Perun

In Slavic mythology, Perun is the highest god of the pantheon and the god of thunder and lightning. His other attributes were the mountain, oak, firmament (in Indo-European languages this was joined with the notion of the sky of stone), horses and carts, weapons (the hammer, axe and arrow), war, and fire. He was first associated with weapons made of stone and later with those of metal.

Myth - reproduced on the ground of folkloristic given: the fight of Perun against demonic opponents (main opponents - Żmij, Veles, aerial dragons and crowd of smaller ghosts: biesy (sing. bies), czarty (czart), latawce (latawiec), porońce (poroniec) etc. Polish spelling.) stealing waters, cattle, divine partner of god (Perperuna), hiding before anger of Thunderlord under/in a man, horse, cow, tree, stone, at last in to water (a fish with red eyes).

Perun is helped by the płanetnicy (sing. płanetnik), chmurni-cy(-k), obłoczni-cy(-k) (Pl.), stuh(-y), zduh(-y), stuhac(-e), zduhac(-e), vjetrogonj-e(-a), jedogonj-e(-a) (Serb.) and, after to carriage names from demoniac enemy to the helper, zmaj(-e), zmej(-e) (Bulg.) and żmij(-e) (Pl.) (spirits, living peoples and even animals with spirit or with body being raised to sky during storm) fighting with smok(-i) ("a dragon") (Pl.) zmej(-e) (Russ.), (ch)al-a(-y) (SouthSlav.).

In Russia, Perun was represented with silver hair and golden moustaches. His bolts of lightning were said to be stones and stone arrows. According to folk beliefs, fulgurites and belemnites and sometimes even archaic tools are these stone weapons' remains. Various Slavic countries also call these deposits "Perun's stones", "thunderbolt stones", "thunderbolt wedges" and "Perun's arrow"; other unrelated names for these include "devil's finger", "God's finger", and "Mother of God finger", and in Lithuania, "Berkun's finger". These thunderbolt stones were sometimes said to be transferred back to the sky by the wind or pł anetnik. The weapons of Perun protected against bad luck, evil magic, disease, and - naturally enough - lightning itself.

In the classification scheme of Georges Dumézil he was the god of the second function (physical and military power). Members of Slavonic squads swore on his name.

Like Thor, Perun's vegetable hypostasis was the oak, especially a particularly distinctive or prominent one. Underneath this oak would be a general place of worship and folding of sacrifices (with a bull, an ox, a ram, and eggs). In Southern Slavic tradition, marked oaks stood on country borders; communities at these positions were visited during village holidays in the late spring and during the summer. Perun is also connected with the plants perunika and perin in Serbian and Russian tradition.

Strong correlation with the near-identical Perkunas from Latvian mythology suggests the close affiliation between, and common origin of, the Balto-Slavic tribes. In the Vedic religion this god is called Varuna. The similiarities between Perun and the god Thor in Norse mythology caused an amalgamation of the two gods in Kievan Rus. Perun may also be compared to Iupiter Quernus.

Christianity replaced Perun with Saint Elijah the Thunderer.

Etymology

Old Slavic per-unъ Slav. god Perun, thunderbolt < *per-oun-os (Gr. keraunós "t.s."), "telling" name (making core of mythological group of ideas formed round conception of Lord of Thunder), describing distinctive act for this god: "to fling a rock" (per-perun-a); OldSlav. *pr-a-ti < *per-a-ti "to strike, to beat"; OldSlav. *pr-e-ti < *per-ti "to push, to press strongly"; Lith. per-ti "to hit, to beat, to strike, to whip"; Trac. per(u) "rock"; Hett. peruna "t. s., goddess of Peruna?".

Toponyms

Examples of toponyms named after Perun include: Perun, Perunac, Perunovac, Perunika, Perunićka Glava, Peruni Vrh, Perunja Ves, Peruna Dubrava, Perudina, Perutovac (SouthSlav.), Prohn, Pronstorf (East Germany < Sorb.=Polab.; from Peron), and Pirin (in bulgarian: Пирин) - a mountain in Bulgaria.bg:Перун da:Percunust de:Perun it:Perun pl:Perun ru:Перун sl:Perun