Talk:Proto-Indo-European mythology/Archive 1

Archive 1

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Archive 3

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"comparative mythology" by jaan puhvel is a useful guide to common motifs in PIE beliefs. cross-dressing in the hall of an enemy, the thrice-sinning hero born with extra limbs used by feuding gods, the king with the uppity sons and the disguised virgin who must preserve the dynasty, the crippled smith, rescuing stolen cattle from a cave to bring rain, the three wide steps, magical prosthetic limbs, the eagle retrieving mead or soma from a mountain/heroic theft of a life elixir, being chained to a rock and tortured by a bird, the treasure inside the fish, the epic battles in gesta danorum and mahabharata, sacred fire in a pool of water, the flood/cosmic winter, origin of social classes, the weak spot and filicide, the monster that bites off the hand, shamanic journeys, ritual hanging, horse/chariot race, raid for foreign women, the king and his association with a horse, triple goddesses, necromancy, one-eyed gods, the wild hunt, foot fetishes, spitting into a crock and a wise man comes out, a water deity that is the sole survivor of nine births, a blind god tricked into murder at a feast and the return of the slain at a time of need, rowan as the wife of thunder, igneous potential of rocks and trees, the cosmic mill, etc. Eaglethunder (talk) 01:11, 5 September 2008 (UTC)eaglethunder

The sumerians?

I've noticed, several times, that the world tree + slaying of snake/dragon-myth(s) were very common among the sumerians. If people are sure that the axis mundi-myth is protoindoeuropean; doesn't that mean that the sumerians were indoeuropeans too? But the fact, though, is that they weren't at all - rather Dravidian, or something. Another alternative - the indoeuropeans (and the semitic people of akkad) copied the sumerians, and thereafter spread the myth? Or mayby the myth is just fundamental for most pagan people...//Charlotte

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Considering we have an article on this, and one on Proto-Indo-European (although that is currently part of Indo-European languages), I think it might be wise to make an article series on the Indo-Europeans: their culture, religion, language, etc. Any thoughts? -Branddobbe 08:48, Mar 9, 2004 (UTC)

I have made an article on Indo-European which I have intended to be a neutral article giving links to both the language article and the religion article. What do you think? Wiglaf 10:37, Mars 9, 2004 (UTC)

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Wiglaf, I've rewritten the first paragraph, splitting it up into a few, trying to provide a sufficiently balanced point of view, indicating both the difficulties in reconstructing such a primeval religion along with the positive evidence for it. I hope you like it. Martijn faassen 21:35, 29 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Yes, I like it. Wiglaf 08:37, Mar 30, 2004 (CET)

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We the Indo-Europeans, closely subsequent descendents of the original Takers, created our wheat-goddess that rewarded us with plentiful harvest and our thunder-god that punished us with lightning bolts, thus ensuring our destiny forever battling nature. We ate from the Apple of Discord and spread our totalitarian agricultural "civilization" to unsuspecting peoples who had previously let the old spirits govern their lives. Our legacy includes writing, commerce, cities, automobiles, recorded music, wealth, famine, democracy, politics, science, genocide, philosophy, logic and mathematics, which we will one day gladly forsake for the old spirits.--Georgopoulos, 22 June 2004

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The articles on Danu(both of them) suggest a relationship. The same goes for Ymir/Yama. - JeffBobFrank 05:44, 25 November 2005 (UTC)

Missing the thought-process here

The results are less interesting than the techniques for arriving at them would be, which are scarcely offered. The inclusion of Eos-Auroroa-Eostre (!) shows how easy it is to stray into fantasies in this kind of speculation. Can this entry be improved, or is the idea basically flawed? --Wetman 12:35, 8 Dec 2004 (UTC)

hm, certainly you accept Eos-Aurora? The Eostre connection is tenuous, of course, but not extremely far-fetched, in my view. dab (ᛏ) 09:22, 13 May 2005 (UTC)

Why is Zeus, rather than Uranus, associated with Dyaeus Pita? Uranus and Dyaeus Pita are both gky gods from whom the other gods are descended, and both are married to an earth goddess. - JeffBobFrank

Presumably the name "Zeus" is related to "Dyeus" and "Uranus" isn't.

'Strue. The genitive form of Zeus is "Dios", that of Ouranos is Ouranou. BTW, I'm going to remove some of the mythology stuff that belongs to comparative religion rather than Indo-European myth. The Dogandpony 21:52, 11 March 2006 (UTC)

True. Dzeus is an alternative spelling, cf. Dyaeus Pita, Ju-piter. Hypatea (talk) 16:43, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Plthivi Mh2ter (Tkon)?

Who are Plthivi Mh2ter and Tkon. I've never heard of them, and google searches for Plthivi or Tkon don't shed any light on the matter. I assume that Plthivi is a theoretical Proto-Indo-European name, but the only sources on the web that seems to mention her is this one (or ones that are identical to this one though I'm not sure who copied whom). Tkon gets lots of hits, but none of them seem to have anything to do with an earth goddess. Are there any sources for this page?--Heathcliff 03:23, 13 May 2005 (UTC)

yes, they are the reconstructed forms of Sanskrit "prthivi mata" and Sanskrit ksham / Hittite takkan, Greek khthon, respectively. tkōn should properly be dgh'ōm, a very early ("Indo-Hittite") form the more familiar PIE form would be gh'ðōm. You can only find so much specialist information with google, sometimes you have to resort to books :) dab (ᛏ) 09:17, 13 May 2005 (UTC)

Obviously. That is why I ask for a source. You seem to be knowledgeable about these matters; could you please provide sources for this information?--Heathcliff 22:26, 13 May 2005 (UTC)

do you mean the gh'ðōm or the dgh'ōm form? the former is in Indogermanisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch (or any etymological dictionary of the languages mentioned above). The form before thorn-metathesis will be in any introduction to Indo-European studies. There is not really much controversy here. Accounts of how the metathesis took place exactly, or whether it should be called a metathesis, will vary, but the basic facts are pretty much universally recognized. dab (ᛏ) 11:00, 14 May 2005 (UTC)

I'd just like a source for the information on this page. You seem to know a lot about this subject, you could just let me know where you got the information if you want. If it's universally recognized, I don't see why providing a source should be to much trouble. Could you please provide at least one source on proto-indo-european relgion that supports to information on this page? Thank you for mentioning Indogermanisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch, but it's hard to get useful information out of dictionary. I have yet to find anything in it on Plthivi, Dghom, or Tkon. Also the Wilipdeia entry on it says it is outdated, and a review of it on Amazon makes the following claim:

In no case can the materials in Pokorny's IEW be taken as raw data. Onomatopoetic words are over-represented, and unfounded etymologies or improbable semantic groupings are not seldom. Using this material for statistical purposes, or browsing it with an interest in general semantics, or picking roots or words in order to compare them with words of other language families, is bound to be very misleading.

Is it still considered reliable?--Heathcliff 13:12, 14 May 2005 (UTC)

look, exactly which point do you want to have referenced? I'll quote a coupe of works on IE myhtology, but are you interested in a particular point? Do you want information on a particular form, or rather on mythological implications? When I say the gdhom word will be in any introduction, I'm serious, it's one of the most widely discussed and best understood words, there is no way a basic introduction will miss it. I am not working on this article full time, you know. I don't know if you are disputing something in particular, or if you're just curious, but can't be bothered to go to the library yourself. dab (ᛏ) 10:16, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

A source on the dghom word would be fine since that is what I've been asking about, but more general information on the infortmation on this page would be useful as well. You say that gdhom would be discussed in any introduction. That's great, that's exactly what I'm looking for: could you please name just one of these introductions? Also I was interested in your opinion of whether or not Indogermanisches Etymologisches Wörterbuch was reliable. Do you have an opinion on this? If you have IEW could you look and see what page gdhom is on and let me know. I still haven't found it, but it may just be spelled differently.--Heathcliff 12:57, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

I don't want to sound impatient, but you did realize the IEW article points to the Leiden online version, didn't you? Here is a link for you, [] (I'm sorry, but you'll have to scroll down yourself). Pokorny is quite reliable, and to be taken seriously. He doesn't have much Anatolian material, and doesn't accept laryngeals, so you'll need additional resources to come up with a "contemporary" opinion (e.g. Rix' lexicon of the PIE verb, and Mayrhofer's Indo-Aryan dictionary), but it's a very good place to start. Concerning introductions, there are a couple of good ones, but I'd recommend the one by Oswald Szemerényi (English translation 1996). dab (ᛏ) 12:57, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

