The gods of the ancient Slavs: Tatishchev and the beginings of Slavic mythology
The gods of the ancient Slavs: Tatishchev and the beginings of Slavic mythology by Myroslava T Znayenko
English | 1980 | ISBN: 0893570745 | 221 Pages | PDF | 121.6 MB
English | 1980 | ISBN: 0893570745 | 221 Pages | PDF | 121.6 MB
This book is not much about the gods of the ancient Slavs, it's about the methodology of scholars who studied the gods of the ancient Slavs; what sources they relied upon, which modern authors they did or didn't accept, and the like. The emphasis is mostly on Tatischev, as the subtitle states. There are whole chapters in Cyrillic, and extended references in Latinized Cyrillic. I suspect this is a very good source on the history of the science of mythology, but if you were looking for history or mythology itself, you'll be disappointed. This book makes clear that the mythology of the Eastern Slavs was not a coherent body of thought or literature, but a great number of rituals, customs, and beliefs which differed considerably over time and space. Most of the early sources were proselytizing Christians who bent the old stories to serve their own needs, and in modern times, Slavic popular mythology has become so confounded with Christian mythology that it is hard for scholars to determine which came first.