Did The Witcher make you curious about Slavic mythology?

[yoobzon]

Even though almost our entire knowledge of Norse myth derives from just two texts, the so-called Eddas (that's about it for sources), they offer a considerable amount of narrative information, and a fairly coherent cosmology. However, our images and understanding of the Norse gods, and their functions, are still far from complete, as only Oðin (Odin), Loki, and Þor (Thor) receive the most attention. The fact that these texts present dialogues, and narratives, rather than merely catalogues of names -- although, there are enough of these in the texts as is -- has helped to widen the appeal of the myths. However, all academic analytics aside, people just seem to like Vikings in general.

If we had similarly well-preserved unique narratives of the heathen Slavic gods and heroes, the subject might enjoy a wider audience.

Just bwanteed to say how much I appreciate your posts Seriously, this info should be at least collected and put in the Witcher wiki under "Cultural inspiration for the Witcher Series". I was born in Poland and I had no idea that there's basically not a single reliable account of the Slavic mythology. Then again, I spent some years growing up in Sweden and there I was thinking we've dug up tons of stuff on the Norse Gods.

Public Education sucks

 

[Riven-Twain]

Just bwanteed to say how much I appreciate your posts Seriously, this info should be at least collected and put in the Witcher wiki under "Cultural inspiration for the Witcher Series". I was born in Poland and I had no idea that there's basically not a single reliable account of the Slavic mythology. Then again, I spent some years growing up in Sweden and there I was thinking we've dug up tons of stuff on the Norse Gods.

Public Education sucks

Thank you. Once I've pursued some of these references, I may compile a summary of Slavic mythic information, both in general, and in relation to The Witcher. Mind, I can't make any promises, though, but I'll try to share my findings, if any.

Although Public Education is itself a very noble endeavour as a service of a civilised society, and thus shouldn't be completely condemned, it does often tend to gloss over many potentially enriching cultural aspects of arts, literature, and history (the Humanities, as they are sometimes called), in the service of politically or economically prescribed curricula. While it cannot provide us with all the information we might wish, it does -- or should -- give us the basic tools to explore further researches on our own. Without Public Education, the opportunities for learning would be severally diminished. (For myself, almost all my knowledge of Myth and Legend is the result of independent studies; however, I am obliged to acknowledge that I couldn't have done so without the fundamental learning and research skills I was taught in school and university.)

 

[Phinnway]

I'd even say that folklore in general in many cases is simply not researched enough, let alone taught in schools.

Maybe not in general education. But at the college level it certainly is. Mythology is a very serious field of study. Has been for nearly 200 years.

 

[yoobzon]

Thank you. Once I've pursued some of these references, I may compile a summary of Slavic mythic information, both in general, and in relation to The Witcher. Mind, I can't make any promises, though, but I'll try to share my findings, if any.

Although Public Education is itself a very noble endeavour as a service of a civilised society, and thus shouldn't be completely condemned, it does often tend to gloss over many potentially enriching cultural aspects of arts, literature, and history (the Humanities, as they are sometimes called), in the service of politically or economically prescribed curricula. While it cannot provide us with all the information we might wish, it does -- or should -- give us the basic tools to explore further researches on our own. Without Public Education, the opportunities for learning would be severally diminished. (For myself, almost all my knowledge of Myth and Legend is the result of independent studies; however, I am obliged to acknowledge that I couldn't have done so without the fundamental learning and research skills I was taught in school and university.)

Obviously, the last comment was a lazy generalization a I do appreciate public education although I think that most Western countries lack a certain vocational angle to high school education. I think a 16 or 17 years old kids should have options to take a semester off and do a placement or something like that. We are asking kids with nothing but some generalist knowledge to choose their academic specialty. This is just BS. some really talented individuals get trapped in those useless degrees and ultimately get little from their college experience.