I do not need a link to IEW. When I said I could not find dghom (or any of the other spellings you've used) in IEW it was because I had looked. What did you think I was talking about?? Thank you for citing Oswald Szemerényi. I'll see if I can find his book.--Heathcliff 19:44, 15 May 2005 (UTC)

and I gave you a link, directly to the lemma g'hðem-, g'hðom-, I mean, what more can I do? They transliterate the palatal as g^ rather than g', but that can hardly be the problem, no? (c.f. PIE) dab (ᛏ) 10:27, 16 May 2005 (UTC)

Sorry, your reply made it sound like it was a link to IEW, you didn't mention it was a link to the page itself. I have to say at this point I don't see the reasoning to lead to the conclusion that the Proto-Indo-Europeans worshipped an earth goddess who is a fore-runner to various bronze age godesses. It seems a linguistic link between the words for earth as been used to reconstruct a theoretical proto-indo-european word for earth and that the idea that Mother Earth was worshiped as a godess just seems to be slapped on at the end. But I don't actually know that this is the case. There may be ample evidence of a proto-indo-european earth goddess. I've just got to find it one way or the other. I've found a couple of books that aren't nearly as outdated as the two you suggested, and I may order them since I haven't found them locally. Perhaps then I'll be able to get some answers to my questions. It may be some time before I can get back to this page, but hopefully I'll be able to add to it and provide some actual sources.--Heathcliff 13:00, 16 May 2005 (UTC)

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btw, "Plthivi" is really an epitheton. it means as much as "She who is flat", more or less "the wide expanse", but female. Dghom otoh is the proper word for "Earth", but not particularly when imagined as a female goddess, just "Earth". I suppose gods needed to be addressed obliquely, so it would be blasphemous to address a libation to "Dghom" (*speculation alert*) dab (ᛏ) 11:03, 14 May 2005 (UTC)

Plth2vih2 Mh2ter (Dg'hōm) is believed to have been the name of (Mother) Earth, see Prthivi. 
Another name of the Indo-European Mother-Earth would be *Dheghom Mater, as in Greek Demeter, 
Albanian Dhe Motë, Avestan Zamyat, Slavic Mat' Zemlija, Lithuanian Žemyna, Latvian Zemes Mate. 

I wonder whether *Plthivi really is a more plausible proto-word than *Dheghom Mater, considering the latter has a lot more attested cognates. 惑乱 分からん 15:53, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

Interesting discussion, but I can't find *tkon in the article. *Plthivi is a lot closer, superficially, to Latona and Pluto than *Dhegom is. Isn't it, 惑乱 分からん? Hypatea (talk) 17:09, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Proto-Indo-European religion vs. Indo-European religion

I've noticed that Indo-European religion diverts to here. Wouldn't it make more sense for these two articles be seperate from each other in the same way Indo-European languages is a seperate article from Proto-Indo-European language? This page would continue to deal with the reconstruction of hypothetical common roots between individual attested belief systems, wheras Indo-European religion would be a more general article on the attested belief systems themselves. Would this be a valid (from a "scholarly" point of view) distinction to make? --86.135.217.213 04:04, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

No - as per Indo-European, "Indo-European" is sometimes used in the meaning of "PIE", e.g. "the Indo-Europeans domesticated the horse". There is no such thing as a "Indo European family of religions", except you mean the various religions of Indo-European speakers, linked to from this article (is Celtic Christianity or Germanic Christianity an Indo-European or a Semitic religion??) -- the term "Indo-European religion/mythology" typically refers to the subject of this article, the religion/mythology of the Proto-Indo-Europeans. dab (ᛏ) 09:40, 31 December 2005 (UTC)

dab is correct. PPIE religion would be some Nostratic thing from 10,000 years ago. It's conceivable, with difficulty. PIE is the same thing as IE in many cases. PIE is a better choice when it comes to reconstructing pantheons and myths. Hypatea (talk) 17:22, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

The Semitic traditions are distinct from the Aryan- whether proto- ,pre-pro, etc; certainly nothing as recent as Christianity and/or islam have any significant portions derived from ancient polytheistic Aryan traditions. As for Celtic, Germanic etc. Christianity, some pre Christian aspects of culture have found their way into these religious practices, but it would be a stretch to include ancient Aryan religious beliefs in any form of Christianity. That said, Christianity did borrow (some times heavily) from Zoroastrian as well as Buddhist theology, which, however, are later part of these Aryan based religions. For instance, the entire "children of light and children of darkness" conflict (basis of John's Apocalypse) is rooted in Zoroastrian theology, where it has a far more secure foundation than in Judaic messianic concepts. Even the apparently inconsequential remark about the women covering their heads in church ("because of the angels") is taken directly from Zoroastrian religious practice. Last but not least, Jesus' entire "Sermon on the Mount" is substantially plagiarized from Gautam's Sermon almost five centuries earlier. There were a number of Buddhist Monasteries - in Egypt (Alexandria) as well as in the Sinai where Jesus could easily have acquired the material, and the Zoroastrian material was similarly freely accessible to him. However, I must differentiate the more ancient Aryan practices from the relatively recent traditions of Christianity and even Zoroastrianism and Buddhism.Chibber (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 00:06, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

god vs. God

Satanael, we have the convention to use uppercase God for the monotheistic entity, and lowercase god for polytheistic male deities. Please use lowercase god here, since PIE religion was clearly polytheistic. dab (ᛏ) 13:54, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

Did I use God with a capital "G"? If I did, then it wasn't intentional and was an "editorial"(pun intended) oversight, as I'm quite aware of the fact that PIE religion was polytheistic. :) Satanael 15:12, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

Books

I was wondering, do anyone here know the best books to buy to get a general overview of Indo-European scholarship and studies, its religion in particular, and as well as of the current discussions in the field. Those here who edit this article, as well as the other articles on the Indo-European topic seem pretty knowledgeable in the field, and I'd like to atleast get an overview of the general consensus, especially when it comes to the different gods of the various Indo-European mythologies and the deities within the PIE pantheon from which they originated. It would be nice if, atleast one, contains info that show how various deities and spirits are connected to other Indo-European cognates and counterparts, and if it contains any archaeology(as I'm going to study anthropology, I consider at least some archaeology a must). I'm particulary interested when it comes to deities such as Dyeus, Perkwunos, Paxuson, as well as any info on the god of death, as well as any possible cognate to Celtic Cernunnos. And preferably not any of those heartattack-providing 100$ tomes. I've looked around for a number of books, but I'm not sure what the best ones to get are. I realize that this may be asking to much, but as I'd really like to know more about it, I would appreciate any help. Thanks in advance. Satanael 22:30, 7 March 2006 (UTC)

Marija Gimbutas has a lot to say about IE religion, but most of it is biased and based on circular reasoning. Archaeology and Language: The Puzzle of Indo-European Origins by Colin Renfrew might be a good introduction. Hypatea (talk) 16:31, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Sources

A Tripod site does not constitute adequate referencing, no matter how good it is. Satanael's question (in Books, above) is a very good one and I would also be interested in having it answered. I know Jared Diamond's 'The Third Chimpanzee' is where I was first exposed to my basic knowledge of PIE, but that isn't an appropriate resource either--it's a book about evolution. Placing the request for sources at the head of the document is far more likely to attract someone who knows what they are doing. Certain editors seem to want to keep it at the bottom of the page, presumably because they view this page as "their own". Fine, whatever. Have fun. The Dogandpony 06:31, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Precisions about modifications that I have made

Beside *Peltawi, I have added her another name *Dheghom *mater (*dhghom) [cf, "Indo-european vocabular" by Xavier Delamarre] and other gods, sun-god and moon-god(dess).

"Poseidon" as the "husband of the earth" or "lord of earth" is absolutely not sure. Another etymology would "master of the waters". Greek "potis" means "husband, lord, master" and eveng "god" as the feminine form Potnia for goddesses in mycenaean religion. Then "potis-don" is the "potis" of the don. "don" may refer to indo-européen *danu, "river". Then "potidon/poseidon" would be "the master of the rivers", "the master of the waters", become "the god of sea". As the old Neptune in Roma was not originally a god of sea but the god of the lakes, sources and waters.

I think you'll find 'Poseidon' was a theonym borrowed by the Greeks. *danu, *san and ne/dne are all IE roots for rivers, but I think this is coincidence of morphemes at work, despite the appearance. Potis is pati, lord, but again, perhaps coincidence. Poseidon and Atlas can be seen as the enemies of/early competitors with the proto Greek tribes, as Solon learned in Egypt. Hypatea (talk) 17:16, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Merge

I started to merge this article 2 Aryan religion, but after realizing how active it is, decided to discuss it 1st. Aryan religion (970) gets far more google hits than Proto-Indo-European religion (561), which is rather a clunky name. Indo-European religion (981) does slightly better, but I prefer Aryan religion because it is short and sweet.

