The world of Scandinavian mythology - legends about the gods - tor. Comparative characteristics of the cults of Thor and Perun

WHO IS GOD THOR AND THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THOR'S HAMMER. ================================================= === Thor (Old Norse Torr), Donar (German Donar, possibly from the ancient German Punra, lit. "thunder", cf. modern German Donner, "thunder") in Germanic and Scandinavian mythology, the powerful god of thunder and fertility, conquering giants and monsters. Son of Odin. Thor's main weapon is his hammer; instead of horses, he harnessed goats to his wagon, which he ate if he was hungry. Thor guarded the city of the gods Asgard from the attack of the giants. He enters the fight and defeats the giant Hold, who stole his hammer, as well as other terrible monsters. On the eve of the death of the gods and the whole world, Thor fights the monstrous dragon Yermungad. he defeats the dragons, but he himself dies from the poisonous bites he received.

Thor also patronizes peasants - cultivators. he vigilantly guards the fields from the evil giants of the Grimthurs. Thor has a magic belt that increases his strength by 2 times, he has iron gauntlets on his hands. One has only to pronounce the name of God as he immediately comes to the rescue. , Tacitus (1st century AD) describes Donar under the Roman name of Hercules. In the field of the spread of Germanic languages, Donar was dedicated to the same day of the week as in Rome to Jupiter (that is, Thursday; German Donnerstag). However, if the Roman Jupiter united all the main functions of the sky god, then in Germanic mythology (as well as in Indo-Iranian, Celtic, etc.) these functions were separated (next to Donar - Thor was Tiu - Tyr, subsequently strongly pressed by Odin) . Donar - T. is rightly compared, on the one hand, with the Indo-European gods Indra, Taranis, Perkunas. (Perun), and on the other - with the Finno-Ugric gods of thunder and sky (Ukko, Taara, etc.); Finno-Ugric parallels suggest that Thor was originally thought of as the god of the sky. A. Olrik believes that the "thundering old man" in the beliefs of the Scandinavian Sami, to whom miniature hammers are sacrificed, directly reflects the Scandinavian cult of Thor of the Bronze Age. The rock carvings in Southern Scandinavia of a god with an ax (sometimes with a hammer) and a wheel (solar sign) seem to testify to a wider range of functions of T. in the past, next to it is the alleged image of a goat. The West Germans have traces of the cult of Donar: in addition to the name of the day of the week, the mention of Thunaer next to Wodan (Wodan) in the Saxon incantation formula, Wigiponar next to Wodan in an inscription originating from the land of the Franks, toponymy among the Franks and in England, where the name of the thunderbolt is mostly associated with the designation of the field, which indicates the function of fertility. The toponymy of Thor, traces of cult places, the reflection of his name in personal names, etc., are very abundant in Scandinavia, especially in Norway. There are clear traces of Thor's connection with the oak cult, indicating the initial connection of the thunderbolt with the world tree (there are Balto-Slavic parallels). Apparently, Odin gradually pushed him away from the world tree.

Thor, stopping for the night, kills and roasts the goats for dinner (leaving only the bones intact), and then brings them back to life. When Tyalvi and his sister Röskva, where Thor stopped for the night, ate meat, Tyalvi violated the ban and began to gnaw bones, which caused one of the goats to become slightly limp; in the form of a ransom, Tyalvi and her sister were forced to become servants of T. Tyalvi often appears as a companion of Thor, sometimes Loki plays this role instead of Tyalvi, and once even Tyr. In Scandinavian mythology, Thor is primarily a cultural hero or hero who protects Midgard (the world of people) and Asgard (the heavenly village of the gods) from giants (jotuns); he is the opponent of the world serpent Yermungandr. Thus, Thor also performs a military function in protecting “friends” from “strangers”, people from giants and monsters, as if modeling an armed people, in contrast to Odin, the patron of a military squad. Favorite topic of the so-called. shield drapes (poems that describe pictures reproduced on an expensive shield donated by the king to the skald) skalds - a description of the so-called. Thor's "fishing", that is, his struggle with the world serpent; "fishing" Thor is also mentioned in Eddic poetry and prose. According to the “Volva Divination” (“Elder Edda”), in the last battle before the end of the world (Ragnarok), Thor fights with Ermungandr, kills him and after that, having managed to take nine steps, he himself dies from his poisonous bites. The struggle of a thunderbolt with a serpent, a dragon is a classic story in Indo-European mythology. It is possible that Thor's dragon fight is a prototype of the dragon fight of the Germanic epic heroes - Beowulf, Sigmund and Sigurd.

Most of the stories associated with Thor tell of campaigns to the east to the land of the giants - Etunheim, or Utgard. After the giant Thrym abducts the hammer of Thor - Mjollnir, he goes to the country of the giants to the Hold in the clothes of the goddess Freya - supposedly the bride intended for the Hold (using the wedding custom of "imaginary" brides), and accompanied by Loki, dressed as a maid. At the feast, the “bride” (i.e., Thor) shows a heroic appetite, greatly embarrassing the groom, and then, having received a hammer (which is brought to consecrate the wedding ceremony), he beats the giants (“Song of the Hold”, “Elder Edda”). The "Song of Hymir" ("Elder Edda") tells about the extraction of Thor. (and Tyr accompanying him) at the giant Hymir's cauldron for brewing beer, which is necessary at the feast of the gods at the sea giant Aegir. Performing the difficult tasks of Hymir, Thor defeats the bull and makes bait for fishing out of his head, and instead of a fish, he almost pulls the world serpent from the bottom of the sea, breaks the goblet (possibly a semantic doublet of the cauldron) on the giant's forehead. J. Dumézil sees at the basis of these plots (which he compares with the story of Odin obtaining the honey of poetry) the myth of the drink of immortality, similar to Indian amrita; F. R. Schroeder, also based on Indian analogies, believes that Hymir was originally not a giant, but an old heavenly god (therefore Tyr is called his son) and that initially there was a connected series of motives: the birth of a divine son, threatening the power of a heavenly god, stealing a drink that gives invulnerability, fighting a snake, killing and overthrowing the old heavenly god.

The "Younger Edda" tells of Thor's campaign to the giant Geirrod (also mentioned by the skald Eilif Gudrunarson and Saxo Grammatik). Having caught Loki (in falcon plumage), the giant demands that he bring Thor without a hammer and belt of power. Thor, however, defeats Geirrod with the help of a miraculous staff and iron gloves given to him (along with a belt of power) by the giantess Grid, the mother of the god Vidar. Thor, thanks to a belt of strength and a staff, happily crosses the Vimur River, grabbing a rowan bush at the last moment. With the help of a magic staff, Thor is kept on a wonderful bench and at the same time crushes the bench of the daughters of Geirrod. With iron gauntlets, Thor catches a red-hot bar of iron thrown at him and kills Geirrod.

But in the end it turns out that Hugi is a thought, Logi is fire, Ellie is old age, the cat is the world serpent, the water in the horn is the whole ocean (“Younger Edda”). In this and other stories, Thor is presented as a simple-hearted and noble strong man-hero; his innocence is partly offset by the quick wit of his companions, especially Loki. In the same regard, Thor is sharply opposed to Odin in the "Song of Harbard" ("Elder Edda"). Unrecognized by Thor, Odin, who has assumed the form of a carrier, refuses to transport the mighty Thor, who has returned from Etunheim, across the strait and makes fun of him in every possible way. This humorous squabbling song contributed to the erroneous theory of a sharp social contrast between the "aristocratic" religion of Odin and the "peasant" religion of Thor. In the “Speech of Alvis” (“Elder Edda”), Thor himself shows cunning and deceit; he “tests” the mythological knowledge of the dwarf Alvis (lit. “know-it-all”), who is wooing Thor’s daughter until dawn comes, when the dwarf must turn to stone.

Also According to some mythologists, Thor, or Donar, is the son of Yord and Odin, but others say that his mother was Frigga, the goddess of goddesses. As a child, he was famous for his enormous size and strength, and shortly after his birth he surprised an assembly of gods by effortlessly tossing a bunch of bear skins from side to side. Usually being in a good mood, Thor sometimes fell into a violent rampage and was very dangerous at that time. His mother, unable to cope with him, sent Thor to the care of Vingnir (winged) and Chlora (heat). These adoptive parents were also the personification of lightning. Soon they managed to curb their ward and wisely educate him. Thor himself, realizing what he owes them, also took the names Vingthor and Chloridi, by which he was also known. Having reached adulthood, Thor was admitted to Asgard, where he took a place of honor among the twelve gods in a huge council hall. He received Trudvangar (Trudheim) in possession, where he built the hall Bilskirnir (sparkling like lightning), the most spacious in all of Asgard. It had five hundred chambers and forty more chambers for the residence of slaves who came here after death. They were always welcome in his house, here they were welcomed with the same warm welcome as their owners in Valhalla, since Thor was the patron saint of peasants and the lower classes. There are five hundred chambers And forty, as I remember, - In the monastery of Bilskirnir there are: The house under the roof, I know, owns my greatest child. (Elder Edda. Grimnir's speeches. Translation by V. Korsun) Since he was the god of thunder and lightning (thunderer), Thor was not allowed to cross the wonderful Bifrost bridge so that he would not set it on fire with the heat emanating from his body? To join other gods at the source of wisdom Urd in the shade of the sacred Yggdrasil tree, he had to walk, fording the Kormt and Ormt rivers and the two Kerlough streams. In Norway, Thor was considered the supreme deity. He was the second in the pantheon of gods of other countries, he was called "old Thor" not because of his age, but because, according to some, he belonged to the oldest dynasty of gods. In myths, he is described as a hero in the prime of life, tall and well-built, with tousled red hair and a red beard. When he shook his hair, especially in moments of anger, sparks flew from them in streams, causing thunder and lightning. First, Thor, arching an eyebrow, Whispered something in a red beard, Throwing eyes full of anger, lightning in different directions. His chariot, creaking wheels, Sending peals of thunder, And the earth and sky shook under the blows of his hammer. (J. Jones. Valhalla) The peoples of Northern Europe later decorated him with a crown, at the ends of which there was either a sparkling star or fire, so that his head was surrounded by a halo of fire - his own symbol.

Thor was also the owner of the magical hammer Mjollnir (lightning), which he threw with crushing force at his enemies, the frost giants, and which had the miraculous property of returning to his hands, no matter how far he threw it. I am a thunderer, Here in my northern land My strength and fortress And eternal power. Among the icebergs I rule over the nations. My hammer - Mjollnir almighty - Is subject to no one: Neither giants nor sorcerers. (Longfellow. The Saga of King Olav) Since this huge hammer, the symbol of a lightning strike, always remained red-hot, in order to hold it in his hands, the god had iron gauntlets - Yarngriper. He could throw Mjöllnir a great distance, and his strength, already huge, doubled if he put on the magical belt Megingjord (belt of power). Here's my belt, I'll put it on and I'll be twice as strong. (Longfellow. The Saga of King Olaf)

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The ancient peoples of Northern Europe considered Thor's hammer sacred and used to wear amulets in the form of Thor's hammers to protect themselves from evil spirits and achieve the blessings of the gods. An amulet in the form of a hammer was worn on newborn babies, pouring water on their heads and naming them with a name. The hammer was hammered into the pillars that marked the boundaries of possessions, and it was considered sacrilege to pull it out. They consecrated the threshold of a newly built house, it was used in a marriage ceremony, as well as in the consecration of a funeral pyre, on which the bodies of heroes were burned along with weapons and horses, and sometimes along with wives and servants. In Sweden, it was believed that Thor, like Odin wore a wide-brimmed hat, and therefore the thunderclouds in this country were called Thor's hat. The same name was given to one of the main mountain peaks in Norway. It was believed that the peals of thunder are the rumble of the wheels of Thor's chariot, since he was the only one among the gods who never rode, but either walked or rode a bronze chariot drawn by two goats: Tangniostrom (gnashing his teeth) and Tangrisnir (grinding his teeth), from whose horns and teeth sparks constantly flew. Oh, great Thor, Having put a magic sword on your shoulders, You are riding a chariot somewhere nearby, Sacred goats are pulling your team - Obeying the silver reins. Matthew Arnold. The Death of Baldur When the god rode in a chariot, he was also called Eku - Thor, or Thor the Charioteer, and in Southern Germany it was believed that one chariot was not enough for thunder peals, because they claimed that it was loaded with copper teapots that made noise during the ride, and therefore familiarly called him a merchant of teapots.

