In our context, Europe designates the peoples of Roman culture (Rome is treated separately), Celtic, Germanic, Scandinavian, Icelandic and Breton. Slavic peoples have their own section.
Holidays of the month
July 6, 2024 (2 events)
July 6, 2024
Today, the Czech people commemorate the burning of Jan Hus. The Czechs made him a national hero, an allegory of their fight against Catholic, imperial and German oppression. He is at the origin of the Czech alphabet, the Hussite Church and probably a precursor of Protestantism. #mythology #myth #legend #calendar #6July #janhus
July 6, 2024
Today, the Slavs celebrate Kupala night. This ancestral festival is today replaced by Saint John's Day. This festival celebrates fire, water, the Sun and Moon, the harvest, fertility, joy and love. Its origin is linked to the cult of Kupala. #mythology #myth #legend #calendar #June 23 #July 6 #kupala
July 15, 2024 (1 event)
July 15, 2024
Today, the Northern Slavs (kyiv Rus) commemorate the death of Vladimir known as the Beautiful Sun or Vladimir the Great. It was baptized following an alliance with the Byzantine Empire and helping to Christianize northeastern Europe. #mythology #myth #legend #calendar #saintvladimir #July 15
July 17, 2024 (1 event)
July 17, 2024
Today, Slavic peoples celebrate Ognyena Maria, fiery Mary. Sister of the thunder god Perun, she is the amalgam of Margaret the Virgin, the Virgin Mary, both sisters of Saint Elias. She is often also associated with Lazarus, the rain and the sea.
July 20, 2024 (1 event)
July 20, 2024
On this day, the Slavs celebrated Perun, the supreme god. The cult of Perun was probably replaced by the cult of the prophet Elijah among the Kyiv boyars in the process of Christianization of Rus. #mythology #myth #legend #calendar #July 20 #perun
Cultural areas in Europe
The history of Europe is one of the best documented, studied and known parts of world history and refers to all the events linked to the European continent, from the time it was populated by the first peoples until until today. According to the German monograph Minderheitenrechte in Europa co-edited by Pan and Pfeil (2002), there are 87 distinct peoples, of which 33 constitute the majority of the population in at least one sovereign state, while the remaining 54 constitute minority ethnic groups.
In ancient times, Indo-European peoples practiced cults that had many things in common. The Germanic, Celtic, Slavic, Greek and Latin mythological systems had common features, such as the belief in a fundamental divine "triad", and the division of men into several categories of distinct social rank.
In Europe, ancient religions are subdivided into:
- faith in the Aesir and the Vanirs, which we today call Odinism, according to Germanic mythology;
- faith in Scandinavian deities, according to Scandinavian mythology;
- Druidism and its late Irish variant, the religion of the Filid, according to Celtic mythology;
- orphism, according to Thracian and Dacian mythology;
- faith in Scythian deities, according to the Scythian religion;
- faith in Slavic deities, according to Slavic mythology;
- faith in Greek deities, according to Greek mythology;
- faith in Roman deities, according to Roman mythology;
- in the Roman Empire, in addition to the gods of Olympus, mystery cults were also practiced and, in late antiquity, primitive Christianity.
One of the common points between religions prior to Christianity is polytheism, sometimes pantheistic, sometimes animist.
Proselytism was not widespread among European peoples, each religion being that of a group of populations equally linked by language, and which had its own deities.