Either which one, they should all go to the same spot. Sam Spade 16:09, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

Erm... they're clearly different things. The term Proto-Indo-European specifies the language and culture of the common ancestor of various languages; Indo-Aryan is a subgroup of this. The Indo-Iranian term Aryan is already overloaded in Zoroastrianism, Vedic civilization and C19-20th definitions of race. Conflating it with the Proto-Indo-European religion implies a sense of identity that isn't proven or even appropriate to this religion. Generally, using the term Aryan is outmoded or minority, with similar problems to the romantic use of Achaean as a Greek dialect. Read thoroughly the article Aryan, especially the sections on Linguistic Terminology and beyond.

Even if they were the same, I don't think you could make a decision on definition based on a Google war. Perhaps Aryan religion could have a more explicit link, to Proto-Indo-European religion with an explanation of its difficult usage.

--Mark 19:46, 19 March 2006 (UTC)

As the above editor said, they are two different things - Aryan religion is a descendent of Proto-Indo-European religion. Suggesting they should be merged is like saying that Proto-Indo-European language should be merged with English language because there are 85,900,000 google results for "English Language" but only 15,100 for "Proto-Indo-European language". --Krsont 18:15, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

there should be no "Aryan religion" article. Either the intended meaning is "Proto-Indo-Iranian religion", or "Indo-Iranian religion" (including historical descendants). The article fails to show evidence that the term is in use at all. I'll make it a dab page. dab (ᛏ) 19:35, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

agree with dab. Aryan doesn't mean IE or PIE anymore, not since 1945 or so. Hypatea (talk) 17:17, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Sources?

It amazes me that we have such a complex article devoid of all references (not including a side note reference). Can some of the original contributers of the article come forward to provide sources? It's sort of decrediting the article to leave it referenceless.--The ikiroid (talk/parler/hablar/paroli/说/話) 22:15, 29 March 2006 (UTC)

Merge

I think this page should be merged with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aesir-Asura_correspondence

How shall I read "Hors and Messiatz"

Please, can somebody check and correct this Russianized form of the Proto-Slavic deities, if they really existed (I am a Slavist but have never heard of them, however, it is possible that they were preserved until latest among Eastern Slavs). In the article, the Russianized name of the moon is wrongly put as "messiatz", whereas it should be *měsęcь. At first, it reminded me of Messiah! Messiatz (mesjac) means 'moon' in modern Russian. The Proto-Slavic form of the word was, *měsęcь. There is a generally accepted "scientific" phonetic transcription for Proto-Slavic language, which is based on the modern Czech and Polish orthographies, including two Cyrillic letters (ъ, ь). This transcription contains no TZ, IA and double SS!!! There is no need to discover America, therefore, because it has already been discovered! I was able to recognize *měsęcь in this MESSIATZ, however, what HORS is and how should it be read I have NO IDEA!

people keep adding ill informed stuff here. It's quite bad. I've removed this particular instance, but feel free to correct other dubious passages yourself. dab (ᛏ) 10:35, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Hors is not a Slavic name, but probably Sarmatian or Scythian. While Mjesec is simply the name of Moon in (most) Slavic languages, and was not a name of a true diety of Proto-Slavic pantheon, the name of Hors is mentioned amongst gods of Primary Chronicle, and in Tale of Igor's Campaign. He was probably adopted in East Slavic pantheon from their Iranian speaking neighboors. --Hierophant 18:34, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Hors is in russian "Xopc" (Khors) [bulgarian Хърс] and indeed seems to come from iranian.

Voir aussi http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki/%D0%A5%D0%BE%D1%80%D1%81 Messiatz is a russian deity as here:

"Myesyats" is on this site. I have probably written the french transcription. Myesyats is also in this list: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_god

About the Serpent...

Under mythology, there's a large paragraph that lists many of the different god vs. serpent stories. It's followed by this little bit:

"The myth symbolized a clash between forces of order and chaos (represented by the serpent), and the god or hero would always win.[4] It is therefore most probable that there existed some kind of dragon or serpent, possibly with multiple heads and likely linked with the god of underworld and/or waters, as serpentine aspects can be found in many chthonic, aquatic Indo-European deities..."

I might be a bit confused, but this part in bold seems to me a claim that dragons-type serpents actually existed in real life in ancient times! I could be reading this wrong, but that's what it's saying to me. Would anyone like to clarify (and hopefully clear up the meaning of the text as well)? T. S. Rice 03:12, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• Well, since more-less the entire article deals with theoretichal reconstruction of hypothetical pantheon, it seems natural to me people reading it would assume the quoted paragraph refers to existance of belief into, not the existance of acctual dragon or serpent. --Hierophant 06:32, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

• • I suppose that makes sense. Text might best be changed itself, though... T. S. Rice 04:59, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

I couldn't avoid reacting on that certain paragraph either - the Axis mundi-myth is, atleast in my eyes, clearly meant to be interpreted as symbolic; and symbolic only (slaying of dragon = creating order/control. Great sea/water = subconsciousness etc.)! Maybe it would be a good idea to change the paragraph, to prevent further misunderstandings? //Charlotte

Yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and change the wording on this, since it hasn't happened yet, and it managed to completely trip me up even though I thought I knew what it meant. For a second, it actually makes you think the article is claiming that dragons existed. You have to read at least two more sentences before your skeptic bells stop ringing. 76.93.65.34 (talk) 07:25, 23 March 2009 (UTC)

Explain some listings

Could someone please illustrate specifically how the theology and practices of the Armenian Orthodox UNIQUELY reflect the Armenian interpretatin of PIE religion?

Could someone please illustrate specifically how the theology and practices of the Greek Orthodox UNIQUELY reflect the Greek interpretatin of PIE religion?

Could someone please illustrate specifically how the theology and practices of the Roman Catholic Church (in, let us say, Boston, Massachussetts) UNIQUELY reflect the "Italic" interpretatin of PIE religion?

Could someone please illustrate specifically how the theology and practices of the Russian Orthodox UNIQUELY reflect the "Slavic" interpretatin of PIE religion?

Were these listings just a matter of mindless inclusion. Let's see the actual parallels here. Dogface 20:06, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

No church is just the official hierarchy, theology and established practice it presents itself to be. Popular Christianity shows extreme variations betwen various nations and/or ethnic groups (those who are Christian, of course); the choice of saints, popular beliefs & prayers, various symbols/practices at established rituals such as baptism/marriage/funeral, etc. Many of these are Christian continuations of rituals and tradions of earlier, pre-Christian religions and mythologies, which survived Christianization and blended in nicely into the symbolism and practice of this new religious system. While I am too tired to give you an example for every question you have asked, just consider the fact that one of the many titles of the Roman Catholich pope is pontifex maximus, which was also the title for the high priests of pagan Rome. If such a syncretism of religions can exist at the very level of the highest priests, then surely much more of it exists at lower levels of popular beliefs and folk religions. Thus, Christianity of various nations in the Old World is as much of a continuation of older pagan mythologies as they temsevles were a continuation of some common PIE religion. --Hierophant 21:54, 4 October 2006 (UTC)

"Too tired" to give examples? That's a spectacularly MISERABLE attitude to bring to an encyclopedia. Yeah, sure, make all kinds of claims, but examples? Who needs examples in an encyclopedia? That's SILLY! Examples and sources in an ENCYCLOPEDIA? The very IDEA!? What a silly though--giving specific examples to back up claims made in an encyclopedia. No, no examples should be given. Just flat claims. That's all that's needed. Yup, that's it. No examples are EVER needed in an encyclopedia. All you do is cite a single title and then indulge in a lazy rhetorical trick, but you're "too tired" to give any real examples. I think you've pretty much proven my point. Dogface 14:40, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

I was too tired because I wrote that late at night and I was sleepy, but somehow I still managed to write you down an anwser in a decent tone without getting all cranky about it; which, apperently, some of us are unable to do even when they are completly awake. Read the following articles (and a few books would not hurt also, I sugest Uspenskij studies in particular): Christianization, Christianized myths and imagery, Christianised rituals, Christianised sites, St Elias, St George, St Nicholas, Slavic mythology, Perun, and in fact most other articles about major Slavic gods. There. Happy? --Hierophant 17:52, 5 October 2006 (UTC)

Christianity is by and large an extension of Judaism. Christian God is the same as Jewish God. The twist is this Jewish God has a Son which is blasphemy for Jews. Moslems still honor Jesus as a prophet but not son of God. New testament is an extension of old testament. The prophets of Old testament are dear to Christians and they praise them. They are certainly the prophets of the Christian God. This proves that Christian God is Jewish God. The prophets of Old testament are also dear to and prophets of Moslem God. Which means Jewish God = Christian God = Moslem God. The so called mythological Gods of prechristian Europe or Pre islamic Central Asia has no place in christianity or islam. So Hands down. There is no iota of truth that christianity or islam are Indoeuropean or PIE religions. In the initial stages no body took seriously the cock and bull stories of christianity in europe. So church adopted a method called "Camouflage" and made the christianity look like indoeuropean to get all europeans in to christian umbrella. So now my concern is indoeuropeans are either stupid or got bored of their gods to adopt a radically different non indoeuropean God. Anyways its too late to revive indoeuropean religion. It is already lost. If there is truth in indoeuropean religion it will reveal itself.