Thor was married twice: first, to the giantess Yarnsaksa (iron stone), who bore him two sons, Magnia (strength) and Modi (courage), who were destined to survive their father and the death of the gods and rule in a new world that would be reborn after a catastrophe, like a phoenix from ashes. His second wife was the golden-haired goddess Sif, who also bore him two children: Lorrid and a daughter named Trud, a young giantess, famous for her size and strength. It is known that opposites converge, and the example of Labor is a confirmation of this. The dwarf Alvis, whom she favored, wooed her. One evening, her suitor, who, being a dwarf, could not bear the light of day, appeared in Asgard to ask for her hand in marriage. The council of the gods was leaning in his favour, and was about to give their approval, when the absent Thor suddenly appeared. Throwing a contemptuous glance at the tiny lover, the father of the bride said that he should prove that his mind can make up for the lack of growth, only then can he be honored with the bride's hand. dwarfs, asking until the sun rose and its first rays turned the dwarf to stone. With this, Thor once again demonstrated the great power of the gods, which should have been a warning to all other dwarfs who are trying to test it. Whose chest would contain so much information of the ancients! But I deceived you with a powerful cunning: you are caught in the house by sunlight!

Thor is named after places that, according to legend, he often visited, for example, the main harbors of the Faroe Islands, as well as surnames believed to be descended from him. Thor's name is present in such names as Trunderhill in Surrey, in the names of Thorburn and Thorvaldsen, and also in the name of one of the days of the week: Thor's day, or Thursday (Eng. Thursday). And all over the earth there is still Thor's day. (Longfellow. The Saga of King Olav) Thor was considered one of the main gods in the pantheon; because he favored the people, he was worshiped everywhere. Temples in his honor were erected in Mary, Khlader, Godi, Gotland and Uppsala and in other places. In Yul (the main holiday dedicated to Thor, coinciding with the current Christmas time), people asked the Thor to send them a happy year. On this day, according to custom, a large oak log (Yul's log) was burned, since this tree was considered sacred and symbolized summer light and warmth, driving away the darkness and cold of winter. Brides wore red, since this is Thor's favorite color, which was considered a symbol of love. For the same reason, wedding rings in Northern Europe have always been with a red stone. The temples and idols of Thor, like Odin, were made of wood, and a large number of them were destroyed during the time of King Olaf the Holy.

Meaning of Thor's Hammer. ==================== Thor's Hammer. The meaning of this symbol is deeply rooted in antiquity. It is generally accepted that the hammer is a mythical weapon that never actually existed, but some historians and archaeologists are sure that such an object was real and the probability of finding it, although small, exists.

What is the significance of Thor's Hammer and where did it come from? In order to answer this question, it is necessary to first clarify some things. The first is who the owner of this artifact was. According to legend, the Hammer, also called "Mjolnir", "Hermetic Cross", "Jain's Cross", "croix cramponnee", "Solar Cross" belonged to the god Thor, the son of the supreme god Odin and the earthly goddess Yord. The hammer was a powerful weapon with a powerful striker and a short handle. His strength plunged any enemy, and evil spirits were afraid of just his appearance. In fact, the hammer had maximum strength only with special gloves in which it glowed red hot and a belt that doubled its strength. In such a set, the Hammer always hit the target and, like a boomerang, returned to the owner. They made the Hammer as a symbol of creative and destructive forces and handed Thor the keeper of the balance between the forces of good and evil. Many were looking for the Hammer of Thor supposedly lost somewhere on Earth, but could not find it. From time to time, the mythical weapon turned into a symbol that the Indo-European tribes worshiped as a sign of the sun, and when all the same tribes migrated to the west, this symbol acquired the name "Thor's Hammer" and began to personify goodness, order and anti-chaos.

Not all Indo-European tribes migrated to North America, there were those that remained on the Euro-Asian continent and called themselves Germans, who also worshiped the Hammer of Thor. According to them, the land they inhabited was, as it were, an island (“Middle Earth”), surrounded on all sides by a giant dark Ocean. On the other side of which were the boundless lands of the jotun giants who dreamed of destroying the human race in the bud. Above Middle-earth in the sky was the world of the gods, and under the earth was the gloomy kingdom of the death goddess Hel. Middle-earth was a kind of outpost from which one could get to the "Rainbow Bridge" leading directly to the gods in heaven. At any moment, the jotun giants or the inhabitants of the dark kingdom could attack people in order to get into the world of the celestials. The serious guard Thor, armed with his great Hammer, did not let them do this.

From the beliefs of the ancients described above, it becomes clear what significance the Hammer of Thor had for the early Germans, and later for the Vikings. On the swords of the Saxons found in England, you can find this symbol, on the amulets of the Vikings discovered during excavations, this sign is also present. In the Old Norse sagas, one can find confirmation that only one symbol of the Hammer of Thor in itself (as well as the Christian sign of the cross and the life-giving cross) was a fairly effective remedy against the incarnations of Darkness. Scandinavian blacksmiths, famous for making "bracteates" (almond-shaped amulets), also actively used this sign, symbolizing protection from misfortunes, the forces of darkness, werewolves and hostile "night" magic. The symbolic meaning of the Hammer of Thor was also used in burials. Tombstones found in Denmark were also carved with the Hammer of Thor to protect against night witches and necromancers. An interesting fact is that in ancient times it was customary to show the sign of the Hammer of Thor with hands, very similar to the sign of the cross. This is evidenced by the following passage: “The king took the horn and crossed it (signed the sign of the cross). Then Kar of Gruthing said: Why does our king do this? Is he not going to follow the ancient customs now? Sigurd Jarl replied: - The king does what everyone who believes in his strength and power should do - he blessed his cup with the name of Thor (signa full sitt Thor) and created a hammer sign (hamars-mark) over it before drinking it.

The fact that the sign of the Hammer of Thor looked like a cross can also be judged by a stone erected in the north of the Eastern Quarter of Iceland in the 13th century in the town of Hel-kundu-heid, which was considered an unclean land inhabited by trolls, witches and werewolves. The stone was in the form of a cross with the edges of the crossbar bent down. Later, the Catholic Church destroyed a rare monument of ancient culture, considering it blasphemous. The strength of faith in the effectiveness of the Hammer of Thor is also evidenced by the fact that several carved church doors in Scandinavian churches and stone reliefs of English churches are decorated, along with traditional Christian paraphernalia, with the sign of the Hammer of Thor. Later, the meaning of the Hammer of Thor is revealed in Icelandic manuscripts of the 16th-19th centuries, where it is no longer considered a symbol of divine worship, but only a strong mystical sign.

The second component of the Thor's Hammer story relates to a physical item that was initially mistaken for a true artifact. It was found in Norfolk and could act as a real Thor's Hammer. Many even believed that it was that mythical super-powerful weapon, but all beliefs were dispelled when a second item was found in northern Germany, and then a third in Kent and a fourth in Liverpool and a fifth in Skane. Uppland. Now it’s already clear to everyone that if the real Thor’s Hammer exists, then no one can say that this is a true artifact, since in ancient times many tried to create weapons similar to it, and because of this, so many copies appeared, some of which were even worn protective nature.

Surprisingly, even today there are people who hunt for this priceless artifact and believe that it exists and is very real. In their opinion, in addition to all the wonderful properties described above, it also has an additional number of advantages. For example, such as time warp. The researchers hunting for it claim that this property is described in the myths of the Scandinavian peoples, or rather the Vikings. There are also historical events proving that the Vikings had a certain secret that allows them to move long distances in the shortest possible time. It is known that they were skilled navigators, but how they managed to do something that only modern ships are capable of today remains a mystery. Here, in explaining all these miracles, the magical power of the Hammer of Thor comes to the rescue.

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Myths about God Thor

Thor was the first and favorite son of Odin and his wife Erd-Earth. He absorbed all the life-giving juices of Mother Earth into himself, took all the power of the elements and swiftness from his father, the god of heaven. He gave rain and fertility to arable land, awakened dormant flowers and trees with spring thunderstorms, and helped migratory birds.

But most of all, Thor cared about people; he guarded Mitgard from giants and monsters, almost constantly fighting with them in the distant and cold east - otherwise their family would have grown, filled everything like a weed, leaving no place for anyone.
And the gods considered Thor the main guardian of Asgard. One had only to pronounce his name in a loud voice - the god of thunder immediately appeared and without delay entered into battle with the most terrible enemy.

It was said that at the age of ten, Thor began to carry his father's weapons, at twelve he was so strong that he could lift ten heavy bear skins from the ground at once. As a gift from the giantess Grid, one of Odin's wives, he received the Belt of Power; when you put it on, the fortress doubles. And when the Karls presented Thor with the hammer Mjollnir, he became completely invincible. After all, a hammer could instantly kill, split the skull of even a mountain giant in two, split the most powerful tree, drive anyone knee-deep into the ground.

The giantess also gave Thor a staff. After all, where only Thor did not appear, where he did not go. I had to overcome boulders and rocks on the way, wade through the thickets, swim across the channels. Not a single horse could have galloped there, where Thor had been, only the horseshoes would have gone astray, and the breath would have caught fire. And therefore Thor preferred two swift-footed goats. One was named Tangrisnir "Grinding Teeth", the other Tangiostr "Grinding Teeth". The howling of the wind and the creak of the trees, the storm and the hurricane were heard in these names. The goats could fall dead in the evening, and in the morning the owner will sanctify them with his hammer, and again they tirelessly gallop.

Since childhood, Thor heard about the terrible Land of giants, Utgard. And as soon as he grew up, he decided to visit it, see everything with his own eyes, and even measure his strength, if it happens, with its inhabitants. He called Loki with him, they set off. In the evening they drive up to the house of one person, stay there for the night. The house was poor, the owners had nothing to feed the guests, they were embarrassed. Thor understood, laughed: "Now we will slaughter our goats and have a nice supper." Tangrisnir and Tangiostr obediently approached, as if it was not the first time they were slaughtered. Thor skinned the carcasses, put them in the cauldron. A delicious smell soon filled the house. Before the start of supper, Thor laid goat skins in front of the hearth and ordered everyone to throw bones at them. The owner's son Tyalvi got carried away, took one leg, split it and sucked out the bone marrow. Then in Asgard they said that Loki taught him. In the morning, Thor got up early, dressed, raised his hammer, consecrated the skins with it. And the goats jumped to their feet - intact and alive. Only one limped a little. The god of thunder frowned; from his gaze, everyone was ready to fall through the ground. And when Thor involuntarily squeezed the hammer in his hands, everyone turned white with fear, they began to ask for mercy. Thor relented, took the delinquent boy into his service, and his sister Reskva into his wife. So the children of the giant Egil remained with Thor.

Thor's trials on the way to Utgard

Thor was afraid that he would ruin the goat if he did not let his leg live, he decided to go on foot with Loki, Tyalvi and Reskva. They kept their way to the east, where the country of the giants Utgard was located. They got to the sea, crossed, then went further. They came across some house, very spacious.
The travelers quickly warmed up and fell asleep like the dead. But in the middle of the night everyone was frightened by a terrible noise and a roar, such that the earth was trembling and the whole house was shaking. All night the noise and roar first subsided, then resumed with the same force.

Barely dawn came Thor outside. He sees a man of great height lying under a tree and snoring loudly in his sleep. Thor guessed what kind of rumble and noise was at night. And the giant seemed to be waiting for the appearance of the god of thunder; woke up instantly and jumped to his feet.

And, as they say, for the first time, Thor did not have the courage to immediately use the hammer. He asked the man about the name, he called himself Skrymir. Thor thought: "Isn't this a nickname"? After all, Skrymir means “Bouncer”. Thor opened his mouth to name himself, and the stranger said: “I know your name, you are Asa-Tor. Haven't you taken my gauntlet?" And Thor realized that they took this mitten at night for a house, and a finger for an extension. Everyone laughed and sat down to eat breakfast.
And then Skrymir asked to be a fellow traveler, and the honest company moved forward. All supplies were put into Skrymir's knapsack, he deftly tied it up and, like a feather, threw it behind his back.

