The legendary bard Boyan, whose fingers on the living strings set armies in motion and whose thoughts ran as a grey wolf across the land, descended from Veles — the god of the underworld bestowed his grandson the gift of prophetic song.
⚠ The Slovo calls Boyan 'Veles's grandson' (Велесовъ внуче), which scholars debate as either a literal mythological lineage or a poetic honorific connecting the bard's inspiration to the god of magic and wisdom. The intermediate generation between Veles and Boyan is unattested.
In the Tale of Igor's Campaign, the legendary bard Boyan spreads his thought across a great tree like a nightingale, his prophetic song traversing the World Tree to reach from the mortal realm to the heavens.
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