Oh Yah... I forgot the angels in Judaim, christianity and islam. To start with judaism and its offshoots are polytheistic, just like indoeuropean religions. At some point of time judaism became strictly monothiestic. It may be due to influence of zorastrianism or vice versa. Even though zorastrianism is monothiestic still it put the other gods in their mythology as subordinates to Ahura Mazda. That is common when indoeuropean religions turn monothiestic. The other gods of abrahamic religions became the angels. The angels in christianity and islam are NOT the indoeuropean Gods. They derive from the lesser gods in abrahamic religions when they were polythiestic religions in the past.

All the above points prove that christianity and islam are not indoeuropean by any standard. -Eudextrous

Unsure examples

Hmmm, reading through the article, some names appear to me as uncertain or incorrect:

• Plth2wih2 Mh2ter (Dg'hōm)

Why *Plth2wih2, the only attested cognate appears to be Sanskrit Prthivi. Are there more cognates found, anywhere else, or is there another reason for *Plth2wih2 to be listed. It just seems as another claim of Sanskrit as the truest mother tongue. *Dhghom Mater seems a lot more probable, with many better examples on widespread cognates.

• Astghik

The Astghik article claims that the name is derived from a word for star, cognate to PIE *ster, related to Greek aster, Latin stella, English star, etc. (Apparently not related to Greek Eos and Latin Aurora.)

• Njord

Njord from *Neptonos (PG *Nerthuz) also seems a little far-fetched, partly because Njord doesn't even seem to be a true water god to begin with, but rather a fertility god.

On the other hand, when looking through links to corresponding articles, it seems that a lot of these connections are highly speculative, anyway. Apparently the article could need some heavy fixing. The theories could remain, but they'd probably need some elaboration on why they are doubted. 惑乱 分からん * \)/ (\ (< \) (2 /) /)/ * 00:50, 5 May 2007 (UTC)

"Fantalov's reduction"

Anybody else in favour of deleting this section altogether? A quick google search reveals this "scholar" seems to be primarily an artist of mythological scenes, and imo it's likely the only time he has presented his ideas for peer review were at the event mentioned here. It should either be removed or more sources found. --Krsont 11:06, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

• On balance I am inclined to leave this section in. First, because Fantalov's theory may well be right, or nearly so. Second, he appears to be a very serious artist, working on mythological themes. Who better to perceive commonalities among different mythological themes? Third, he is Russian, and almost all of his publications are in Russian. The fact that his only scholarly writings in English are merely notes for a conference presentation does not mean that they were not backed up with good scholarship. Let's give him the benefit of the doubt for now, and see how his ideas are received. —Aetheling 21:36, 7 October 2007 (UTC)

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

• • I agree. We have to be careful to avoid overstating the notability of this, but there is nothing wrong with mentioning it. The material was removed anonymously. We should consider at least partial restoration. --dab (𒁳) 10:22, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

** Hello, I'm the one that deleted Fantalov's section. I kind of like his artwork, but there is no support for his arguments. Anyway, I am very new here, and don't understand the rules or the code very well (though I have read the tutorial and the history of this page). Nevertheless, I propose rewriting this page. I thought I would discuss it first, though. I'll be signing my posts V.A. for Very Anonymous (for reasons that I am not properly signed on). So let's see if this message is readable, V.A. 00:28, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

you may be right, I may have over-estimated the notability of this. It sounds sensible enough, but it apparently cannot be traced to any sort of notable publication. dab (𒁳) 12:51, 20 December 2007 (UTC)

changing mythology to religion in topic headings

I was looking at the category:Indo-European mythology and I think many of the titles should be changed from myth to religion, ex. Hindu religion instead of Hindu mythology, on that category page and also, further down on this page. It's no one's fault, it's just because this section developed rather haphazardly. I realize this would take a lot of work, and I don't want to start changing things, especially since I would probably code it wrong. Can anyone else help with this, and is this the right place to ask this question? PLaying with diacritics ;-) ŅĄ¶Ẽ V.A. 00:23, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

undo the revision

• • the link that I am removing, along with much other nonsense about St. Gabriel leads to this text:

“Transgression and denying the Lord, and turning away from our God, speaking oppression and revolt, conceiving in and uttering from the heart lying words. And justice turned back, and righteousness stands far away; for truth has stumbled in the street, and uprightness cannot enter. Yes, truth is lacking and he who turns aside from evil makes himself a prey. Now the Lord saw and it was displeasing in His sight that there was no justice. And he saw that there was no man, and was astonished that there was no one to intercede; Then His own Arm brought salvation to Him; and His righteousness upheld Him. And He put on righteousness like a breastplate, and a helmet of salvation on His head; and He put on garments of vengeance for clothing, and wrapped Himself with zeal as a mantle. According to their deeds, so He will repay Wrath to His adversaries recompense to His enemies… And a Redeemer will come to Zion… Arise, shine; for your light has come, and the glory of the Lord has risen upon you. For behold darkness will cover the earth, and deep darkness the peoples; but the Lord will rise upon you and His glory will appear upon you. And the nations will come to your light and kings to the brightness of your rising…And they will call you the city of the Lord, the Zion of the Holy One of Israel. Whereas you have been forsaken and hated with no one passing through, I will make you an everlasting pride, a joy from generation to generation. You will also suck the milk of nations, and will suck the breast of kings; then you will know that I the Lord am your Savior, and your Redeemer, the Mighty One of Jacob. (Emphasis mine) (Isaiah 59:13-18,20; Isaiah 60:1-3, 14b-16)

“The Lord has bared His Holy Arm in the sight of a;l the nations, that all the ends of the earth may see the salvation of our God.” (Isaiah 52:10)

• • we do not lead to have a link to this stuff on a page discussing IE religion.

V.A. 00:52, 25 December 2007 (UTC)

• • Could somebody please get the bigots banned from wikipedia? They won't let us work! Alejandro. 11, February 2008 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 189.156.41.218 (talk) 14:50, 11 February 2008 (UTC)

Overhaul?

This page would benefit from an overhaul. It looks as if there's too much fuzzy etymological and superficial connections to be of any scholarly value. Could someone weed out the credible connections from the extraordinary. For several deities linked here, different etymologies are postulated than the ones mentioned in the article. 惑乱 分からん * \)/ (\ (< \) (2 /) /)/ * (talk) 01:25, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Anyway, I guess the article could mention both etymologically connected gods, with thematically connected (attributes, etc), but then the article should mention the difference, and also source the schoulars subscribing to the theories. 惑乱 分からん * \)/ (\ (< \) (2 /) /)/ * (talk) 17:29, 6 March 2008 (UTC)

I agree. All names solely derived from Sanskrit should be removed as they are late inventions, for example.92.252.127.105 (talk) 18:12, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

I disagree. Among all the extant Indo European mythologies discussed (here and elsewhere), those of the Indian subcontinent (Hindu, Buddhist, Jain, and Sikh) are the only living mythologies still growing and evolving as part of vibrant religious/mythological traditions. Just because these have gone extinct in Europe and elsewhere does not mean that all these have to languish in the same limbo as the extinct myths. From personal experience, I realized well into my adult life that my grand mother made up some "mythological" tales, telling them to my siblings and my cousins at bedtime. Human genius for the magic of myths and myth making does not have to die just because it does so in Europe. Besides, newer tales on a mythological canvas also reflect the societies of their times. This is true today as much as it was thousands of years ago. Chibber (talk) —Preceding undated comment added 00:39, 23 May 2013 (UTC)

massive influx of original research/synthesis

I've tried to deal with some of it, but there's just so much crazy stuff in this article now. Read at your own peril! --86.144.101.168 (talk) 23:00, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

yes, someone has to clean up the anon additions, or purge them. I've tagged it with {{OR}} for now. --dab (𒁳) 08:03, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

