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Boars in Slavic tradition

Today we are giving an answer for the previous post’s question, as well as we will reveal a title of our first story about a life of Slavic tribes in the Early Medieval times… Guessed already? 😉 Indeed it is a BOAR! Introducing a concept art of one of the leading characters in the story…

According to archeology, the worshiping traditions of the Boar (Wieprz) by the Slavs are ancient. In 1908, 1975 and 1984 ancient oak trees with boar jaws affixed in them, were elevated from the bottom of Dnieper and Desna rivers. These sacred oak trees are dated from VIII to X century – covering a long period of history when sacrifices were made to the Slavic gods near these trees (an oak – is the tree of Slavic god Perun).

Well, this is about forest boars, but there were marine as well …In the very first years of XI century, Thietmar of Merseburg in his “The Chronicon” talks about a legend of the Slavic tribe Ratari, whose principal city of Rethra (Ridegost) was located on the Baltic Sea: “An old legend, enmeshed in various superstitions, testifies that when they are in a grave danger, a huge boar with white glistening fangs comes out of the sea… to reveal itself to many.”

Thus, the boar was specially honored by our Slavic ancestors.

Boar

Creating backgrounds

Background and character illustrations are underway. This is work in progress on the forest from our first story. Can you guess what animals live here in abundance? 😉

Forest

Leshy – the Forest Master

Introducing another character from our story. Various Slavic people have called him differently – leszy, lisovik, leshy, borowy, polisun – but all those names reflect his habitat, as he is the Forest Master, protector of forest animals and birds. Leshy is able to turn himself into any person, beast and bird. He may help people, but also may punish those who violate his forest rules …

Leshy

Main character sketches…

The main character is a young hunter (we keep his name a secret for now) from a settlement in the “Boar” (Wieprz) river valley in the territory of the modern Poland. This is where our first story begins…

Slavic hunter

Comics creation started

We started creating the first episode in a series of stories about life, culture and beliefs of Slavic people in Early Medieval times. You can see some concept art on the photo.

Comics concept