They walked again all day. Only late in the evening we camped under a large oak tree for the night. We woke up in the morning, not far left to Utgard. And now I’m in the other direction, over there to those mountains!” Already on the move, Skrymir threw these words: “If you would go back, they don’t like such small things in Utgard!”
The travelers set off further and around noon they saw a city in the middle of the field: tall gates, huge chambers. All entrances were tightly locked, and through the bars of the lattice, as if through wide doors, the daredevils passed and went to the chambers. They see a lot of people sitting on the benches, considerable growth, daring mind. And at the head of the table is either a leader or a king. He saw the uninvited guests and said: “I will not hide my name. I have a double one, and both parts are well known to you: Utgard-Loki. The travelers looked back at their Loki, and he seemed so dear and sweet to them in comparison with the formidable leader of the etuns.
Utgard-Loki also looked at them: “We only start business with those, and as real guests we welcome those who will be able to surprise us with something: either skill or cunning, so get ready for trials.”

Trials of Thor and his Companions at Utgard

Thor and his comrades listened to the words of Utgard-Loki, looked at each other. The desperate Loki stepped forward and said: “Let's start with me. Perhaps I have no equal in food. I’ll take on my share faster than anyone.”
Utgard-Loki grinned: “Well, then, dare, if so. We have such Logi. Your names are similar, maybe your appetite will be equal? Then they brought a large bowl - more than a trough - full of meat. Hooked on different sides of Loki and Logi. They met right in the middle of the trough: Loki, barely breathing, finished ironing the last bone, and Logi ate all the meat, all the bones, finished eating, in addition, the trough. Loki was embarrassed, he realized that he boasted in vain, there are eaters more knowledgeable than him.

Then Thor said that he would most willingly measure his strength in drinking. Approvingly buzzed around, moved again into the ward, immediately brought a penalty horn - as if not very large, but long, the end is hidden somewhere under the table. Thor took a sip so that his breath caught, looked into the horn, and there seemed to be no decrease in water. The second time Thor pulls the water as far as he can, he tries to lift the end of the horn, but again nothing happens - even less water is lost than the first time.
Mocking lights began to play in the eyes of Utgard-Loki, he suggested mastering the horn from the third time. And everyone around is laughing almost out loud. Furious Thor, gathered all his strength and took an enormous sip. He looked into the horn: the water was reduced, but the bottom could not be seen. He threw the horn in his hearts and did not want to drink any more, he only said that aces would not call such throats small.

The eyes of Utgard-Loki laughed again. "Okay, Thor. Let's find more fun. Here, for the sake of laughter, young boys sometimes raise my cat from the ground; whoever is higher wins. If you do not consider this trifling matter unworthy of yourself, try it! At the same moment, a gray cat jumped to the floor, and not a small one.
Thor went up to her, grabbed her in the middle of her belly and began to lift. But the higher he pulled her, the more she bent into an arc, and the longer her paws became. Persistently lifts Thor the cat up. And now there is no longer enough strength, and the cat has only torn off one paw from the ground. In a word, Thor's child's play failed. Utgard-Loki burst out laughing with a good-natured laugh: “Do not blame yourself, Thor. The cat is big, and you are very small against us giants. Look, no one is laughing around, everyone seems to be even surprised that the cat could not stay on all its paws.

In the morning, the guests were again seated at the tables, forced to thoroughly refresh themselves before the road. They said goodbye and went on their way. They went out the gate with Utgard-Loki. He looked at the gloomy Thor, smiled, then quite seriously and respectfully said: “If I had known in advance that you were so strong, I would not have let you into my city. Listen to the truth. I deceived your eyes. After all, I was with you in the forest. You could not untie the knapsack because it was tied with fetters of magical iron, and when you hit me three times, I substituted a rock in my place, and deep depressions remained there. The first time would have been enough for me to give up my breath.”
The straightforward Thor was amazed and said: “Thank you for the truth, but in your city the competitions were held in front of everyone, no one deceived anyone, and we still shamefully lost! Maybe my hammer is strong, but I myself, apparently, am not very good.

Utgard-Loki cheered up, almost fell with laughter. “Why, Logi-Flame competed with your Loki in food, and he burned not only meat, but also a trough. Hugi-Thought ran with Tyalvi; who can quickly argue with thought? And the end of the horn from which you drank was connected to the sea. Here you go to the shore, you will see how shallow it is. Now it will be called the ebb." And again Thor asked incredulously: “But what about the cat?” Utgard-Loki’s face turned gray already: “We were frightened, Thor, when the cat tore off its paw. We deceived your eyes: it was not a cat at all, but the World Serpent Ermungard. And you almost raised it to the sky and almost broke it in half. A great miracle happened.
Thor heard such confessions, the fire of revenge burned in his chest, he decided to immediately crush the giant city. But he did not find anything behind him, except for a flat desert field. Everything was thought out by the etuns from start to finish.
Thor returned to Asgard. He knew that more than once he would have to face the giants both in open battle and in peacetime. Since then, they began to call Thor "The Giant-Terror".

Fishing Thor

According to the stories of some aces, Thor and Tyr did not immediately leave Hymir. They stayed overnight, and the gloomy etun told the gods that they would have to get up early in the morning and go fishing in order to stock up on food for dinner. Thor, without hesitation, replied that he was ready to go to sea, if only to find bait. Humir grunted unkindly: “Go to the herd of bulls, if you have the courage, tear off anyone’s head - you won’t find better bait!”
Without delay, Thor went to the forest, near which the herd was grazing, saw a huge black bull and instantly cut off his head. And with a satisfied look went to the boat. Humir was angry, he didn't count on that. Silently he pushed the boat and pushed the oars into Thor's hands.
Thor leaned on the oars, the boat rushed like an arrow into the open sea. Soon Humir ordered to stop, as they swam to a place where flounder was well caught. And Thor rows himself further, as if he does not hear.
Hymir glanced sideways at his hammer, was silent. It looks like the coast has not been seen for a long time, and there are no fishing boats. Toru says: “It is very dangerous to sail further. You can stumble upon the World Serpent. And then we'll be unhappy." Thor replies: “A little more, and we will stop. It seems to me that we have a great fishing ahead of us!” Humir was completely depressed, mentally already began to say goodbye to life. Finally, Thor threw the oars.

Thor took out a strong forest in a thick rope and a hook that looked more like an anchor. He planted a bull's head on him, poured oil on it so that the smell of bait would disperse far in the water, spat on him according to a fishing sign and threw the hook overboard. And the other end of the fishing line tightly wrapped around his fist. A detour went to the bottom, and Tor Ermungard spent here no worse than he himself was held in Utgard, slipped into the hands of the Serpent.
With greed, Ermungard swallowed the bull's head: for a long time such tasty food did not fall into his mouth. But then the hook with terrible force dug into his sky. From the pain of the Snake already darkened in the eyes! He rushed with such fury that he almost pulled Thor out of the boat. Thor came to the excitement, got excited, increased strength in him. He rested on the bottom of the boat, punched it with his feet, stood on the seabed and dragged the Serpent to the very board. It was necessary to see this terrible sight when Thor fixed his eyes on the Serpent, and the Serpent, spewing poison, began to devour Thor with his eyes.
Neither alive nor dead sat Humir in the boat. And when he saw the head of the Serpent and the waves ready to overwhelm the boat, he grabbed a knife in unconsciousness and rushed to the forest. Thor raised his hammer over his head to bring it down on the Serpent. Hymir was ahead of him for a moment: he cut through the forest with a knife, and the liberated Ermungard plunged into the sea. Thor threw a hammer after him, and, people say, already in the water the hammer pierced the Serpent's head. But Thor did not wait for the Serpent to surface belly up. He had enough of Humir's annoyance with a fist to the ear, he fell overboard, only his heels flashed. Thor cooled down a bit, dragged Hymir into the boat, caught a couple of whales, and they headed for the shore.
Humir was sullenly silent, and Thor was not particularly amused either - he could not forgive the giant for his cowardice. Hymir, on the other hand, harbored a desire to hurt Thor with something. And more and more often they began to call him the "Enemy of the World Serpent."

Thor - bride

The giant Thrym steals the hammer. The giants said among themselves that Hrungnir did not bring good to his bragging; that no one can defeat Thor. But in their hearts, many giants also did not mind taking Siv and Freya out of Asgard. The goddess did not give rest not only to those who saw them, but even to those who only heard about them. They especially talked a lot about Freya - about her beauty, kindness, hospitality, cheerful disposition, friendliness.
From these stories, the heart of the giant Thrym, the most noble among the etuns, flared up. He had everything: beautiful palaces, herds of horses, black bulls, golden-horned cows, treasures, precious stones. Even the dog collars Thrym wove from gold. But all this splendor lacked one thing - a beautiful and noble hostess. Thrym decided that he would achieve Freya at all costs. He understood that it would hardly be possible to kidnap her, to take her away against her will: she would call Thor, and not demolish the unlucky groom's head. It was necessary to come up with something so that Thor himself would give Freya into his hands.
And came up with a love hold. Once Thor was visiting the giantess Yarnsaksa, rejoicing at the strength and removal of his son Magni. Out of habit, he went to take a nap under a tree in the nearest forest. Here Hold guarded him, instantly grabbed the hammer and was like that. Thor woke up and gasped: Mjollnir was gone. He began to search, searched all the bushes, looked under every blade of grass: he became so furious that his hair stood on end and his beard was ruffled. Shame and disgrace: like an old grandmother, they stole a hammer from under her nose.

Thor decided not to tell anyone except Loki, maybe he will be able to find out in whose hands Mjolnir is. Loki readily agreed to help, only for speed advised to ask Freya for her falcon plumage. The goddess gasped, immediately took out the plumage, saying only: “If it were even gold or silver, I would never regret it for such a thing!” He put on Loki's plumage and in the blink of an eye rushed to the country of jotuns. On one of the barrows he saw Thrym. He, as if nothing had happened, combed the thick manes of his horses. “Well, how are the aces doing there? Why did you complain? he asked Loki amiably. And Loki replies: “I argued, Thrym, that no one but you would dare to hide Thor’s hammer, and so I decided to find out if I was right or not.” Flattered Loki Hold with these words. He laughed: “Yes, I hid Mjollnir far, deep, no one will find it. But I'm willing to trade him for Freya if you want."
And in Asgard, the frustrated Thor wandered around with such a gloomy look that no one dared to speak to him. Suddenly, wings rustled right above his head, and Loki appeared before his eyes. Without taking a breath, he told Thor everything, and they decided to persuade Freya to accept the giant's offer. The beautiful Freya almost drove them out of the house, became angry, snorted with indignation so that the chambers shook, and the precious necklace of the Brisings fell off her neck. "Thor! Yes, I will cease to respect myself if I go with you to Jotunheim! These stubborn giants wooed, wooed, and that's what they thought! Let's get together, maybe we'll find another way to get the hammer back."

In an instant, Freya ran around all the gods, called for a council to the main square-ting. They broke their heads, broke, everyone offered his own. As Heimdall was silent the longest. Then he suddenly laughed merrily, went up to Thor, hugged him like a beautiful girl, and said: “What if we dress you up as a bride? A long skirt will hide her legs, a veil and headdress - a head and a face, we will put jewelry on her chest, Freya will not regret her famous necklace, because everyone knows who it belongs to. No one will suspect a trick."
Thor waved his hands, refused to be a laughing stock. He knew how quick the aces were at nicknames: now you agree, and then the glory of the effeminate will stick. The aces were sad, because with the help of the hammer it doesn’t cost anything for the giants to capture Asgard and create everything that Hrungnir spoke about. They began to assure Thor in chorus that they would only love him even more if he saved everyone from trouble. Loki unexpectedly helped in the persuasion, a great lover of all sorts of adventures and reincarnations, he volunteered to change clothes too and accompany the bride-Thor in the role of a servant.
They put a wedding dress on Thor, hung a bunch of keys on his belt, as befits a future mistress, decorated his chest with all Freya's jewelry, and covered his head with a magnificent dress. Without delay, frisky goats were harnessed, and they rushed off so that the earth burned under the hooves and the mountains collapsed. The hold receives guests. From a distance the giants saw the chariot of the Ases. Thrym became agitated, ordered the jotuns to quickly cover the benches and put refreshments on the tables. Soon they were bursting with barrels of beer, honey, roast, fish, delicacies.
It was just in the evening, everyone was pretty hungry, and as soon as the guests appeared on the threshold, they began to sit down at the tables. The bride and her maid were seated on either side of the hold. He could not swallow a piece of excitement, he did not take his eyes off the bride. And she seems to have forgotten why she came. She placed several casks near her, pushed a roasted bull and fish - and let's gobble up. In an instant, the bride-Thor emptied three barrels of honey, ate a whole bull, eight huge salmon and all the goodies.
Thrym was amazed and said in confusion: “I have not seen brides who would swallow everything without chewing, in such quantity and pour beer into themselves, as if into a bottomless tub. I have never heard anything like this about Freya!” The maid-Loki almost choked at these words. He playfully led with his shoulder and whispered in the hold’s ear: “My mistress was so eager to get to the beautiful groom quickly that for eight days and nights she didn’t take poppy dew in her mouth, drove and drove the goats without rest. But in general, she is small!”
Hold beamed and immediately wanted to kiss the bride. He threw back the cover ... and recoiled dumbfounded.

