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Concept
Vulcan (mythology)
Summary
Vulcan (Vulcanus, in archaically retained spelling also Volcanus, both pronounced wʊɫˈkaːnʊs) is the god of fire including the fire of volcanoes, deserts, metalworking and the forge in ancient Roman religion and myth. He is often depicted with a blacksmith's hammer. The Vulcanalia was the annual festival held August 23 in his honor. His Greek counterpart is Hephaestus, the god of fire and smithery. In Etruscan religion, he is identified with Sethlans.
Vulcan belongs to the most ancient stage of Roman religion: Varro, the ancient Roman scholar and writer, citing the Annales Maximi, records that king Titus Tatius dedicated altars to a series of deities including Vulcan.
The origin of the name is unclear. Roman tradition maintained that it was related to Latin words connected to lightning (fulgur, fulgere, fulmen), which in turn was thought of as related to flames. This interpretation is supported by Walter William Skeat in his etymological dictionary as meaning lustre.
It has been supposed that his name was not Latin but related to that of the Cretan god Velchanos, a god of nature and the nether world. Wolfgang Meid has disputed this identification as phantastic. Meid and Vasily Abaev have proposed on their side a matching theonym in the Ossetic legendary smith of the Nart saga Kurd-Alä-Wärgon ("the Alan smith Wärgon"), and postulated an original PIE smith god named *wl̩kānos. But since the name in its normal form is stable and has a clear meaning—kurd ("smith") + on ("of the family") + Alaeg (the name of one of the Nartic families)—this hypothesis has been considered unacceptable by Dumezil.
Christian-Joseph Guyonvarc'h has proposed the identification with the Irish name Olcan (Ogamic Ulccagni, in the genitive). Gérard Capdeville finds a continuity between Cretan Minoan god Velchanos and Etruscan Velchans. The Minoan god's identity would be that of a young deity, master of fire and companion of the Great Goddess.
According to Martin L.
Official source
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