Perkwunos
Perkwunos (Proto-Indo-European: *perkwunos) is the reconstructed name of the weather god in Proto-Indo-European mythology.
Contrary to other gods of the Proto-Indo-European pantheon such as Dyēus, the sky god, or Hausōs, the dawn goddess, widely accepted cognates stemming from the root *Perkwunos are only attested in Western Indo-European traditions. The linguistic evidence for the worship of the thunder-god Perkwunos as far back as Proto-Indo-European times (4500–2500) is therefore less secured.[1]
Name
Etymology
The name *Perkwunos is generally regarded as stemming from the Proto-Indo-European (PIE) verbal root *per- ('to strike').[1][2] An alternative etymology is the PIE root *pérkʷus ('the oak'),[3] attached to the divine nomenclature *-nos ('master of').[4] Various cognates can be found in the Latin quercus ('oak-tree') and oak-nymphs Querquetulanae,[2][5] the Germanic *ferhwa ('oak'),[6] the Gaulish erc- ('oak') and Quaquerni (tribal name),[7][5] the Punjabi pargāi ('sacred oak'),[8] and perhaps in the Greek spring-nymph Herkyna.[9][10]
The theonym *Perkwunos thus either meant 'the Striker' or 'the Lord of Oaks'.[11][12] A theory uniting those two propositions has been proposed in the mythological association of oaks with thunder, suggested by the frequency with which such tall trees are struck by lightning.[3][7]
The root *perkwunos also gave birth to a group of cognates for the ordinary word 'thunder', such as in Old Prussian percunis, Russian perúny, Latvian pērkauns ('thunderbolt'), or Lithunian perkūnija ('thunderstorm').[3][13]
Epithets
Other cognates related to thunder, through another root *(s)tenh₂, are found in the Germanic Thor, the Celtic Taranis and the Latin (Jupiter) Tonans.[14][15] According to Jackson, "they may have arisen as the result of fossilization of an original epithet or epiclesis" of Perkwunos, since the Vedic weather-god Parjanya is also called stanayitnú- ('Thunderer').[16]
George E. Dunkel regarded Perkwunos as an original epithet of Dyēus, the Sky-God.[17] It has also been postulated that Perkwunos was referred to as *Diwós Putlós ('son of Dyēus'), although this is based on the Vedic poetic tradition alone.[11]
Role
Weapon and lightnings
Perkwunos is usually depicted as holding a weapon, named *meld- in the Lithuanian and Old Norse traditions, which personifies the lightnings and is generally conceived as a club, mace, or hammer, made of stone or metal.[18][19] In the Latvian poetic expression Pērkōns met savu milnu ("Pērkōn throws his mace"), the mace, milna, is cognate with the Old Norse mjölnir, the hammer thrown by the thunder god Thor, and also with the word 'lightning' in the Old Prussian mealde, the Old Church Slavonic *mlъni, or the Welsh mellt.[3][19][20]
If his thunder and lightning had a destructive connotation, they could also be seen as a regenerative force since they were often escorted by fructifying rains.[21] Parjanya is depicted as a rain god in the Vedas, Latvian prayers included a call for Pērkōns to bring rain in time of drought,[1][22] and the Balkan Slavs worshipped Perun along his female counterpart Perperuna, the name of a ritual prayer calling for fructifying rains and centred on the dance of a naked virgin who had not yet had her first monthly period.[23] The earth is likewise referred to as "menstruating" in a Vedic hymn to Parjanya, a possible cognate of Perperuna.[24] The alternative name of Perperuna, Dodola, also recalls Perkūnas' pseudonym Dundulis, and Zeus' oak oracle at Dodona.[23][25]
