty how much of #kresnik folklore originated from #Slavic #mythology (#Kresnik (deity), and how much arose from a separate shamanistic tradition."

"After Christianization, the #kresnik instead was claimed to have learned #magic at the School of #BlackMagic in Babylon, but retained benevolent traits as a generous and powerful friend of the poor."

"The origin of the name may be from the word 'krst', which means "cross", and which in #Serbia is the word for a stone sign denoting village boundaries. It may also be derived from the same root as the Slav word for "resurrection," ... approximating "resurrector.""

"Similar beliefs circulated among the Italian Benandanti cult. Also see zduhać."

"A zduhać and vetrovnjak in Serbian tradition, and a dragon man in Bulgarian, Macedonian and Serbian traditions, were men believed to have an inborn supernatural ability to protect their estate, village, or region against destructive weather conditions." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zduha%C4%…

"It was believed that the souls of these men could leave their bodies in sleep, to intercept and fight with demonic beings ... Having defeated the demons and taken away the stormy clouds they brought, the protectors would return into their bodies and wake up tired."

"In the region of Birač, zduhaći were said to meet with angels "on the leaves of high and thick branches". They were sometimes thought to have a prophetic gift."

"However, a zduhać could ally himself with the Devil, and use his innate power in accordance with the Devil's directions. That zduhać was doomed to turn into a #vampire, unless he confessed and repented."

"Much of the religious vocabulary of the Slavs, including vera (loosely translated as "faith", meaning "radiation of knowledge"), svet ("light"), mir ("peace", "agreement of parts", also meaning "world") and rai ("paradise"), is shared with Iranian." en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slavic_pa…

'#Kresnik: An Attempt at a Mythological Reconstruction' ojs.zrc-sazu.si/sms/article/vi… Kresnik tradition has numerous parallels in Indo-European mythologies; the Author outlines a later transformation of Kresnik in the period of Christianization

'Cave of Iapodes and its petroglyphs – an Early Slavic shrine of #Perun / #Kresnik' @serbiaireland academia.edu/16257755/Cave_…

'What do Birds Sing? On Animal Language in South #Slavic Folklore' ojs.zrc-sazu.si/sms/article/vi… - on the #languageofthebirds; because of course there would be ...

"... most interesting – and understudied – are the folk traditions about “animal language”, “silent language” or “bird’s language”, which were supposedly known only to a few adepts, and could open the path to wisdom and success for them."

#funfact: "the Medieval Italian and Provance #poets described birds as singing 'ciascuno in suo latino,' which
is to say each singing in its own Latin, meaning any language."

#funfact: "Medieval Europe ... saw in “bird’s language” the secret language of the troubadours, the alchemists, and
practitioners of the Jewish #Kabbalah, that is to say – a magical language of the initiated few."

"In an intuitive way, the similarity between human and animal languages was understood by people of ancient
cultures, and this left traces in their collective memory and knowledge."

" ... recently in astronomy observatories the sound notation of the low-frequency radio waves was recorded, confirming that the universe is not silent and soundless ..."

" ... and that each one of the planets of our solar system has its unique sound, as do also the stars, constellations and galaxies. It turned out that the idea about the “speaking and singing nature” was quite correct and all-encompassing."

"... the knowledge of bird or wild language is never transmitted by the bird, but always by the serpent."

"... the transfer of linguistic knowledge from the snake onto man takes place by way of a narrow tube conducting snake saliva into the hero’s mouth. Fairy tales connect this procedure with human anxiety related to touching a poisonous snake’s throat with the mouth."

"The deeper meaning of all this, however, is apparent from cases where the hollow gadget comes in the form of the shepherd’s pipe."

"Perhaps the symbolism of the flute as a link between the animal and human languages is made even more explicit in instances where one brings the pipe close to his ear, and the snake whispers through it enabling him to understand
the animal language."

"It was important for this symbolism to be explicit; clearly, it was also present in the minds of both storytellers and listeners ... it is also interesting to note that the Middle English word for the pipe, the whistle, also carried the meaning of snake’s hissing."

"The pipe as a mediator of snake’s knowledge enabled humans to communicate also with the underworld and the dead. A Sardinian fairy tale ... speaks of a shepherd opening a secret passage into the otherworld and the underground treasury by whistling a precisely set melody."

"As some records compiled by Branislav Rusič show, in the Balkans there was a sense that the secret of the wild
language was stored in the world of the dead."