The the bits I took a crack at are borderline absurd. -- Fullstop (talk) 00:42, 25 April 2008 (UTC)

What I can see, the article doesn't contain very much original research/synthesis anymore, but citations and citation cleanups are still needed, such as that "(p. 408-9, Oxford Intro.)" is converted to a complete reference with book name, author, edition, year, publisher, page number(s) and if possible/applicable an ISBN. ... said: Rursus (bork²) 13:13, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Saint Paraskeva

The name of Paraskeva is related to the Greco-Latin word Parasceve, which means "day of preparation". It was a term used by Hellenized Jews to refer to, inter alia, the day before the Sabbath, i.e. Friday. The notion that 1st Century Jews took the name of their Sabbath preparation from Saint Paraskeva is fanciful, to say the least. It is more than likely that the reverse is true, especially since Parasceve is mentioned in several places in the Greek and Latin New Testaments. Mention of Paraskeva is out of place in this article; her name clearly has nothing to do with "prixea". Rwflammang (talk) 17:09, 28 April 2008 (UTC)

Saint Nicolaus

The notion that Nicolaus of Myra took his name from the same root as Neptunus, Nechtan, Nethuns, Hnikar, nixies or Neckar is equally fanciful. It is obvious to anyone who knows Greek (and certainly was obvious to the parents that named him) that his name is directly related etymologically to Nike.

Does the editor of this article actually know any Indo-European languages besides English? At any rate, this reference to Nicolaus is off-topic and should be removed from the article. Rwflammang (talk) 15:45, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Elves and Demons

What makes the editor think that elves are related to air-spirits? What makes the editor feel that demons are earth-spirits? I could cite Tolkien's and Lewis's academic work as authority that the reverse is true: elves earthly and demons airy. Rwflammang (talk) 15:51, 29 April 2008 (UTC)

Judaism, Christianity, and Islam

The claim that the PIE religion is the ancestor to Judaism, Christianity, and Islam is highly misleading and should be either removed or highly qualified. These 3 religions all stem from a semitic root. There are undeniable PIE influences, namely in their angelology and demonology which were influenced by Iranian religion, and also, perhaps, in monastic celebacy which has paralells in Hinduism, Buddhism, and Ancient Greek Religion. But these PIE influences are relatively minor compared to the major semitic doctrines and practices. Rwflammang (talk) 20:24, 30 April 2008 (UTC)

It was a very recent addition by an anonymous editor. Paul B (talk) 15:10, 1 May 2008 (UTC)

Some anonymous editor is apparently pushing his view, once again. 惑乱 分からん * \)/ (\ (< \) (2 /) /)/ * (talk) 20:44, 15 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, any help you can render to keep his undiscussed edits off of this page would be appreciated. He is quite persistent, yet unwilling to talk. Rwflammang (talk) 14:22, 17 June 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I know that, and his version seems problematic in many ways. Maybe we should request an IP ban? 惑乱 分からん * \)/ (\ (< \) (2 /) /)/ * (talk) 10:00, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

An IP ban sounds kind of drastic to me. How about "limited protection"? That will prevent edits made by anonymous and "one-off" editors. It might draw our editor out into the public where he can defend his edits or criticize ours. Rwflammang (talk) 17:02, 18 June 2008 (UTC)

Oh, boy, this has got to be the most absurd thing I have seen so far at wikipedia. I had to read the Talk page here out of disbelief at the claim. Rwflammang has it right as far as the extent of Indo-European influence of the Abrahamic religions. I'm going to delete the reference. Kjaer 11:38, 11 October 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kjaer (talk • contribs)

Saint Vlas

This article sure seems to contain more than its share of folk-etymolgies. This is especially ironic given that it purports to report on the work of real linguists. A case in point, the name Vlas in real life comes from the proper name Blasius, a variant of the Roman cognomen Blaesus which comes from the Latin adjective blaesus meaning "having slurred speach". There's not much of a relation to the name of the bull-god that I can see. Rwflammang (talk) 18:58, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Perun and Meno mistakes

The first mention of southern Slavic Perun as a friendly goddess is mistaken. The god and name are cognate with Perkwunos (which is the same in Finnish and Estonian, beyond the IE pale, btw). "Meno" is not a word in Lithuanian and not possible as one, the problem is the -uo ending was probably transcribed historically as a long -o. Menuo (dot over first e) is the equivalent of menulis (dot over first e), only the (masculine in both cases) ending (but not stem or root) differ. Veles (dots over both es) are spirits of the dead. Austaras (wings over first s) was a mistake. I have corrected what seemed needing correction and left information in brackets where I wasn't sure. Hypatea (talk) 16:37, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Perkwunos and Parashurama similarity

Hi guys, I was reading through both these articles and found striking similarities between the story of the cattle theft and the ensuing fight. So I added a line to the proto-indo-european similarities section (check edit history). -- Dandekar (talk) 06:08, 28 July 2008 (UTC)

Needs to include Yezidi myths somehow

The Yezidi have an IE religion, according to Lady E. S. Drower, 'The Peacock Angel', and others. Because their religion seems to contain especially archaic features of whatever common religion can be said to have existed among the IE peoples, it would be good to include some of the material in this article. This article looks a lot better than I would have expected for such a topic. Usually people try to promote their own theories on IE religion but this looks fairly sane. Hypatea (talk) 16:41, 4 June 2008 (UTC)

Add it if you've got the sources.92.252.127.105 (talk) 18:11, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

I am asking you please to leave the Yezidi and some other groups out of the discussion for now. The reason is the very high level of violence in some areas directed at minority groups. Hopefully things will calm down sometime in the future and we can publicly acknowledge them, but at the moment I do not think it is very safe. Please consider carefully. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 71.32.223.31 (talk) 19:49, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

I think the preceeding anonymous and very odd statement should be disregarded. Such warnings does not apply. Wikipedia develop some kind of knowledge base and recommendations to abstain this development is odd and un-Wikipedian in the extreme, especially as the comment was anonymous. ... said: Rursus (bork²) 13:17, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

indeed. If we have a scholarly source connecting Yezidi mythology and PIE mthology, we will mention it; if not, not. --dab (𒁳) 13:45, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

Confer with the Vulgate?

The title God the Father was current in the Aramaic speaking Judeo-Christian communities of Galilee, was translated into Greek, used in the composition of Jude, and thence translated into Latin. Maybe an editor can explain to me how this expression in the Vulgate is useful in reconstructing the name of the PIE sky god. If not, I'd like to remove it. It is at best off-topic and at worst misleading. Rwflammang (talk) 16:14, 5 June 2008 (UTC)

I am not convinced, but you are perfectly correct in removing the comparison unless the comparison is sourced to some quotable source, per WP:NOR. If we can find some Indo-Europeanist who draws the parallel, we can still mention the factoid, but we shouldn't just pull it out of our sleeve. --dab (𒁳) 12:37, 9 July 2008 (UTC)

vandalism by religious bigots

The Proto-Indo-European religion page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proto-Indo-European_religion on Wikipedia is still being vandalized by religious bigots, since June 18, 2008. There's no point in advising Wikipedia of the situation, because wikipedia administrators condone religious bigotry (and by the way, if you are a wikipedia administrator, solve the problem yourself, don't whine to me about it, because you have the authority to fix it and I do not). In the meantime anyone who is interested in the subject can help by copying the current scholarly version 101508 of the page into Wikipedia and you can credit David Bigot Bachmann for this since he's the one who vandalized the Proto-Indo-European religion page.

anon's version moved to User:Hipsit18/sandbox --dab (𒁳) 10:43, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

Laryngeals

Throughout the article, laryngeals are listed inconsistently. It seems that at some point, looking through the article history, someone began adding and/or changing reconstructions to use laryngeals with capital <H> and subscript vowels (e.g. *H_e, *H_a, and *H_o,) instead of subscript numbers (as found in the Laryngeal theory article.) In my experience, the former usage is very non-standard, mainly due to the disagreement about the exact pronunciation of the laryngeals (see the Pronunciation section of the Laryngeal theory article).

I am proposing that we switch to one consistent laryngeal system. I personally would like to go with the original system used in this article, and the one used on the Laryngeal Theory article, with lowercase <h> and subscript numbers, rather than uppercase <H> and subscript vowels. While I understand the latter might be more approachable to someone unfamiliar with laryngeal theory, they are, to me, more standard and more "correct."