Striker and god of oaks
The association of Perkwunos with the oak is attested in various formulaic expressions from the Balto-Slavic languages: Lithuanian Perkūno ąžuolas (Perkūnas's oak), Latvian Pērkōna uōzuōls ('Pērkōn's oak'), or Old Russian Perunovŭ dubŭ ('Perun's oak'). The Slavic thunder-god Perūn is said to frequently strike oaks to put fire within them, and the Norse thunder-god Thor to strike his foes the giants when they hide under an oak.[3][26] The striking of devils, demons or evildoers by Perkwunos is a motif also encountered in the myths surrounding the Baltic Perkūnas and the Vedic Parjanya.[27][3]
A mythical multi-headed water-serpent is connected in particular with the thunder-god in an epic battle. The monstrous foe is generally described as a 'blocker of waters', and his heads are eventually smashed by the thunder-god to release torrents of water that had previously been pent up.[28] The myth has numerous reflexes in mythical stories of battles between a serpent and a god or mythical hero. The latter is not necessary etymologically related to *Perkwunos, but he is usually associated with thunder in some way: the Vedic Indra and Vṛtra (the personification of drought), the Iranian Tištry/Sirius and Apaoša (a demon of drought), the Albanian Drangue and Kulshedra (an amphibious serpent who causes streams to dry up), the Armenian Vishap and Vahagn, the Greek Typhoeus and Zeus, or the Norse Thor and Miðgarðsormr.[28]
Stony skies
Perkwunos is often portrayed in connection with stone and (wooded) mountains, probably because the mountainous forests were his realm.[29] A cognate relationship has been noted between the Germanic *fergunja ('[mountainous] forest') and the Gaulish (h)ercunia ('[oaks] forests').[30][6][7] Words from a root *pér-ur are also attested in the Hittite pēru ('rock, cliff, boulder'),[31] the Avestan pauruuatā ('mountains'),[32] as well as in the Sanskrit párvata ('rocky, cliff, mountain'),[33][2][34] the goddess Parvati, and in Parvateshwara ('lord of mountains'), an epithet attached to her father Himavat.[35] In Germanic mythology, Fjörgynn was used as a poetic synonym for 'the land' or 'the earth', and she could have been the mistress of the wooded mountains, the personification of what appears in Gothic as fairguni ('wooded mountain').[29] Additionally, the Slavic Perūn sends his axe or arrow from a mountain or the sky, and the Baltic tradition mentions a perpetual sacred fire maintained for Perkūnas in the forests or on hilltops.[36]
A term for the sky, *h₂ekmōn, denoted both 'stones' and 'heaven'.[37] The motif of the stony skies can be found in the story of the Greek Akmon ('anvil'), the father of Ouranos and the personified Heaven.[38] Other cognates appear in Hittite aku ('stone'), Vedic áśman ('stone'), Iranian asman and deity Asman (both names referring to 'stone, heaven'), Lithuanian akmuõ, and also in Germanic *hemina (German: Himmel, English: heaven) and *hamara (Old Norse: hamarr, English: hammer).[19][37][39]
The mythological association can be explained by the observation (e.g., meteorites) or the belief that thunderstones (polished ones for axes in particular) had fallen from the sky.[40] Indeed, the Vedic word áśman is the name of the weapon thrown by Indra, Thor's weapon is also called hamarr, and the thunderstone can be named Perkūno akmuõ ('Perkuna's stone') in the Lithuanian tradition.[41][38][42] The original meaning of *h₂ekmōn could thus have been 'stone-made weapon', then 'sky' or 'lighting'.[43]
