Radegast- Slavic GodDeity"God of Hospitality"

The Dear Guest

Radegast's name combines two Slavic roots: "rad" (dear, glad) and "gost" (guest). He was the god you prayed to before opening your door to a stranger, and the god you prayed to before riding out to meet an army. The Obotrites and Lutici, West Slavic tribes who held the lands of modern northeastern Germany, kept his worship until German conquest and forced Christianization destroyed it.

The Temple at Rethra

At Rethra, the sacred city of the Lutici confederation, Radegast's temple stood in a forest surrounded by lakes. Thietmar of Merseburg described it around 1018: a wooden structure with walls carved in the images of gods and goddesses. Inside stood the gold-clad statue of Radegast, armed for war, with an eagle on his helmet and a bull's head on his chest. Adam of Bremen, writing around 1075, confirmed Rethra as one of the great pagan sanctuaries of the Slavic lands.

The temple kept a sacred horse for divination. Before a military campaign, priests led the horse over crossed spears laid on the ground. If it stepped cleanly, the omens favored war. If it stumbled, they stayed home.

Thietmar calls the chief idol at Rethra "Svarozhich," the son of Svarog, while later sources use "Radegast." The name may have belonged to the city itself. German chroniclers recording what they saw at a distance, in a language they did not speak, may have confused the name of the place with the name of the god. Both names survived.