Furthermore, there is the complication of figuring out how to match up either system. *H_a and *H_o are obviously supposed to be *h₂ and *h₃, respectively, but *H_e is a bit confusing. Is it supposed to be *h₁? If so, using <e> is probably incorrect, since *h₁ was most likely a glottal stop (IPA: [ʔ]), a bit phonetically distant from <e> (IPA: [e]) (again, see the Pronunciation section ofthe Laryngeal theory article).

Just wanted some opinions before I began changing anything. --Limetom 04:58, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Looks like there's an *H_x too. Now I have no clue what *H_e and *H_x are supposed to be. --Limetom 05:01, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

It's not about the pronunciation of laryngeals, but of the ultimate "colouring" phonetic output they induced in Late PIE (and post-PIE if they remained segmental..). This is not supposed to be linguistics article, but religious! :) Yes this is non-standard, but it's quite popular in books/articles that discuss PIE divinities, flora&fauna, i.e. are not centered on reconstructions themselves but on their semantics and distribution. Casual reader would more likely reognize *H_a as "laryngeal inducing */a/" than *eh₂. *H_x should probably mean as standard H denoting "unknown laryngeal". --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 14:08, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

Again, I understand why it's done, but the scant sources used for the article, especially the one mentioned where the laryngeals are first explained, don't seem to use the system that is in the article. I see no real reason not to use the laryngeals as per the Laryngeal theory article. Being consistent with the other Proto-Indo-European articles is also a plus in my mind. Besides, if someone is unfamiliar with the system, the article can and should link to the Laryngeal theory article; it seems in line with the WP:BUILD guideline. I am going to be bold and go with the "standard" system. In lieu of other situations with this article, I would suggest some discussion here, especially if people disagree with me on this issue. --Limetom 04:37, 20 August 2008 (UTC)

Copyvio from A Grammar of Modern Indo-European By Carlos Quiles

Some of this article is copied from the book above (which is not mentioned in the article). See [1]. Doug Weller (talk) 21:28, 5 September 2008 (UTC)

Wow. Just "some"? It seems to be a pretty big chunk of the article. Obviously, this is a serious problem. I've added the {{copypaste}} template for the time being. I'll get to work on finding as much of the copyvio as I can, but it appears, at this point, to be a big chunk of the article. --Limetom 21:59, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

It appears I acted too soon. Apparently, Quiles' A Grammar of Modern Indo-European is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. See: here.

However, it still needs attribution, and it really shouldn't just be copied and pasted. I also have my doubts about other sections of the article as well. --Limetom 23:26, 6 September 2008 (UTC)

Quiles is the Modern Indo-European guy. Why are we quoting him? His account is an ok "tertiary source" summary, I suppose, but he is quoting his own sources, and we should refer to these directly. --dab (𒁳) 09:23, 12 October 2008 (UTC)

Pluto demonized?

In a massive rewrite which can be found here, an editor re-introduced errors regarding elves, demons, St. Nick, etc. which are discussed above. In addition to these, the editor charactarized Pluto (mythology) as being demonized by Christians as a god of the underworld. Actually, it was the ancient Romans who worshipped Pluto precisely as a god of the underworld, as a sort of kinder, gentler version of Hades. He figures into Christian religion not at all, unless you equate him with Mammon, which is a stretch. I have reverted all of these edits. Rwflammang (talk) 00:09, 10 October 2008 (UTC)

this article is semi-protected because it has a dedicated resident troll replacing it with their private (and, as you note, flawed) version. Sometimes, they create a new account to get around semiprotection, in this instance Hipsit18 (talk · contribs). Just revert back on sight. This particular character likes to post their entire article to talkpages and user talkpages. Should also be reverted on sight. I have moved their version to their user namespace, at User:Hipsit18/sandbox, where such private sketches belong. --dab (𒁳) 10:38, 3 November 2008 (UTC)

P.I.E. and Vedic texts

I will not claiming to be an expert on this subject, despite holding a B.A. in Anthropology. I think if anyone happens to have any more sources they can contribute to this article as a whole it would be very useful, I have some articles from various journals however the one anthropology journal I think would do the best, The Journal of Indo-European Studies, is not one of them.

I am a little concerned about the overall conception of Proto-Indo-Europeans as a cultural group with shared religious practices as well as the hypothetical shared language. I will not disagree over the linguistic concept of a shared language within this group, however it is important to recognize that the entire conception of "Indo-Europeans" is as this hypothetical linguistic grouping, not a single cultural unit.

The only other thing I wanted to bring up was the referencing to Vedic texts as related to the theoretical PIE religion/mythology. Vedic texts cannot be linked Indo-Aryan, and therefore Indo-European peoples. Vedic texts are known to come from an oral tradition, however no one can specifically pin-point when they developed; it is thought to be no earlier than 1,500 BCE. Despite this oral tradition the Vedas were not written down until 100 BCE. This accompanied with the fact that there are no group of peoples or cultures that we can look at in prehistoric South Asia, including the Indus, Painted Greyware Period, etc. The Archaeology as a whole does not support the idea that the Vedas, or even Hinduism is founded from an Indo-Aryan (and therefore Indo-European) invasion, and the inclusion of Vedic literature/references is completely unsubstantiated.

—Preceding unsigned comment added by Nightshrill (talk • contribs) 06:51, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

it appears you want to read up on our Indo-Aryan migration article. The Rigveda (and the Rigveda only, not the later Hindu texts) are one of the main sources on which reconstruction of PIE mythology is based). I would prefer to keep the "Indigenous Aryans" non-issue out of this article as completely off topic. --dab (𒁳) 15:59, 29 November 2008 (UTC)

I have read up on the Indo-Aryan migration article, and it goes through exactly what I was saying, even citing both Kennedy and Shaffer that there is absolutely no archeological evidence to support Indo-Aryan invasion, migration, and specifically pointing out the focus on the Rigveda specifically is irrelevant as it is still subject to the exact time frames I had originally discussed. The simple fact that you claim that the Rigveda is "...one of the main sources on which reconstruction of PIE mythology is based" without even offering a citation to show where that idea comes from (certainly no anthropological study I or any others in my field have heard of) just lends to my conclusion. This article lacks academic sources, a writer who understands the material in any relevant context and is a prime example of why professors tells their undergrads to never use Wikipedia. Nightshrill (talk) 21:25, 3 December 2008 (UTC)

It can all be found in the books in the ==References section==. Just place a {{fact}} tag for the statements you find particularly dubious, and someone will add a cite. You (as an alleged anthropologist) should be familiarised with the term symbolic culture which is inherently non-material and can only be reached by mental efforts such as comparative linguistics/mythology/poetics etc. The only thing that is "hypothetical" about IE is the PIE language itself - it is doubtless that all living and dead IE languages share a common ancestor, a language which in isolation "evolved" for a few thousand years. If you suspect that the ethnolinguistic group speaking it could not and did not exhibit a period of common cultural developments (living obvious traces in e.g. mythology, but also customs, social structure etc.), than you must be very naïve. --Ivan Štambuk (talk) 17:51, 1 February 2009 (UTC)

"there is absolutely no archeological evidence to support Indo-Aryan migration" -- if you are determined to dismiss all evidence as inconclusive. Did you know there is no archaeological proof for human evolution? That is, if you believe God planted all the fossils in order to test your faith.

Some, of course, may consider the appearance of the Gandhara grave culture at precisely the spot and precisely the period predicted by Rigvedic philology rather compelling circumstantial evidence. Oh, and the decline and fall of the IVC, and the appearance of chariots at precisely the period predicted by Rigvedic philology. Philology developed at a time, mind you, when neither the Gandhara grave culture nor the IVC were even discovered, making them independent circumstantial evidence. Of course you can also wave your hands and dismiss archaeology altogether, because archaeological evidence by definition is mute and won't mind. But if you're looking for archaeological evidence it is hard to imagine what more you could want to expect. --dab (𒁳) 09:29, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

you are generally correct dab and of course no one -no serious scholar- doubts a migration into India but the decline and 'fall' of the indus valley civilisation is not necessarily connected to the indoaryans 85.74.216.79 (talk) 10:46, 11 March 2009 (UTC)

well, the causality is open to speculation. Did the Roman empire decline because of the Germanic incursions, or were the Germanic incursions made possible because of the decline of the Roman empire? Declining civilizations and barbarian invasions are two aspects that mutually cause one another. It is difficult to say anything about this in the case of the Roman empire, and it is completely idle speculation in prehistoric instances such as the Kassites or the early Indo-Aryans. --dab (𒁳) 09:01, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

Gods of Horses

The article states, "...possibly Christianized in Albanian as Sts. Flori and Lori..." I seem to recall that in Russian Orthodox Christianity, SS. Florus and Laurus (Флор и Лавра) are the patron saints of horses. The church of that name in Moscow is located in the former Tatar community, which was known for its horse traders and leather tannery. I'll try to find a reference to it somewhere, and in the case of success, will add that note. Amustard (talk) 03:37, 22 May 2009 (UTC)

Sun Deities

This page is semi-protected, so I cannot make the adjustment myself. It is listed under the Sun Deities section that the OE varient name is Sunna. This is incorrect. The proper form would be "Sunne" as the final -e indicates a feminine word. The solar deity in Germanic cultures is always feminine. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.72.61.111 (talk) 13:41, 2 July 2009 (UTC)

Heaven/Sky Creation Myth?