Evidence
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The following deities are cognates stemming from the root *Perkwunos or derivatives in Western Indo-European mythologies:
- PIE: *per-, 'to strike' (or *pérkʷus, the 'oak'),[1][12]
- PIE: *per-kwun-os, the weather god,[1]
- Baltic:
- Old Prussian: Perkunis,[3][4]
- Yotvingian: Parkuns (or Parcuns),[45][46][47][48]
- Lithuanian: Perkūnas, the god of rain and thunder, depicted as an angry-looking man with a tawny beard,[3][4]
- Latvian: Pērkōns, whose functions are occasionally merged with those of Dievs (the sky-god) in the Latvian dainas (folk songs),[3][4]
- Baltic:
- PIE: *per-uhₓn-os, the 'one with the thunder stone',[3][11]
- Slavic:
- Old Church Slavonic: Perūn (Перýн), the 'maker of the lightning',[3][49]
- Old Russian: Perunŭ, Belarussian: Piarun, Slovak: Parom,[3][26]
- South Slavic: Perun and Perperuna, a reduplicated feminine derivative from Perun's name which parallels the Old Norse couple Fjörgynn–Fjörgyn and the Lithuanian Perkūnija–Perkūnas,[23][24]
- Slavic:
- PIE: *per-kwun-iyā, the 'realm of Perkwunos' (the wooded lands or wooded mountains),[29][7][5]
- Celtic: *ferkunyo,[50][7]
- Gaulish: the Hercynian (ercunia) forest or mountains, ancient name of the Ardennes and the Black Forest,[51]
- Germanic: *fergunja, meaning 'mountain', perhaps 'mountainous forest' (or the feminine equivalent of *ferga, 'god'),[6]
- Old Norse: Fjörgyn, the mother of the thunder-god Thor, the goddess of the wooded landscape and a poetic synonym for 'land' or 'the earth',[3][52]
- Gothic: fairguni (𐍆𐌰𐌹𐍂𐌲𐌿𐌽𐌹), 'wooded mountain', and fairhus, 'world', Old English: firgen, 'mountain', 'wooded hill',[6][5]
- Old High German: Firgunnea, the Ore Mountains, and Virgundia Waldus, Virgunnia, 'oaks forest',[6][5]
- Slavic: *per(g)ynja, 'wooded hills' (perhaps an early borrowing from Germanic),[11][29]
- Old Church Slavonic: prӗgynja, Old Russian: peregynja, 'wooded hills';[29] Polish: Przeginia (toponym),[53]
- Celtic: *ferkunyo,[50][7]
- PIE: *per-kwun-os, the weather god,[1]
Other cognates are less secured:
- Indo-Iranian:
- Vedic: Parjanya, the god of rain, thunder and lightning (although Sanskrit sound laws rather predict a parkūn(y)a form; an intermediate form *pergénio has therefore been postulated, possibly descending from *per-kwun-iyā).[1][54][11]
- Nuristani: Pärun (or Pērūneî), a war god worshipped in Kafiristan (present-day Nuristan Province, Afghanistan),[3][11]
- Persian: Piran (Viseh), a heroic figure present in the Shahnameh, the national epic of Greater Iran; it has been suggested his name might be related to the Slavic deity Perun,[55]
- Celtic *herku- ('oak'),[7]
- Celtiberian: berkunetakam ('Perkunetaka'), a word attested in the Botorrita Plate I and interpreted as a sacred oak grove,[56][57][58]
- Gaulish: ercos ('oak'),[7]
- Gallo-Roman: references to 'Deus Ercus' (in Aquitania), 'Nymphae Percernae' (Narbonensis), and a deity named 'Hercura' (or Erecura) which appears throughout the provinces of the Roman Empire.[59][60]
- Irish: Erc (mac Cairpri), mentioned at the end of Táin Bó Cúailnge, and placed on the throne of Tara by Conchobar mac Nessa in Cath Ruis na Ríg for Bóinn;[61] although an alternative etymology from PIE *perk- ('color') > *perk-no ('[spotted] fish') has been proposed by Hamp and Matasović.[62]