I'm 26 now and if I got a chance to rewind, I would have chosen Chemistry or Engineering. As it is right now, I have a sociology degree and even though I've managed to use my interpersonal skills to land respectable sales jobs, I still feel that my degree is much more of a burden than a blessing. If public education forced me to face reality a bit earlier, my life wouldve been a bit less stressful. I don't know exactly what kind of a reform would fix this but I do know that we live in a dynamic, interconnected world and everything about public education up until University level is too standardized and rigid. I say: Let kids play around with a couple of things in depth instead oftrying to cover everything

And thanks for looking into the mythology for us. Looking forward to read your findings

 

[Riven-Twain]

Maybe not in general education. But at the college level it certainly is. Mythology is a very serious field of study. Has been for nearly 200 years.

Quite so, however, it seems to shift in and out of 'fashion'. It was a particularly lively study in the latter part of the 19th-century, and enjoyed quite a lot of attention a bit after mid-century of the 20th, but I'm uncertain of its present condition, to-day. When I was at university (three years ago), the subject seemed heavily burdened by theoretical methodology, and restrictively compartmentalised, so that a person studying Norse myth might not ever be referred to Slavic or Finnish material. The broad multicultural mythological studies of the past seem to have given way to rather isolated subject-focuses. At least, that was my impression.

 

[Phinnway]

@yoobzon Oh yeah... There is so much pressure put on 18 y/o kids to choose a field of study, yet most of them don't have the knowledge or experience required to make such a life changing decision. It's one of the reasons why I think the education system in "'Murica" is corrupt and in need of reform.

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

Maybe not in general education. But at the college level it certainly is. Mythology is a very serious field of study. Has been for nearly 200 years.

That pretty much depends on what mythology / folklore. Some is researched, while other is practically unexplored.

 

[Phinnway]

@rivenll I just know that it's still very much alive. I mean, you can get an entire degree devoted to studying Tolkien for f's sake. I think it's safe to say the study of mythology is still in fashion as well. It's possible the problems you noticed with mythology were specific to the university you studied at. *shrugs* Or maybe not :ice:

And I think this part describes many, many fields of study. Too many, in fact.

theoretical methodology and restrictively compartmentalised

That pretty much depends on what mythology / folklore. Some is researched, while other is practically unexplored.

I highly doubt that. When I was at college I stumbled across a encyclopedia of mythological symbols. And yeah, it was world-wide.

If there are any unexplored world mytholgies I suspect it's due to lack of sources, rather than lack of serious effort in the area. And if you think the study of mythology has mainly been restricted to Greco-Roman and Norse myth you are dead wrong and need more exposure to the subject.

Were there any specific mytholgies you had in mind?

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

I highly doubt that. When I was at college I stumbled across a encyclopedia of mythological symbols. And yeah, it was world-wide.

I know people who went in various ethnological expeditions (i.e. field studies when people gather folklore and so on). And they have a lot to say about how under-researched some folklore is.

 

[Riven-Twain]

@rivenll I just know that it's still very much alive. I mean, you can get an entire degree devoted to studying Tolkien for f's sake. I think it's safe to say the study of mythology is still in fashion as well. It's possible the problems you noticed with mythology were specific to the university you studied at. *shrugs* Or maybe not :ice:

Very possibly. One of the virtues -- but also a curse -- of so deep and rich a subject as Mythology is that it's vast enough that we could spend a lifetime exploring it, and still have much to learn.

 

[Phinnway]

s when people gather folklore and so on). And they have a lot to say about how under-researched some folklore is.

Do you have any specific examples of folfk-lores your friends say are under-researched? It's possible our disagreement comes down to defintion of terms; i.e. that what I mean by "mythology" and what they mean by "folk-lore" are two different things.

I just whipped out my old mythology text-book that I kept around for some reason (I took one class on mythology) And just about the only mythology that hasn't been studied is eastern-European. And I suspect that could be attributed to the fact that they couldn't get in the U.S.S.R. to do research.

