The Prussian mythology was a

polytheistic Polytheism is the belief in or worship of more than one Deity, god. According to Oxford Reference, it is not easy to count gods, and so not always obvious whether an apparently polytheistic religion, such as Chinese folk religions, is really so, ...

religion of the

Old Prussians Old Prussians, Baltic Prussians or simply Prussians were a Balts, Baltic people that inhabited the Prussia (region), region of Prussia, on the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea between the Vistula Lagoon to the west and the Curonian Lagoon ...

, indigenous peoples of

Prussia Prussia (; ; Old Prussian: ''Prūsija'') was a Germans, German state centred on the North European Plain that originated from the 1525 secularization of the Prussia (region), Prussian part of the State of the Teutonic Order. For centuries, ...

before the

Prussian Crusade The Prussian Crusade was a series of 13th-century campaigns of Roman Catholic Church, Roman Catholic Crusades, crusaders, primarily led by the Teutonic Knights, to Christianization, Christianize Forced conversion, under duress the Prussian mythol ...

waged by the

Teutonic Knights The Teutonic Order is a Catholic religious institution founded as a military society in Acre, Kingdom of Jerusalem. The Order of Brothers of the German House of Saint Mary in Jerusalem was formed to aid Christians on their pilgrimages to t ...

. It was closely related to other Baltic faiths, the Lithuanian and Latvian mythologies. Its myths and legends did not survive as Prussians became Germanized and their culture went extinct in the early 18th century. Fragmentary information on gods and rituals can be found in various medieval chronicles, but most of them are unreliable. No sources document pagan religion before the forced

Christianization Christianization (or Christianisation) is a term for the specific type of change that occurs when someone or something has been or is being converted to Christianity. Christianization has, for the most part, spread through missions by individu ...

in the 13th century. Most of what is known about Prussian religion is obtained from dubious 16th-century sources ('' Sudovian Book'' and Simon Grunau).

Historical background and sources

The

Teutonic Order The Teutonic Order is a religious order (Catholic), Catholic religious institution founded as a military order (religious society), military society in Acre, Israel, Acre, Kingdom of Jerusalem. The Order of Brothers of the German House of Sa ...

, a crusading military order, began the

in the 1220s. Their goal was to conquer and convert pagan Prussians to Christianity. The Knights built log and stone fortresses, which proved to be impregnable to the Prussians. Despite five Prussian uprisings, the conquest of Prussia was complete by the 1280s. German, Lithuanian, Latvian, and Polish colonists repopulated the decimated region. It is estimated that by around year 1400 the Prussians numbered 100,000 and comprised about half of the total population in Prussia. The Prussians were subject to

Germanization Germanisation, or Germanization, is the spread of the German language, German people, people, and German culture, culture. It was a central idea of German conservative thought in the 19th and the 20th centuries, when conservatism and ethnic nati ...

and assimilation and eventually became extinct sometime after the 16th century. The Knights regarded paganism as evil, worthy of complete eradication and not study. Therefore they showed no interest in local customs and produced no detailed accounts of Prussian mythology. Bits and pieces of reliable but accidental and fragmentary mentions of gods and traditions can be found in official Teutonic documents and chronicles, such as the 1248 Treaty of Christburg, Chronicle of Peter von Dusburg, or correspondence with the Pope. Affected by the

Protestant Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the papacy and ...

, the former Catholic stronghold the

Monastic State of the Teutonic Knights The State of the Teutonic Order () was a theocratic state located along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea in northern Europe. It was formed by the knights of the Teutonic Order during the early 13th century Northern Crusades in the region ...

was transformed into the Lutheran

Duchy of Prussia The Duchy of Prussia (, , ) or Ducal Prussia (; ) was a duchy in the region of Prussia established as a result of secularization of the Monastic Prussia, the territory that remained under the control of the State of the Teutonic Order until t ...

in 1525. Religious disputes brought new interest in the pagan Prussian religion. Right about that time two fundamental studies of Prussian culture were produced: the '' Sudovian Book'' and Chronicle of Simon Grunau. There is considerable academic debate on the authorship, dating, and reliability of the ''Sudovian Book''. Most modern Lithuanian scholars follow Wilhelm Mannhardt and treat it as a reliable and independent source, which was used to prepare ''Constitutiones Synodales'', a book of ceremonies prepared by a church

synod A synod () is a council of a Christian denomination, usually convened to decide an issue of doctrine, administration or application. The word '' synod'' comes from the Ancient Greek () ; the term is analogous with the Latin word . Originally, ...

and published in 1530. Another school of thought claims that it was the opposite: the ''Sudovian Book'' was a distorted copy of ''Synodales'', which in turn was prepared based on Grunau, and that they all should be rejected as "invention" and "forgery". Simon Grunau (died ca. 1530) is much-criticized for using dubious and falsified sources and often augmenting facts with his own imagination. Modern scholars often dismiss the chronicle as a work of fiction, though Lithuanian researchers tend to be more careful and attempt to find its redeeming qualities. The work is responsible for the introduction and popularization of several major legends: 6th-century King Widewuto, the temple of Romuva, the pagan trinity ( Peckols, Potrimpo, and

Perkūnas Perkūnas (, , Old Prussian: ''Perkūns'', ''Perkunos'', Sudovian language, Yotvingian: ''Parkuns'', Latgalian language, Latgalian: ''Pārkiuņs'') was the common Baltic languages, Baltic List of thunder gods, god of thunder, and the second m ...

