SILA KORNEJ | СИЛА КОРНЕЙ | MIGHTY ROOTS
“Young Slavic hunter from the Lendians tribe goes after a boar into the forest, not expecting that this will be the beginning of a much longer journey full of unknown trials and adventures…”
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We continue to work on the first story from the animated fantasy comic book series about customs and beliefs of the Slavic people in the early Middle Ages. The “static” PDF version of our graphic novel is ready and available in English for FREE download here: https://slovene.soft.team/boar
Ancient Slavs considered spring as the awakening time of the earth from sleep. Nature wakes up and sets everything in motion. This annual cycle of the world re-creation is reflected in many Slavic myths and traditions.
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A special power was attributed to the spring sun – many rituals were based on the exposure to the spring sunlight. Eastern Slavs, for example, put dezha (special wooden tub for sourdough bread making) on the sun to absorb its power: it was washed, dressed up in a beautiful towel, girded with a belt and placed on a fence pole from the sunny side before the sunrise – so that it could “see the sun”.
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Our Slavic ancestors also “warmed the spring”, hoping that the warm weather will come sooner. They lit ritual bonfires in the fields, in the gardens, and even floated them down the rivers. By the way, the beginning of the spring ice drift was associated with the awakening of the Vodyanoi (Wodnik, Vodenjak).
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Slovenes, Croats and other southern Slavs believed that the awakening and “warming” of the earth was associated with the falling of a “heavenly fire particle” on it. These beliefs contain echoes of the myths about the heavenly fertilization of the earth (the “marriage” between heaven and earth).
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To be continued…
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The painting by Viktor Korolkov “Bogatyrsky son” (“The legendary hero dream”) was used as an illustration.
We continue to work on the first story from the animated fantasy comic book series about customs and beliefs of the Slavic people in the early Middle Ages. The “static” PDF version of our graphic novel is ready and available in English for FREE download here: https://slovene.soft.team/boar
Here it is – the first print batch of the “BOAR” graphic novel!!! (and an answer for the question in the previous post ?)
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Only in Russian for now – however, English print version can be available if you guys send us enough requests! (we are still working on Interslavic translation, but it goes slow)
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In the meantime, a free PDF copy still will be available for some time here: https://slovene.soft.team/boar Looking forward to your reviews!
Have you ever tried to milk a cow or build a house? Our Slavic ancestors used the “bread and salt” pair in many rituals, connected to birth, funerals, cattle-breeding, agriculture and construction. Both Eastern and Western Slavs, when laying the house foundation, as well as at all stages of its construction, put pieces of bread and salt in the corresponding parts of the building in order to ensure its durability and home’s prosperity.
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For protection and ritual cleansing, bread and salt were placed inside a cradle or a bathtub of an infant, as well as sewn into swaddling blanket. Bulgarian women carried bread and salt with them before and after childbirth to “preserve milk”. In Belarus, to ease childbirth, a woman in labor kissed a bread loaf with salt and walked around the table three times.
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Bread and salt were believed to have protective and fertility properties for livestock. Russians and Poleshchuks put them in a barn (tied to horns, to a milking gear, etc.) so that the cattle were fertile, produced more meat and milk, as well as to protect animals from an evil eye and diseases.
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More interesting facts can be found in: “Slavic Antiquities” – encyclopedic dictionary in 5 volumes by Institute for Slavic Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences.
