Greyhorn Pagans

This will be already the 6th Creation Myth I cover! Slowly making my way to the Middle East and Asia I have covered some very interesting stories so far! This one is me carefully taking a step towards the Middle East and Asia. The story as told by the Turks. Once part of the mighty Ottoman Empire, now still a force to be reckoned with. Let's get this story started! This myth from pre-Islamic Turkey was written down in the 19th century but derives from much earlier oral sources. The name of one of the characters, Erlik is mentioned on the Orkhon inscription, the earliest known Turkish writing (8th century AD).  When the Earth was not the only thing that was, was water. Endless water clear to the four corners of nothing. A full water, grand within its silence -yet a worthless water without use or beauty. A fearful water. (Sounds reminiscent of the Slav Myth and Celtic Myth I covered earlier with its dark sea(1)) If a snake would drink from this water death would become him. If a dead...

  Part 5 of my # CreationMyth series will cover the story as told by the Celts .  Although the Celts are one of many folks who practiced oral traditions and have (almost) no written accounts thankfully through their many interactions with the Romans and Roman Empire written records of their looks, their culture and their beliefs. So here we go! The Celtic creation myth! Once upon a time, there was no time. There were also no gods and no man or woman to walk the land. There was only the sea and its deep depths and dark eternal quiet. A strain of melody moved across the water, a whisper at first. The music was the Oran Mór (Great Melody) and it grew into a great spiraling, gathering sound and gaining momentum reaching further and louder till it reached a great crescendo. Then, where the sea met the land a sea-mare was born. White, and made of sea-foam and her name was Eiocha . Not far from where the land met the sea, a tree grew, a strong and sturdy oak. On the oak grew a p...

Part 4 of my creation myth series coming up right now! This time I will cover the Slavic creation story since I want to dive a bit deeper in Slavic paganism and spread more knowledge about it. So here we go! The oldest Slavic traditions say that in the beginning there was nothing, there is old-dark, dark sea and sky, the only " existing " thing created by Rod (the forefather of all Slavic gods and of all creation) was a golden egg ( again with the egg) in which rested Svarog , the Divine creator. Under the influence of forces of imbalance the egg cracked open and created a light that shone upon Svarog and created his shadow. From his shadow Crnobog originated and Vodan , god of the sea and the water came from the glare of Svarogos old-sea. From the top of the egg shell's dust the world tree, ash tree (AGAIN!), was created which rising separated the heavens from the earth and see.  Svarog , using gold powder from the bottom of the world (lower half of the eggshell), m...

As promised I will cover the origin stories as told by our (European) Pagan ancestors all the way back to the PIE (Proto Indo-European) days. I will be starting with the one I myself am most familiar with and that is the Norse creation story. It starts with the world before anything was. Before there was soil, before there was sky, before there was any green thing. There was only the abyss of Ginnungagap . This chaos of perfect silence and darkness lay between the realms of Múspelheim and Niflheim , the lands of elemental fire and elemental ice. (On a quick personal note I think it's funny how "perfect silence and darkness" is described as being chaotic. Perfect silence and darkness is where I find peace, especially after working and dealing with people all day) Venomous water from the spring Hvergelmir in Niflheim flowed into this emptiness, freezing over and again, layer after layer of ice and frost. The hot winds of Múspelheim blew over the ice of Niflheim cau...

  Part 2 of my #creationmyth series! This time focusing on the story as told by the ancient Greeks. It's a story quite unfamiliar to myself and I bet to many others as well which is exactly why I am doing this series. - In the beginning there was only chaos, a empty darkness. In this darkness the only thing that existed was Nyx . A bird with black wings born out of this chaos together with her brother Erebus . Erebus - to which the underworld belonged - impregnated his sister Nyx after which she laid an golden egg. For ages she sat upon that egg with nothing happening. Then finally life began to stir in the egg and out of the egg were born Aether , the bright upper air and Hemera , the day. Afterward, feared by everyone but Erebus Nyx fashioned herself, by herself a family of haunting forces with among those the hateful Moros (Fate) , the black Ker (Doom) , Thanatos (Death) , Hypnos (Sleep) , Oneiroi (Dreams) , Geras (Old Age) , Oizus (Pain) , Nemesis (Revenge) , Eris (Strife) , ...

 While the true Roman origin myth varies from source to source and the Romans themselves were - as a rule- not myth makers there are some stories about how the land we now know as Italy and their folk came to be.  Myths or stories from ancient Romans times about how the world was created are practically non-existent and are usually told through the Greek story but with Romanized names. One of the earliest to relate the story (reminiscent to Homer's Odyssey) was the poet Virgil in his epic Aeneid. The same Virgil who also was the guide of Dante Alighieri through the 9 circles of hell in his famous book "The Divine Comedy".  In this story, our hero, with the help of his mother Venus escaped Troy with his father (a mortal named Anchises) and a number of his fellow soldiers before the city was completely overtaken by the Greeks. This story and its connection to the Trojan Wars gave the Romans a link to the ancient Trojan culture. It should be noted that the story of the Troja...