Svetovit

Svetovit, Sventovit, Svantovit is the god of abundance and war, and the chief god of the Slavic tribe of the Rani, and later of all the Polabian Slavs. His organized cult was located on the island of Rügen, at Cape Arkona, where his main temple was also located. According to the descriptions of medieval chroniclers, the statue representing this god had four heads, a horn and a sword, and to the deity himself were dedicated a white horse, a saddle, a bit, a flag, and eagles. Once a year, after the harvest, a large festival was held in his honor. With the help of a horn and a horse belonging to the god, the priests carried out divinations, and at night the god himself rode a horse to fight his enemies. His name can be translated as "Strong Lord" or "Holy Lord". In the past it was often mistakenly believed that the cult of Svetovit originated from St. Vitus. Among scholars of Slavic mythology, Svetovit is often regarded as a Polabian hypostasis of Pan-Slavic god Perun. His cult collapsed in 1168. In Latin records, this theonym is notated as Suantouitus, Suantouith, Suantuitho, Szuentevit, Suantevit, Zuantevith, and others, and in Old Icelandic as Svanraviz and Svanteviz. Scholars agree on the reading of the Latin records; the digraphs ⟨an⟩ and ⟨en⟩ indicate a Slavic nasal vowel. In the first part of the theonym, there is an Old Polabian continuation of the Proto-Slavic adjective *svętъ (with a nasal [e]). At the Old Polabian stage, at least in northern dialects, as a result of the transition of [ę] into [ą] (nasal [a]), *svętъ passed into Old Polabian dialectal *svąt-. On this basis, the Old Polabian dialectal theonym is reconstructed as *Svątevit. In English publications god's name is being transcribed as Svantovit (from reconstructed Old Polabian *Svątevit), Sventovit or Svetovit (from hypothetical Common Slavic *Svętovitъ). The prevailing view in the literature is that *svętъ in Proto-Slavic language meant "strong, mighty", and only under the influence of Christianity did it acquire the religious meaning of "holy, sacred".