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Slavic God Svarog
Svarog is Chief god of the heavens. From “svargas” - radiant sky, “svarati” - gleams. His name survives in the Romanian word for sunburnt or hot - sfarog. {Romanians, like Hungarians, have a lot of Slavic in them.} In Slavic mythology, Svarog is the Slavic god and spirit of fire and his name means bright and clear. So sacred was the fire that it was forbidden to shout or swear at it while it was being lit. Folklore portrays him as a fire serpent, a winged dragon that breathes fire. According to some interpretations the fire-god Svarogich was the son of Svarog. However, other sources refer to these names as one and the same god of fire.

Older myths describe him as a smith god, identified with the generative and sexual powers of fire. In those myths, Svarog fights Zmey, a giant serpent or a multi-headed dragon. Zmey kills people indiscriminately. Svarog catches Zmey with blacksmith’s tongs and uses him to pull a plough, thus separating the land of the living (Jav) from the land of the dead (Nav), bringing order (Prav). Zmey takes over the dead. In some myths, the ploughed ditch becomes the Smorodina River, and Zmey becomes the guardian of Kalinov Bridge.

In neo-paganist religions, Svarog is often the supreme god-creator and the central part of the (holy) trinity Triglav. He completed the creation of the world by giving it Prav.

Svarog is associated in Christianity with Saints Cosmas and Damian, and Saint Michael the Archangel. His animals are a golden horned ox, a boar, a horse, and a falcon named Varagna.

Svarog legends can be traced back to the 8th-6th century BC when the Slavic tribes first began to practice agriculture. The etymology of the word Svarog is likely to be Sanskrit svarga (sky) or Slavic svar (bright and clear).



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» Slavic Lesser Deities

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