), the pagan high priest ('' Kriwe-Kriwajto''), and female ''waidelinns'' (similar to Roman vestales). Various later authors simply copied information from Grunau and the ''Sudovian Book'' adding no or very little new information.

Prussian pantheon

Early lists

The 1249 Treaty of Christburg mentioned Curche, an idol worshiped during harvest festivals. Scholars were unable to positively determine its gender, function, or etymology. Various suggested functions include god of food (Simon Grunau), smithing god (similar to Slavic

Svarog Svarog is a Slavic god who may be associated with fire and blacksmithing and who was once interpreted as a sky god on the basis of an etymology rejected by modern scholarship. He is mentioned in only one source, the ''Primary Chronicle'', which ...

and Greek

Hephaestus Hephaestus ( , ; wikt:Hephaestus#Alternative forms, eight spellings; ) is the Greek god of artisans, blacksmiths, carpenters, craftsmen, fire, metallurgy, metalworking, sculpture and volcanoes.Walter Burkert, ''Greek Religion'' 1985: III.2. ...

), god creator (derived from related Lithuanian word ''kurti'' – to create), god of harvest and grain, evil spirit, god of fire. Some even doubted whether it was a god at all and suggested that it was a name given to a corn dolly. Another reliable source is a 1418 memorandum (''Collato Episcopi Varmiensis'') written by Bishop of Warmia to

Pope Martin V Pope Martin V (; ; January/February 1369 – 20 February 1431), born Oddone Colonna, was the head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 11 November 1417 to his death in February 1431. His election effectively ended the We ...

. The letter reminded the Pope about the Teutonic achievements in Christianizing Prussians, who no longer worshiped ''Patollu'' and ''Natrimpe''. Most scholars interpret this as two different gods, but ''patollu'' could also be an adjective (evil, hellish) to describe ''Natrimpe''. Based on later works, ''patollu'' is usually identified as Peckols, angry god of the

underworld The underworld, also known as the netherworld or hell, is the supernatural world of the dead in various religious traditions and myths, located below the world of the living. Chthonic is the technical adjective for things of the underworld. ...

, and ''Natrimpe'' as Potrimpo, god of seas or grain. In addition to the trinity of Peckols, Potrimpo, and

, Grunau mentioned three minor gods: Wurschayto or Borszkayto and Szwaybrotto were personifications of Widewuto and Bruteno, and Curcho was god of food (borrowed from the Treaty of Christburg).

''Sudovian Book'' and ''Constitutiones Synodales''

''Constitutiones'' lists ten Prussian deities and also provides their classical Roman equivalents. Note that none of these are goddesses and furthermore that Curche is missing from the list. This list is closely mirrored in the ''Sudovian Book''.

Suaixtix

Suaixtix (alternate spelling: ''Suaixtis'', ''Swaystix'', ''Schwaytestix'', ''Swaikticks'', ''Sweigtigx'', ''Szweigsdukks'', ''Šwaigzdunks'', ''Sweigsdunka'', ''Žvaigždzuks'') is described as a "god of light" (''Gott des Lichts'') in historical sources, or a god of stars. His name has been proposed to be cognate to the word for

star A star is a luminous spheroid of plasma (physics), plasma held together by Self-gravitation, self-gravity. The List of nearest stars and brown dwarfs, nearest star to Earth is the Sun. Many other stars are visible to the naked eye at night sk ...

Slavic languages The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavs, Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic language, Proto- ...

, reconstructed as ''*zvězda''. He also appears to be connected to words for "star" in

Baltic languages The Baltic languages are a branch of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family spoken natively or as a second language by a population of about 6.5–7.0 million people

: Lith ''žvaigždė'' and

Latv LATV (; originally pronounced on-air as from 2007 to 2014 and, since 2014, serving as a backronym for its on-air slogan, "Latino Alternative Television") is an American bilingual broadcast television network, digital publisher and media company ...

''zvaigzne''. The deity's name seems to contain a Prussian stem ''-swaigst-'', present in ''swaigst-an'' (perhaps related to German ''Schein'', "light") and verb ''er-schwaigstinai'' (" tilluminates"). On the other hand, still aligned with the interpretation as god of light, Roman Zaroff postulates that ''Suaixtix'' might have been a solar deity, based on ethnographical and folkloric data of the other Baltic languages.Zaroff, Roman. 2019.
Some aspects of pre-Christian Baltic religion
. In: Lajoye, Patrice (ed). ''New Researches on the Religion and Mythology of the Pagan Slavs''. Paris, FR: Lingva. pp. 195-196.

Footnotes

References

Bibliography

;General overview: * Mikhailov, N.
Das “gemischte” slawisch-baltische Pantheon von Christian Knauthe
. In: ''Res Balticae'' Nr. 01, 1995. pp. 115-139. * Zaroff, Roman.
Some aspects of pre-Christian Baltic religion
. In: ''New researches on the religion and mythology of the Pagan Slavs''. Edited by Patrice Lajoye. Paris: Lingva, 2019. pp. 183-219. ;Studies on the deities: * Ivanov, V. V.
The Baltic god of light and the Balto-Slavic word for star
. In: ''Res Balticae'', Nr. 02, 1996. pp. 135-149.