He turned to the servant Loki and asked: “Why does Freya's eyes sparkle with such an unbearable brilliance? Of them, I swear, the flames blaze! The sensible maid ingenuously replies: “Freya spent eight nights without sleep, so she was eager to get there as soon as possible. Here are the eyes from insomnia and inflamed!
Hold calmed down, ordered to begin wedding ceremonies. According to the custom, his older sister entered and began to ask the bride for gifts with the words of the wedding song: “Give me wrists, red rings, if you seek my friendship, my friendship and good affection.”

But Hold is impatient; he orders to bring the hammer Mjollnir as soon as possible, to put the bride on her knees as a sign that the gods approve of the union. Thor shook with inner laughter when he saw his mighty hammer. He jumped up and began to crush the jotuns. Thrym fell first, then his sister. Instead of gifts, she got blows, instead of rings - her hammer pounded. The whole race of giants was exterminated. And Thor was even more often called "Lord and owner of the hammer Mjollnir."

INTRODUCTION

The spiritual culture and worldviews of many Indo-European peoples are in close contact with each other. Not only common names, but also common myths unite the cultures of different and even the most distant from each other Indo-European peoples.
This similarity allows us to imagine the ancient pantheons of the Indo-Europeans, and hence the Slavs and Germans. Together with the Romans, Greeks, Celts, Iranians and Indians, they are part of the same language family - the Indo-European.
The ancient Scandinavians are closest to the Germans in spiritual culture and general myths, the differences in their mythology are insignificant - they differ from each other only in the personal names of gods and heroes.
But at the same time, Old Norse mythology, so close to Germanic and Germans, who are in the same language family with the Slavs, is strikingly different from the mythology of the latter.
There are many differences between Slavic and Scandinavian mythology, but the most interesting difference is the location of the god of thunder, who among all Indo-European peoples is at the head of the pantheon, but if among the Slavs the god of thunder Perun occupies a dominant place in the pantheon, then among the ancient Scandinavians the thunderer Thor occupies only second place, yielding primacy to the god of war, Odin.
There were many reasons why the Scandinavian god Thor was not supreme. First of all, the main reason was the location of the ancient Scandinavians in the historical arena, as well as their homeland - the Scandinavian Peninsula, which, due to cold weather conditions, could not feed the ever-increasing population. Before Odin, the main god of their pantheon was Tyr, the god of justice, but due to the above reasons, he gave way to Odin, the god of war and discord, who called for wars and violence. With this new god, the Vikings raided neighboring (and not only) countries and ravaged them. Justice for them was no longer the main piety - it was replaced by military prowess, led by the god of warriors Odin. That is, Thor never occupied a dominant position in the pantheon - this was not allowed by the living conditions of the ancient Scandinavians.
Not such a situation was among the ancient Slavs. The Slavic land has always been famous for its fertility and rich resources, that is, this was the basis for the fact that, unlike the Scandinavians, they did not have to earn their living through robbery and violence, since the fertile land and mild climate gave rich harvests. The Slavic land could feed all its inhabitants and even many times more of them, since it was not yet fully developed and populated. So it was Perun - the god of fertile thunderstorms - who was the main one. In addition, unlike the Scandinavian Odin, he did not conquer and plunder, but defended his land.
The Scandinavian Tor was similar in function to the Slavic Perun, but at the same time it was different in different aspects: in the symbols of power and their use, in the cult, in the features of the veneration of this cult, its prevalence, etc.
So what are these similarities and differences?
This paper gives a comparative description of Slavic and Scandinavian mythology on the example of the cult of the Slavic god of thunder Perun and the Scandinavian god of thunder Thor, as well as an analysis of each of these cults.

Timeline of the study: VIII–X centuries.

Object of study: Scandinavian and Slavic mythology as a phenomenon of spiritual life in Western and Eastern Europe in the VIII-X centuries

Subject of study: the cult of the god of thunder in Scandinavian and Slavic mythology.

Target research: to give a comparative description of Slavic and Scandinavian mythology on the example of the cults of Thor and Perun.

Tasks:

1. To characterize the gods Thor and Perun, and consider their functions in the mythology of the Slavs and Scandinavians.
2. To analyze the ways and features of the veneration of Thor and Perun.
3. Analyze the similarities and differences between the cults of Thor and Perun.

CHAPTERI. SOURCES ON SCANDINAVIAN AND SLAVIC MYTHOLOGY

1.1 Overview of sources on the cult of Thor

To study the cult of Thor, today there are many diverse sources that allow modern researchers to study the cult of the Scandinavian god of thunder Thor, who was one of the main ones in the Old Norse pantheon. These sources are divided into written and material.
The main and most important source is the Old Norse myths themselves, which are recorded in the main collection among written sources - “Younger Edda”. The "Younger Edda" are songs composed in pre-literate times and recorded by an unknown author (or authors) in the first half of the 13th century. These songs detail Thor, his place in the Norse pantheon of gods, his functions, and his exploits and adventures. This collection is undoubtedly important in order to understand who the god Thor is, and how the ancient Scandinavians saw him.
"The Younger Edda" is a textbook of poetic art, compiled by the Icelandic scholar Snorri Sturlusson in 1222-1225, containing a prose presentation of myths and quotations from ancient poetic works. Under the general title "Edda" appear two manuscripts, compiled in the XIII century, very different from each other. The oldest of these documents dates from about 1230. This is a kind of textbook on the poetic art of skalds with an excursion into Old Norse mythology, intended for young poets. Old Norse poetry is unthinkable without the use of haties and kennings, the possession of which, in turn, implies deep knowledge in the field of pagan beliefs. And in order to explain the ancient poetry, becoming less and less clear after two centuries of the domination of the Christian religion in Iceland, Snorri Sturlusson compiled the Edda. She received the conditional name "Prose Edda", or "Younger Edda". .The second manuscript is currently in Reykjavik. This is a Royal Codex dating from the end of the thirteenth century, but as we can determine from older fragments, it was only copied from the original, written between 1210-1240. This codex includes large Old Norse poetic tales about gods and heroes, and it is called the "Poetic Edda" or "Elder Edda". All Norse mythology is collected here, as it could be written down 200 years after the introduction of Christianity. True, some scattered information relating to the pre-Christian period is contained in the descriptions of Arab travelers, in the stories of Western European Christians, in the laudatory songs of skalds, the stories of the Danish chronicler Saxo Grammaticus, and also the stories of Adam of Bremen, which are contained in his "History of the Hamburg Archbishops", written around 1070 year.
One of the sources for studying the cult of Thor is the Old Norse runes. Before 1000 and the appearance of the Latin alphabet in Scandinavia, it is the runes that help us to penetrate more deeply into the traditions and mythology of the Vikings. Some scientists insist that in the etymology the word "runa" occurs in the Old Germanic root, from which the word "raunen" in modern German, which means to whisper, comes from. That is, the runes convey a secret message. They also refer to some of the Eddic poems, which list the magical virtues of powerful runes.
The first futhark of runic writing consisted of 24 icons. It was used from the very beginning to the end of the 9th century. The second futhark appeared at the end of the 8th century, or perhaps at the beginning of the 9th century. The number of letters has been reduced to 16.
Runestones are distributed throughout Scandinavia, where there are more than 6 thousand of them. Approximately half of them date back to the 10th-12th centuries and are located in Sweden. There are about 620 monuments in Denmark and 602 runestones in Norway. Finds have also been made outside Scandinavia. The study of the cult of Thor is supplemented by bracelets found in the Black Grave mound, on which runes are carved. Most of the Uplandic monuments were erected after the introduction of Christianity in Sweden, which is reflected in the texts and in the ornament of the rune stones. Runic stones and Gotland stelae, strictly synchronous with the Viking Age, set, as it were, a coordinate system for orientation in the pagan worldview, captured in later written monuments - the Elder Edda, skaldic poetry, the Younger Edda, sagas.
One of the sources is memorial stones common in Scandinavia during the Viking Age. Most of them are concentrated in Gotland - most often they were carved with scenes of battles of the Einherim, Valhalla, as well as images of Thor's hammer - Mjolnir.
Rock carvings in southern Scandinavia depict a certain god (presumably Thor) with an ax or hammer, solar signs, and a goat, which was Thor's animal.
According to the memorial stones, one can study and more fully characterize the cult of Thor among the ancient Scandinavians.
The main material sources include archaeological finds in Old Norse burial mounds. In 1880, a well-preserved ship was found in one of the Gokstad barrows in Vestfold. A small amount of jewelry was found in it. It dates back to 850. Silver figurines of animals and people were found in both mounds (it is assumed that these are figurines of gods).
In addition to burial ships, sources are also Viking burials, in which many things were found that carry a sacred character.
Tibla - the burial of the nobility, discovered in Upland (Sweden). The complex includes a chamber grave, plundered, but swords, bronze belt linings, buckles with images of the gods Odin, Thor and Freyr were found. This burial dates from the middle or the end of the 6th century.
Many amulets-hammers were also found, which symbolized the protection of Thor. Similar hoards have been found throughout ancient Scandinavia. The symbolism of bronze and silver amulets made in the 10th century is complex - some of them depict faces with round eyes or - apparently, people tried to depict the burning eyes of the god in this way, and sometimes the upper part of the hammer played the role of a beard. Such hammers are most often found not in graves, but in treasures that could be an offering to God. In one cache in Torslev (Jutland) a silver bowl with a hammer on the bottom (dating back to the 10th century) was found - it could be used during the rituals of worshiping Thor. Some of the decorated axes were ritual or special indicators of status associated with Thor. In a tomb with a wooden burial chamber, discovered in 1869 in Mammen, near Vyborg (Denmark), lay the remains of a richly dressed man, at whose feet lay two axes - one iron, and the other turned out to be beautifully decorated, with gold and silver inlays. It depicted the bearded face of the god Thor. Numerous such finely crafted axes have been found in burial mounds in Denmark, Sweden, Finland, and northern Russia.
All of the above sources give us a huge amount of information for studying the Scandinavian god of thunder and lightning - Thor, and they are also of great value both for the archeology of Scandinavia and for literature, since the literary heritage of the ancient Scandinavians is unique in its complexity and beauty of the style.

1.2 Overview of sources on the cult of Perun

Perun is the only undeniable god in Slavic mythology, about whom the most documents and material sources, undeniable in their authenticity, have been preserved.
First of all, let us recall the most important testimonies about Perun among Russians and Western Slavs. Direct evidence of the veneration of the god Perun in Russia during paganism is the chronicle of Nestor, treaties between the Russians and Byzantium in 907, 945, 971, the Novgorod Chronicle, the Galician text from 1302. Among the written sources of Czechoslovak antiquity, no text with the mention of Perun has yet been discovered. Some mythologists are content with just pointing to two Slovak songs recorded by the enthusiastic Slavophile Kolor. These songs mention Buoh'eParom'e. The dictionary of the Slovak language contains the verb "peruntati" - to crack, the adjective "perunsky", and also there are several spells with the name Parom, Peron (Parondotebe, Peronovastrelat'azbila). The Polish King Vladimir banned the folk custom to keep the eternal fire of Perun (Pioruna), whose name is now used by the Poles in the sense of "thunder". Here you can also find local names dedicated to Perun. The fact that the Baltic Slavs also called the thunder god by the same name is evident from the names perendan, which is quite consistent with the German Donnerstag.
The testimony of Procopius in the 6th century about the cult of the thunder among the southern Slavs is quite classic and indisputable: “The Slavs recognize only one ruler of this universe, one god, the creator of lightning.”
Another source and evidence of the cult of Perun among the Bulgarians is the story of the Bulgarians Hieroschemamonk Spiridon - he is unconsciously the first Bulgarian folklorist. He mentions that in the XVIII century, when he lived in Bulgaria, they still revered Perun and honored him during the rain. Spiridon understands under the name of Perun not only the raincoat himself, but also the Thunderer - this is evident from the explanation by Father Spiridon himself: “lightning or Perun”.
The cult of Perun can also be traced by topographic names, as well as how strong an influence he had on people who, in honor of Perun, called their children by his name (the names Perun, Perunka, etc.).
The spread of the name Perun among Russians by many scientists is explained by his mention in the Nestor Chronicle, during the rewriting of which this name allegedly passed into books, and only then into legends. Such an explanation can in no way be applied to the South Slavic lands and dialects, where one can hardly speak of any influence of the Nestor Chronicle. Most personal names, topographical and other similar names, starting from Istria to the White and Black Seas, cannot be explained in any other way than by the fact that they are evidence that has survived from the time of the pagan cult of Perun among the southern Slavs.
Also, material sources are well preserved to this day - these are the temples and idols of Perun, which are located throughout the territory inhabited by the ancient Slavic peoples. They remained due to the fact that after the baptism of Russia, the Slavs would secretly bow to Perun for some time, not following the order of Prince Vladimir - to destroy idols and temples.
Thanks to the above sources, modern researchers of the cult of Perun have the opportunity to study it in full, as far as they are preserved. The number of sources would have increased significantly if Christianity, through various persecutions, sermons and writings, had not gradually destroyed pagan traditions, or had not mixed and renamed them.