This is more of question; my knowledge of non-hindu traditions is pretty poor so this is more of a question than suggestion. But isn't there a clear similarity between the vedic creation myth of "prthivi and dyaus separated by vayu/indra" and that of Gaea and Ouranos? (On a sidenote; Ouranos and Varuna I believe bear the same roots and are related to the night sky).

Also, the article feels too long. leaflord (talk) 19:41, 17 July 2009 (UTC)

Varuna, Heos, Arun, Ouranos, Dyaeus...

Interesting the method of the authors of using linguistic ie ethimologic correspondences among the God names. It is easy to imagine that while some names have continued to indicate the same divine concept as in the case of Dyaeus, Zeus, Jupiter, sometimes there may have been changes in the nature of the God so named and the original position-function may have been taken by another God-name. Varuna-Ouranos may be a case in point. The Greeks considered Ouranos the father of the universe using the same ethimos of Varuna which in their language had come to mean Heaven. On the other hand Varuna is the God of the Sky at dawn and this a different ethimos for the same concept as Eos. These are shifts in meaning by the structure remains (almost) the same. Esiod's "Theogony" gives a detailed account of the 'history' of the changes in the Greek pantheon through the succession Ouranos, Kronos, Zeus.Zanzan1 (talk) 12:42, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

image captions

Some of the captions seem inaccurate. [2] Zeus is not the chief god of the Indo-European pantheon, Dyeus is. — goethean ॐ 15:41, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

I do not think that this article can usefully include images, except perhaps if we find an artist's impression of PIE deities specifically. --dab (𒁳) 17:02, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Featured article criteria conveys that suitable images with appropriate licenses should be included if available. About the image captions, I have used the text in the article as image caption. --Redtigerxyz ^Talk 17:13, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

what do these "criteria" have to do with anything? The question is, do we have any images that are pertinent to the article. If we do not, I see no point in cluttring it with unrelated or tenuously related imagery. If we can get a free image of the Kernosivka idol or something similar, I'll be all for including it. --dab (𒁳) 19:31, 11 October 2009 (UTC)

revulsion

I guess this must go here, since I cannot edit to add a new category. In the section Bulls, there is this line: "Among some of the less revolting distributions is this one" that is biased. Specifically the part about how the Irish Celtic myth of the Bull of Cualnge is "revolting." I'm going to edit that line because of this bias to just "an example of one of the distributions." Munin and hugin (talk) 06:09, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

yes, well spotted, that wasn't in appropriate tone. --dab (𒁳) 11:06, 11 December 2009 (UTC)

Arabian mythology

Isn't Mesopotamian and Arabian mythology related somehow with Proto-Indo-Eurpean religion? I'm just asking, I don't know the answer. --Axel Kockum (talk) 20:22, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Not very closely or directly, no (leaving aside a few very general and vague resemblances, such as the presence of a Sky-Father god). However, ancient Persian culture seems to have been influenced to some degree by both Indo-European and Mesopotamian traditions... AnonMoos (talk) 21:36, 21 January 2010 (UTC)

Sources regarding the IELG from the 19th and early 20th century

Should be looked at with great concern. Scientific racism and false out-of-Central Asia/out of India theories abound.

And this wiki has a lot of references from the late 1800's.

WP:Fringe.

Forged texts, synthesized translations.

Outright lies.

Be on the alert. NJMauthor (talk) 05:37, 26 February 2010 (UTC)

Edit request from 98.233.48.62, 8 May 2010

{{editsemiprotected}} Please add the following to the list of battles ending with the slaying of a serpent in the "===Dragon or Serpent===" section:

• Beowulf vs. an unnamed Dragon in Old English literature;

98.233.48.62 (talk) 18:40, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

Please supply a reference to a reliable source, and reinstate the request, thanks.  Chzz  ►  23:15, 8 May 2010 (UTC)

The analyses I've seen usually take the Beowulf v. the dragon story as based on the older Germanic Siegfried v. the dragon story. So Siegfried is taken as the original Germanic dragon-slayer. Ekwos (talk) 06:58, 16 June 2010 (UTC)

Pluto

Is *Plth2wih2 anything to do with Pluto? 93.96.236.8 (talk) 21:28, 30 August 2010 (UTC)

PIE polytheism?

I am sorry,but the whole chapter about PIE deities is a rubbish. According to a therory which alone satisfying me, Proto-Indo-European were not polytheists, simply because - in opposition to popular belief - polytheism is not common, it forms only in a high level of civilization. A neolythic culture could create only polydoxy, more primitive form of cult without concept of gods, or - at best - with one sky god, anthropomorphic sky, who was Dyēus/Deiwos (these are two forms of the same root).What's more, the polydoxy was still atested in some primitive IE peoples,like Germans in the times of Julius Caesar, Thracians or Celtiberians. The similarities between other gods' names are effect of the origin from the same roots (like *Perkwunas, "thunder" - some peoples devinized thunder aspect of the sky god). Of course, I do not want to delete that chapter, but in the name of neutrality the other theory must be mentioned too. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 83.19.91.30 (talk) 13:18, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

That's really not what it says at Polytheism... AnonMoos (talk) 00:09, 10 February 2011 (UTC)

I wonder why this article attracts so many crazies? --86.147.179.152 (talk) 18:24, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Seriously. :bloodofox: (talk) 18:44, 12 June 2011 (UTC)

Westergaard

Westergaard in the article links to a family name disambig where the one in question wasn't listed. I added a redlink to the disambig. He does deserve an article. Cf. da:Niels Ludvig Westergaard, de:Niels Ludwig Westergaard (with divergent spelling and date of death). --88.74.193.158 (talk) 04:10, 27 February 2011 (UTC)

Freyr/Freyja not related to *PriHeh2; Frigg, however, is

The association of Scandinavian deity names Freyr and Freyja with with a PIE *PriHeh2 is linguistically unsustainable. These names are from PGmc *fraw(j)ōn (m) and *frawjōn (f) respectively; the latter just a feminine form of the former. These names/terms (with the senses "lord" and "lady") are related to PIE *pro- "forward; first" (> PGmc *fra-); the Gmc form suggests a PIE *prou̯io-, though there is no particular reason to believe in such a term in the PIE period as opposed to the Gmc form(s) being a later creation. None of this has anything to do with PIE *PriHeh2 -- although, in contrast, ON Frigg (< *PGmc *Frijjō) is from PIE *PriHeh2. See, for example, Orel, Vladimir,A Handbook of Germanic Etymology. (Leiden: Brill, 2003), pp. 112, 114; Mallory, J. P., and D. Q. Adams, The Oxford Introduction to Proto-Indo-European and the Proto-Indo-European World. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2006), p. 208; Mallory, J. P., and D. Q. Adams, Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture. (London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 1997), pp. 214, 339.Carlsefni (talk) 22:11, 28 June 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dougweller (talk • contribs)

I believe this is covered satisfactorily at the Fraujaz and Frijjo articles. Or at least it would be, if efforts to clarify this point were not constantly torn down by people for some inscrutable reason of ideology or personal belief. [3] --dab (𒁳) 15:03, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Now that's a rather weasel-y way to characterize consensus against your bungled edits there, Dab; demonize them as having an "ideology" or "personal belief" rather than you simply being repeatedly caught red handed without knowing your scholarship in the area. Redirecting against consensus also wasn't wise. :bloodofox: (talk) 16:57, 23 February 2012 (UTC)

Why was chronological information about Chariots removed?

Chariots were a significant part of some secondary Indo-European expansions, and came to have symbolic importance in some Indo-European speaking societies, but they were invented too late to exist during the "period of Indo-European unity" or the first expansions (when the only wheeled or horse-drawn vehicles that existed were simple basic wooden carts or wagons with wheels made of three planks fastened side-by-side). AnonMoos (talk) 10:16, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Beowulf?