"... Santilawdić (Saint David) beeps, and blows in hell. Since Saint David is known solely in Wales, the name Santilawdić can relate only to the Jewish and biblical King David, the renowned musician and psalmist. He also had his place in other Slovenian songs and legends."

"In #Dalmatia more than 160 inscriptions and images dedicated to #Silvanus are known. They are roughly placed in the period between the 1st and 4th century with a majority dated between the 2nd and 3rd century." academia.edu/3565736/The_Cu…

'Alchemical experiments of Queen Barbara of Celj (1381–1451)' hrcak.srce.hr/178818 @t3dy "a very early contribution to the history of #alchemy in #Croatia"

The irony is that most likely my Slavic people weren't Croats at all but Narentines, also called the Paganoi, "pagans", as they resisted Christianization right up until their disappearance from the the historical record in the 10th century.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Narentines

The Narentine polity (known to the Latins as Arenta of the Arentanoi), known to the Greeks as Pagania, took in many islands off the Dalmatian coast including Korcula - the tribe of Croatia was situated to the west.

Arenta became a stronghold for pagans in the Balkans, and became great Dalmatian Slavic pirates that were able to threaten the Venetian Republic, even defeating Doges in naval battle. Korčula was one of the last islands of Pagania to fall to the Venetians in 1000.

In the end though if I belong to anything, its probably to #Veles, Slavic wet, wooly, hairy, bearded, dark god of waters and the underworld, and music, magic, and trickery, opponent of the supreme thunder god Perun: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Veles_(go…

In Slavic cosmology Veles in serpentine form is lying in a nest of black wool in the roots of the Tree of the World. He is also the shepherd of the dead.

In his role as a #trickster god, Veles is in some ways similar to both Greek #Hermes and Scandinavian #Loki. He was connected with magic. The 'volhov,' priests in ancient #Slavic religions, is obviously derived from his name, and still means sorcerer in some Slavic languages .

The duality and conflict of Perun and Veles does not represent the dualistic clash of good and evil; rather, it is the opposition of the natural principles of earth and water (Veles) against heaven/sky and fire (Perun).

The death of Veles was never permanent; he would reform himself as a serpent who would shed its old skin and would be reborn in a new body. Although in this particular myth he plays a negative role as bringer of chaos, Veles was not seen as an evil god by ancient Slavs.

In fact, Veles, appearing under the Christian guise of St. Nicholas, saves poor farmers and their cattle from the furious and destructive St. Elias the Thunderer, who represents Perun.

Finally we arrive in Wonderland (or is that Woden-land?) - this artwork represents the seven major deities of Slavic theo-cosmology, together constituting the hierarchy emanating from the supreme God, Rod (the concept of generation itself).

① The central axis is Svarog ("Heaven"), comprising his three forms: the four-faced Svetovid ("Worldseer"), Perun ("Thunder") at the very centre, and Svarozhich ("Son of Heaven") below.

Further below Svarozhich there is another form of he himself contained in a squared receptacle, Maria Ognevo ("Fire Goddess").

② On the right and left hand of Svetovid there are Belobog ("White God") and Chernobog ("Black God"), themselves in the guise of Dazhbog ("Day God") and Jutrobog ("Moon God"). They are the supreme polarity upon which all the alternating ways of divine manifestation rely.

③ To the left and to the right of the white figure of Perun, there are, respectively, the black figure of the great goddess Mokosh/Mat Syra Zemlya ("Wetness/Damp Mother Earth") and the red figure of Veles (the male god belonging to the Earth and god of tamed animals).

④ The three forms of Svarog and the three gods Perun, Veles and Mokosh constitute intersecting trinities (Triglav, Tribog), which correspond to the three dimensions: Prav, Yav and Nav.

Prav, literally "Right", is ultimately the central axis of Heaven itself, functioning as the medium of all dimensions of space-time.

In the guise of thunder (Perun) it impregnates matter (Mokosh), which retains its rhythmic squaring regulations (thus constituting Nav, which is the continuity of time);

in the guise of the Son of Heaven it comes to light in present reality (Yav), and is fostered by humanity (Veles), and preserved as the hearth (Ognebog).

commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_…

All summed up famously in Slavic god Triglav ("Three-Headed"), whose three heads are Svarog, Perun & Svetovid or Veles, & represent the three worlds, qualities & times of Slavic cosmology (respectively Heaven/air/future, Earth/water/present and the underworld/earth-soil/past).