CHAPTERII. CHARACTERISTICS OF THE GODS OF THUNDERS. THEIR FUNCTIONS

2.1 God Thor

Thor (Donar) - the ancient Germanic god of thunder, storms and fertility, the "thrice-born" eldest son of Odin and the goddess of the earth Yord, the son of Odin and Fjorgyn, as well as Odin and Frigg. In Scandinavian mythology, the god is the protector of the worlds of gods and people from giants and dangerous monsters.
It is assumed that the Roman historian Tacitus mentions Donar under the name of Hercules, describing the religion of the Germans. The German mercenaries, having adopted the Roman system of attributing the days of the week to one or another deity, gave Donar Thursday - the day of Jupiter. This can speak both about the similarities of Jupiter - the establisher and guarantor of the world order in Roman mythology with Donar, and about the high status of both gods in the eyes of the Germanic warriors.
The "Speech of the High One" says: "He is the strongest of all gods and men." His domain is called Trudvangar (Fields of Power), and his chamber is called Bilskirnir (Indestructible). There are five hundred chambers in this hall and forty more. It is larger than all the houses that people have ever built.
Attributes of Thor: hammer Mjollnir. Frost giants and mountain giants feel the hammer as soon as it is raised. Asa Thor's hammer was not only the main tool for protecting the gods and people from the ancient forces of darkness and chaos, but also an absolutely necessary ritual item of aces.
The second attribute is the Belt of Power. As soon as he girds himself with them, the divine power will double.
His third treasure is iron gauntlets to hold his hammer.
God lives in Asgard - the world of the gods. Thor's chambers are called Trudheim. Thor was represented as a red-haired, bearded strongman with a Mjollnir hammer in his hand. The hammer was originally thought to be stone, then iron. This is an indispensable attribute of Thor, like the spear of Odin or the sword of Tyr. Thor was also called Eku-Tor, that is, "Thor with a chariot." Any vehicle with two wheels instead of four and driven by two animals was called a chariot.
Thor is the god of warriors - defenders, "people's militias", but he was also revered as a heavenly god - a thunderer who sends rain to the earth, and prayed for the blessing of the harvest. Thor was called the “thunderer” and it was believed that when thunder rumbles, it is he who rides across the sky in his chariot, and lightning flying from heaven to earth is the hammer of Thor.
Thor rides in a wagon drawn by two goats. The names of the goats - Tangniostr and Tangrisnir ("Grinding Teeth" and "Grinding Teeth") allude to the gnashing of teeth and the roar of a thunderstorm itself. At the same time, goats have always been associated with lust and therefore fertility, that is, with the cult of fertility. Goats for Thor are not only mounts, but also a source of food. Thor eats the animals for dinner, and in the morning they are healthy again and can run.
Thor in Scandinavian mythology is primarily engaged in protecting Midgard (the world of people) and Asgard (the world of gods) from jotuns - giants from Utgrad (the world of giants). Thor was called: “enemy and destroyer of giants and giantesses” (Appendix 1.1).
Most of the plots associated with Thor tell about his travels to Utgard and heroic deeds there. As it is said in the Younger Edda: "... he traveled a lot, traveled half the world and alone defeated all the berserkers, all the giants, the largest dragon and many animals." And “Great power and might was given to him. Therefore, he conquers all living things.
Thor was a warrior and hero, and stories of his skirmishes with people have not come down to us. Perhaps because people are too weak compared to the red-bearded god, they are not his rivals and especially do not encroach (at least they did not encroach before) on the foundations of the world order, unlike creepy monsters. Due to this circumstance, Thor is considered an ally and helper of people in their struggle and opposition to both direct enemies and the “powers of darkness”. Thor was perceived as the protector of human clans and clans, as well as the developed land belonging to them. Thor, with his name as a symbol, could bless fate and a single person.
In Ragnarok - The death of the world (or the twilight of the gods), Thor fights the serpent Jörmungandr, kills him, but also dies himself, poisoned by the bites of the serpent (Appendix 1.2)
At the end of the Viking Age, the "red-bearded Red Thor" becomes the main opponent of the White Christ, a god from the South. The red color of Thor was associated with a furious will, passion, strength, and the white color of Christ - with kindness, justice, compliance. In fact, the supporters of Christ in Scandinavia planted their faith with no less bitterness than the pagans defended theirs. There were also rumors that Thor offered Christ a duel to the death, but Christ refused (Nyala's Saga).
So, we see that Thor, with all his strength and military prowess, is not an aggressor, but a defender of Asgard and Midgard. Thor is a peaceful by nature, friendly and good-natured god. He gives vent to anger only when those under his care are in danger. He is a friend and protector of people.
So, the god Thor: the god of thunder and lightning, the patron of farmers and cultivators, the guardian of the balance of good and evil in the world, the protector of Midgard and Asgard (the world of people and the world of gods), the patron of marriages.

2.2 God Perun

Perun is the god of thunder and lightning, the patron saint of warriors. The son of the god Svarog and Lada the Mother of God. During the birth of Perun, the earth shook in the district, lightning flashed in the sky, thunder rumbled, welcoming the birth of the son of Svarog Perun the Thunderer.
Perun - Heavenly Warrior, leader of the heavenly host, supreme patron of the entire military class. With his lightning arrows, he creates the germ of the Earth, and also drives all the undead out of the world away. In his heavenly patrol, Perun vigilantly guards the borders of his native land. He is the protector god, the guardian of every row, order and law, the holder of power and the guardian of justice. He teaches his warriors to be true to duty and value honor above their own lives. His Element is Storm. His constant companions are iron and fire. From the blows of his thunder club - the earth shakes.
In addition to fire, Perun is closely connected with the cult of water, wood and stone. According to the Slavs, on warm days of spring, Perun fertilized the earth with rains with his lightning and brought the sun out from behind the clouds. He is considered the ancestor of heavenly fire, which, descending to earth, gives life. His creative power awakened nature to life, and he, as it were, created the World again. Hence Perun is a producer, a creator. At the same time, Perun is a formidable and punishing deity; his appearance excites fear and trembling. Also, Perun was subject to the elements of nature and some areas of people's lives [13, c34].
Perun also acts as a guardian of order in the world. He pursues evil forces and creatures of chaos - those who violate harmony. Lightning is a reflection from the blows of the sword of Perunov, with which he strikes the Serpent of heaven. After all, the main duty of Perun is to protect the Sun, which the Heavenly Serpent wants to steal.
The weapons of the deity are the “thunder arrow” or “devil's finger” (belemnite stones), a spear - lightning, a sword, a saber, an ax or a club (Appendix 2.1). According to some legends, Perun's lightning is of two kinds: purple-blue - "dead", striking to death, and gold - "alive", creating, awakening earthly fertility.
Perun moves across the sky on his chariot drawn by horses, on his horse or on the wheel of Perun (the "thunder sign" or a wheel with six spokes). In folk legends, Perun is represented as a rider galloping through the heavens on a horse or riding a chariot drawn by winged stallions, white and black. The roar from the chariot people mistook for thunder. When Perun throws stones and arrows on the ground, a thunderstorm arises (Appendix 2.2).
Our ancestors believed that the Warriors who died in battle fell into Perun's army.
Perun - The father and progenitor of the Slavs, was depicted as a middle-aged Warrior with black and silver hair and a fiery golden swirling beard. Perun's hair was likened to a thundercloud. Perun was also imagined as a middle-aged angry man with a red swirling beard. Perun was surrounded by birds sitting on the branches of the World Tree. Perun in his left hand carries a quiver of arrows, and in his right bow, an arrow shot by him hits the enemy and causes fires. He was also revered as the lord of rain clouds and earthly water sources, including springs that break through the earth after a lightning strike.
Perun, walking around the world, willingly takes the form of a forest bull Tura.
The flower of Perun is considered to be a blue iris (six lilac-blue petals, a thunder sign). Trees of Perun: oak, hornbeam. Perun's bird is an eagle..
So, Perun, the eldest son of the god Svarog: the god of thunder and lightning, heavenly fire, the patron of warriors and the princely squad, the god-governor, the god who punishes for non-compliance with laws, the protector of Reveal (Earth), the giver of male power.

2.3 Similarities and differences

As we can see, the Scandinavian Thor and the Slavic Perun are very similar in their functions, but according to myths they have a different birth and attributes of their power.
Now consider the similarities and differences separately.
Thor and Perun perform almost lonely functions: they are, first of all, the gods of thunder and thunder. On the one hand, it is a furious thunderstorm and thunder, which indicate that the gods are angry, that they are going to restore order or protect the World from enemies. But on the other hand, it is a fertilizing thunderstorm, it is a blessed rain, thanks to which people will reap a good harvest. That is, both gods are the personification of the Stormy Sky and are also considered gods of fertility.
These gods are the protectors of the world, who keep the balance of good and evil in it. With their formidable weapons, they kill enemies and are the guardians of order, protect the world from chaos, which is under constant threat from giants (Thor) and chthonic monsters.
Both Thor and Perun are similar in appearance - they were represented by middle-aged men with a red swirling beard. A red beard is an indispensable feature of the God of Thunder among various peoples. They both also have magical weapons that give them extra strength, as it is nowhere stated that they can throw lightning without them.
Both gods ride around the sky in their chariots, going on urgent business to save the world, and these chariots make a noise that people call thunder.
But, despite all these similarities, these at first glance are so similar to each other, the gods have many differences that strictly delimit the scope of these gods.
First of all, the main difference between Perun and Thor is that the first is the head of the pantheon, the main god-almighty. And Thor is the second god in his pantheon, that is, he has less responsibility than Perun. In addition, this difference suggests that in Scandinavian mythology, the previously standing supreme god of thunder and thunder was supplanted by the god of war - Odin, and in Slavic mythology this god remained in the same place, which indicates a different mentality, worldview and values among the ancient Slavs and ancient Scandinavians.
The second important difference is that Perun is immortal, and Thor is destined to fall at the End of the World, that is, Thor is mortal. To this difference, one can add the fact that Perun overcame his snake enemy and saved the world from destruction, and Thor fell from his poison, never having completed his main mission.
At the end of the pagan period, the development of local cults led to the fact that the ancient figure of the god, the creator of lightning, was supplanted by others. In Scandinavia, the dominant place was taken by the god of war - Odin. Only in Russia, as we see, Peryn remained the main god of both the people and the Varangian team, headed by the prince. The Torah was revered by the farmers and the people's militias.
After analyzing the characteristics and functions of the gods of thunder from the Scandinavian Thor and Slavic Perun, we can conclude that their figures are similar to each other, but at the same time they differ greatly from each other in important details that immediately catch the eye.
Comparing these two gods, you can see how different the Old Norse and Slavic peoples are in their vision of divine majesty and power, but at the same time, the similarity of their main functions should be noted.