Why is he listed under the "Dragon or Serpent" portion of mythology? He was not an Indo-European god and was never presented as anything but a man, a member of a historically documented Germanic tribe. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 97.127.154.20 (talk) 16:59, 17 February 2012 (UTC)

You must have missed this:

The_Dragon_(Beowulf)

HeinrichMueller (talk) 15:54, 8 October 2016 (UTC)

Manu and Yemu

Has any research been done to try to connect this to the coexistence of humans and Neanderthals? PIE may have been old enough to retain artifacts of their existence. They did share something of a proximity to each other, and doubtlessly the ancestors of the PIE peoples had interacted with the Neanderthals. This must have left traces in legend for quite some time. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 136.223.177.1 (talk) 15:20, 26 March 2012 (UTC)

We can't really trace Indo-European back further than southern Russia of about 5,500 or 6,000 years ago, while current best evidence is that the last Neanderthals lived around Gibraltar or Portugal about 25,000 years ago, so it would appear to be quite a stretch. People can sometimes retain purely oral folk-memories of things that happened thousands of years ago, but such memories tend to be heavily-genericized and assimilated to common motifs or archetypes. Considering that Germanic folk-memory transformed Attila the Hun from an oppressive and sinister foreign conqueror to a noble king (Atli/Etzel) in less than a thousand years, I doubt that there's much possibility for accurate or specific folk-memories of Neanderthals over more than 20,000 years... AnonMoos (talk) 07:26, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Sanskrit/Indic

They are late derivatives, why are they mentioned in the etymologies? No European language is derived from Sanskrit. It is more of a long-lost descendant of a relative than part of the actual core family. Tocharian should be at its place.92.252.127.105 (talk) 18:05, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Not too sure what you mean by that -- Sanskrit is not a direct ancestor of any non-Indic language, but the Rig-Veda is often considered to reflect the situation of ca. 1500 B.C., long before most other Indo-European branches are textually attested. Tocharian is interesting in its own way, but I'm not sure that it has any great light to shed on Proto-Indo-European religion, considering that Tocharian speakers were heavily influenced by Manichaeism and Buddhism by the time that attested Tocharian-language texts were written... AnonMoos (talk) 07:08, 25 April 2012 (UTC)

Irminsul

Irminsul (Irmin, god of the Irminones & German Säule = Pillar) is German/Saxon but it's declared as Norse alongside Yggdrasil.92.252.127.105 (talk) 18:28, 24 April 2012 (UTC)

Irmin is not only the God of a Tribe, but is more than a transcendantal God, wich is related to the old germanic Tiwaz. Irmin is actually the name for the highest One. It can be found in the 'Hildebrandlied' where Hiltibrand (Hildebrand) prays to Irmingot wich mean 'highest God' and wich is related to the later 'Allvater'. Irmin can also been found in the norse equivalent of Jörmun who is a Name given to Odin, to show that behind Odin is the transcendental Tiwaz. Irmin derives from proto-germanic 'Ermunaz'. The Irminsul is the Pillar of Irmin. Such Pillars who were dedicated to a transcendental high beeing can also be found in vedic culture. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 87.240.253.58 (talk) 19:03, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

Horse sacrifice PIE ritual

I am shocked to see that there is no mention about Horse sacrifice in PIE ritual section--Rahulkris999 (talk) 12:14, 5 May 2012 (UTC)

Dažbog is a mistake! It should be "diabeł"

Slavic languages are intercomprehensive so I dont know which "slavic" language did author mean, so: "Dažbog" is made of two words: Daż (give) and Bóg (god)... so it means God of Prosperity... while "diabeł" [polish lang.] - meaning "devil" is the same word as "deva", "zeus", "deus", "daeva" — Preceding unsigned comment added by 31.174.34.136 (talk) 23:03, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

I suspect "diabeł" is ultimately from Greek... AnonMoos (talk) 00:55, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

Alevi!!!???

What does a link to Alevi has to do with a wikiarticle about PIE religion?

Please remove that link — Preceding unsigned comment added by 41.224.237.227 (talk) 07:48, 9 July 2012 (UTC)

Correspondence between Greek and PIE Deities

The name for "god" in Greek is "theos" or "thea" resp., also derived from PIE *deiwos. It is possible that the PIE "Goddess of Plenty", as described in this article, has a Greek equivalent in Ploutos, the god of plenty, son of Demeter, the goddess of agriculture (i. e. fields = wide, flat lands; and harvest = plenty, riches). 91.119.77.17 (talk) 11:26, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

Actually, theos is NOT commonly etymologically connected with deiwos / dyews. AnonMoos (talk) 14:47, 2 August 2012 (UTC)

Citation for Celtic world-tree as hazel tree?

Seriously, what's the deal? Citation? It's not unlikely there was a world-tree among Celtic-speaking peoples. I think there is an Irish text-- it may be the Dindshenchas-- mentioning a giant/supernatural being bringing a tree from the Otherworld for some special purpose? But as far as I know, this is the closest we get, outside of the obvious use of trees in centering communities/households or what have you. — Preceding unsigned comment added by GlennBecksiPod (talk • contribs) 08:40, 23 December 2012 (UTC)

Scandinavian mythology vs germanic mythology

I think where it says "Thor vs. Jörmungandr, Sigurd vs. Fafnir in Scandinavian mythology;" would be more precise if it said Germanic mythology instead. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.203.58.99 (talk) 19:19, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

I agree. Far too often, Germanic Mythology is often called "Nordic" or "Viking" or "Scandinavian". Excluding the majority of Germanics! This is almost racist. There are a FEW differences between Scandinavian and Continental Germanic Mythology, but they are largely the same.

If the question is origin, that is also disputed. Vikings were among the last that were still faithful to the Germanic Gods, but that does not mean they are more valid. Saying that Germanic Paganism comes from Scandinavia is inaccurate. We know that no one originated in Scandinavia. They started on the Continent. And we also know that Germanic Mythology has origins from thousands of years ago, as the article is pointing out.

I agree "Nordic", "Scandinavian", and "Viking", should usually read "Germanic".HeinrichMueller (talk) 16:02, 8 October 2016 (UTC)

Connection between PIE Primal Cow Creation Myth and the Alphabet

Hi Everyone,

I was just reading about a possible "Primal Cow" PIE creation myth at piereligion.org (nice work there), and I then remembered what I read at the wikipedia page about the greek letter Alpha:

Now, I know that semitic mythology might have nothing to do with the PIE one at all, but a striking similarity rung to me here, i.e, between a PIE bovine (or else)1, whose body provides for the creation of the world, and the "first" letter of the alphabet, which means "ox", and is, or was, considered a basis of human survival (and I think this last one is reasonable to all).

1- Might as well be unrelated, but hebrew alef is also connected to rulership (aluf, master), and this reminded me of Norse giant Ymir who is slain (or dethroned of its former rulership) by Odin and brothers.

Nemoswlewa (talk) 01:29, 21 January 2013 (UTC)User:Nemoswlewa (I´m a new user, page still empty)

References

The first alphabet in the world (a consonantal alphabet) was created as a result of interactions between Egyptians and Semitic-speakers sometime in the first half of the second millennium B.C. (i.e. 2000-1500 B.C.). And Sinai or lower Egypt in the first half of the second millennium B.C. is far apart in both time and space from proto-Indo-European origins or early Indo-European migrations (it was hundreds of miles from any significant concentration of Indo-European speakers at all, in fact)... AnonMoos (talk) 19:14, 20 May 2013 (UTC)

Njord and Ty?

Hi,

surprised to see Ty (Tyr, Ti, Ziu etc.) not included in the "Zeus" group; this is often seen elsewhere, so I assumed this was kind of an established thing - but perhaps not? Less surprised not to see Nerthus/Njord alongside "Neptun" etc., since there seems to be a lot of confusion both about the name, the function, the gender ... and perhaps "negative information" ("No, Njord doesn't belong here") isn't encyclopedic, but perhaps a small, unobtrusive "not to be confused with..." would help the confused?

T 85.166.163.126 (talk) 00:56, 9 May 2015 (UTC)

Tyr/Tiw is I believe not from dyeus but deiwos, the word for a god in general- in fact in Old Norse there are some attestations of "tyr" being used in such a way. As for Njorðr, surely his name is cognate with Greek Nereus, an older sea god. However regarding neptonos in Germanic, it's interesting that Nanna (the wife of Baldr) is called Nepsdottir in Gylfaginning, and that a Nepr is listed among the sons of Odin. Apart from possible issues with the lack of a p>f shift (although there are exceptions to this elsewhere), this seems the clearest evidence of a Germanic Neptune-cognate? Walshie79 (talk) 16:32, 6 March 2016 (UTC)