- Greek: keraunos (κεραυνός), the name of Zeus’s thunderbolt, which were sometimes also deified (by metathesis of *per(k)aunos; although the root *ḱerh₂, 'shatter, smash' has also been proposed),[10][63] and the Herkyna spring-nymph, associated with a river of the same name and identified with Demeter (the name could be a borrowing as it rather follows Celtic sound laws),[9][10]
- Illyrian: Perëndi, a sky and thunder god (from per-en-, an extension of PIE *per, 'to strike', attached to -di, the sky-god Dyēus, thus related to *per-uhₓn-os (see above); although the Albanian root perëndoj, 'to set (of the sun)', from Latin parentare, 'a sacrifice (to the dead), to satisfy', has also been proposed),[64][65]
- Thracian: Perkos/Perkon (Περκος/Περκων), a horseman hero facing a tree surrounding by a snake,[11][10][8]
- Romano-Germanic: inscriptions to the Matronae 'Ala-ferhuiae' found in Bonn, Altdorf, or Dormagen.[5][66]
Thunder-god's weapon
The name of Perkwunos' weapon *meld-n- is attested by a group of cognates alternatively denoting 'hammer' or 'lightning' in the following traditions:
- (Northern) PIE: *meld- (or *meld-n-),[19][67]
- Germanic: *melðunijaz,[19][68]
- Balto-Slavic: *mild-n-,[20]
- Slavic: *mlъldni, 'lightning',[20]
- Old Church Slavonic: mlъni, Serbo-Croatian: múnja, Czech: mlna, Russian: mólnija (молния), 'lightning',[20]
- Baltic: *mildnā,[19]
- Old Prussian: mealde, 'lightning',[67]
- Latvian: milna, the 'hammer of the Thunderer', Pērkōns,[67]
- Slavic: *mlъldni, 'lightning',[20]
- Celtic:
- Welsh: mellt, 'lightning' (singulative mellten, 'bolt of lightning'),[19]
- Breton: mell, 'hammer',[68][69]
- Middle Irish: mell, 'rounded summit, small hill'.[69]
Legacy
Some scholars argue that the functions of the Luwian and Hittite weather gods Tarḫunz and Tarḫunna ultimately stem from those of Perkwunos. Anatolians may have dropped the old name in order to adopt the epithet *Tṛḫu-ent- ('conquering', from PIE *terh2, 'to cross over, pass through, overcome'),[16][70] which sounded closer to the name of the Hattian Storm-god Taru.[71]
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Further reading
- Chadwick, H. Munro. "The Oak and the Thunder-God." The Journal of the Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland 30 (1900): 22-44. doi:10.2307/2842615.
- Cotton, Gérard. "Orientalia I: Parjányah, le dieu qui <<frappe>> de la foudre,". In: Revue belge de philologie et d'histoire, tome 10, fasc. 3, 1931. pp. 579–585. doi:10.3406/rbph.1931.6798
- Haffter, P. "THE DESIGNATIONS OF THE OAK IN ROMANCE LANGUAGES." Acta Classica 15 (1972): 95-112. JSTOR 24591271.
- LAJOYE, PATRICE. "Quirinus, Un Ancien Dieu Tonnant? Nouvelles Hypothèses Sur Son étymologie Et Sa Nature Primitive." Revue De L'histoire Des Religions 227, no. 2 (2010): 175-94. Accessed June 7, 2020. JSTOR 23618183.
For the etymology of the Indo-European weather-god, see:
- Carnoy, Albert. "Le chêne dans la toponymie et la linguistique". In: Revue Internationale d'Onomastique, 10e année N°2, juin 1958. pp. 81–101. doi:10.3406/rio.1958.1615
For the association with "stones", "mountains" and "heaven", see:
- Beckwith, Miles C. "The 'Hanging of Hera' and the Meaning of Greek ἄκμων." Harvard Studies in Classical Philology 98 (1998): 91-102. doi:10.2307/311338
- Hamp, Eric P. "On the Notions of 'Stone' and 'Mountain' in Indo-European." Journal of Linguistics 3, no. 1 (1967): 83-90. JSTOR 4174952.
- Mitchell, Stephen A. "THE WHETSTONE AS SYMBOL OF AUTHORITY IN OLD ENGLISH AND OLD NORSE." Scandinavian Studies 57, no. 1 (1985): 1-31 (plus footnote nr. 53 on page 26). Accessed June 14, 2020. www.jstor.org/stable/40918675.