CHAPTERIII. PECULIARITIES OF HONORING THE CULTS OF THE THUNDERS

3.1 Places of worship

The cult of Perun has been known for a very long time, although some scholars attribute its wide distribution among the Slavs only to the 8th-9th centuries.
In the annals there is no news about pagan temples. However, archaeological excavations give some idea of what the East Slavic pagan sanctuaries looked like. They were usually located on the top of a hill or on a large clearing in a swampy forest area and represented a flat rounded area, sometimes with a slightly raised middle or, conversely, with a funnel-shaped depression in the center. The temple of Perun should have been located on an elevated place - on a hill or mountain, but not in a lowland. The Drop itself could be carved from stone, from oak or elm, but not from spruce or aspen. In terms of height, Perunov's Kap could not be lower than an adult husband who raised his hands, since it is not worthwhile for a person to look at the image of a god from top to bottom. In front of the Kapyu lay an altar stone or an oak sacrificial deck. A plow could be made around the temple, or a palisade was erected, or six or eight cleansing fires were laid out. The sacred fire inside the Temple itself could be either one - in front of the sacred face, or four - on the four cardinal points around Kapi. On Perun's Day, in front of the entrance to the Temple, the purifying Fiery Gates could also be installed, built from two vertically standing pillars with a crossbar, tied with tarred tow and solemnly lit, so that everyone passing through them bowed to the ground to God. The site was surrounded by one or two ditches and low ramparts. The places where idols were worshiped were called "temples" (from the Old Slavonic "drop" - an image, an idol); where sacrifices (requisitions) were made, - “retreats” (Appendix 3.1).
The sanctuaries of Perun are arranged in the open air. They are flower-shaped; in those sanctuaries excavated by archaeologists, there are usually eight “petals”, but in ancient times, according to scientists, there were six. "Petals" were pits in which unquenchable sacred fires burn. In the middle is a sculptural image of Perun. An altar is placed in front of the image of God, usually in the form of a stone ring. Offerings were piled there, sacrificial blood was shed: most often - animal, and if the people were threatened with serious misfortune - then human.
The symbols of the temple are an oak idol, a stone, or two stones on either side of the idol, a sacrificial fire lit in front of the idol, a six-beam wheel on the idol, a symbol of lightning or an arrow, or even a thunder arrow itself with the idol. Probably, the pagans did not cut down living trees for idols - a living, but an old, powerful oak was already a symbol of worship for them, putting facial features on it with gold and silver paint. Oak, struck by lightning, was especially revered and amulets, staves, wands, arrows made from it were considered the best guardians from Navi.
From generation to generation, the legend of the sacred Perun Hill was passed down.
Sanctuary in Peryn. After 983, the idol of Perun was placed here. The sanctuary was located on the island of Peryn (the left bank of the Volkhov River at its source from Lake Ilmen), in 4 km south of Veliky Novgorod. It was a horizontal platform in the form of a regular circle with a diameter21 m, surrounded by an annular moat. Exactly in the center of the site was a pit from a wooden statue of Perun. In front of the statue was a round stone altar. The site was surrounded by a moat - an eight-petalled flower formed by eight symmetrically arranged pits. At the bottom of each of them, during the festivities, a ritual fire was kindled, and in one of them, facing Volkhov, the fire burned constantly.
Adam Olearius, who visited Novgorod in 1654, writes: “The Novgorodians, when they were still pagans, had an idol called Perun, that is, the god of fire, for the Russians call fire “perun”. And in the place where this idol of theirs stood, a monastery was built, which retained the name of the idol and was called the Perun Monastery. This deity had the appearance of a man with a flint in his hand, similar to a thunder arrow (lightning) or a beam. As a sign of worship to this deity, they kept an unquenchable day or night fire, laid out from an oak forest. And if the servant at this fire through negligence allowed the fire to go out, then he was punished by death.
A characteristic feature of the myths and rituals associated with Perun is their correlation with oaks and oak groves and with hills on which the idols of Perun (in Kyiv and Novgorod) and his sanctuary were placed in ancient times. Geographical places were named in honor of Perun, and children were also named after him. The names of Perun and Perunka have survived to this day.
However, women were not supposed to bow to Perun - for this there was his female counterpart - Dodola, or in a slightly different religious sense - Makosh.
The Scandinavian Thor also had its own places of worship. According to Adam of Bremen, the most powerful of the gods who were in the pagan temple of Uppsala was Thor. Temples in his honor were erected in Mary, Khlader, Godi, Gotland and Uppsala and in other places. Temples and idols of Thor, like Odin, were made of wood, and a large number of them were destroyed during the time of King Olaf the Holy.
On Yul (the main holiday dedicated to Thor, coinciding with the current Christmas time), the brides wore red, as this is Thor's favorite color, considered a symbol of love. For the same reason, wedding rings in Northern Europe have always been with a red stone.
The ancient peoples of Northern Europe considered Thor's hammer sacred and used to wear amulets in the form of Thor's hammers to protect themselves from evil spirits and achieve the blessings of the gods. An amulet in the form of a hammer was worn on newborn babies, pouring water on their heads and naming them with a name. The hammer was hammered into the pillars that marked the boundaries of possessions, and it was considered sacrilege to pull it out. They consecrated the threshold of a newly built house, it was used in a marriage ceremony, as well as in the consecration of a funeral pyre, on which the bodies of heroes were burned along with weapons and horses, and sometimes along with wives and servants. Thor is named after places that, according to legend, he often visited, for example, the main harbors of the Faroe Islands, as well as surnames believed to be descended from him. Thor's name is present in such names as Trunderhill in Surrey, in the names of Thorburn and Thorvaldsen, and also in the name of one of the days of the week: Thor's day, or Thursday (English Thursday).
Common to all adherents, regardless of their social status, was the unusually wide popularity of Thor, whose name parents willingly gave to children, hoping for his patronage. Names such as Thorolf, Thorfinn, Thorgrim, Thorir, Thora, Thorgeir, etc. - there are many dozens of them - worn equally by nobles and bonds. An amulet depicting Thor's hammer can be found in the richest burials (Appendix 3.2). Scandinavian rulers minted his image on their coins. Often the Vikings went into battle, calling for help from Thor, since he was also a warrior god. .
The places of worship of these thunder gods are very diverse. Both gods were revered, building temples and temples, naming groves, meadows, villages in their honor, and children were named after them, hoping for their patronage.

3.2 Ways of worship. Sacrifice.

Any cult could not do without sacrifice. These offerings were considered legitimate tribute to the gods.
Sacrifices to Perun took place at the temple. In front of Kapi lay the Alatyr stone-altar or there was an oak sacrificial deck (there could be four of them - on the four cardinal points around Kapi). In the center stood a wooden pillar (idol), and next to it was an altar, where the bones of sacrificed animals are still found. The places where sacrifices (requirements) were made were called "trebes".
Animals, bread and drink were sacrificed to Perun. In the hierarchy of victims, the horse occupied the second place after the man. The horse was associated with Perun (for example, solar horses adorned the roofs of houses). In the case when the requirement was rejected by God, special expiatory sacrifices were made; the remnants of the unclean treb were buried in the ground. Only after the treba ascended did they take out the cup-brother with nourishing honey or surya, which was consecrated by the priests.
The cup was passed around in a circle so that everyone, having accepted it with a bow from the hands of a relative, raised it to heaven - to the glory of their native gods, splashed a little on the ground - to the glory of their ancestors and took communion from it himself, loudly pronouncing the due praise from the heart. Following the brother, all those gathered were carried around with the remnants of the required bread, leaving only a small part of the requirement on the temple. When the circle closed, the people parted, letting two warriors pass forward, who, by agreement of the Magi, wished to honor Perun with a ritual duel. Usually the battle was fought with swords - according to the rules agreed in advance. The winner was honored by the whole World, revering him as overshadowed by the special mercy of the Terrible God.
With the introduction of Christianity among the southern Slavs, the god Perun was transformed into the Christian Saint Ilya, since the Christian legends about Ilya, with the attributes of a rain-bearer and a protector of the harvest, were mixed with Slavic ideas about Perun.
The custom of sacrificing to St. Elijah leads to the testimony of Procopius about the sacrifices made in honor of the thunder among the southern Slavs: on the day of St. Elijah, the best of the roosters was sacrificed to him, in Rhodope, the village of Yarlov, etc. on one of the hills overgrown with oaks, the villagers killed their victim .
In Scandinavia, sacrifices were made differently. Animals and people were sacrificed to the Thor. Sacrifices were arranged at the revered places of worship of this god.
The most famous center of sacrifice was the temple at Uppsala, in which the idols of Thor, Odin and Freyr stood. Each idol had its own priests, and they made sacrifices depending on what kind of disaster befell the country. If disease and famine spread, sacrifices were made to the Torah.
But the main sacrifice was performed once every nine years (a sacred number). Kings and people were supposed to take part in this festival, and everyone had to send gifts to the temple, especially Christians (there were already quite a few of them in Sweden at the time of Adam), since they had to pay off the pagans so as not to participate in the sinful for them idolatry. Nine males were sacrificed from every kind of living creatures, with whose blood it was customary to propitiate the gods. The corpses of the victims were hung in the sacred grove that surrounded the temple (it reminded of the wonderful grove of Glasir that grew near the gates of Valhalla); dogs, horses and people hung there interspersed, and one Christian who had been there told Adam in horror that he counted seventy-two such corpses.
Similar descriptions of temples in other Scandinavian countries are unknown, and archaeologists cannot really find traces of a pagan temple in Uppsala - after all, with the introduction of Christianity, it was destroyed, and a Christian temple was built in its place.
Sacrifices to Thor continued until the introduction of Christianity in Scandinavia.
One cannot see any cruelty in the custom of sacrifice among the ancient Slavs and Scandinavians. These sacrifices were determined by the worldview of that time and were used for the benefit and salvation of society.

3.3 Priesthood

Each god had his own priests, who were considered the most respected people for their spiritual connection, as they believed in ancient times, with the gods.
It is not known who the priests of Thor were, but the description of the fabulous temple in the northern country of Biarmia has been preserved in one of the sagas of ancient times - the Sturlaug Saga. Names Biarmia is reminiscent of the name of the Permian land in the north of Eastern Europe, but in the saga it is a fantastic country, and huge riches are stored in the temple dedicated to Odin, Thor, Freyr and Freya. The main one is the magic horn of Urharhorn, the horn of the magical beast Unicorn - you can’t touch it with your bare hands. The king sends the warrior Sturlaug to get this horn. Sturlaug and his comrades penetrate into Biarmia through the country of hundings, people-dogs - this is one of those peoples of monsters that, according to medieval beliefs, inhabited the ends of the earth. The Hundings seized the heroes and placed them in a prison - inside hollow stones. But Sturlaug found a weapon inside that helped the heroes get out.
When they got to the temple, they saw the idol of Thor sitting on an honorary platform. In front of him was a table full of silver. Nearby lay Urarchorn. full of poison. The temple also had chess made of gold, and luxurious robes and golden rings were hung on poles along the walls.
Thirty women were engaged in worship, one of whom stood out for her heroic growth and intimidating appearance - she was dark blue, like the goddess of the dead Hel. She performed the ceremony in front of Thor and, seeing Sturlaug, she uttered threatening verses-visas: but Sturlaug was able to get to the horn. His friend Hrolf was also able to overcome the obstacle and take the golden chess, but the evil priestess rushed after him and threw him against the slabs so that he broke his spine. Sturlaug managed to reach the ships with his prey, and when the terrible priestess overtook him, he pierced her with his weapon - the one that helped him get out of the stone prison.
The events described in the saga are fantastic, the biarms - the inhabitants of the north of Eastern Europe - are attributed to the worship of the Scandinavian gods, but the echoes of ancient beliefs and cults have been preserved in the saga.
Perun had a whole hierarchy of priests of different ranks: in each zhupa, along with the zhupan, there was a priest; in each tribe, along with the prince, the priest of the entire tribe, and along with this, over this local system, the priest of the main god of the whole union of tribes, in this case Perun, dominated. The Slavic priesthood, as a social group, "hierarchically organized, is formed at the stage of state organization (from which it receives material support) and governs the religious life of a certain area."
Managing religious life was not easy, even at the level of a single village; it was complex at the level of a tribe with a common tribal sanctuary, and it became very complicated and diverse at the level of the state, which united about fifty tribes. A simple rural sorcerer had to know and remember all the rituals, incantations, ritual songs.
Each pagan temple and sanctuary had its own permanent priest and ministers, so to speak, clergy. In the round sanctuary of Perun near Novgorod, an unquenchable fire was maintained (Appendix 4); this had to be carried out by some kind of permanent ministers, like later deacons, bell ringers and church watchmen. Before him always burned a sacred fire of oak wood. On Peryn, where Dobrynya is 980 approved Perun, there were eight of these fires (Appendix 4.2). Bonfires were made in recesses, covering a large flat temple, on which stood the only idol of Perun. A priest who did not follow the fire was punished by death. The range of their duties is unknown to us, but it should be assumed that they took care of the selection of sacrificial animals, their maintenance, collected and stored gifts brought to the sanctuary, notified the people about the approach of this or that festival - prayer, participated in the pagan worship itself, perhaps they were actors of those "games" in which certain episodes of myths were reproduced.
On Perun's Day - the twenty-first heart (July), all men present at the beginning are required to have weapons with them. During the conception, the warriors make a solemn procession with a song. After glorifying Perun, the warriors proceed to the consecration of weapons: swords, axes, spears, knives, maces and other edged weapons are placed on the shields placed in front of the temple. A bull is sacrificed, and in the absence of it, a rooster (should be of the same color, not motley, red is best). A weapon is spoken on the sacrificial blood, the priest smears the forehead of each warrior with blood, after which they put red bandages on their heads. Military amulets are consecrated over the sacrificial fire.
After the beginning, the ritual battle between "Perun" and "Beles" begins, dedicated to the victory of Perun over Veles (Perun defeats Veles and returns the herd of heavenly cows). At the end of the battle, the warriors carry a boat with gifts and put it on steal. The elder, having undressed, sets fire to the steal. After the fire burns out, the warriors pour a grave over the ashes and begin the funeral feast (ritual battles on the grave). Then the Strava is performed, on which all the fallen Slavic warriors are commemorated.
Thus, people communicated with their gods - in this case, the priests acted as intermediaries between God and the people. The priests were very respected people, as it was believed that they had direct communication with the gods. At the same time, the measure of their duties was quite large, which carried a cruel punishment for an untimely offering or, in the case of the Slavic priests, for an extinct sacred fire in front of the temple of Perun, a priest who did not follow him was punished by death.