The mytholgies included in my text book were:

Chinese
Japanese
Polynesian
Aboriginal Australian
Indian
Persian
Mesopotamian
Phrygian
Egyptian
Greco-Roman
Celtic
Norse
Aztec
Mayan
Sub-Sahran African cultures (Bantu, Dahomey)
Native American cultures (Hopi, Shohoni, Blackfoot, Apache)


EDIT: Just realized my old mythology text book is available on google-books, which begs 2 questions: (A) why do I still have it lying around, and (B) why the !@#$ did I have to buy it in the first place?

 

[Gilrond-i-Virdan]

They researched Yiddish folklore mostly in countries of former USSR. You said it yourself - a lot of it was caused by censorship in Eastern Europe.

 

[GuyNwah]

Three other reasons that are important are:

* Lack of a writing system. Glagolitic was the first, and it was introduced by Christians.

* Scarcity of artifacts. Think carved wood, wet climate, buried on purpose. The Zbruch Idol is, in part, remarkable because nothing like it (indeed, hardly anything at all) has survived.

* Suppression by Christendom. Myths and artifacts were suppressed or appropriated, leaving them inaccessible or obscuring their origin.

The Communist era had little to do with it. Documentation of folk tales and other traditions in Europe began much earlier, with the brothers Grimm and the formidable traveler Ármin Vámbéry active in the mid-19th C. There was little to collect, with only more recent material surviving.

 

[Engagerade]

Keep this thread going!, im having great time reading all this interesting information :thumbsup:

 

[ummagoomba]

As Pole I feel kinda ashamed that I never realized how reach culture of my ancestors was before "Christ bringers" came to our lands. I feel it's wrong that nowadays even here in Poland hardly anybody got proper knowledge of slavic culture not to mention that for schools it seems to be taboo topic, I can't recall even one freakin lesson throughout my whole education period about it.


Anyway, how do you feel about it, did Witcher series make you at least a little bit curious of Slavic mythology ?

I have started reading The Witcher series. I got into it after watching the dev interviews that came with TW1. The team were so into it and discussed Slavic mythology and it definitely got my interest. I am loving the books and will definitely look at more Slavic culture and mythology as it is very intriguing.

 

[Phinnway]

* Suppression by Christendom. Myths and artifacts were suppressed or appropriated, leaving them inaccessible or obscuring their origin.

I find it interesting that in Eastern Europe idigenous mythologies were supressed, whereas in Western Europe they not only preserved Greco-Roman and Norse mythology but even incorporated it into popluar culture. More so Greco-Roman than Norse, but Norse mythology still had a significant impact on the literary imagination of the medieval era and renaissance.

I suppose in Western Europe they supressed the idigenous religions too. But for some reason they preserved their herioic tales and incorporated it into popular culture. I wonder if it partly has to do with the fact that the Norse were agressive, whereas the Slavs mostly kept to themselves.

 

[GuyNwah]

Some of it was appropriated, not all of it was suppressed. For example, there are some saints in Orthodox Christianity who differ in their attributes from Western denominations and have striking parallels to Slavic pagan gods. Ilia Gromovnik (Elijah the Thunderer), a clearly repurposed Perun, may be the outstanding example.

Christianity spread most rapidly among the elite, who also took to reading and writing but had little interest in recording "peasant" beliefs. What did get written down is marked by misunderstandings, exaggerations, and outright falsehoods, so historians and cultural anthropologists have been saddled with the task of deducing what is true when all of the sources are unreliable and archeological foundations are almost entirely absent or intentionally destroyed.

Some of the few good sources are:
* Saxo Grammaticus, who reported on the Danish conquest of Rügen and the destruction of the great temple of Svantevit at Arkona. [Gesta Danorum]
* The Primary Chronicle [Tale of Bygone Years], the history of the Kievan Rus', including the rise of Christianity under Vladimir the Great.