3.4 Comparative analysis of the cults of Thor and Perun

The ancient Slavic and Old Norse peoples in the Viking Age (VIII-X centuries) were in close contact with each other, as a result of which the cult of Perun among the ancient Slavs had the same meaning for them as the cult of Thor among the ancient Scandinavians. We can trace that the cults of these gods are very similar in their historical action, but at the same time, one cannot fail to notice significant differences between them.
Both cults operated over a vast territory, where these gods were honored by thousands of people, zealously fulfilling their duties in honoring the cult of the gods. Sacrifices were obligatory, not a single service took place without them, and people were also sacrificed, which is typical for both cults. The priesthood was an integral part of these cults: the priests had great power, since it was believed that they directly communicate with the gods, who give answers to the questions asked of the gods through them. Priests performed a number of duties, such as performing rituals, offering sacrifices, and serving their gods. But at the same time, there are some differences in the question of the priesthood. The fact is that we can only learn about the priests of Thor from the sagas, which in turn are semi-fictional works or greatly exaggerate history. The only eyewitness mention of the priests of Thor is from Adam of Bremen, who claimed that the idol of Thor in the Uppsala temple occupied a place of honor, and thanks to this, the researchers suggest that the priests were still there. With the priests of Perun, everything is much simpler: there are many references of eyewitnesses and travelers who confirm the presence of the priestly class among the ancient Slavs.
Another, but already significant difference between the two cults is the location of the revered god in the pantheon of gods. Perun occupied a dominant place in the ancient Slavic pantheon, which suggests that it was the cult of Perun that was considered the most important in the Slavic land. Thor also ranks second in the Old Norse pantheon, thus not being the strongest, but the most common. Here there is also a similarity between these cults - since Thor and Perun were also gods of fertility, thanks to life-giving thunderstorms, it was their cults that were the most common, but the cult of Perun was both the strongest and most widespread, and the cult of Thor had primacy in prevalence, but gave way to the cult of his father, Odin, the god of war.
A significant similarity of the cults is the circle of worshipers of the gods - to a greater extent they were plowmen, precisely because of the function of the gods - a fertile thunderstorm. But there is a difference in this matter - the cult of Perun was also revered by warriors, princes and their squads, while in Scandinavia they revered not Thor, but Odin, that is, the cult of Perun had an effect in various circles of the society of the ancient Slavs, and the cult of Thor was distributed only among peasant warriors - defenders. Although there is information about the veneration of Thor by some Scandinavian princes, but such information cannot affect the overall assessment of the cult of Thor, since such cases were of a single nature, in the veneration of the cult of Perun, the princes were considered the main admirers of the cult, that is, it had a mass character.

CONCLUSION

Comparing the Old Norse god - the thunderer Thor and the ancient Slavic god - the thunderer Perun, we found many similarities and differences that allow us to analyze the mentality of these peoples, find common features and worldview in it, but in different guises. Due to the place occupied by the thunder god in the pantheon, we can judge the main priorities in the life of the ancient Slavs and Scandinavians, but at the same time, one cannot ignore the place of worshipers in the social ladder.
Perun - the god of princes, their squads and warriors in general, was a fair, punishing and omnipotent immortal deity, protecting the Earth from chaos, to which clouds, rains and storms obeyed, due to which farmers also revered him. God occupied a dominant place in the ancient Slavic pantheon, had his own places of worship - temples and his priests.
Thor - was considered the god of farmers, due to the fact that he personified a fertile thunderstorm, the protector of Asgard and Midgard, the winner of giants and a friend of people. The found remains of the Scandinavian jarls, on which there were amulets - Thor's hammers, indicate that some princes also revered him. God occupied the second place in the Old Norse pantheon, which indicates the preference of the Scandinavian peoples for war over agriculture.
Based on this, we can see both similarities and differences between Old Norse and Old Slavic mythology, which, thanks to contacts between these peoples, acquired or borrowed some aspects from each other.

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. Thor (ancient Icelandic Torr), Donar (German Donar, possibly from the ancient German Punra, lit. "thunder", compare modern German Donner, "thunder") in German and Scandinavian mythology, the powerful god of thunder and fertility, conquering giants and monsters. Son of Odin. Thor's main weapon is his hammer; instead of horses, he harnessed goats to his wagon, which he ate if he was hungry. Thor guarded the city of the gods Asgard from the attack of the giants. He enters the fight and defeats the giant hold who stole his hammer, as well as other terrible monsters. On the eve of the death of the gods and the whole world, Thor fights a monstrous dragon Yermungad. he defeats the dragons, but he himself dies from the poisonous bites he received.

Thor also patronizes peasants - cultivators. he vigilantly guards the fields from the evil giants Grimthurs. Thor has magic belt increasing his strength by 2 times, he has iron gauntlets on his hands. One has only to pronounce the name of God as he immediately comes to the rescue.
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Tacitus (1st century AD) describes Donar under a Roman name Hercules. In the field of the spread of Germanic languages, Donar was dedicated to the same day of the week as in Rome Jupiter(i.e. Thursday; German Donnerstag). However, if the Roman Jupiter united all the main functions of the sky god, then in Germanic mythology (as well as in Indo-Iranian, Celtic, etc.) these functions were separated (next to Donar - Thor was Tiu - Tyr, subsequently strongly pressed by Odin) . Donar - T. is rightly compared, on the one hand, with the Indo-European gods Indra, Taranis, Perkunas. ( Perun), and on the other hand, with the Finno-Ugric gods of thunder and sky (Ukko, Taara, etc.); Finno-Ugric parallels suggest that Thor was originally thought of as the god of the sky. A. Olrik believes that the "thundering old man" in the beliefs of the Scandinavian Sami, to whom miniature hammers are sacrificed, directly reflects the Scandinavian cult of Thor of the Bronze Age. The rock carvings in Southern Scandinavia of a god with an ax (sometimes with a hammer) and a wheel (solar sign) seem to testify to a wider range of functions of T. in the past, next to it is the alleged image of a goat. The West Germans have traces of the cult of Donar: in addition to the name of the day of the week, the mention of Thunaer next to Wodan (Wodan) in the Saxon incantation formula, Wigiponar next to Wodan in an inscription originating from the land of the Franks, toponymy among the Franks and in England, where the name of the thunderbolt is mostly associated with the designation of the field, which indicates the function of fertility. The toponymy of Thor, traces of cult places, the reflection of his name in personal names, etc., are very abundant in Scandinavia, especially in Norway. There are clear traces of Thor's connection with the cult oak, indicating the initial connection of the thunder with the world tree (there are Balto-Slavic parallels). Apparently, Odin gradually pushed him away from the world tree.

In Scandinavian mythology, Thor (also acting under the nickname Veor, Vingnir, Chloridi) is a god from the genus of Ases, the second most important (after Odin), the son of Odin and Erd (either Hlodyun or Fjorgyn). Erd - literally "earth", and Fjorgyn is etymologically identical to Perkunas - Perun and indicates the genetic connection of Thor with the Balto-Slavic thunderer. Thor is the husband of Siv, a goddess with golden hair (which emphasizes Thor's attitude to fertility), the mother of the god Ull. Thor has a daughter, Trud, and sons, Magni and Modi, and Magni was born to the giantess Jarnsaksa. Apparently, the names of the sons (Magni - lit. "strong", Modi - lit. "brave") personify the "strength" of Thor. God's heavenly home Trudheim . Thor is depicted as a red-bearded hero armed with a war hammer Mjollnir . Thor rides in a cart drawn by goats. The hammer - the primordial weapon of the thunderer (ancient Icelandic. Mjollnir has the same root as the Russian word "lightning") - was originally thought of as stone, but in the "Younger Edda" in the history of the blacksmiths - tsvergs (dwarfs) making the treasures of aces, we are talking about already about the iron hammer. In myths, it is mainly a battle ax (returning to the owner like a boomerang), with which T. beats jotuns (giants). The hammer is Thor's special weapon. spear of odin , Tyr's sword . The giants seek to steal the hammer (or ensure that Thor arrives in their country without the hammer and belt of power). It is based on the motif of the theft of a thunderous instrument by demons, also known to Finnish and Estonian folklore. The names of the goats of Thor - Tangniostr (Tanngniostr) and Tangrisnir (Tanngrisnir) indicate the gnashing of teeth and clearly go back to the very phenomenon of a thunderstorm, but the goat is also related to fertility. In the "Younger Edda" goats act not only as Thor's "horses", but also serve as a source of inexhaustible food (cf. a similar situation with a boar, which the fallen warriors eat in Valhalla - einherja ). Thor, stopping for the night, kills and roasts the goats for dinner (leaving only the bones intact), and then brings them back to life. When Tyalvi and his sister Röskva, where Thor stopped for the night, ate meat, Tyalvi violated the ban and began to gnaw bones, which caused one of the goats to become slightly limp; in the form of a ransom, Tyalvi and her sister were forced to become servants of T. Tyalvi often appears as a companion of Thor, sometimes instead of Tyalvi, Loki acts in this role, and once even Tyr.
In Scandinavian mythology, Thor is primarily a cultural hero or hero who protects Midgard(human world) and Asgard(heavenly village of the gods) from the giants (jotuns); he is the enemy of the world serpent Yermunganda. Thus, Thor also performs a military function in protecting “friends” from “strangers”, people from giants and monsters, as if modeling an armed people, in contrast to Odin, the patron of a military squad. Favorite topic of the so-called. shield drapes (poems that describe pictures reproduced on an expensive shield donated by the king to the skald) skalds - a description of the so-called. Thor's "fishing", that is, his struggle with the world serpent; "fishing" Thor is also mentioned in Eddic poetry and prose. According to the "Volva Divination" ("Elder Edda"), in the last battle before the end of the world ( Ragnarok) Thor fights with Yermungandr, kills him and after that, having managed to take nine steps, he himself dies from his poisonous bites. The struggle of a thunderbolt with a serpent, a dragon is a classic story in Indo-European mythology. It is possible that Thor's dragonfight is a prototype of the dragonfight of the Germanic epic heroes - Beowulf, Sigmund and Sigurda.
Most of the stories associated with Thor tell of campaigns to the east to the land of the giants - Jotunheim, or Utgard. After the giant Thrym abducts the hammer of Thor - Mjollnir, he goes to the country of giants to hold in the clothes of the goddess Freya - allegedly a bride intended for Thrym (using the wedding custom of "imaginary" brides), and accompanied by Loki, dressed as a servant. At the feast, the “bride” (i.e., Thor) shows a heroic appetite, greatly embarrassing the groom, and then, having received a hammer (which is brought to consecrate the wedding ceremony), he beats the giants (“Song of the Hold”, “Elder Edda”). The "Song of Hymir" ("Elder Edda") tells about the extraction of Thor. (and Tyr accompanying him) at the giant Hymir's cauldron for brewing beer, which is necessary at the feast of the gods at the sea giant Aegir. Performing the difficult tasks of Hymir, Thor defeats the bull and makes bait for fishing out of his head, and instead of a fish, he almost pulls the world serpent from the bottom of the sea, breaks the goblet (possibly a semantic doublet of the cauldron) on the giant's forehead. J. Dumézil sees at the basis of these plots (which he compares with the story of Odin obtaining the honey of poetry) the myth of the drink of immortality, similar to Indian amrita; F. R. Schroeder, also based on Indian analogies, believes that Hymir was originally not a giant, but an old heavenly god (therefore Tyr is called his son) and that initially there was a connected series of motives: the birth of a divine son, threatening the power of a heavenly god, stealing a drink that gives invulnerability, fighting a snake, killing and overthrowing the old heavenly god.
The "Younger Edda" tells of Thor's campaign to the giant Geirrod (also mentioned by the skald Eilif Gudrunarson and Saxo Grammatik). Having caught Loki (in falcon plumage), the giant demands that he bring Thor without a hammer and belt of power. Thor, however, defeats Geirrod with the help of a miraculous staff and iron gloves given to him (along with a belt of power) by the giantess Grid, the mother of the god Vidar. Thor, thanks to a belt of strength and a staff, happily crosses the Vimur River, grabbing a rowan bush at the last moment. With the help of a magic staff, Thor is kept on a wonderful bench and at the same time crushes the bench of the daughters of Geirrod. With iron gauntlets, Thor catches a red-hot bar of iron thrown at him and kills Geirrod.

The Prose Edda tells of Thor's struggle with the giant Hrungnir. Hrungnir, ahead of Odin in the equestrian contest, began to boast before the aces in Asgard that he would kill the gods and take away the goddesses Freya and Siv. Then the gods call Thor, and he, together with Tyalvi, goes to Hrungnir in Etunheim. In a duel with Hrungnir, Thor wins by cracking his skull with his hammer, and Tyalvi knocks down the clay giant Mekkurkalvi, molded to fight Thor (cf. the image of Ullikumme in Hitto-Hurrian mythology). However, Thor himself turned out to be wounded in the head with a millstone (whetstone, flint), and the foot of the murdered Khrungnir pressed down on his throat (a similar motif in the Georgian myth of Amirani). Hrungnir's leg is thrown off by the son of Thor - Magni, the hero "at the age of three nights", and the shard of flint was almost taken out of Thor's head by the sorceress Groa, but not completely, because she stopped conjuring with joy when she learned from Thor that her husband Aurvandil would soon return (Thor carried him out of the land of the giants on his shoulders; he threw the frostbitten finger of Aurvandil into the sky, turning it into a star); the fragments of the grindstone remained in Thor's head. In this plot, J. Dumézil sees traces of a ritual action (with a clay giant), he considers a wound on the forehead a sign of initiation. During the campaign, Thor, accompanied by Tyalvi and Loki to the giants in Utgard, Thor, confused by the lord of Utgard Utgard-Loki (who named himself when he met Thor Skrymir), seems to be trapped all the time: he spends the night in Skrymir's glove, cannot untie his bag (a popular motif meeting of a hero with a giant, cf. Ilya and Svyatogora in the Russian epic). Thor and his companions, as it were, cannot stand the test: T. can neither drink a horn filled with moisture, nor overcome Ellie, nor raise a cat high from the ground; Hugi overtakes Thjalvi and Logi eats faster than Loki. But in the end it turns out that Hugi is a thought, Logi is fire, Ellie is old age, the cat is the world serpent, the water in the horn is the whole ocean (“Younger Edda”). In this and other stories, Thor is presented as a simple-hearted and noble strong man-hero; his innocence is partly offset by the quick wit of his companions, especially Loki. In the same regard, Thor is sharply opposed to Odin in the "Song of Harbard" ("Elder Edda"). Unrecognized by Thor, Odin, who has assumed the form of a carrier, refuses to transport the mighty Thor, who has returned from Etunheim, across the strait and makes fun of him in every possible way. This humorous squabbling song contributed to the erroneous theory of a sharp social contrast between the "aristocratic" religion of Odin and the "peasant" religion of Thor. In the "Speech of Alvis" ("Elder Edda") Thor himself shows cunning and deceit, he "tests" the mythological knowledge of the dwarf Alvisa(lit. "know-it-all"), wooing the daughter of Thor until dawn comes, when the dwarf must be petrified.

The pantheon of the Scandinavian gods is represented by a large number of various creatures, but the most important group of divine creatures, which almost all the peoples of Northern Europe worshiped to one degree or another, were aces - warrior gods. They lived in heaven in the impregnable fortress of Asgard, connected with the world of people by the Rainbow Bridge. According to Scandinavian mythology, Thor - the god of thunder and lightning - was the most powerful and majestic among the twenty-seven warrior aces. It will be discussed in our article.

Scandinavian mythology: pagan beliefs of the peoples of Northern Europe

The culture of Norway, Iceland and Germany is simply impossible to imagine now without mythology, which was the main religious belief of these peoples. According to the pagan cult, almost every natural phenomenon had its own god or goddess, but the geographical location of the northern countries significantly influenced the nature of the gods of the Scandinavian pantheon.

Long cold winters and harsh summers did not favor the appearance of kind and sweet deities, so the latter, as a rule, are harsh warriors, fighting for good and peace in heaven and on earth every second of their existence. Most of these deities were favorable to people and helped them avoid trouble, but the weak and cowardly gods severely punished. After all, in a harsh climate there is no place for weaknesses and regrets.

It is not surprising that mythology easily explained the most incomprehensible and terrible natural phenomena to the Scandinavians. Thor, for example, was the god who could cause thunder and lightning, but he used them only against giants, protecting the world of people and the fortress of Asgard from them. That is why Thor enjoyed universal love and reverence, there are a lot of funny and instructive stories about his exploits, according to which one can imagine what incredible qualities people endowed the obstinate ace with.

Thor - god of thunder

Thor was considered the son of the supreme ace Odin. In his mother, the goddess Erd was predicted for him, but, according to some sources, another wife of Odin, Frigga, gave birth to this hero. As a baby, Thor managed to show all the gods in Asgard his absurd character and strength. He threw stones and bearskins with ease in a moment of anger, although at all other times he was a sweet and good-natured child. Since Thor is the god of thunder, his sudden outbursts of rage were always accompanied by lightning that burned everything around and deafening thunder. Due to his unbalanced character, Thor constantly destroyed the halls of Asgard, and his mother decided to send him to be raised by foster parents.

According to what Scandinavian mythology tells, Thor was taken into the family of Vingnir and Chlora, personifying lightning and fire. Only they managed to curb the incredible temperament of the god of thunder and instill in him some patience and peacefulness. After coming of age, Thor was sent to his father and mother to take his place of honor in the banquet hall of Asgard.

What did Thor look like?

Thor - the Scandinavian god of thunder - simply could not look frail and ordinary, so the Scandinavians awarded him with incredible appearance and strength. According to legend, he surpassed all aces in height and weight, had a powerful figure and a red beard. When he sat in his rightful place at the table with other gods, he could not get enough and managed to empty the table in a few seconds. It is not surprising that it was difficult to imagine a warrior god without armor and weapons, with which mythology generously provided him. Thor never parted with his hammer and belt, helping him defeat the most terrible giants.

According to the Scandinavians, heat constantly emanated from Thor's body, so Odin forbade him to cross the Rainbow Bridge on foot or in a chariot after the first attempt, which ended in the collapse of the pillars and railings of the bridge. Therefore, when Thor returned from his military campaigns, he could get to Asgad only by crossing the river that separates the world of gods and people, ford.

Who did Thor patronize?

Despite all his militancy and imbalance, as evidenced by Scandinavian-Germanic mythology, Thor was very kind and provided his patronage to the humiliated and oppressed. He often helped the peasants, and the slaves could count on getting into his house of Bilskirnir, where forty rooms were allocated for them.

Many northern peoples recognized the Thunderer as their intercessor and unequivocally believed that it was Thor who should occupy the first place in Asgard. Scandinavian mythology endowed him with a mass of magical abilities. For example, he could influence fertility, as well as resurrect dead people and animals. The formidable god was not indifferent to children and couples in love, therefore he could bless marriages and served as a protector from children's nightmares.

Some legends indicate that Thor was indulgent towards sailors and anyone who often goes to sea. Therefore, during a storm, the sailors were never afraid of thunder, they believed that it was Thor who was fulfilling his duties, protecting them from the evil giants.

How did Thor travel on his travels?

All the gods of Asgard had horses, but not a single stallion could lift Thor. Therefore, a special chariot was created for him, in which two goats were harnessed. They had an evil look, and their eyes burned with an ominous fire. Since it was difficult to find food in difficult military campaigns, the Thunderer killed his goats every evening and, roasting them on a fire, ate them with great appetite. The next morning, Thor resurrected the animals and continued his journey.

Thor's Magic Hammer

Mythology provided the thunderer with ammunition, without which he could not defeat his enemies. Thor's main weapon was a huge red-hot hammer - Mjollnir. The hammer itself symbolizes a thunderclap and is subject only to God himself. After each throw, he always comes back, but even Thor could not hold a red-hot weapon in his bare hands. Therefore, the Thunderer was always portrayed in huge iron gauntlets, allowing him to throw a hammer and catch it without harming himself.

Belt of Power: The Secret of the Thunder God's Invincibility

Thor never went to fight the giants without his belt - Megingjerda. It looked like a wide piece of iron, decorated with rivets and forged details. This belt increased the power of the god several times and made him indestructible.

Several times cunning giants tried to deprive Thor of magical items in order to defeat him in a decisive battle, but, to the delight of aces, the Thunderer did not allow the loss of his irreplaceable accessories.

Thunder god family

As Norse mythology testifies, Thor was married and had several children. His first wife was a giantess, whose name means "iron stone" in translation. She gave birth to the Thunderer two strong and courageous sons, who were to take the main place in the world revived after Ragnarok.

The second wife of the god Thor - the beautiful golden-haired goddess Sif - was the complete opposite of her husband. She was distinguished by wisdom and calm disposition, in Scandinavian mythology she was responsible for fertility and always came to the aid of her husband in difficult situations. In marriage, Sif gave birth to Thor a son and a daughter, who was distinguished by the incredible strength inherited from her father.

There is a legend about the hair of Sif, famous for its incredible beauty. The god of cunning Loki once sneaked up on Sif and cut her hair for a joke. Seeing his wife the next morning, Thor became furious and promised to destroy Loki. As an apology, he went to the dwarves, who forged luxurious hair from gold for Sif. Magic curls instantly grew to the head of the goddess and became her main decoration.

Hammer of Thor: an amulet of the peoples of Northern Europe

It is worth noting that ordinary people treated the magic hammer of the Thunderer with great reverence and often used his image as a talisman. Archaeologists found many pendants in the form of a hammer covered with patterns and runes on ancient temples. Most often, amulets were made of iron, which was considered the metal of Thor, and silver, reminiscent of lightning in the night sky.

Babies were always hung around the neck with a small hammer on a waxed cord, often this was done simultaneously with the naming of the newborn. The hammer was used during the marriage, and also placed on the funeral pyre of a warrior.

During the construction of houses, the peasants drove a hammer into the restrictive pillars and consecrated the threshold of their dwelling with it so that no evil and dark forces could penetrate a person’s life.

Thor worship as a way of life for the Scandinavian peoples

The god of thunder was so revered that many of the rites and traditions of the European peoples are closely connected with the worship of Thor. A large number of fjords and bays in Norway are named after him, and many English counties have the name of the thunderer in their name. In addition, in English reading Thursday is literally translated as "a day dedicated to the god Thor."

In many northern European cultures, there was a special winter holiday, during which it was customary to burn a large log and call on Thor, who could bring spring and warmth with him.

A special relationship in Northern Europe was to the red color. Thor, bursting with heat and throwing sparks, was associated with the color red. Therefore, in order to achieve the blessing of the god of thunder, the girls put on red dresses for the wedding. And in wedding rings, up to the spread of Christianity in Northern Europe, a red stone had to be inserted.

The God of Thunder in Scandinavian mythology occupied and continues to occupy a special place, because even the modern inhabitants of Northern Europe, just in case, wear a small hammer under their clothes, hoping to ingratiate themselves with the formidable Thor.