Vladimir the Great determined that Kiev should have one faith, and in a strikingly modern act, went church-shopping. His decision not to embrace Islam is particularly eloquent, "Drinking is the joy of all Rus'. We cannot exist without that pleasure."

 

[Riven-Twain]

I find it interesting that in Eastern Europe idigenous mythologies were supressed, whereas in Western Europe they not only preserved Greco-Roman and Norse mythology but even incorporated it into popluar culture. More so Greco-Roman than Norse, but Norse mythology still had a significant impact on the literary imagination of the medieval era and renaissance.

I suppose in Western Europe they supressed the idigenous religions too. But for some reason they preserved their herioic tales and incorporated it into popular culture. I wonder if it partly has to do with the fact that the Norse were agressive, whereas the Slavs mostly kept to themselves.

In the case of Norse myth, we have a truly unique situation, as, although Christian, the Icelanders (whom we owe virtually all our literary accounts of the old Northern Gods and Heroes) possessed an unshakable pride in their heritage, and loyalty to their ancestors, which the Church could not utterly efface or demonise. In fact, being such a far-flung outpost of Christianity allowed the Icelanders a certain amount of liberty in their application of the their newly-acquired Christian literacy. As a result, the Sagas and the Eddas survived, and were transcribed, where other accounts of Heathenism would have perished.

In the case of the Greco-Roman tradition, it is for a different set of reasons that they endured, as the Church itself helped preserve these myths intentionally. The western Church copied and recopied the works of Ovid, Virgil, Apuleius, and other classical pagan Romans, because they were written in Latin; however, their reasons for doing so were much more varied. Often, mediaeval Churchmen held these pagan works up as teaching examples of the follies and vices of the past (while they admired, and attempted to imitate, the poetry and rhetoric of the classical writers at the same time). The classical myths became useful tools for learning Latin, and demonstrating the superiority of the Christian faith over the superstitions of the bygone ages.

A similar preservation occurred in the Eastern Church of the Byzantine Empire -- whilst the original Greek myths became almost unknown in the mediaeval West -- however, they would not appear in Catholic Europe until the Renaissance, when the Turks drove Eastern Orthodox Clerics from Asia Minor, and into Italy. When these Greek myths, as found in Homer, Hesiod, and a number of theatrical works, entered the West, they were enthusiastically received, as there was much revered Greek philosophy and mathematics which accompanied them. As a result, Renaissance Europe enjoyed a certain 'accidental' restoration of Greco-Roman mythology, which would continue to be praised amongst literary circles for centuries.

The forces and conditions of history which conspired to preserve the myths of the Norse, and the Classical Tradition are, of course, much more complex and intricate than I can describe here; however, my brief, informal, summary gives a rough idea of some of the general factors. One thing cannot be emphasised enough, though: that, although early Christianity is responsible for the suppression, obliteration, and re-appropriation of much of the old beliefs of Europe, we likewise owe certain generous Christian mediaeval writers an inestimable debt of gratitude. For it is only through them that we have any substantial literary accounts of the Heathen beliefs at all, as, without the education systems, and zeal for chronicling, which the Church brought to Europe, these myths would have faded into oblivion. While we could wish to have much more, or wish that circumstances had transpired differently, the debt to them for our present knowledge yet remains.

 

[Phinnway]

@rivenll Thanks for the history lesson. Some of that I already knew, but some of it I needed a refresher course on. For example, I knew the circumstances that gave rise to the Italian renaissance was partly born from wars between Christians and Muslims. But I did not realize it was from war refugees settling in Southern Italy. I honestly thought it was from an increased cultural exchange brought on by the Crusades.

In general, I find the medieval era very fascinating. It's interesting to study the roots of our modern Western culture. Honestly, if I could study anything at university it would be somewhere in the realm of medieval humanites. I'd love to stufy medieval and renaissance literature.

 

[Ozmodion]

yea great thread and great reading on the history